The most successful families embrace and elevate their family history, particularly their failures, setbacks and other missteps.

Moses became Americas true founding father because he evangelized action; he justified risk. He gave ordinary people the courage to live with uncertainty.

Our instinct as parents is to order our kids around — it's easier, and frankly, we're usually right. [But] reverse the waterfall as much as possible. Enlist the children in their own upbringing.

I grew up as a fifth-generation Jew in the American South, at the confluence of two great storytelling traditions. After graduating from Yale in the 1980s, I moved to Japan. For young adventure seekers like myself, the white-hot Japanese miracle held a similar appeal as Russia in 1920s or Paris in the 1950s.

The bottom line: if you want a happier family, create, refine and retell the story of your family's positive moments and your ability to bounce back from the difficult ones. That act alone may increase the odds that your family will thrive for many generations to come.

But humans disappoint. Adam, in tasting the fruit, indicates that he prefers Eve to God, so God banishes them.

There's a reason the Exodus story has inspired so many Americans. It's a narrative of hope.