Family Systems Activity Book

This book focuses on the internal dynamics of the family. Families are extremely important to human beings.  It is hard to imagine life without a family, and perhaps even those who claim they have no family, have, in fact, an “imaginary family” in their minds, to which they belong and in which they participate. It is inside the family that we find much of what is meaningful in our lives and where we do much of our psychological growth. Not only is the family important, it is also extremely complex, insofar as it performs many vital functions for humans. This book will attempt to take the reader through the many facets of the family to lay bare its anatomy and its functioning. At the end, perhaps the reader will have a better understanding of the dynamics of family life.

        This book will attempt to draw together the complex threads running together through the family. First, the approach involves the use of “systems thinking.” The meaning and the implications of this will be spelled out in the early part of the book. Second, the family is a place where biological, psychological and social development takes place. The family itself goes through developmental phases. Thus there follows a section on biopsychosocial development and its relationship to the family.

        Families are deeply affected by culture. Thus there will follow a section that opens up this realm, which examines the ways in which the set of beliefs about behavior that are learned and shared in the “cultural surround” can affect the family.  It is my basic assumption that families have an unconscious life. Thus, there is a section delineating some basic unconscious processes that operate in families. Many of the unconscious processes that operate in families operate across generations (sometimes many generations). There is therefore a chapter dealing with intergenerational effects and some examination of the intergenerational transmission of trauma.

        All of my work is influenced by Dabrowski’s theory of positive disintegration. To my awareness, at the time of going to print, this hierarchical model of human development has not been systematically linked to the understanding of family systems. Thus, a chapter is devoted to the application of Dabrowski’s theory to the understanding of family dynamics. Next we turn to the topic of love, its many twists and turns and different forms. Finally there are sections on sexual orientation and gender in the family.

        This book uses many case studies, involves the study of several movies on the family, and will ask you, from time to time to look inside yourself or to interview others to find out more. At the end of the book, there is a fifteen-week journal, with spaces for you to fill out. This is aimed at helping you gain further insight into families, your own assumptions and expectations and perhaps to give you some understanding of your own family, be it the one you have now, or in the past or in the future.