Some people believe their parents are at fault for not having beenbetter? parents. The basic viewpoint isMy family is the cause of the problems in my life.? According to the authors, an alternative to this viewpoint is that every family member, including one's parents, is embedded in a multigenerational.
emotional process and everyone, including oneself, has a responsibility to grow up (differentiate) as much as possible within that process. If people hold their.
parents or others responsible for their growing up, they may go through an entire lifetime faulting their parents and looking for someone who can finally give them what they have alwaysneeded.? If people relinquish the notion that parents weresupposed? to have done itright,? they have many options forgrowing up themselves.?.
According to Bowen, declaring one'sindependence? from family is not differentiation of self. It does not resolve one's emotional fusion with the past. .
Most people who claim to beindependent? of their families havebroken away? from them rather thangrown away? from them. Growing away from one's family depends on gaining more emotional objectivity. More objectivity means one is better able to see the ways in which he or she is part of the system: the ways in which he or she affects the emotional functioning of others and the ways others affect his or her emotional functioning. If one does not see himself or herself as part of the system, his or her only options are either to try to get others to change or to withdraw. If one sees himself or herself as part of the system, he or she has a new option: to stay in contact with others and change self. The goal always is to work on oneself, not to attempt to change one's family. The goal is not to get the family toaccept? you, tolove? you. The goal is to be more of a self, which is not contingent on acceptance.
The authors assert that the characteristics of a therapist's relationship with a family are important from the outset.