As the new year begins, consider these tips for enhancing your family reunion planning:

1. Review your reunion strategies and the overall family dynamics to identify areas of improvement for this year.

2. Encourage planning team members to become more organized and explore opportunities that can make your reunion financially sustainable.

3. Inspire each planning team member to connect with a younger family member, mentoring them to take an active role in the planning process.

4. Motivate younger family members to leverage their skills to help the reunion planning team operate and communicate more effectively.

5. Unite all family members to collaborate on improving both physical and financial well-being, starting with healthier eating habits, regular exercise, annual doctor appointments, and strategies for saving and achieving financial security.

The most cherished aspect of any family reunion is our family members. While some are eager to participate, others may need a little encouragement to contribute their talents and assist with planning and/or attending. This year let’s commit to nurturing ourselves, each other, and the legacy of our reunions. Let’s stay connected, communicate often, and uplift one another. Let’s encourage Involvement and keep each other engaged—especially those aged 20 to 40, as they will eventually be responsible for ensuring our reunions continue and thrive. And let’s remember that preparation is key. The more prepared we are as a family, the smoother and easier it will be for our traditions to carry on.

Hope is not blind optimism. It's not ignoring the enormity of the task ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path. It's not sitting on the sidelines or shirking from a fight. Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it, and to work for it, and to fight for it. Hope is the belief that destiny will not be written for us, but by us, by the men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is, who have the courage to remake the world as it should be. 

                                              - President Barack Obama