By Shelly Gilman
Guest Columnist
Editor’s Note: Wills are not only for the wealthy or well known. A last will and testament can make life–and end-of-life decisions–easier for everyone, regardless of financial circumstances.
Creating a will helps protect your loved ones and allows you to make meaningful gifts to the people, organizations, and causes you value.
Some things to keep in mind:
- A will is an essential legal document
everyone should have. - A will gives you and your family peace of mind.
- A will helps you create a legacy that lasts beyond your lifetime.
- If you include the Jewish Community of Louisville in your will, you help carry forward the values, traditions, and wisdom that support a vibrant Jewish future.
As you think about what you want to pass on to your family, you may also want to consider creating what we call an ethical will. An ethical will:
- Helps you share your hopes, dreams, and life lessons with loved ones.
- Offers guidance while strengthening family identity, heritage, and understanding.
- Preserves your wisdom, values, and personal story as a lasting legacy for future generations.
What do you really want to leave your children and grandchildren? As you consider your life’s story, and the good and bad decisions you have made – what is most important to you? Have you thought about how you can make a gift of your most precious asset – your ethical values? Your values and memories are the most important gifts that you could leave behind, and your heirs have earned the right to inherit the essence of your spirit.
Consider – each of us had eight great-grandparents, but how many of us know the names of more than one or two? Each of us needs to leave a statement of our family’s historical story, family values and then do what’s necessary to perpetuate them.
Also ask yourself, where have you and your family earned its wealth? Are all of your children and grandchildren living in this community? If you give everything to your children and grandchildren, would it bother you to know that some of your hard-earned savings, all of which were earned here, may now be used to benefit the citizens of your heirs’ new communities? Large communities like Chicago, Atlanta, and Austin certainly present wonderful opportunities but consider a phrase, somewhat revised, from Las Vegas – “a portion of what happens here, has been achieved here and should stay here.”
Involve your family in your plans for sharing your ethical values and charitable giving. Say to your family – “I have done my best to help each of you, now let us, as a family work together to do good for our community and for others.”
Consider – We know that the best things in life – are not things – they are the substance of our souls – our spirit – this is the point of this discussion – how will you arrange to leave a message that the best things in life are acts of loving kindness and our actions that help others? Consider the following statement of personal values to give to your children.
“My dear children and grandchildren:
Somewhere among my papers is a will made out by my lawyer. Its purpose is to dispose of my material things that I owned at the time of my departure from this world to the unknown adventure beyond. I hope its terms will cause no ill-will as it seemed sensible when I made it. I am more concerned about leaving you something that is vastly more important… I want to leave a legacy of our family and a statement of my personal values – this is the greatest gift of what I possessed during my life.
“Also, my children stand at one another’s side in an hour of need…. Support a needy brother with good advice as well as practical aid. The main thing–live together in peace, help one another in bad times, think on occasion of other members of the family, pity the poor.… and help those less fortunate.”
Some of the most beautiful provisions of ethical wills involve statements of gratitude. A favorite of mine is the “Ethical Will” of a noted humorist, Sam Levinson – who said: “I leave you my unpaid debts. They are my greatest assets because everything I own – I owe:
- To America I owe a debt for the opportunity it gave me to be free and to be me.
- To my parents, I owe America. They gave it to me and I leave it to you. Take good care of it.
- To our Biblical tradition, I owe the belief that man does not live by bread alone, nor does he live alone at all. This is also the democratic tradition. Preserve it.
- To the six million of our people and to the thirty million other humans who died because of man’s inhumanity to man, we owe a vow that it must never happen again.
- I leave you not everything I never had but everything I had in my life: you my family, respect for learning, compassion for my fellow man and some four-letter words for all occasions; words like ‘help,’ ‘give,’ ‘care,’ ‘feel,’ and ‘love.’ Make gifts of these words.
Now – ACT – Do Something Good.
Work with the folks at the Jewish Community of Louisville’s planned giving office and develop a Living Legacy Perpetual Fund to support forever the charitable causes that were important to you.
Be sure to sign & date your written statement, your family needs to know when you wrote it. Good luck and note – it may be best to type your statement and not write it in cursive – your grandchildren won’t be able to read it.
Sheldon “Shelly” Gilman is a Louisville attorney with extensive expertise in estate planning. He is also a longtime member of Congregation Adath Jeshurun.
