Creating Authentic Welcome by Exploring Gratitude This Thanksgiving!

12 years ago I wrote a book called Giving Thanks! A Dialogue on Gratitude. It was part of my “Celebrate” series of Intentional Social Interactions (“IZI”) how-tos, each one focused on a different cultural holiday and designed to bridge a specific cross-difference divide. Each features a feast appropriate from vegan to carnivore, how to go about identifying your guests for that cross cultural feast and questions that make no assumptions that help create a safe(r) space to have conversations with people with whom you differ.

Resolute! is an Asian New Year hot pot feast that is a conversation between procrastinators and the “get it done” towers.

EarthSeder is a cross-faith dialogue centered around a traditional passover and the exploration if your faith or personal ethics requires that you “repair the earth.”

Independence is a cross-generational dialogue to celebrate Juneteenth / the Fourth of July. But by far, Giving Thanks, A dialogue on gratitude is the feast that most people ask me to help them with the most.

Giving Thank’s purpose is how to get through Thanksgiving with your liberal and conservative family members. Normally, we have between 30 and 80 people over for Thanksgiving Dinner. I cook two 24 pound turkeys (have you ever counter cooked a turkey?) a 15 to 20 pound bone in ham. In the past couple of years I’ve added two 15 pound goose. Some of my dishes have an actual fan base. Many years I’ve had to make 8 pear pies in addition to my deconstructed pie bar. The shiitake gravy is a dark, silky, velvety umami flavor bomb. We’ve welcomed corporate CEOs and teens who live in cars. A key touchpoint of IZI is our question cards where we make no assumptions. At the end of this article I’ve included the questions we are currently asking during Giving Thanks. Feel free to use them.

Radical hospitality requires that we authentically welcome a diverse cross-section of our community to our table. What does it mean to welcome someone authentically? Authentic welcome means always putting the guest first. Understanding that people feel a little unsettled in new circumstances especially when they are bridging cultures in any way. People are worried about getting what they need to eat. That’s why the meal is ALWAYS appropriate from vegan to carnivore, including wheat, dairy and soy intolerances. We design the feast and the experience to be a unique blend of the comforting (the smell of garlic and onions, comfortable homey or community friendly setting) with the new (cross-cultural conversation, youth, lots of diversity in food types and preparation). It is this combination that allows people to just relax and be themselves.

Regardless of how much you want to make everyone feel comfortable by having nametags, resist this feeling. Really, step away from the nametag. Your brain registers information before you can rationally let it know what is happening. So even if you feel you just want to provide an easy way for guests who need help remembering a name, it still signals very loudly that your guests are not a member of the same tribe/family or they wouldn’t need nametags. Your brain registers the word “stranger” before you can tell it “friend.” Trust us on this one! There are many other reasons we don’t use name tags, but that’s another story for another day.

We have other ways of helping people remember names. The easiest is to put out some small blank pieces of paper and a few pen/pencils so that visual learners/thinkers can spell out any name they are having trouble with.

Make your feast even more enlivening and enlightening by encouraging your guests not to stay in one place throughout the meal. That’s why we set up this feast as multiple food stations so that eventually diners have to get up and move around to get more food. Recommend to your guests that they find someone new to speak with, maybe someone they don’t know as well. Avoid a “kids” table. This is a great opportunity for all generations to have a meaningful conversation about thankfulness/gratitude. It is very eye-opening to hear the differences in the types of things for which a five year old perceives they should be thankful and those of an 80-year old. Question cards should be scattered on the tables, at food stations (okay, they are just card tables set up in the living room, dining room, sun porch, and if you have a beverage area (our front entrance) designated scatter a few there as well. We only have one decent bathroom. Our house is only 1,800 square feet. We don’t live in a mansion. But we make up for that with our enthusiastic welcome to everyone who rings our bell on Thanksgiving day.

Some ideas about whom to include:

Someone who has recently lost a job or is in poverty;

Someone across culture, ethnicity or some other means of self-identification; Someone whom you would like to get to know better but for whatever reason always felt nervous about inviting;

Someone in your church, school or job who might feel cut-off or outside a social network.

Don’t just think of the poor, although ensure that you do include some people in need of a great meal and belonging. Every year we end up with CEOs, civic leaders and other “beautiful people” at our table just because they are assumed to be too popular and fabulous to accept such an ordinary invite.

This year if you insist on bringing together your liberal and conservative family members it might help to have some conversation guidelines.

Conversation Guidelines

We will assume good faith and intent in one another

We are looking to the future, not the past

We won’t rush to fill the silence

We are all on the same side

We do not cross-talk or speak over one another

Each of our voices and viewpoints is unique and valued in this conversation

Actively listening is as important as sharing

This is a space created for us to understand each other and understand ourselves and to practice the words, actions and behaviors of trust, collaboration, transparency and accountability

We speak authentically from our own personal perspective, experience & heart

We don’t speak for others or put words or intentions in each other’s mouths

We do constructively paraphrase each other to clarify intent and meaning

We have not already made up our minds that nothing will work to change the culture

We believe that we can lead more effectively to deliver the results we want to achieve

We ARE open to growth and change

We’ll only use electronic devices to further our connection, the conversation or to help overcome anxiety for those who need to pull back emotionally during such intensive exploration

When appropriate or in small group conversations, we will intentionally seek out those with whom we do not have the strongest relationship in order to practice collaboration, transparency and trust

All are equal in this conversation

What is shared about individuals in the room remains within the conversation circle and is not to be used as ammunition or fodder for stories outside the room

If we wish to share something personal we heard from someone we met, we will first ask permission to share their story, or even ask them to come and share their story in their own words instead of speaking for them.

You copy and paste the above and liberally sprinkle the sheets around the room. You might be surprised how far it goes when someone at Thanksgiving isn’t talking about what “those people believe.” You can talk about the impacts of words, actions and behaviors upon you.

Question cards are one of the essential building blocks of Intentional Social Interaction.

Giving Thanks Question Cards

Do you have a favorite ritual, tradition or holiday?

Is there one thing for which you are most thankful this year?

How do you demonstrate gratitude or show thanks?

Do you have a way you demonstrate gratitude/Show thanks? What is it?

Have you had a time when you unexpectedly felt thankful or grateful?

Do you have a favorite thanksgiving dish? What?

Is this your first “Thanksgiving” celebration?

Have you had a time when you unexpectedly felt thankful or grateful?

If someone is grateful for something you’ve done, how would you like them to demonstrate their thanks?

If someone is grateful for something you’ve done, how would you like them to demonstrate their gratitude?

Do you have a way to let someone know that you are grateful they are in your life? If so, how?

Do you have a way to describe what it means to be thankful?

Are there any things in life that you think you should be able to take for granted? What things?

If you celebrate Thanksgiving, do you have a favorite sweet or savory dish? What is it?

Have you had an experience that caused you to unexpectedly feel gratitude?

Does your culture of origin teach that you should be grateful for everything you have?

Does your culture of origin have any traditions around giving thanks? If so, can you describe them? Do they mean anything to you?

Are there any things for which you feel you don’t “have to be” thankful because you feel you automatically “deserve” them? What are those things?

Are there any things for which you feel you don’t “have to be” thankful because you feel you earned them? What are those things?

Are there any things in life that you think you should be able to take for granted? What things?

If you lost all of your material possessions through no fault of your own, would you expect anyone to help you get back on your feet? Who? What would be the nature of help you would either seek or be willing to accept?

Would you be willing to support a political leader who imposed policies and spoke in a way that made 20% or more of your community feel unwelcome or as though they did not belong because of the inferiority of their genes?

Would you be willing to support a political leader who imposed policies and spoke in a way that denied you equal access or equal rights with the rest of your community?

How would YOU feel to have your friends or family support a political leader who intentionally imposed laws and public policies that denied you equal protection under the law?

Do you feel as though you should be able to impose your religious values on those who do not believe as you believe?

How would you feel if someone attempted to force you to adopt their religious values?

If you lived in a place plagued by violence, of which you were only a victim and over which you had no control or power, is there anything you would be willing to do to save your life or the life of your loved ones?

If you had to flee from your community due to war, famine, religious or ethnic persecution, natural disaster or coercive violence, where would you flee? How would you want to be received/treated by those to whom you fled?

Circle share-in: Do you have something for which you most thankful this year?

The important thing is this: each person gets a little time — anywhere from a few seconds to a minute or two — to say one thing that’s meaningful to them and their observance of the holiday. We have a rule of thumb: if you have less than 30 people you basically allow circle share-in comments to be unlimited. From 30–60 people we ask for only one to two sentences and if more than 60 people we ask that they only say two words on the question.

Are you one of those people for whom it feels awkward to ask your guests to share openly with the whole crowd? Our advice: don’t worry — just give it a try, you’ll see that people love it.

What makes this year different than all other years?

This year for the first time in more than 40 years I will not be hosting Thanksgiving. It’s the year anniversary of my father’s death. A dear friend died two weeks ago. I struggle with the way that people treat me. The assumptions they make.

It’s also an incredible amount of work that too many take for granted. I’m engaging in some much needed self-care. This year there will only be four of us. I’m not sure if I’ve ever been to a thanksgiving for only four before. But I am grateful for my sons and my husband. That they just want me to have an easy Thanksgiving.