It was another one of those days.
“I was coming home from my office, and I was driving into the neighborhood, and I recognized the sense of dread that came over me,” Jordan Langdon told The Epoch Times, thinking back on an evening in 2019 that would forever change her life as a mother and wife.
“So I go inside, and I’m pushing past shoes and backpacks and coats and all this stuff, and the anxiety and agitation are rising up in me. There’s still dishes in the sink from breakfast, and I’m nagging at the kids and barking orders, like, ‘Why haven’t you started your homework? Why haven’t you done this, this, and this?’”
After dinner, she was closing doors harder than she normally would, because she was frustrated. Langdon took her youngest child, Ani, upstairs for a bath.
“I’m washing her hair, just trying to get this thing done, and she closed her eyes, and said, ‘Mom, I don’t think Dad wants to live here anymore,‘“ Langdon said. ”’I don’t think he wants to move, but I don’t think he wants to live here.’ My mouth just dropped to the ground, and I’m thinking, as a therapist, how does a 4-year-old come up with this unless she has really, truly experienced it and witnessed a distance between us that I wasn’t even aware of?
“Then she popped her eyes open and said, ‘Can I have a snack?’”
After putting Ani to bed, Langdon told her husband what had happened.
“And he said, ‘That’s interesting,'“ Langdon told The Epoch Times. ”And then he put his hand on his chin, looking up at the ceiling, and I could tell he was choosing his words carefully. And he said, ‘I’m not thinking about moving, but you’re really not fun to live with.’
The Family Huddle Begins
Having earned a master’s degree in social work from the University of Texas, Langdon worked in a variety of places as a counselor, from a prison to psychiatric hospitals. With a growing family, she decided in 2012 to work part-time and opened a private counseling service for families.The bathtub wisdom so innocently expressed by her daughter sent Langdon into a deep dive into her own family’s dynamics.
“We bumbled through this for months and months,” she said. “Then we landed on the fact that I was stressed and overwhelmed because I was doing everything for everyone. I was a team of one, and I needed my husband to be the leader that I knew he desired to be and that God desired him to be, which meant a lot of surrender on my part. And then, we started doing these weekly family huddles.”
Held on Sundays, these family meetings initially involved writing out the week’s calendar. At first, the children were bored, but as the huddles continued, “they started feeling like a valued member of the team,” according to Langdon.
“All this great joy and unity started happening because we would show up at the same time every Sunday, my husband would lead, which they weren’t used to, and this was awesome,” she said.
As these huddles became routine, the family began working on developing good habits. However, rather than discuss and analyze different virtues, they “got more granular, like starting to make beds first thing in the morning,” Langdon said. Every week they selected and practiced a particular activity they hoped to make a good habit, and then talked over their progress the next Sunday. Mom and Dad would praise those who had tried hard to reach that week’s goal, and “the other kids wanted the positive praise; they wanted to rise to that level.”
Soon, the Langdons decided to come up with a family mission statement. According to Langdon, it expresses who they want to be, what their values are, and what their long-term vision is. The statement has seven sections.
Another Door Opens
In 2022, Langdon’s life took yet another turn.“I thought God was calling me to get another master’s degree, and specifically in theology, a good, holy degree to pursue,“ she said. ”I went to school at the Augustine Institute ... in Denver, and they asked me to do an internship. That wasn’t part of my plan, another thing to do, so I thought I’d outsmart the system and find an internship right there in the same building.”
Although he had never taken on an intern, Markel offered Langdon that position. From her hours spent in the office listening to him counsel parents, she developed a deep and abiding respect for Markel.
“I have a huge admiration for Steve,“ she said. ”His humility and his willingness to share his own experiences for the benefit of others gave me the courage to do the same, and it’s been the thing that has helped other people get in touch with the pain in their lives.”
Langdon’s internship turned into a permanent position. After a great deal of prayer, she closed her private practice and set to work helping build Families of Character.
The Family Huddle Goes Public
Unfortunately, follow-up calls to determine the efficacy of these parenting tools revealed that many moms and dads weren’t using them, that they felt too overwhelmed by the demands of living to fit the journals and charts into their schedules. It was then, at the instigation of Langdon, that Families of Character decided to quit pushing the products and to look instead for a more productive, hands-on strategy to help families find the time and enthusiasm to focus on character development.Langdon’s family huddle became a key tool in making this happen.
“So, we started coaching parents on how to hold a weekly meeting and to reorder the priority of relationships in the family,“ she said. ”That’s when we started seeing significant transformations in marriages and families.”
“It’s never too late to condition your kids in good habits, in virtue,“ she said. ”You just have to be a little bit more creative in how you bring this up.”
For Langdon, the lynchpins of the family are faith and marriage.
“It’s important to prioritize your relationship with God, and second, to nurture the sacrament of marriage and the covenant that is ‘till death do us part,’“ she said. ”We don’t make a covenant with our children. We don’t make a covenant with our boss or our co-workers, but oftentimes those relationships trump the forever relationship of our marriage.
“So, huddle up as a family, date each other as husband and wife, and pray together every day.”
The Family Huddle Guide: A Quick Look
Jordan Langdon’s guide emphasizes a 3-Cs approach to meetings and family dynamics: connect, communicate the calendar, and pursue a common goal. She offers age-based practical tips for reaching these goals. Here are just three of them:“Pick a day and time each week to have your entire family together. You’ll need to reserve about 30 minutes on your calendar.”
“Involvement for a toddler might mean choosing a toy to bring to the huddle or selecting a snack for everyone to enjoy.”
“Tweens and teens juggling school projects, social outings, and family time can use the calendar review to express their needs and negotiate family resources, such as transportation or shared spaces, fostering independence and problem-solving skills.”
