For many people, the day after Thanksgiving marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season. For others, it’s “Buy Nothing Day,” which protests the consumerism of the season. In 2008, Black Friday was also designated the “National Day of Listening.” This is an unofficial holiday that encourages families to set aside time together to listen to each other’s stories. This year, when the family is together, take some time to talk to the older generations about their heritage. Here are some tips to have some great conversations with your family.

Plan Your Questions

StoryCorps started this project in 2008 as a way to gather oral histories. They have some great questions to get the conversation going:

• What is your earliest memory?
• What are you most proud of?
• When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
• How do you feel now about what you became?
• What does your future hold?

Notice that these questions are open-ended. When you’re interviewing someone, don’t ask questions that can be answered by yes or no. Get the person talking. If the memories aren’t coming, ask questions that deal with one of the senses. For example, “What smells do you remember from childhood?” or “Tell me about your first pet.” A good follow-up question is “How did that make you feel?”

Listen to Your Family’s Stories

A good conversation has give and take, so you may find yourself sharing your own stories with your family. Don’t get so involved in your own stories that you forget to be a good listener, however. Avoid interrupting. When you do interject, use why, what and how questions to get more information. Have your family turn off their devices to listen to the speaker without distractions. Even if you’ve heard the story before, don’t prejudge the message.

Record the Conversation

Get permission to record your conversation. Use some warm-up questions to set the context. Identify yourself and the interviewee, then talk about how you are connected to each other. There are plenty of tools that can help you record your conversation. It can be a good idea to practice before you start recording your family’s stories. StoryCorps recommends setting a time limit of 40 minutes for your conversation. Focus on the memories you want to preserve, maybe a certain event in the person’s life or about your relationship.

Save Your Stories

Once you’ve made a commitment to recording your family’s stories, make sure you store them in a way that is accessible to your family. Email the recording to others in your family, create a cloud storage that is open to everyone in the family, or use social media. Don’t keep these recordings to yourself and only on your phone.

Create Memories While You’re With Family

Don’t let Black Friday be the only day you have these conversations with your family. When you get together with your loved ones, ask questions that help you make memories and tell the history of your family. The history of your family can easily fade away as people get older and they lose their own memories.  

While it might feel morbid to think about, it’s these conversations that make it possible to hold a celebration of life when your loved ones do pass. No one likes to think they are mortal, but the reality is that no one is promised tomorrow. It can be difficult to think and to talk about funerals and death. Getting your family to open up about the past and the future can be a way in to discuss how they want to be remembered.