Does the well-known saying “You can choose your friends but not your family,” reveal the fact that from the get go we believe we are hapless victims of circumstance and simply have to put up with what life has handed us? What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?
If we can accept and embrace the family we are born into, then this forms the foundation of our relationship with family and we are more likely to be open to the learning on offer, knowing we are blessed by everything that unfolds, even if it does not look pretty. This understanding frees us from the belief system that has us as victims of circumstance in our families, caught up in blaming others and feeling like we are haplessly trapped in some kind of enduring punishment.
Bringing more awareness to all our pictures and beliefs about family and all the expectations and ‘rules’ in our societies means that we can start to unpack them and live free from them. There are many rules, ideals and expectations about what a family ‘should’ look like that we are forever trying to live up to, and from this comes the crippling way that we compare and compete with others: a mean judgement of ourselves alongside what we see everyone else doing.
We work so hard at keeping everything looking alright on the surface, no matter what is going on behind closed doors. The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are and aware of the true potential of all our relationships and what they offer.
One of the many ills of living with pictures is that they keep us in the isolated, arm’s length disconnection from one another as we all collude in the pretence of ‘keeping up appearances.’
- What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all? That our learning is so much richer when our attention and energy is not focussed on maintaining a status quo that can be labeled ‘acceptable’ and/or ‘good.’
- What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?
- What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?
- What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence? At what stage do we take responsibility for our lives, heal our past hurts, move on from blame and stand on our own two feet, laying the path ahead with the choices we make?
- What if as parents we stay in dysfunctional and unhappy relationships ‘for the children’ because the world says that two parents together are better? And from the adult role models in their lives, what does this teach children about relationships, integrity, truth and love?
Suspending disbelief for a moment or two and allowing ourselves to explore these ‘what ifs’ opens up the possibility of a whole new way of relating to life, family, relationships and the beautiful, significant and responsible part we can play in all of the above.
By Mary-Louise Myers, age 60, carer for our elderly, health practitioner, mother of 2, Australia & Matilda Bathurst, age 51, midwife, primary school teacher, mother of 3, cook and writer, UK
Related Reading:
A true family model for the 21st century
Building true relationships and positive parenting
True Family
Words on Serge Benhayon 
“What if as parents we stay in dysfunctional and unhappy relationships ‘for the children’ because the world says that two parents together are better? And from the adult role models in their lives, what does this teach children about relationships, integrity, truth and love?”
This statement show just how deep the lies we are fed run, that two people whether they have children or not should stay together in dysfunctional and unhappy relationships. I know of so many relationships that are based on an arrangement of two people staying together because of security and comfort. Worse if children are involved because what standard of life is being reflected back to those children where they are trapped in a loveless family and then grow up to repeat the same patterns as their parents. What we do to ourselves is utterly gross as there is no evolution but a stagnation of another wasted life.
Thank you Mary-Louise and Matilda, as a Student of The Livingness the Loving boundaries that we set with our younger generations and thus the way we share with everyone is a discipline that is Loving❤️ and when the reactions and conditions are dropped as True Love is felt and thus the energy one is in can shift so that the feeling of Joy is exquisitely felt and held as our normal way of living, as True family.
The majority of us live with closed hearts and keep everyone out and this is the devastation we try to block out as we live by the rules of the society we have all had a part in making. This false way of living will implode on itself because there is a part of us that cannot be kept down and entrapped within a body. This part of us, the divineness of who we are, is constantly being communicated to by the universe that is forever calling us back to our origins.
Could it be we live in a house with a revolving door and we hold the key to which way we leave and thus what we learn in life, and that comes from those who are willing to evolve with us or True Family.
Family teaches us responsibility for ourselves and others.
This was very healing for me to read as in reading this ‘If we can accept and embrace the family we are born into, then this forms the foundation of our relationship with family and we are more likely to be open to the learning on offer’ I started to feel something in my body that I did not want to feel to allow it to heal.
If we all provided a community that would support us through to passing over, life would take on a different responsibility along with divine purpose, so we all learn and evolve together.
I am having the most amazing experience with my family as being with them is bringing up all sorts of un-dealt with issues around what family is and what isn’t. Feeling the little girl and the force of someone’s attitude and feeling helpless and then the realisation that actually I’m a grown woman and I can choose differently now. I do not have to put up with such blatant, life draining negativity. If a family member wants to be in this funk then so be it but that doesn’t mean to say I have to take it on and own it as my own.
We literally have soooooooo much to learn about relationships and our responsibility with and in them ✨
Another saying comes to mind and that is ‘blood is thicker than water’ and when we consider how water takes on consciousness maybe water has more consciousness than blood?
When we drop all judgement that comes in when we get, “caught up in blaming others and feeling like we are haplessly trapped in some kind of enduring punishment,” life becomes simple.
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow,” The lessons we learn from our birth family are there to teach us how to live in harmony with our wider family of humanity.
Family also teaches us not to accept abuse just because they are family and so we may make exceptions for their behaviour.
Seeing family as relationships to learn from rather than a ball and chain or obligation to collusion is very liberating.
Perfect for me to read this today, thank you. I can see that the pictures I hold about family get in the way of fulfilling the purpose I have there, which is much more than a familial role. It’s about the full reflection we can bring, and the truth and love we can express from our whole being.
Melinda I agree and what has been a huge learning for me is that we cannot love one more than another, if we hold back love with one we are holding back love for everyone. This does not mean we have to take on abuse or be a door mat but observe life and not get taken in by the emotion of it. The difference is quite amazing. To be caught up in the emotion of life to me feels like being in a full wash cycle of a washing machine, where we are tossed around in constant motion. To observe life feels to me like sitting at the launderette and watching the washing machine on a full wash cycle. No involvement at all which is very freeing and spacious.
What a gorgeous reply Mary, thank you. I have to admit I’m not strong on observing, I’m often in the washing machine tumbling around with it all, not in the launderette watching the cycle! Thanks for your honesty too about love, it’s a huge topic of not having special ones we love and others we don’t, that’s really a conditional and emotional love. Being love is quite different and I am still learning that, to allow the love within out, a love that automatically holds everyone and everything equally. How grand we are but how we have stepped away from our grandness – it is still inside of ourselves though, just waiting for our reconnection to it.
Pretending everything is fine never works and just poisons whatever relationship we do have. As hard as it may seem to be, a broken relationship has more potential for true healing than a fake one.
Thanks Lucy, that gave me a ‘stop you in your tracks’ moment. How strongly I’ve been held by staying silent and not rocking the boat, but what you have highlighted here is the surface of something means nothing, better that it look a mess but true healing be on offer than the polite facade of suppressed hurts and expression, and the presence of abuse or stagnation.
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all?”
Awesome reflections – our family we are given will alway be an opportunity to learn and grow from – whether we take that gift or not is something we either do or don’t, either way it is a gift.
It is true, what if we choose our family to learn what we know we need to learn but are unlikely to choose it once in incarnation? Just what if…. It is well worth considering what it is about family relationships and reflections ‘pushes our buttons’ so we can learn what has not worked and make a pledge to build relationships based on a true foundation of Love not comfort.
What if indeed. ‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ And what if we choose our name as well? I was recently in a workshop where the icebreaker was to discuss the name you had been given and what it means to you. In talking with my partner I discussed what if our name had not been given to us but we actually chose it. It is interesting in how much we let go of the responsibility of the choices we have made or are under the illusion that we did not make those choices or have no choice! … it is so disempowering when we do that.
Mary-Louise I have learnt and come to a greater understanding of families and what they are and present since attending the workshops and courses of Serge Benhayon and I feel much more settled in myself knowing that we are all one big family and that family is not defined by blood alone this is a very narrow way of thinking and an ill belief and trap we have fallen into that keeps us separated from each other which is the complete opposite to how we should be with each other.
Yes, what if we stopped blaming our family and started looking at why they are the perfect choice for us to learn from. I appreciate and thank every one of my family, blood related and other for the incredible learning I have received through them in this life.
We all have so much to explore when it comes to understanding our relationships with True, family, relationships and work. Then as you have shared Mary-Louise the ideals and beliefs around every interaction change in the most glorious ways.
Yes to really look at our relationships and ask questions about them and most importantly how WE are in them (what do we bring to them or not bring to them) which I feel we do not do enough!
Or simply be, is enough or is being something that is always evolving so we are always bringing all of US?
“What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?” – every situation is an opportunity for us to learn and grow and get a deeper understanding of life and what is on offer. Do we choose to see the magic of this or do we choose to go with how mundane life appears to be?
Unfortunately Henrietta we have become stuck in the mundaneness of life. Until Serge Benhayon started presenting 20 or so years ago,we had little to no idea there could be a different way to view and live life. Serge Benhayon has reintroduced the magic and pure beauty of God back into our lives.
Perhaps it is difficult to accept that maybe there is no coincidence in who we end up in our family with because if we do we will have to ask ourselves, why is it that this person ticks me off, why is it that I get affected so much by what happens in our relationship? Perhaps the answer then goes away from making it personal and about the other person, but brings a focus to our reactions, what in us is being triggered & that is difficult for us to look at?
These ‘What ifs’ are great questions you pose Marie-Louise and if one does ponder them they do bring a whole different understanding of family to the one generally accepted as the norm – one that is loving and expansive.
“What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence? At what stage do we take responsibility for our lives, heal our past hurts, move on from blame and stand on our own two feet, laying the path ahead with the choices we make?” – and also what we perceive as our past life experience as well, I can feel how we hold onto them as a form of identification, as well as justification/alibi for us not to move on.
Ouch! That is very true, they are reasons why we don’t move on but when we bring understanding to our past experiences and consider the freedom of letting them go, it is truly life-changing.
Hi Fumiyo and Lucy, I believe that you both make an interesting observation about past lives how many of us take these into consideration when looking at our patterns and addictions to life being a certain way. If we were more open to reincarnation and brought understanding to why we reincarnate I feel certain we would then act in a more responsible way throughout our lives knowing that it will have a knock on effect with the next life to be lived. Surely this would support us all immensely to evolve up and out of here?
Family is a microcosm of humanity and so from learning how to establish a harmoniously living family it is a reflection for how the family of humanity can live in true brotherhood.
‘To hold our own and stay steady’ living the truth of who we are in love is everything needed within family. There is then no blame, reaction, victim, pictures, expectations or investments but the living of responsibility, our purpose to self and the family we have chosen.
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all? That our learning is so much richer when our attention and energy is not focussed on maintaining a status quo that can be labeled ‘acceptable’ and/or ‘good.’” – this is Gold Mary-Louise and Matilda, and allows us to let go of the pictures and be more open to what is there for us to learn from. Thank you!
I can relate to the sharing on offer too Henrietta
““What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all?”
I did not have a pretty childhood at all I could feel the energies swirling around and through the family and was terrified of it. Not realising that the energy that we can all feel as children is a deliberate attack to stop the light we are born with from shinning. Our current way of living does not want any reflection of light to show, not a speck, because once we realign back to the light we are, then the energy that currently rules us is diminished and no longer has any power.
I like the fact that on some level we do choose the parents we get born to, that our choices begin well before we are born because this comes with the understanding that we are here to learn and trusting that everything is configured in a way that allows the fullest learning.
Not having our relationships with family or any other dominated by pictures of how it all should be is amazing. Learning to have relationships led by connection has been a huge, life-changing process.
At this time of year families come together to celebrate Christmas and enjoy being with each other but what if we came together like this all the time and not just for Christmas.
As custodians of a spirit we are parenting to the best of our ability when we set boundaries that we hold True for everyone.
On the surface a swan seems magnificent as it glides effortlessly on the water but under the water it’s feet are paddling away, but we don’t see that. And that could be said about our relationships they can look great to an outsider but behind closed doors that same relationship could be very abusive but we don’t see that.
Yes and what if by trying to pretend everything is OK we actually protect the abuse that is happening and thereby do not allow space for change and for a more loving, connected and simple way of being in relationship?
And what if Lucy by pretending everything is okay and accepting the abuse, this has a domino effect on everyones relationship in that everyone accepts abuse in their relationship. We are all connected so what happens in one family can be felt in every family around the world. Now there is a science we were not taught at school that we should all have access to.
Indeed family is a learning experience and in my case it is to free myself of the construct of family and know that true family are those around me who choose love first.
What if this earth life is all about re-learning to Live as one big family and this is part of the story of the latest Robin Hood Movie by Otto Bathurst that when we all work together as one family miracles can happen.
Holding family, as is generally experienced, as an ideal to be preserved is one of the greatest hindrances to humanity establishing true brotherhood here on Earth.
All relationships, and in particular those within families, are the greatest opportunities we have to evolve as they trigger our unresolved hurts for healing and provide the place to practice and develop unconditional love.
This should be family 102 after 101 Love, “Bringing more awareness to all our pictures and beliefs about family and all the expectations and ‘rules’ in our societies means that we can start to unpack them and live free from them.” This can be life changing and gives the whole family permission to be who they truly are and to see each other. There are so many assumptions and misconceptions in families from hurts and taking things personally.
Choosing our family was something I use to struggle with until I started to see in me what it was that I had to heal within. Then we have the more obvious one with the people we meet and choose to spend time with. Sometimes I used to wonder how on earth did that happen to me, to understand much later it’s just a sequence of events which were presented to me in order to help me to grow, to evolve.
I find when back with family it is very easy to fall back into old patterns or ways of dealing with things. Families do seem to bring up in us things that need to be addressed, so once again there is a choice to deal with it or not, evolve or stagnate.
“We work so hard at keeping everything looking alright on the surface, no matter what is going on behind closed doors.” – a classic scenario where we play into the external game rules that we use in society forgetting how important it is to remain honest and true to our natural way of being.
Every relationship that we encounter is simply an opportunity to grow and learn and evolve. The so called ‘more challenging ones’ are actually the ones that teach us the most about ourselves and life!
Family by quality is the one for me.
Why would we make a distiction between being part of each other or not? Isnt that already a separation from our whole brotherhood?
Its exhausting keeping up appearances and I can see and feel how this builds so much tension in our bodies and our relationships.
Spot on Natalie – there is nothing honest about keeping up appearances, and yet we get to be masters of this, and it does exhaust us – and thus being natural and transparent is what is needed and this in itself does not exhaust us even though it may not fall into the category of playing the external game which is so not natural for us.
Yes simply because we are not made to pretend but to be our true self. Hence it is exhausting to do so.
I see that it is exhausting and also builds resentment and bitterness which combined with exhaustion is a recipe for ill health if ever there was one.
Living with blame can stunt our life, our evolution, our connection to joy and can cause all sort of relationships issues in life. I find it is certainly much easier, more loving and more responsible to let go of blame and live the joy that is within us and embrace taking responsibility for life.
This is not only empowering for the person letting go of blame, but it is equally freeing for the person they have directed so much energy towards.
It is fair to say that the model of society starts first in our homes where we establish a platform upon which we call “normal”. If the model of society is failing us then we have to have a very good thorough look at what family really means and whether how we are approaching “family” is really the fullness of love and truth we may think it is.
They are the first group of people we come into contact with and set the foundations for what we consider to be normal amongst each other.
When we embrace the understanding of purpose and the bigger picture family brings, we detach ourselves from the limitations of the potential of what is on offer within family; true love is then possible to lead the way.
I feel we have bastardised and corrupted the true meaning of family by making it about blood family and the many deeply and varied entrenched ideals and beliefs we have around the concept of what we all think family should be.
I feel the same Alison, this has become much clearer for me in recent years as I am more and more aware of what true family means I am also able to then see what is not true family.
Everyone born in a family has a purpose to fulfill but some do not know that.
I agree with you Bodjetstar, to be honest I can now look back on my family and see that there were huge life lessons for me to learn from and I have. We all have the choice to be overwhelmed by the lessons or rise ourselves above them to know and understand we are much more than our hurts that we hold on to for lifetimes until it is time to let them go and move on. And we all reach this point sooner or later.
I agree too Bodjetstar and if each of us realised our purpose in family and saw our place in the family as a learning ground for later in life, I feel we would all have a very different understanding of family and what we are all here to bring.
That understanding will help you focus on the positive sides than struggling with the faults of other members of the family.
To view who we are each in family with as a choice is, I reckon for many, a big leap away from what is the conventional norm. However it also feels very important that we at least have these kinds of discussion, because what if it were true? Then what would that mean for the whole of society with regards to schooling, parenting, etc…? Because if we do choose our family, then what else are we choosing and are simply not aware of?
I feel there is always something for us to learn from our family be it functional or dysfunctional, because everything we are offered in life are full of opportunities for us to learn and evolve.
Being true to ourselves is key and this can be more challenging within family to stay steady and hold ourselves however, if we are willing to be aware and accept the learning our family offers us there is potential for enormous change within ourselves and within our family.
‘One of the many ills of living with pictures is that they keep us in the isolated, arm’s length disconnection from one another as we all collude in the pretence of ‘keeping up appearances.’ ‘ This can happen in any relationship and just keeps us firmly away from the intimate and loving relationship we might otherwise have. Time to get more real and go to new places of honesty with each other allowing ourselves to be seen for the vulnerable, delicate, precious beings we are and to feel the power in the reclaiming of ourselves.
To understand that all the people in our life are there for us to learn and grow is a games changer and brings every relationship and every person we know into a different perspective other than the one of likes and don’t likes.
So true Esther and when we understand life and meeting people in this perspective we also understand how deeply loved we are to be constantly offered opportunities to evolve.
‘What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?’ This one is very interesting because I know I have used how good my relationships are as a measure of how ok I am as a person. Dare I reflect on how many compromises I’ve made in order to keep a relationship sweet? If I am connected and am not relying on or needing the outside world to tell me I’m ok then this is an amazing reflection for others. It’s far from being aloof but actually the opposite, deeply connected. When I’m just in it for getting reassurance and my needs met then other people essentially become commodities and that feels so so disrespectful and so far from the connection we could have.
I have in the past years greatly expanded my understanding of family and what I consider to be family and no matter whether they are blood relatives or not there is always the fact of constellation meaning that no one is in our life for no reason and always is there an advancement offered through their reflections.
A great thing to become aware of as a young women is that I am not the ‘child’ of my parents anymore but am a adult women and don’t have to act like a child around my parents.
This is really interesting to me – how is my relationship with my mum now it’s more that I look after her than she me, and that I do no have children myself so am still the youngest. We went away a few months back and I took care her. What surprised me was feeling how I still wanted to be looked after. All my jobs have been around looking after people. But what this exposed was how I’ve never allowed myself to be looked after.
As a child I wouldn’t accept help, thinking any need was a weakness. But there I was very much feeling my child’s internal conflict of feeling I was on my own and needing help but having to provide it which mirrored my childhood – thinking that I had to parent the parent because I wanted to escape the situation we were. Writing this I see the opportunity to heal, to admit my fears as child and how I hated the situation, but how I wasn’t responsible for fixing it, in the same way that in my jobs it’s not my job to take away someone feeling the consequences of their actions, to support yes, but not to take on board their stresses as indication I am a failure! Each of these childhood issues I heal allows me to be the woman I am with my mother, another amazing woman.
Each of the people in the world I have connected with, and genuinely care for are family to me.
“What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?” What if indeed… if this were to be the case, the world as we know it would be a very different place.
I know as i begin to undress the many pictures i have about who I/we should be or what I/we should be doing I am fascinated to unravel how easily I allow my mind to form and pursue a desire that can chip away at both my mental and physical wellbeing. Through learning to honour how my body responds to each situation I have built a level of confidence i never thought was possible.
“What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence? At what stage do we take responsibility for our lives, heal our past hurts, move on from blame and stand on our own two feet, laying the path ahead with the choices we make?…” Great question. Once we find ourselves asking this question, its an invitation to graduate into true adulthood, responsibility, self respect, acceptance and letting-go.
The difficulty of embracing your family is not so much the family you got (in spite of its characters) but the fact that such constellation is what you need to go beyond where you were when you incarnated again. Accepting that we have to go there to evolve may be hard, but not accepting is much worst.
Our kids learn far far more from the way we live than from what we say. So if we are not truly living love in our relationship with our partner or with them, then what exactly are we teaching and imparting to our children?
Great question Joshua and I find children are very smart, they know when someone is speaking from knowledge and emptiness, and not from their livingness. I feel it is very important to nurture and confirm their ability to spot the difference, to support them to be themselves and trust what they feel. When we choose to be loving in our relationships this is what will be reflected to our children.
‘What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?’ that is a very strongly held picture around family that we ‘stick together’, yet why would the relationships within families be any different from those outside of the blood related ones? The understanding that breaking up can be a developmental or evolutionary process (and one I have witnessed many people blossom in) applies across the board – exposing the pictures around family and the way we can keep each other back from that growth for the sake of that picture.
The current purpose of family seems to be to have a group to be belong to, but also one that we will accept ‘unacceptable’ behaviour from. If we love everyone equally, as all religions espouse is the way to live, we would inspire each other and not accept behaviour that brings the family or an individual down. I am learning to not be attached to family and to learn to be myself despite pressure to conform. I am also learning my responsibility to be and bring true love and growth to the family.
“What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence? ” as hard as this can be to fathom it is indeed something I have come to appreciate, that we are ultimately able to look at our own choices and heal the past hurts and not drag them with us as an excuse for not being loving with ourselves and others. It takes time but the work is well worth it.
When it comes to family and childhood hurts yes I agree David this might often be hard to fathom, yet it IS worth the time and the self-responsibility as it can turn around all relationships, not just that with our family of origin.
Michelle it’s awesome, from your experience you were able to see through the information and lies about Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon and follow what you know was true.
That is a common one when we indulge in the blaming of our up bring we have had and hold onto childhood hurts, forever capping us from truly connecting deeper with ourselves, family and others.
We hold so many reactions against our families, children grow up to become young adults who despise their parents and put the whole blame on them simply because it is easier that way. To even go to the concept of that we may actually be choosing our families asks too much of us to consider, perhaps it is true, and perhaps our parents, brothers, sisters and so on are in our lives because they’re there to teach us a lesson, for us to strengthen a side that we are not so strong in and evolve. But if we remain stuck in the blame of who did what to me, then we will never understand the lesson, and grow.
When there were large families in past times, people could choose among their family whom they would relate to. German even has a word for it “Wahlverwandtschaft” – those relatives we elect to relate to.
Family ought to be a place where we feel safe to be all of who we are so that then we can bring that essence out into the world for all to know, see and enjoy.
If it is that we are in a family to learn and grow, we can accept that sometimes this may not look pretty at times, yet we also know that there is the potential to bring deeper understanding and awareness so we don’t keep falling into the same pattern and reaction. As we heal these hurts the whole family shifts and adjusts to the now new and deeper relationships.
Families reflect a large set of beliefs. Recently I uncovered one reflected by my father. Not him as a person, but a set of beliefs he had picked up from his parents and unconsciously passed on to us, the kids. As a grown up I found it rather reveiling to see through a jugdment I had on myself the past weeks and realize it was how my dad perceived himself in relationship towards us, his family. The beautiful thing is that I went softer and more accepting towards me ánd I got a deeper understanding for him and his behaviour and with that more love came through.
‘What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?’ i am really feeling the pertinence of this one more and more. I have been transparent in an area of my life regarding my health that I suspected would be responded to with assumptions and I have received an email confirming this. This is actually ok. I know I will be put under greater scrutiny and I understand why. Now it’s about how I live, how I respond and say, let’s not judge me based on assumptions but respond to how I actually am, the quality I hold and my integrity at calling it out if my work is being compromised.
On some level people will know my choices to be in disregard have led me to where I am at with my health so I can’t cry it’s unfair if they are dubious about me and that my call to be transparent has called for me to be under the spotlight. The big question now is, do I reflect a deep level of responsibility that inspires no matter where my health takes me?
When I was 13 years old I asked my mum if I could call her by her first name as she was just as much a friend to me as a mother. My mother was very touched by this and since then I speak to her on a first name basis which to us has always been very endearing.
It’s interesting how ideals and pictures of our roles within the family can obstruct connection. In my own family, my parents refused to be called anything other than ‘mummy’ and ‘daddy’, which as I grew into an adult became harder and harder to stick with. They were very clear that they wanted our roles to be perceived in a certain way – for boundaries to be in place in our relationships in the ideal of what a mother/father/daughter relationship should be. To me, this is capping. With my own children, when they call me by my first name I celebrate it because not only do I hear the divine vibration of my name being called back to me but I feel our true equality.
The roles of mother daughter father son etc come loaded with ideals and beliefs which are sometimes hard to get past. Calling each other by our names and also using each others name when we are talking about each other seems much healthier and less burdensome. Sometimes calling someone by their full name rather than a nickname can take the sting out too. Respect and decency are regained when we let go of emotional and mental tenets .
I am pleased you have mentioned the point about respect and decency with regards to names. In the primary and secondary education fields the prevailing thought is that calling a teacher by their first name shows disrespect. However having worked in both the FE sectors and secondary and having had students call me by my first name, and title and surname, I can say that I much prefer to simply be called Michelle. This supports an equal relationship with my students and I find that the formality of the surname can act as a barrier to that. There is no disrespect in someone calling me by my first name – it is the way they call it that counts. Also I know that many teachers like to hide behind their role and this is much harder to do when you are being addressed by your first name.
I can feel the sweetness in your gesture towards your mum Henrietta, that’s very lovely and certainly breaks the norm asking us to reconsider the relationship with the woman that birthed us into the world.
That is beautiful Henrietta.
I can feel how calling a parent by their name, once we reach our mid teen years, can be a growing up for both parties. Its an adjustment in the relationship where there is an understanding of respect and eaqualness between parent and child; a step forward together we so often just don’t make.
Family is always an interesting topic to explore – to me there is family and then there is family which really comes down to how we choose to see things. In the end, I find that family is not determined by a bloodline but that we are all one large family learning to live together – and with some we will get along, whilst with others not with so much ease. Either way it is a lesson, a learning and an opportunity to grow and evolve together.
This is a great sharing as there is such a blinded view when we see family as those who were raised under the same roof rather than the universe that holds us all as one.
I wonder how many would speak and feel about our family if we realized we actually choose them ourselves before birth. I know it changed a lot for me and it supported me in taking more responsibility for my life and learning to see what lessons I had not yet looked at that had been on offer from the moment I was born.
We can certainly feel justified in our reactions to family members if we believe that we just happen to randomly end up there and can indulge in feeling like a victim; this can go on for years, right through middle age and beyond. However strip that away and understand we that we are in that family to evolve, to learn from what is being reflected there, from each member and to also reflect something back. In being aware of this it has also supported me to observe more and rather than take things personally I can objectively ponder on what it is I am being shown and what it is I have to learn, as well as being more free to love without need or any demand and that we are all just fine with where we are at.
There is great freedom and empowerment in seeing life as a means to learn to return to who we are rather than something that just happens to us.
Realizing that our family constellations have a purpose will allow for a very different view, one that will show us what there is to learn and advance from in this life. And this could be across the range of possibilities, from saying no to abuse and breaking the belief that we should stay with family no matter what, all the way to embracing and surrendering to the love and support that can come from such a constellation.
Beautifully put – we are not hapless victims of circumstance but make our life according to our choices. And that includes our parents and siblings, the whole birth family and beyond.
It even means we can be absolutely loving with no resentments from past events to every member of our family once we have worked through our issues.
“The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are…” Reading this sentence I can feel so clearly how this has played out in my own life, for more years than I care to register. But to live in way that deeply honours who we are and has no external rules but only answers to the truth of what one feels is not only incredibly freeing for the individual, but offers so much in the way of inspiration, reflection and support to so many others as well.
With mental health at an all-time crisis, it is so important that this is articulated clearly as it has been done here. Whilst so many of us have felt and continue to feel the devastation in the tension of feeling like we are ruled by those external ideals which feel so alien and wrong, we have the propensity to feel that it is us who are out of line, not the other way round.
‘The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are…’ This is truly devastating when we realise the gold we could otherwise be living within our relationships – and when I realise what I have settled for has been so short of the true intimacy on offer. This is true of my relationship with myself – how I have had such high expectations of myself based not on love but on ideals and beliefs that have no care for people; and judged myself for not meeting these requirements to be loved!
I’m living with extended family at the moment and it is so huge to feel the difference in if we do something out of being a nice family vs if we do something in true life and purpose. It’s actually a great reflection for us all to choose more love and honesty.
The devastation of ‘living beholden to external rules’ and perpetuating the game of keeping up appearances is so far reaching and infiltrates so many of our micro choices every day. I had to check with myself this morning who I was putting my make up on for…
If we can see the bigger picture and understand that life, our lives and who are in them is there to support all of us to evolve, to grow beyond any ways of being we have and hold onto which do not support us to be all we are, our relationships are different and how we approach them is different and all of a sudden those issues or challenges become something else, not a nuisance or even an issue but an opportunity if we can let go and embrace them for all of us to evolve.
When I think of what family is about now, it is very different to what I was fed through movies and socialisation. Now I would say family is an opportunity to learn to be in harmonious, evolving relationships with a group of people, to learn the true meaning of love and that that is equally for every other person we meet.
You touch on a great point here, when you talk about the role modelling that parents are responsible for.
Accepting is key, accepting that we are where we are due to the choices we’ve made, and that those around us reflect to us those choices and how in fact we are offered an opportunity in that reflection to heal how we are and how we’ve been … there are no accidents, there is just reflection and a call to responsibility for us all, and we do this together.
Yes, there are no accidents, there is no such thing as good or bad luck and, as Albert Einstein said, “God doesn’t throw dice”. In other words, the buck stops with us.
‘keeping up appearances.’ doesn’t work, people see past this anyway and if we play this game it puts unnecessary stress on our family to live a lie instead of being honest and accepting what is really going on. Honesty supports us to grow and living in an illusion simply does the opposite.
Yes – illusion does the opposite of truth. Illusion is the falseness of our ever expanding love.!
I know the concept of ‘keeping up appearances’ quite well, or as it was said in my family ‘you do not hang the dirty laundry outside’ It is devastating not only for those in it who are repressing their feelings and needing to pretend but for all the onlookers who are presented with a false picture thus the illusion of family life is perpetuated.
I love coming back to this blog as each time it reflects something different to me. If we as children and as adults see each other as equal we heal our own hurts. I had a beautiful opportunity recently when my parents travelled over to the country I’m living in for a holiday. It was like I took the childhood glasses off and saw them for the amazing people they are and have always been, and it has been different ever since.
‘What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?’ And this breaks all our pictures of what a relationship should be, for often a relationship does need to break in order to have something true be lived and expressed, the question for us is how willing we are to continue to evolve our relationships? How willing are we to express and live truth?
I actually love the different reflections my family members offer. We are all quite different in expression though we have supported each other to develop our understanding of others and all of life through our relationships.
I love the real purpose of family shared here that opens up so much and the reality of true healing and evolution in our lives.
I love the possibility that we are in a family to learn from it and that there is always something there to be reflected to us.
Me too HM, I often look back and appreciate my family for reflecting so much for me to learn and grow.
Being really open to the learning on offer in every situation takes so much reaction out of me; I am keen to see the opportunities and the part I play.
HM wise words, and one where we know and can appreciate that what we are being offered with family is the opportunity to evolve, grow and expand for a greater purpose than just what we call family today.
Agreed HM we always have the opportunity to learn and grow from family and more and more come to understand just how great family is, in that we are ultimately all family and have a responsibility not only to those directly near us or who we traditionally call family but to everyone worldwide.
I love this point about the richness of learning on offer when we let go of the status quo of needing to label things as acceptable.. learning is unpredictable, messy and unbounded and the more we can be okay with that, the greater the potential for learning and evolving.
Recently I became open to meet a member of my extended family for the first time. It was a meeting that healed a separation and cleared previous misconceptions and we related to each other as the true brothers we already are. It was beautiful and divinely constellated to be that way.
With correct relationship with self and free of judgement, it is possible to heal family divides.
Our families offer us the opportunity to rise above the current imposition of ideas and beliefs of what families are ‘meant’ to be about and embrace the deeper potential of what the constellation is offering each and every family member, and live the power of what true family means.
Much evil has been disseminated under the guise of ‘family’. It is a crippling consciousness that will not let you know you are owned by it and will not let you form true connections and relationships with others thereby leaving you bereft of any true family when you are under its spell.
Very powerful Liane what you’ve shared here. We can break this spell by living true family and we all know deep within what this feels like.
Working from the natural openness and love that is our ‘within’ and natural way, we can learn so much from every interaction, relationship and apparently challenging situation we find ourselves in.
It is very easy to play nice to not disrupt the status quo. Family has a tendency to bring up all kinds of things that need looking at which can be very, ‘not nice’ at times. These moments need to be embraced for the learning that comes from them, if we are willing to go there.
The ‘nice game’ is just that a game and sooner or later all the tension we carry unresolved comes to the surface. When we are willing to learn and observe when the games begin and choose not to play, we are offering another true family and the evolution that is there for ALL.
It is always great to get a fresh perspective on things and family is one of those that needs a fresh perspective.
That made me laugh when I read your comment Elizabeth…. though I agree a fresh perspective without any belief or ideal attached can bring a renewed sense of openness and connection with others.
The opportunities for growth in families are so rich. When we can remove ourselves from our hurts and really embrace these opportunities it is really amazing.
I am absolutely here to learn and feel that family is much more than blood – and that it is not about treating family as anymore than how you would treat friends. I am receiving this learning each day and it is about the choice I make to respond to this in full and in truth.
Whatever comes to us, embrace it as if you had chosen it, because in reality we actually had.
When we start to know who we actually are, who we truly are, we related everybody differently including of course our family.
For much of my life I used to believe that “we are hapless victims of circumstance and simply have to put up with what life has handed us?”, including family, but there were moments when I would question if in fact this was the truth. And now, thanks to the shared wisdom of Serge Benhayon and finally reconnecting to who I truly am, I know there is no way I am a victim of life, that I actually have created this life by the choices I have made, and that I do have a choice as to what life presents me with next.
We need to wake up and become aware of where we are in, which energy we are living and what else is there for us to life, to not accept the way things are in this loveless state and to bring back the love that we are.
I firmly agree with the part here about how some relationships need to break in order to truly heal.
Family is not an ideal or a picture, but a living breathing learning of taking deeper responsibility every day.
True, it is not a given that family comes ready made. What an awesome training ground for being and living this responsibility in all of life, in brotherhood.
“What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development”? The belief that a good relationship is one that stays together no matter what is one that harms us individually and as a society. It’s not that we give up on the relationship as soon as there is an issue, but we need to feel that some relationship have a certain purpose/lifespan and once we have learnt and healed what was needed, we are in disharmony to stay together.
I love how you say it is an honouring of the purpose of family. The word honour and its quality is so sorely missed in our living ways nowadays. We have made everything about have do’s and must do’s and with that have completely forgotten what it means to live in unison with our innate beingness that does not make life a must but simply an honouring of who we are.
The true understanding and purpose of family is beautifully offered here for us all and brings a new light and opportunity to our lives with awareness love and evolution from the acceptance of all we are offered to learn from.
It’s so important to look past pictures and ideals and consider what we are choosing in our lives, in terms of our relationships, jobs, daily choices and so forth. Having a great or successful job is one thing, but do we feel great within the role and feel fully empowered to make change and provide an excellent service? One of the worst things we can do is settle for things looking good on the surface but feeling empty underneath.
To truly accept another as they are is to embrace them as a family.
Which does a brilliant job of de-constructing our false pictures about family and re-establishing the truth that we are all family.
True Gill, whatever issues and problems emerge within birth or adopted families, wise to keep our attention firmly with the quality of reflection we offer others. To be steady, loving, clear and without expectations frees us from the ‘wishing things were different” tree and drops us into the pool of accepting things and people as they are. When we have corrected our relationship with self, new constellations appear and the possibility to heal relationships with others we may have separated from or they from us is offered to us.
‘…knowing we are blessed by everything that unfolds, even if it does not look pretty. …’ This is such a beautiful way of being. I can reflect on every aspect of family life and see what I’ve been offered to grow. When it’s not looked pretty I’ve had a big part in that which is great to see and take responsibility for. When I’ve been able to observe what’s not been pretty there’s been great learning too. Knowing everyone we meet, not just family, is never random but divinely constellated I can start noticing what is there for me to learn and grow from. The more I’ve denied this in the past, the more I can now see how spot on the constellation was.
Most of us try to avoid tension within relationships in any way as there is a perception that tension is not a good thing. But it is important we learn to express and deal with whatever tension arises for when it is undealt with it festers and leads to greater conflict and dynamic later on often.
Yes, learning that tension is a part of life and can be used as a guide for us to feel our way – not in avoidance but what there is to take note of and respond to; to bring a truth and transparency that avoiding tension doesn’t do. Like you say avoiding tension creates far more problems in life! but being understanding of this and supporting oneself to stay present in the tension is key for me.
“Keeping up appearances” has enabled much evil to be done on earth.
By placing people in a special category we expose them to a horde of unsaid demands and beliefs. Hold them as equal and we may be surprised what transpires between us.
“By placing people in a special category we expose them to a horde of unsaid demands and beliefs” And may I add abuse. Most family cultures thrive on differentiation, elders, youth, father, mother, aunts, uncles, many labels. This comes with a pecking order. I always offer my nieces and nephews the choice to call me by my first name without ‘aunty,’ but tradition and habit makes it difficult for them to do so and I accept their choice. The whole idea that elders are equal and no different from the young or a child is still a consciousness many people are resistant to.
I agree with what has been written
“What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?”
My family has been a huge learning curve for me, I have gained so much wisdom and I adore my elder sisters and we are having so much fun and enjoy each other’s company which wasn’t the case when we were growing up.
The true purpose of family is an very worthwhile sharing and knowing for us to live and is super supportive bringing a depth of understanding , purpose and harmony to our lives wherever we go and are that is so beautiful when felt and lived .
How much abuse do we accept under the umbrella of family? Why is it that ŵe feel we can treat our family in ways that we would never treat others? I love the question you ask ‘What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for their to be true learning and development? This is such a great question to ask as there are so many relationships that continue which hold both people in the relationship back.
We have so many adopted beliefs and ideals related to what is family and friends when all our relationships are an opportunity to learn how we are equal in essence in the inner heart.
For too long we have simply accepted the societal belief that we are stuck with our family, that we have to put up with their behaviours no matter what and that we are supposed to love them without question. When you look at it from this belief it makes it sound like we are all the victims of some random event and therefore there is nothing we can do about it. But once you come to understand that we in fact choose our family for the purpose of lessons to be learned or to heal issues from previous lives, we take the power back into our own hands and with it the choice to accept what our family situation is offering us, or not.
Family can really be defined by the love we share, it doesn’t need to be about bloodlines.
“Bringing more awareness to all our pictures and beliefs about family and all the expectations and ‘rules’ in our societies means that we can start to unpack them and live free from them.” Beautiful and a much needed understanding of the purpose of family and the reflections for us all to evolve from.
It’s true that the level of abuse we accept from our family is not what we would allow from friends, work colleagues or strangers. So there is something about our ideals, beliefs and pictures of what families are about that allows us to do this.
” What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?…” Love this, as it completely turns upside down the notion that we are hapless recipients of some random lottery of who and how we land in a family group… Rather, where we have landed is a consequence of many lifetime energetic choices as well as an offering to advance from these energetic choices.
We get so wounded by our family of origin that we then tend to hold everyone else on the planet at arms length in case they hurt us. This way of protecting ourselves from hurt does not work and in fact limits us.
If we were to believe in reincarnation as a way to evolve up and out of a dense plane of life that we as beings descended into to experience creation, it then makes complete sense to me that we chose the families we reincarnate into so that we can learn the lessons of life which is to renounce creation, so that we can all eventually ascend out of this plane of life back to where we are meant to be.
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all?” This is a powerful question or statement and wipes out perfectionism and trying to keep up appearances. Over many years I’ve been peeling away the ‘keeping the status quo’ and trying to hide all the not so pretty things to reveal what is really going on.
The fact that we choose our own families before we reincarnate for the purpose of learning and evolving is one that changes the foundation of counseling and the approach to healing our childhood hurts.
This is really important to remember; ‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ This takes away any blame and judgment of our family and instead can bring an understanding and acceptance.
If we all looked at our families as a place to learn, evolve and grow, would we not pay more attention and not dismiss and blame.
We may not overtly blame our behaviour as adults on what happened in our childhood but we can certainly use it as an excuse not to change, as if we can’t change because we are held in this dynamic, or that it is difficult to get out of and therefore we need sympathy in order to get by. We say we understand and we want others to understand but we have no true desire to move beyond where we have chosen to position ourselves. There is a comfort and sense of security in staying where we are.
Reading the words: “living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within” I could see clearly how often we defer to the rules and beliefs we have been raised to live by, instead of learning to trust what we indelibly know to be true. And to do so we have to call in a force to override this truth. What an exhausting and confusing way to live.
Even though I never felt as I belonged to my family deep down I know it was my choice to be with them to learn and to teach, to understand and love, to see the abuse and care, to make my own choices and embrace the humanity as my extended family.
This has been my expereince as well Elena. It is very empowering to understand the deeper purpose of why we have the families we do, and to learn to hold ourselves in our own truth within that group, with whatever may come our way.
We can see families wherever we go in life, in our work colleagues, neighbours, shop owners and our communities (online or locally).
We are part of a universal family and to understand life in this way gives new meaning and purpose to all relationships , Even when we meet someone briefly on a rail or boat journey we relate and communicate with them as if they are part of us,, which of course they are.
A great reminder to stop and look at the blessings being offered while travelling with my family on holidays. We’re each having moments of being triggered by something but it’s a lot easier to work through it when we’re honest.
If we consider the possibility that we choose our own family rather than just being lumped with them by chance or luck then it places a completely different perspective of what the purpose of family is and our responsibility in that.
And I for one absolutely love the ‘different perspective’ that this choice offers us. Once I had accepted I had actually chosen to be in my family I could finally see the reason why, what I was there to learn and what I was there to bring to the other members. My life and all the decisions I had made became crystal clear so there was no blame, simply an acceptance of the fact I made the choice.
Very true Andrew, as with everything in life, if we accept the energetic foundation of life and the bigger picture we are part of, including the wheel of rebirth, it brings a whole new level of responsibility as well as clarity on why things are the way they are, which is very empowering.
What if actually feeling no attachment whatsoever to your blood family is a good thing, as it shows you, that you healed all the momentums and behaviours that you came with and that you needed to work on by reflection of that constellated family? And what if the cycle of evolution would be then, feeding back to that family all that you developed and healed so that they get pulled and inspired to do the same? The whole meaning of family gets a total different face, doesn´t it?!
If we make it about blood- family we are not offering the extent of what we can reflect as we limit ourselves already at the start. We are here to reflect everything possible to everyone without specialising or limiting the recipients.
Holding onto any picture of right and wrong and needing the acceptance of the world in upkeeping our external appearance is awful. We have lost the warm, intimate connection with ourselves. There is no more relationship and it hurts.
The Benhayon family have redefined family for me. It’s not about blood ties, it is where there is true love and connection and that can be with friends, work colleagues, people on the other side of the world. And our truest family of all is humanity as there are no special people, we are all one. I have also seen that the purpose of family is not to settle into comfort and familiarity but to hold and nurture each other as you grow.
Here in the UK we are very good at ‘keeping up appearances’, in fact I was brought up to not make any ripples but keep everything well and truly brushed under the carpet. How can we possibly evolve if everyone is playing an unspoken game of staying in absolute contraction from who we truly are, and no-one is daring to call out the elephants in the room?
I’m so good at doing that—calling the elephants out in the room and I witness the reactions and the silence that comes back. I get affected sometimes and understand to keep building the relationship with myself.
It is quite interesting why this is playing out so much in the UK. I also observed that specific behaviour for many years. Pondering about it, what if the actually strength of UK citizens is be to be very straight forward and direct and the best way for weaken these people is to plant in their system to be nice and non confrontative?
“What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence? At what stage do we take responsibility for our lives, heal our past hurts, move on from blame and stand on our own two feet, laying the path ahead with the choices we make?” – a super wise question indeed…and how much more freeing is this in life when we can heal our past hurts and stand on our own feet without putting the blame on anyone else…
Sympathy is definitely not a prerequisite to supporting someone, in fact it is the antithesis of what is required.
True – sympathy is the cheapest commodity there is, it serves no one.
This is huge what you are presenting, and I know a truth. And reading again what came to me is it is really all about choices and how we live. As of course it makes sense how we have lived in previous lives will determine the choices that we make in the next including choosing what family we will be born into and why. These vital life lessons start well before the school classroom it starts with our everyday livingness.
The understanding of family and its purpose here for us all to evolve is a real and honest changer to our lives bringing a deeper sense of purpose with the true family reflection we can start to live and all it offers. l
I agree it is not by chance that we are born into the families that we are born into, we are there to learn, evolve or maybe even be the teacher, so it is important to roll with this whenever it is possible and not walk away from our responsibility where family is concerned.
All relationships hold the purpose to support, understand and deepen. When we make this the pivotal part of each moment there is so much to appreciate what we all bring.
Being around other people reflects to us the truth, and supports awareness. Fighting this energetic fact causes such disruption that we say we’d like to avoid sharing space. But it’s not them we have difficulty with but what we get to see.
Every day we are offered reflections and revelations that can support us expand our understanding and awareness, heal our issues, deepen our relationships. Yet when we try to live according to pictures we end up being blind to most of this.
‘There are many rules, ideals and expectations about what a family ‘should’ look like that we are forever trying to live up to.’ And from this we start to play the ‘nice’ card to not rock the boat or I could call it the ‘ugly’ card as I know from my own experience how trying to be nice can be a cover for frustration about the situation you are in and it is felt by all but not spoken about what is truly going on.
There is so much more to explore in relationships than we tend to do. We like to stay on the surface and not look any deeper into what a relationship, or better said, the constellation has on offer for us. Relationships does give us the opportunity to get a vaster access to the universe, the stars, there where we do come from and one day all will return to. Is it possible that it is that connection and reality we avoid to connect to if we choose to only look to relationships superficially?
It looks to me that we have bastardised family for its true purpose, that is to provide the opportunity for evolution and transparency for all into a fixture where we like to keep everything as it is, and more so to keep everything within not showing their real face to the world.
When people do not deal with their hurts families can be an absolute war zone. The more we deal with our hurts the more we can see another for who they are and not as the person who hurt us.
‘What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?’ Growing up I was told that if people knew me they wouldn’t like me. I set about having people like me so I didn’t feel the devastation of this comment by a close family member. Truth was I wasn’t loving all the time, and that’s ok. People weren’t always understanding. What’s lovely is being able to more closely deal with relationships breaking down because I’m no longer saving them at all costs including the cost to truth and responsibility. I’m not making things palitible so the ugliness that is present isn’t seen and learnt from. This can feel very uncomfortable at times but I keep coming back to feeling me and feeling ok.
Yesterday, I had a sticky moment with family members and whilst there was some reaction on three sides, including from me too, I stuck to what I felt was true for me. The beauty in all of this was that one member had to feel their stuff more acutely and although uncomfortable, it brought it up and could no longer be buried; the other member got to claim their truth more and see where they had been compromising and I got to express clearly what my needs were without compromising myself also. We avoid discomfort, but don’t appreciate the learning when we allow it to come up and what results in the end…. (a relationship with greater truth!)
Those close to us are so often those we treat the worst and yet are meant to be those we Love the most. Could it be this false hierarchy of attachment that hurts?
I’ve come to understand the reflections we receive from our families. How there is much for me to not react to – and so it is actually a huge learning to be in the family group I am in. I am asked to observe and to not get caught in the sympathy of family. It is a lesson that is huge for me as I let go of this need and ideal around what family looks like.
Going into the sympathy of family can be very devastating as it will get you caught up in all kind of ideals and beliefs, but more so in to the dynamics that are at play, dynamics that like to stay unseen, and with that bring devastation in everybody compared to evolution that the true purpose of family is.
Mary-Louise, I find this article really supportive, you ask some very wise and important questions about relationships and families, thank you, there is much to ponder on here.
Mary-Louise, I really feel how true this is; ‘There are many rules, ideals and expectations about what a family ‘should’ look like that we are forever trying to live up to.’ I feel like there is such a strong picture that families should look a certain way – for example that we should be married and have not one, but two children; the list of the perfect family goes on and the pressures are huge. Thank you for writing this article and exposing the ideals and beliefs that there are around family.
This is a great question; ‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ Reading this I can feel how we could accept and appreciate our family and the learning that is on offer, rather than what sometimes seems to happen – that we blame and criticise our families.
Being open to understanding and exploring the power of the constellation we are born into is everything that family is about. Learning how to be with each other in transparency, honouring the vibration of who we are in essence and pulling each other up to live aligned to this vibration is how we learn to live in true family, supporting each other to heal and evolve.
There’s too much emphasis on happy families – where did that perfect, flawless picture come from? The beauty is also in the ugly moments and in the difficult moments – that’s where we get to see how awesome it is for us to learn and grow and develop together.
This is so true Meg, how often do we smooth over the cracks to keep everyone happy therefore not only holding back our own evolution, but that of everyone else.
And no matter how much we smooth them… they never go away the same as they do if we face them head on…
I used to hate and blame my family for many of the situations I was in. But I have come to realise that appreciating them for all the being and offer me with far surpasses any niggle or issue that could ever come between us. In fact it squashed it like a bug.
I have done this too Joshua, blame my family. Talking to people this seems to be a common theme running through many families – playing the blame game, therefore we are all playing the same game! Ridiculous isn’t it when all it needs is a dose of honesty and a willingness to take responsibility
“the possibility of a whole new way of relating to life, family, relationships and the beautiful, significant and responsible part we can play in all of the above.” This changes everything and offers a real purpose, understanding and learning from life as we know it, and brings a bigger picture to our lives, beautifully, and the opportunities we have and are on offer for us all to evolve.
Letting go of the victim card in relation to our family is a big one for people to let go of. We often blame our parents or early family life for patterns that are entrenched, and we are not willing to let go of, like a security blanket that is well past its use by date.
Living free from the constraints of what family is or is supposed to be feels like a fairytale when all that you know and can see is society making normal what those constraints are. It is therefore such a brave and beautiful person who takes that step out in to the unknown and attempts to re-establish what true relationship can be.
If we embraced the fact that we are born into a certain family for a reason we would not have all the dysfunction that currently exists in family life everywhere.
So true, we’d be willing to see the reflections on offer about ourselves so we can learn and grow. So often I’ve worked with families who will blame other family members for things they too are doing just as much. They’d be way more understanding, as I’m discovering. What irritates me most about my family I can see I am similar and as soon as I see this, I understand why I’ve made those choices or struggle with them, and can drop the judgement and be way more understanding. My family feel less judged and more open to the love that is on offer rather than get more entrenched in defensiveness and justification.
family is never smooth sailing – and yet we all try to put on the happy family picture -when in fact – what if we all have something to learn, what if we are there to bring stuff up and grow and develop, and that is not always pretty.
I was just thinking about this earlier today and asked myself what am I doing if I am trying to not make anything come up with family. Who would have thought that sometimes feeling our most uncomfortable can actually be an opportunity to heal something we’ve been holding in our bodies for a very long time.
When you consider each spirit/Soul chose to be a part of your family then the honouring of the purpose of family really gives one something to deeply contemplate. Regardless of how you regard each member of your family, everyone has something to share, a part to play and a living way to reflect, and in turn, to learn and evolve or devolve through, this can be done individually or the family can move together, the choice of how or when they do this is entirely up to each member. This understanding gives an entirely different perspective on family but also a deep appreciation of the intricacies and magic of God to bring the exact spirit/Souls to each family to bring about all that is needed for each individual and the family as a whole, if chosen, to heal and evolve.
Seeing all there is to see and engaging rather than avoiding difficult or conflictual relationships, allows us to better know what there is to learn by staying or when it is time to leave.
There is so much to look at how we live our lives and re-understand the true purpose of.
Just as the stars are not thrown randomly into the night sky, so too are the people in our lives constellated by the hand of divinity to assist us to return to this expression within us, or plotted by the hand that directly opposes this evolution.
It is so true that keeping up appearances in our relationships and families is a way of living where we keep people at arms length, all for the sake of the not being hurt. And yet we are hurting ourselves all the time when we are not honest about what is really is going on.
The more accepting and embracing we are, the more open we are to the learnings on offer.
We can learn so much from our family relationships, the good, the bad and the ugly. Every relationship is worthy of development.
Yes true and it is also important for us to discern the purpose of the constellation in order for evolution to advance us.
‘our learning is so much richer when our attention and energy is not focussed on maintaining a status quo that can be labeled ‘acceptable’ and/or ‘good.’’ – When we are open to see everything in life as an opportunity to learn and grow, no matter what that ‘everything’ may look like, then and only then can we truly evolve.
Yeah we have such pictures of what relationships should look like we are blind to true learning, and miss out on all the gold that is there in all of our relationships.
The fact of our lives and the constellations for us to learn by is beautiful if we embrace this makes so much sense of everything we are facing and wondering why . This answers everything and makes perfect sense allowing us to evolve from old behaviours that no longer serve us and to heal the past and our lives truly.
Accepting that everything in life is for us to learn so that we can evolve out of the same patterns and choices that we have made for life times after life times, then it makes sense that our family is constellated to offer us the very reflection that is needed for us to see what those patterns are.
To live from the understanding that the family we are born into is not by accident and instead is specifically chosen to support us to learn and heal what is needed in this life brings a dimension that is far more expansive and rewarding that the commonly held perspective.
Yes, and it instantly removes the victim aspect and replaces it with responsibility.
Everyone constellates in life to reflect the perfect thing, that you need to see. If we truly understood and embraced the gifts that are there we’d have no need for school.
True Joseph imagine the constant learning this would afford us. We would be attending the school of life with no need for institutionalized schooling.
We are a long way from that but we know that so much more is possible for raising children and how we live in our communities.
Knowing that we are attending a school of life supports us in all our activities including the education system we currently have.
The power of being humble enough to learn in relationships cannot be underestimated. Humility breaks through so many of my false behaviours of arrogance and irresponsibility.
To be able to accept this fact, that we are born into the family we are because we have a purpose to be there and there is no coincidence, may be difficult to grasp for some. But when understood fully, the opportunities we then have to potentially heal our family relationships is enormous.
Honouring the purpose of family is honouring the purpose of life if we understand that we are here to learn and evolve back to who we truly are.
Life transforms when we have true purpose.
When we have a relationship with purpose we see the purpose of every relationship.
A message I got from this, and what I am playing with at the moment, is being OK with tension. Its a tricky one as I often eat, check my phone, make excuses to be somewhere else (even if it is the toilet!) etc….to not feel/be with the tension. But it is worth exploring because the other option – of just checking out – is taking humanity on a path that is further and further away of connecting to ourselves.
So true that we may completely overlook what’s needed in an instance if we have an investment in a certain person being ‘family’ and hence that we have to treat them in a certain ‘nice’ way.
What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development? Therefore there is no failure in breaking up as can sometimes be the myth, but can be a true stepping stone for more learning and expansion.
It is very common to blame our family for our childhood hurts but what if we take responsibility and start to understand that blame doesn’t resolve anything, it just pushes our hurts and issues aside with zero healing? For me, taking responsibility for my childhood hurts and healing them was deeply empowering. It revealed to me that much of what I experienced as a child was very much part of my contribution too.
Your list of reasons that we are born into the family we are, are deeply thought provoking and all ask us to ponder on the true reasons we are in the family we are in, however this one particularly stood out for me today –
“What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?”
What a beautiful honouring of the true purpose of family and one that changes everything brings understanding to our lives and an openness to see and learn from all that is around us and brings a real purpose and contentment to our lives.
Very interesting.!
I know that one Mary-Louise, keeping up appearances to others when inside I have felt in turmoil. This creates such a pattern of dishonesty that gets copied and repeated, and keeps us feeling alone. Your description of the true purpose of family supports us all to work on our relationships and learn and grow, whatever the outcome is service to us all.
Our family is our very first relationship that we are born into, regardless of the composition. It is from here we develop the standards and beliefs around family and relationships by the very way we are raised and interact with each other. As said ‘What if the true purpose of the family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all? ‘ speaks words of truth, as it is the opportunity to learn so much about relationships, including what is loving, unloving, and all that comes up. We can learn this is not how I want to relate because it hurts or I’m very loved and all my relationships will be about love, it is a wide gamut and much to learn. It can be an alchemical experience in terms of our development for us and others. It does not mean it is always easy it can be extremely challenging, but it can be an incredible growth in our relationships with everyone.
So many people blame their parents for their ills, it is such an easy way to not look at our own patterns or take responsibility for our own actions by blaming someone else. The fact of family having the purpose of learning relationships is a great lesson, how we are in every relationship affects every other one.
It is true, parents are a great target to place blame for any areas in our life that are not working. However, with this attitude nothing changes as we remain a victim of life. Only by being honest with oneself and owning what one has created, can we then take responsibility for our choices, which is hugely healing as the clearing begins of old patterns and behaviours, and as we go through this process, we become more real, more raw and sensitive to all we are feeling, along with a deeper understanding of life, of ourselves, thus the blaming drops away as we live in a way that supports us to honour all we are feeling, and trusting that we have everything we need to take care of ourselves which has a positive significant impact on how we relate with all others, including family.
I have always questioned the ‘staying together for the sake of the children.’ Growing up, to me, it felt more like a convenient truth where the adult didn’t have to face the difficulties of admitting all was not well in the family to the degree that the social construct of what makes up a good family – children having their birth mother and father together as parents- dictated at the time. What was role modelled was that following ones inner knowing of what was true was prohibited and would be met with social stigma and discrimination.
Much has changed in the last 30 years but listening and following through with what is true is still met with objection. I question how free are we when we succumb to societal dictates and not our own inner knowing which, rather than being a decisive factor actually brings us more together as a community.
Knowing that I had chosen my family in the first instance was such a blessing and allowed me to see my part in my relationship with them. It took away that destructive force that comes with blame and allowed me to feel my responsibility and to see my family in a whole new light.
Same for me Susan. When we play the blame game there is zero opportunity for learning and evolution, it keeps us stuck in our hurts and issues and creates more hurts. It becomes a vicious cycle that doesn’t break until we start taking responsibility for our actions and choices.
Establishing a loving, harmonious relationship with ourselves is key to building a harmonious loving family unit, that naturally builds and develops community – very naturally, community becomes family.
Family is always a massive topic and brings up a lot for most people. The more I see family as an opportunity to grow, learn and evolve from and with the more everything seems to flow with them. It is because we have a sense of purpose why we are together rather than it just being random. We have so much to offer each other rather than fighting we can utilise the reflections we have and learn from them, seeing areas we have not dealt with so can now deal with them and clear life long patterns so they no longer have to have such a dominating hold over us.
This understanding “that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?” is massive because it reveals that there is no bad luck or good luck only a choice and learning to have with your family – in whatever way this looks like.
What if staying in a relationship that is not working or harmonious is more about maintaining an arrangement and our security than being true to what is needed.
The purpose of family is to learn the true meaning of family.
That we are all one big family and it is not just about our ‘blood’ family, as we are all equal beings. And just to add something I have often thought about is how does blood family work when we consider our parents are not blood related?!
Simple and clear Mary and spot on!
” The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are. ” Beautiful well said bringing true quality to our lives.
Families are so important – from the beginning we use our families to get a sense of what love and relationships look like, and we learn so much as we grow about commitment to life, responsibility, team work, caring for ourselves etc.
Yes, I agree with you Rebecca, it is very important. If we have a solid and loving family relationship this sets us up for life but if we have issues and loveless behaviours then we tend to struggle in life. We also have the opportunity to rebuild a loving foundation for ourselves later on in life if we didn’t have this as a child, so it is never too late.
I agree – I have my blood relatives, but they are not the only people in my family, because family to me is about love. I may not have had the most loving aunts and uncles etc, but that doesn’t stop me from committing to loving relationships with others that are then my family. It is like we give into the saying ‘you can choose your friends but not your family’ as a way to excuse any behaviour that you experience simply because they are family.
This is a beautiful sharing opening up the true purpose of family and all relationships with real loving quality and evolution for all.This allows us to let go of the ideals beliefs and abuse we put up with and contribute to.
We choose everything – from before we are born and are the complete architects of what transpires in our life. If we want things to change we need look no further that the way we choose to live.
Family is defined by quality, and it is fascinating how when we change our quality, the people constellated around us often shifts too.
Now that is a 101 on parenting. This brings a completely different understanding to all our relationships.
‘Bringing more awareness to all our pictures and beliefs about family and all the expectations and ‘rules’ in our societies means that we can start to unpack them and live free from them.’ – It is truly empowering to free ourselves from the rules we have taken on and take responsibility for our own learning and development in life, seeing ourselves as a victim in our own family keeps us stuck in our tracks and we end up with resentment and bitterness for a situation we ourselves actually choose to continue.
What if we’ve got family completely wrong, and it’s not just our support network as we grow up and it’s not just about being with someone, or loving someone or raising kids but there’s a much greater purpose to us being together – it’s our opportunity to learn together and grow together and change life-long patterns.
I agree with you Meg; ‘it’s our opportunity to learn together and grow together and change life-long patterns. And what a blessing we are all given through the family structure for the expansion on offer of learning about ‘true relationships’.
We have so much to learn from family when we understand it from this perspective Mary-Louise. We can celebrate and appreciate the differences we all bring, and as the relationships develop, and sometimes when they break too when that has been chosen, we all can learn and grow our family relationships.
A real exposing of the truth of what family is really all about, and the learnings on offer for us all if we embrace the choices we have and see the opportunities to break free from the ideals and beliefs that hold us less, and not who we are and what we truly feel. A beautiful offering of what-ifs that allow us to stop and feel and allow more love in our lives.
‘The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are…’
Today I’ve been considering this blog in relationship to the young unaccompanied asylum seekers I am in contact with and how many do not have any contact with blood relatives. They come from very culturally different cultures and often will find pockets of these cultures in the country they are in whilst also assimulating the norms of that country. It’s very interesting to observe how they respond to the opportunity to start again and come from their innate qualities and standards because they are neither in their past cultural bubble and are not from the culture where they find themselves in. Often they try to impose their cultural norms and expectations of the new country onto their experience of it in a very understandable attempt to continue a sense of security in a foreign land.
Just the title of this blog is a stop-in-your-tracks moment. Family is in fact the very last place that most of us look for purpose. We might see the purpose in our work…in our community…in building certain relationships…in sports..exercise, or any other activity…but family?? Family is where most come to switch off, to relax, to hide, to give up, to abuse, to emote, to complain, to have fun…the list goes on…but I guarantee that it is very, very rarely that you’ll ever hear most people speak of the purpose of family. So it is brilliant that this conversation is being had. And,if family does in fact have purpose, then isn’t that the perfect design, because within the circle of family is where the vast majority actually spend the greatest percentage of time over our whole lives.
“You can choose your friends but not your family” On a very simple level, this saying just immediately highlights the separation that we consider to be utterly normal.
Thank you Mary-Louise and Matilda this is such a huge topic to consider, not just from the point of view of one’s birth family, i.e. parents and siblings but also the relationships one has with adult children, their partners, and one’s grandchildren, and honouring the purpose and reflections that are there for our own growth but also for the growth of the family as a whole.
‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ – Fighting our own family is in fact fighting ourselves and our natural learning and evolution.
Everything in life, every interaction and every moment is brought together perfectly to reflect our own choices and support us to fine-tune and deepen our relationship with ourself, the whole of life and the universe. It is useful to remember this with all interactions – especially with family where we seem to have tons of ideals and beliefs that get in the way of us remaining in the moment and staying true to what is really required
Golnaz what you have shared is so pertinent because we are perhaps our least alert and receptive when we are with our family. I can’t help but wonder how our lives would change if we focused and worked on improving our family relationships perhaps even above all others, rather than our current way of ignoring them and writing them off as just what happens in families.
We seem to be good at compartmentalising relationships and focusing on one bit here and another bit there. Do we reserve more care and understanding to our family or to the person we imagine is ‘the one’ in our life? Are we more conscious of the impact of our words and actions when we are at work?
At the end of the day there needs to be equal love, truth and integrity brought to every single relationship.
Golnaz, I agree, we compartmentalise pretty much everything and the label that we stick on things then governs our behaviour towards that thing or person. And the categories that we love to place things into are often fairly basic, e.g. I like it/ I don’t like it etc and the added complication of this, is that we often don’t re-visit our categories and so something like racial prejudice can stay unchallenged for a lifetime.
“One of the many ills of living with pictures is that they keep us in the isolated, arm’s length disconnection from one another” – This is so true. We can feel completely separate and isolated from our closest friends, families, kids or partners purely as a result of the thoughts and pictures we entertain in our head.
And any holding of pictures can stop me from forming deep relationships with all sorts of people – even the slightest pre-conception, no matter how subtle, can shut us down to what is on offer.
How many of us get stuck in blaming the parents/family for all our woes and don’t accept the responsibility of where we are at and why we were born into that family in the first place. Nothing happens by chance and when we look at each and every situation there is always stuff to learn and work through.
I put my hands up, I blamed my mother for all my woes many years ago. Truth was it was easier to blame than own what I had created; struggle and complication! Thankfully I did learn and mature, and took responsibility which supported me to make many different lifestyle choices.
Ok… So I had completely forgotten about that saying, you choose your friends not your family – how wrong, or more aptly, un-true that is to everything about us as beings. This saying completely disregards the fact that we reincarnate life after life, that as has been written, we choose the group we are born into for the experience we need to have, and ALSO it disregards and squashes the fact that we can have family with anyone/group of people we like who are not so-called ‘blood-related’! Wow.. our little ditties and riddles can be very reducing of the grandness of life – and this is just one example.
So true Rachael. As you say “our little ditties and riddles can be very reducing of the grandness of life” and then when we stand in the diminished caricature version of who we are, we point the finger at other people and other things and complain about being a victim of life! It is great to have this call out so that we wake up from our self created illusion.
Very interesting read! I’ve had a rough time with my relationship with a close family member and I agree that it’s a learning experience. If I learn nothing from it, the pain and suffering will continue and potentially be completely in vain. Hearing your take is a good reminder to not get tied up in the “why am I related to this person” and instead reflect on “what can I learn and how can I grow from this?”
A total turn around in the way we explore what happens in our life… the difference between your two questions is absolutely huge.
“Do we believe we are hapless victims of circumstance and simply have to put up with what life has handed us”? When it comes to family we don’t seem to take any responsibility for the family we end up in. If we believe we have drawn a ‘short-straw’ on family, we really don’t want to see that there is a reason why we ended up there or that we have any of the same patterns. There also seems to be a resignation that whatever disfunction is in our families, we just have to put up with it. Why should we put up with the greatest abuse we receive in life coming from our homes? I am sure this is not the way it is meant to be.
‘There also seems to be a resignation that whatever disfunction is in our families, we just have to put up with it.’ – And there is also a thing about hiding the dysfunction, keeping up the appearances and the facade no matter the cost.
Nothing in this life is coincidental or a simple twist of fate, all has purpose, is divinely constellated and is there to support us to return to who we truly are. Looking at our family from this perspective will offer the opportunity to let go of a whole range of ideals and beliefs that have kept us bound for much too long.
This is actually HUUUUGEEEE ‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ Because it puts us in the driver’s seat and makes us truly responsible for everything we have created in our life! Can we handle this? Although it maybe uncomfortable to feel at first it is extremely empowering once we have accepted this as through this acceptance we can then make true changes.
The resetting of the purpose of family is worthy of books to be written, and shouting from the rooftops. Such is the wisdom of the Ageless wisdom that this understanding could transform the world.
I agree Heather, and once this understanding is embodied and lived by enough people it will transform the world.
Staying together ‘for the sake of the children’ belies the intelligence and wisdom that children have. They, maybe more than the adults in a family, are sensitive to their energetic environment. They know what’s going on and the presence of a dysfunctional yet pretend ‘happy family’ serves no one.
The tendency I experience in families is that they try to keep all that is not so pretty inside and do not allow anything of that to become visible or noticeable on the outside. How different is that with the family model that is presented in this blog. A family model that purposely is open and transparant to society and shares everything openly, the pretty and the not not so pretty but mainly that family is about evolution and nothing else.
“What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence?” To me this becomes more visible that you can describe holding on to the old hurts from childhood can be called an addiction. As when we look at the true purpose of life, then life is about evolving back to soul, our natural way of being. And not adhering to that natural purpose of life and instead bring in complications of any kind can be called additional behaviour because it does not serve the purpose of our life here on earth in this human body.
Great questions you have posed Mary-Louise and Matilda, and do not we always get “the learning and experience we need” in life to evolve and it is up to each of us to come to that understanding about our evolutionary path?
I love this ‘that our learning is so much richer when our attention and energy is not focused on maintaining a status quo that can be labelled ‘acceptable’ and/or ‘good.’ It’s not about keeping up appearance but rather keeping it real.
The ‘what if’s’ are great food for thought Mary Louise, and you have shown that the true purpose of family is to learn and grow. The picture that everyone has a happy family but me is a total set up for us to bury our issues and not discuss them, for fear of exposing ourselves. When there is abuse, we abuse ourselves by not calling it out and walking away, when there is disharmony, it is our choice to accept it or not. It is still a learning process.
I have seen families destroyed due to the choice to hold onto a picture of a ‘perfect’ family.
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all?” This blows apart the perfection we seek within our family unit. We need to allow ourselves to feel the raw truth, allow the feelings and learn from our surroundings in order to deal with and let go of our issues. Not always pretty.
I know I chose my family both karmically and in the literal sense. I knew exactly what I was getting into and why I was getting into it. I wasn’t always able to be honest about this but now that I am I feel very appreciative of my family, and the reflections each and every family member offers me and the way I reflect back to them.
There’s no accident in anything or anyone in our life, as long as we think there is we are dreaming.
What you have shared here ladies offers a completely new level of understanding, acceptance and appreciation of the part we play in our immediate blood families, and the wider family of our friends, colleagues and communities. It highlights the responsibility we all have to play in every one of our relationships.
I like the way that you have raised the bar on what it is to be in family, how this can be the bedrock for how we are in the world, and how ultimately it is a freedom to decide this and not a pre-determined outcome imposed upon us.
We can sometimes behave in families like we have no choice but to be a certain way, or not able to do things differently for fear of upsetting someone. When there is the possibility of more honesty in family groups, and we can all say what we feel without needing a change, a change does happen between people within the group. Tiptoeing around issues simply feeds them by circulating the same energy.
Great point Gill. Communicating how we feel is so important in a family, or any relationship.
The learnings about relationships, behaviours & patterns we discover with people from our immediate family, offers fertile ground and foundation of understanding in relationships we develop with people in our wider community.
I agree with Mary-Louise – my family provides me with plenty of opportunities of accelerated learning and understanding.
‘the belief system that has us as victims of circumstance in our families’ – … can keep us running in submission to the often unspoken family rules and consequently in the hurts for doing so, our entire life.
All the expectations and needs we put on our family and on any relationship we have, are the set up for failure. To surrender completely to what is on offer without any imposition on how the other has to be is the formula for a magical relationship with opportunities for growth and deepening.
We are fed so many ideals and beliefs about family from young, that it can become an imprisonment rather than a golden opportunity to evolve.
So true Janet, you are spot on and this imprisonment is self created. Which means we have the power to get ourselves out of this imprisonment and set ourselves free to evolve.
I agree with you blaming our upbringing is futile and irresponsible as it get us nowhere as there is no right or wrong but a learning to be had from all the choices we make.
I agree Mary and blame of any sort simply stunts our opportunity for further learning and growth.
What stands out in this article is the responsibility we all hold to let go of our past hurts. Nothing creates more hurts in life than to live life ensconced in our past ones.
Yes, and what’s more – the old hurts fester and attract new hurts, so hurts pile up on hurts and we end up living through a fog of pain, distress or depression, reacting rather than responding to life. If letting go of the hurts creates a vacuum then let’s fill it with care, love and nurture for ourselves.
If we can accept that life is about learning and growing we can then accept that the family we are born into is also presenting us an opportunity to learn and grow and from our reaction to our family we can pinpoint areas that we may need to work on in this life.
It is a very common theme to blame our families for our woes but that keeps us in the shackles we feel to be in. When we allow ourselves to truly observe the dynamics within our family we will see that everyone has accepted to play their part, and thus we have the power to change, step by step by stopping to play the part we thought we had to play.
There are so many ideals and beliefs around what family is, which is when we see and feel the facade that is often presented – making it look like everything is ok on the surface but what is running underneath and behind the scenes can be clearly felt by all.
Take away culture and religion and we are one big family called humanity.
I agree, we are one big family even with culture and religion, that fact of family is just more hidden when we add culture and religion as it is currently practised.
Great points Paula and Christoph. What a great illusion it is then when we so hugely reduce the concept of family to just our ‘blood’ family’ or the people in our household, and when we identify with just a group of others at the exclusion of the rest of humanity.
‘The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are’ – How sad is it that most of us spend our entire life submitted to external rules and demands, and completely miss out on our own innate beauty and absolute wisdom.
What you have said here is very wise Eva when we live beholden to external rules we can lock ourselves away for life times from who we naturally are.
We have so many false ideas about what family is and it is these ideals and beliefs that stuff it up for us. When we let go of our expectations of what family ought to be we can begin to appreciate being with everyone, including our immediate family.
Actually everyone misses out on us when we bring our pictures and needs into a relationship. For if you do it with one, you most certainly do it with others as well. I love how we can learn how to be with others and in groups by learning it first with one and then expand that.
We can grow so much from our family – when we work together to be that foundational support rather than cutting each other down .
This fact when it comes well known will change the face of families — “that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?”
Is family what life is all about or is it a setup to keep us living in a way that society dictates is OK? I have observed how being in a family and living the rules of the family means that choices made are not about what’s true or fostering true love and care of a person, if anything, the fear of being cut off means a person denies what they feel and overrides this to the point where they can be affected by illness and disease. Living absolute honesty and transparency within family may at times be painful but it means they also get all of the love we naturally are and so does the rest of the world.
Very empowering and liberating to live from the ‘the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are and aware of the true potential of all our relationships and what they offer.’
Reading this article after a while I realise how quickly pictures enter my arena and hey presto I am performing again, dancing to a tune that is not true. It is great to be reminded about the responsibility we have to build a steady and sure relationship with what we know to be real and true, qualities that bring our bodies alive rather than contract them.
‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ Now this offers a different perspective many may not have considered….especially when we find ourselves in a dysfunctional family. When we accept wherever we find ourselves in life, including the family we find ourselves in, the space and potential is there for growth and expansion.
Have we noticed how we play out the relationships we have with family, with everyone we have a relationship with? So we take the same pictures we hold around family and impose them on ourselves and others. It is well worth healing old hurts so that we break these patterns
Often when we looked at other families as children others seemed to have that perfect picture. But in reality if we are living to ideals and pictures of what it means to be a family we miss out on learning what we need within our own and how all of our relationships can offer a sense of family.
It is not until we grow older that we discover that some of these perfect families were riddled with their own dark secrets beneath the happy picture they were presenting.
Yes, it is ‘the grass is greener on the other side of the fence’ syndrome – we compare/want what we do not have, regardless of the bigger picture and what we in particuar are here to learn.
There is so much effort to make family look like it’s working when from my experience there is only one family in this world that I could say hands down lives what they present.
It’s beautiful to feel and explore the ‘family quality’ that exists behind every relationship we have. Indeed family is much more than the blood ties…
Every person we meet is a constellation and an opportunity to learn and grow and be more love. Family is part of that as well. Looking at it like that offers a lot of space and lightness for sometimes we need to learn it the ‘hard’ way. It also offers a different understanding of the word family, because actually we are all family and all connected to each other.
There are many great questions you ask here Mary-Louise for us to ponder on, in consideration to our family relationships, because in most families there are some relationships that we think we might not choose, yet those are the exact ones we can learn from.
Yes Gill, there’s often no coincidence in the way we find ourselves with those that surround us in a particular family group… There’s more than meets the eye in our family … the purpose is evolutionary if we choose to see the bigger picture.
We avoid the evolution on offer and do not honour the purpose of family if we choose to stay stuck in victim mode. It is only when we embrace the family we have chosen with all their quirks and the hurts that they are nurturing that we allow these relationships to expand in ways we may never have imagined.
Beautiful Helen, it is true, when I embraced my family it was a beautiful reflection and confirmation of how much I had cleared and healed my own hurts… and when out in the world, I observe how much at ease I am with all others which is a huge shift for me as I always found relationships difficult.
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes this may not look pretty at all?” This really stood out for me as I have been reluctant to see the learning when things aren’t pretty or when it’s seemingly a mess.
Imagine focusing on a pebble in a whole ocean of Love – this is like us making family above all else. You might make your little island but there is so much more on offer in truth. Love doesn’t isolate it connects and integrates.
When we frame our life with pictures of how it should look then we expend all our energy maintaining this facade and avoid the opportunities we are constantly being offered to evolve.
Very true – the pictures that we think we ought to live up to will forever keep us imprisoned. Every picture we carry is taken on by choice and can therefore also be dismissed and let go of by choice.
‘What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence? At what stage do we take responsibility for our lives, heal our past hurts, move on from blame and stand on our own two feet, laying the path ahead with the choices we make?’ I have witnessed the effects this can have on a relationship from close-by and it gives forever excuses to not be responsible for things that happen in life and allows to be reactive to certain situations. A relationship can’t deepen in love and intimacy with irresponsibility and without honesty.
‘We work so hard at keeping everything looking alright on the surface, no matter what is going on behind closed doors.’ To some extent this has become synonymous with families; that they keep things behind closed doors and deal with things internally, putting on a facade. We have the opportunities to all learn from the situations we encounter in families and choosing to ignore them only deepens old hurts and causes more harm to all.
The reticence of families can be explained as it is there because of privacy, but then we only look at the interest of all the individuals and not to the collective This model of family actually should be called inclusive, not open for involvement of others but too, not open to share anything with society therefore consumers of it and too not actively involved to serve society either.
So many significant questions about the way we hold and relate to the concept of family. If any if these points are truly reflected upon and brought to a deeper understanding, it would bring more quality not just to our relationships but pretty much every aspect of life.
If we spent half of the time we currently take to perfect our exterior image – whether this is perfecting the ‘perfect’ picture or perfecting the ‘imperfect’ picture – on our self worth, relationships and purpose in each moment then society would be an extremely different place.
There is so much purpose in what you share Susie about spending time on our self worth and relationships before anything else.
Staying in dysfunctional relationships for the sake of the children is definitely mis-guided because there is no love in an unhappy household. I have seen so many split relationships where both parties have blossomed when they don’t have to live together. It isn’t the same for everyone of course, but it can happen.
Yes and what example you set for children: you have to stay together not matter what? Parents often think that children benefit from them staying together in a loveless relationship, but this is not possible. Children benefit from love and this can also come from a single mum or dad.
Indeed Carmel and Monika. This idea that we cannot leave a relationship ‘because of how it may affect our children’ can be so damaging – how can we be a true role model to our children if we are staying in a relationship that is not true? Kids are so perceptive they will feel the ‘lie’ anyway, so the only people we are deceiving is ourselves.
I feel most of us take our families for granted. Every person within our family is there for a reason and despite their behaviour which can at times be atrocious and unacceptable there is a beautiful person underneath just not aware of how to bring that out in a world that is set up for anything but supporting them to do so.
It’s very easy to blame our childhood or blood family for how our life turns out, but it is very liberating to take responsibility for how we choose to live in adulthood, see what is on offer to learn from, behaviours, patterns in life, ways we have taken on and then change them. So much to learn and evolve from.
“Honouring the Purpose of Family” – is honouring the fact of love and its presence amongst a collection of peoples.
The whole world is our school and our families are one of the major classrooms of life. When we can take a step back from taking it all so personally, it enables us to see the perfection in the constellation and what is on offer to face, heal and evolve, so we can once again return to living in harmony with one another.
Sometimes it seems far too easy to abandon family issues and give up because it all seems too hard but it is like any other sort of issue they don’t go away if ignored.
They most definitely don’t Kev. I’m in a different country to all my family and anything I need to look at or learn from my family is reflected in someone in front of me… always where I’m living.
When we tie ourselves to our blood family are we living on a sailboat that never leaves its mooring?
Do we ever stop and have a look at all the pictures we hold about how family to us must look like and consider the diversity of these of other people. Although I have never done it so no experience, I think when you would look at all the images from a group of people you will not find any duplicates but all different individual created pictures as we have choosen to be individuals and therefore do all create our own lives and associated images too.
And how complicated this makes everything… all these conflicting expectations, often unspoken, creating so much jarring in our relationships.
Yes they do, create much jarring in relationships but when when we deeply connect and allow ourselves to truly feel we find that there is no reason for this jarring or any conflict at all because we all want to be loved for who we are and not for the image we might have created for ourselves.
The problem with living to the ideal of the pictures we hold is that because we all hold different pictures they will never be the same. That said, when we live from pictures and not the truth, we always have to compromise in relationships and are never able to fully connect and have that deep connection from essence to essence that otherwise would be possible.
Photos are frozen moments in time! I’ve never heard anyone say they had a movie in mind of an outcome!
Me either Steve. We tend to make fixtures of our reality while reality is contentious expanding, so never the same and when we make it a fixture, or a picture, we retard in our evolution as we disconnect from that forever expanding stream that life naturally is.
It works both ways, not only what the parents offer children to grow and develop, but children equally evolve parents. If we understood this deeply, all the conscious ideals and beliefs that are adopted and taken on would hold no construct or pillar in ‘family’ .
It’s one thing to say that everyone in our life is there for a reason, another to observe and feel that this is the truth. If we actually do that we can’t possible get angry, dismissive or have a gripe with other people.
When I am with people be it blood family or not and if they are holding me with deep love and respect I can feel a level of holding and I am without question considering them true family. When we are reflected back an openness, love and embracing then anyone can be family.
Blood family is only one part of the story about being family, as that is just a physical explanation about how we are connected. But as you say Natalie, when we understand that we can connect on more delicate and intimate levels with one another then everybody is in fact family and not only the family from the blood line. as that is a picture that we are told family is and is far from the truth of what real family is and means to us.
It completely transforms our relationships within our families when we realise we chose this family to grow and evolve… and it allows us to bring understanding, to not react but to respond to people and situations in a more loving way.
Yes to be open to what we show and offer each other instantly dissolves the defence and reaction.
Our ‘blood’ family is a microcosm of humanity… all that happens within the microcosm will happen in the macrocosm, and therefore how we behave within our own families will be reflected back to us by humanity.
I feel it’s fair to say that out of all our relationships, it is our family relationships that we struggle with the most. And because this is common to us all, we tend to write them off as just being ‘how it is’, rather than looking a little deeper and examining what’s there to be felt, learnt and evolved from.
When we accept the constellation of our family we can see the learning that was on offer, freeing us from blame.
There’s no other group of people that we blame more than our family. Often our feelings of blame, judgement and resentment last a whole lifetime. The effects of this can’t help but spill into our next life. We aren’t ever ‘let off the hook’ energetically, everything must eventually be brought back to harmony.
How often do we blame someone for our day’s misery, and yet, we might as well have missed a great opportunity to understand and learn. –
Thank you both for this awesome article. I especially loved the part about not indulging in past hurts, as I feel that is one of the most liberating aspects of life – to be free from blame.
Our blood family offers us a place to grow and evolve through our relationships. If it can be seen in this way then the fertile ground of evolution is on offer.
We have created a construct of family which actually caps us rather than its true purpose – to support a flourishing from within. The concept of family can keep us in a trap to maintain a persona or a way of being which is everything but evolutionary, everything but who we truly are.
‘What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?’ – Exactly, why is it that so many see it as a failure to break out of a relationship that no longer works or serves? Why do we seem to think that the facade actually works?
Definitely we have to be much more loving with relationships and there natural endings. While we are caught up in right, wrong pictures we are living lies even if the lies look like they are working.
Sometimes it may seem hard to realise that we are not born into our families randomly especially if we have been feeling a victim of what takes place however once we do accept this then we can start to make sense of all that happens and the opportunity we are presented with.
How we are in our families is a micro version of what we have to learn in our relationships with humanity at large in the wider world.
Oh I like that Andrew, it’s very true, shows how important our immediate intimate relationships are.
So much needless stress is placed on keeping up appearances that ironically destroys the picture we are trying to achieve. Gosh, what a burden goes when we drop them. Then we can address what’s needed and without pressure to be anything other than who we are, no pressure on another to be any different either and this is when miracles can happen! Or not, and if not a miracle has taken place because there’s love and understanding there when before there wasn’t.
Writing this, I see the opportunity for acceptance in so many areas of my life where I want to be a certain way and I’m not. Dropping the trying and accepting my choices, hearing what’s really going on for me is a great beginning to understanding. It’s not demanding I get to a destination (that’ll be attached to a picture) as this has caused me great stress and exhaustion.
There are as many ‘should look likes’ as there are people! We each have our own ideas and pictures of how family/sister/brother/parent/grandparent/cousins etc should be – according to our own needs, but very rarely question what is true and what is the purpose. To bring it back to the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are, lets us know the true potential of all our relationships.
I agree Rosanna – there are so many ideals and pictures around family, that get in the way of us being who we are, but that also excuse much abuse.
It is rather sad if we use the society image of how family should look as a way of judging ourselves because we all have different ways of relating and relieving tension, and for some that is in the form of angry outbursts. Understanding the energies at play in family dynamics helps us to understand what is going on and to react less.
“Bringing more awareness to all our pictures and beliefs about family and all the expectations and ‘rules’ in our societies means that we can start to unpack them and live free from them.”
It is through detangling our attachment to these ‘family’ pictures that we become alerted to how insidious these external imposts can be and how over the years they affect our posture and in turn our movements.
Living free of these rules not only empowers us to re-claim our sense of what feels true but equally liberates the bodies alignment to years of untrue movements.
‘knowing we are blessed by everything that unfolds, even if it does not look pretty’ …. this breaks any pictures we have and asks us to go deeper in what we’ve been presented with in life and understand that it’s offering us an opportunity to heal our hurts, to let go of behaviours and ways of being that are not true and to understand that no matter how a situation looks, there can be gold on offer for us if we truly read what is there for us to learn.
Attachments serve us never. Discernment is the key.
What if all our constellations that we encounter with people are indeed opportunities to grow and learn and resolve our hurts?
Yes I agree our relationships are rich with opportunities to grow and develop ourselves as wiser more loving human beings.
‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family’. I can now feel the absolute blessing that my family have offered me. I now deeply love and appreciate my family and have learnt much from my relationships with every person in my family. This feels like a beautiful way to be, rather than being in judgement and blame of each other.
Yes, each relationship shows me so much and in their unique way each is very beautiful even when they are seemingly not! There is always more going on beneath and a connection we cannot deny.
There is often a dishonesty in families where everyone pretends they are getting on well because everyone else looks like they are getting on well too. But underneath there are grumblings and discontent, control and infighting behaviour, but once we are more honest, we can build relationships and all learn and grow.
Opportunities for familial relationships are all around us and our lives enriched when we accept the invitation.
“….. allowing ourselves to explore these ‘what ifs’ opens up the possibility of a whole new way of relating to life, family, relationships and the beautiful, significant and responsible part we can play in all of the above.” I so agree – love the what ifs and knowing about the energy at play and the multidimensionality of all life gives an understanding of what can be going on, not only in families but in all relationships.
Yes, ‘keeping up appearances’ is such a common behaviour in society, but as a counsellor I am regularly shocked by what happens behind closed doors.
“Bringing more awareness to all our pictures and beliefs about family and all the expectations and ‘rules’ in our societies means that we can start to unpack them and live free from them.” There are so many rules about family, the unwritten rules and the ones that mean we put up with anything but truth in our families just because they are family. As a recent advert showed most abuse happens within families.
Absolutely David, in fact we hold the devastating belief that having a family gives us the right to abuse them.
I have up until now very much focused on what it was that I was to learn especially in some relationships within my family more than others but it had not occurred to me that there is also a learning for my family if they so choose, in whatever way, from me. It also is worth noting that the tension I feel is not only within me but is also sensed and felt within them too. There is so much offered to us within family to support us to evolve.
“You can choose your friends but not your family,” – yes, and I used to say this myself until I later realised and upon great reflection and with solid understanding the greater choice that lays in one/us/myself choosing love irrespective of association through family or bloodline. And plus the choice to choose love means your family becomes much bigger too.
It changes everything when we open up to the purpose of family. I love the call to honour this and welcome the learnings that are on offer to us with the family we were born into by design not chance.
Yes Zofia! That’s a glorious consequence of opening up family to encompass everyone ❤️
Being a family member gives us a golden opportunity to learn from issues that arise and grow from them.
Plain and simple the true purpose of family.
Family in some ways may be like dealing with everybody, but more intense and giving us more opportunities to learn.
Families or groups of people in general like to keep everything as it is and do not like any change or to be challenged on its collective behaviours. But this is what we have made families to be and that’s why we still do not allow our families to be the environment where we all can prosper and evolve, that quality of family that it is actually meant to be.
Could it be, that part of becoming adult is to take responsibility for your behaviour and your issues you have to deal with and to not keep blaming the way you are parented? As I experience that children in our current society are not asked to become adult when they are at, let’s say the age of 16, and take their own responsibility for their lives. Instead, they are kept under the protective cloak of the family they’re are from and sometimes stay there for many more years, if not for their whole lives.
“One of the many ills of living with pictures is that they keep us in the isolated,” ways of living that hides the truth about re-incarnation, as we would have to understand our responsibility to incarnate for the true greater good of all humanity and being responsible in this way we have in each incarnation!
These pictures we hold of blood family, hold us the same as the family photographs locked behind glass in a frame and never changing.
We are definitely framed as we are shielded from the lies so the images we receive are unlike the transparency that should be what we openly share in every way so then we can express the energetic truth and that level of sharing can be shared “changing” our lives forever.
STOPPING the “ways of living that hides the truth about re-incarnation”
We choose our family, whether we like that fact or not – and there is no better school, and that includes the good, the bad and the ugly.
Why is it that we tend to tolerate abuse from family but not the same as people outside of our family? I wonder if this is because we tend to treat and see our family separate to everyone else we know, hence the standards are then different.
Chanly I wonder if the answer has anything to do with the fact that our family members can’t ever stop being our family, In that, we know that if we abuse non family too much, then they can simply get up and walk away and so there is an element of adapting our behaviour to keep others close. But we get so lazy and complacent with our family because we know for the most part that they’re not going anywhere. So we end up treating our family members like bits of the furniture.
“You can choose your friends but not your family” is really not true at all if we consider the cycle of rebirth patterns of behaviour and karma. We do indeed choose our family, which offer us a whole heap of circumstance and learning we encounter to evolve.
When we live with true purpose our lives transform … life in truth is not about us as individuals – it is about all of us.
There is a saying i heard ‘you can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family’… however, superficially it may seem correct, but, it is such a reduced view of the greater mechanical, Divine flow and movement of evolution that we find ourselves face-to-face with the very configuration we (yes) asked to face in order to give ourselves the most favourable circumstance to evolve.
We have siloed Love into a comforting hug from ‘those close to us’ when it is a quality of divine joy available with us all. Talk about thinking you’re a pauper when you are a King.
I like what is presented here,
There is so much more to learn and understand about relationships within family dynamics . If we realize this is more about evolution and working through our issues instead of trying to not rock the boat so to speak .There is also so much more to learn and understand when we take into account our karma and choice of being together as a family group.
It’s true, we can break the generational hurts and behaviours that keep repeating by choosing to take responsibility for our hurts and make changes in our lives to heal and move on. If we stay in blame or disempower ourselves as victims nothing changes. There is a greater responsibility here as the healing we can choose is something that is not only for our own life but affects the brotherhood of humanity we live in.
Your list of what if’s is an absolute show stopper. They are certainly questions that I had never considered until I heard Serge Benhayon talk about true relatiohnships and true family and the responsiblility we each have to not hold back the truth of what we know deep within us. So if we honour each other in this way, we really can begin to honour the purpose of family and why we find ourselves in the family unit that we are in.
When we eventually return to seeing the multidimensionality in everything, then this will transform our understanding of family.
Yes, because if we don’t, the way we are in families will stay as it is already for ages and will we not experience the evolving power families can have.
“…we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are…” And this is the case with so many things, not just family. We try to live up to ideals and expectations instead of surrendering to the truth and living from there.
‘What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?’ If we live knowing this, then it could transform our family relationships. I can feel that there would be more acceptance and less judgment of our family and that we could work together to support each other and to evolve.
Family can either be the cradle for growing up as an amazing divine being or it is the snakepit we seek to survive with whatever means that then form our personality and behaviours as an adult. The latter most will be familiar with, the former is rather rare and unknown to most.
And the friends we choose, do we choose them to learn and grow or to stay comfortable.
Equally good question Esther. I’d say it varies. We make judgements just as much on the friends we choose as we do the food we eat for example – knowing exactly how much according to our willingness to pull out of, or stay in comfort.
That is such a great question which I will ask myself from now on and look more deeply at why some people make me feel uncomfortable.
“Knowing we are blessed by everything that unfolds, even if it does not look pretty.” What a great observation and wisdom about every aspect of life. There is a huge level of empowerment available in the understanding that whatever faces us in life has a seed in it, that can assist us to deepen our connection, expand our awareness and know that we have a far greater ability to respond in a way that supports ourself and everyone else, which means a greater responsibility in life.
‘We work so hard at keeping everything looking alright on the surface, no matter what is going on behind closed doors.’ – This seems to be the key focus and something that most of us learn in life, to keep up the facade at any cost, not only in the family but within all areas of life.
This was certainly true in my family and I was told ‘we don’t wear our hearts on our sleeve in this family’ – so it was definitely spelled out to me. It was many years before I learned to ask for support again from others when things weren’t going so well.
We learn so much through relationships, especially those in our families, because we often have things to work through with family dynamics. When we focus on our innate qualities and standards that we hold within, which make us who we are, we hold up a mirror to reflect this to others.
Power-full blog – it is a very intelligent perspective of why to accept the responsibility of the family you reside in. Worth sharing on the internet like you have Mary-Louise. This line should grab people’s attention — “What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?” Should get some tails wagging.
Family can be anyone, it doesn’t have to be the people you are related to, therefore school is like a family and if there is no time for love then the children are deprived and may grow up not loving themselves or anybody.
I love that family can be anyone, this breaks the rule or saying that ‘family is blood’ because when we are connected to our Soul, we can feel without a doubt that humanity is our family. We are all one huge global family.
Why is love, not on the curriculum in schools? How many people leave the schools to raise their children?
‘This is a family’ said my work colleague, talking about our workplace. Families come in all shapes and sizes and the relationships we have everywhere are all reflecting an opportunity for us to develop and evolve.
We can become so enmeshed and entrenched in family dynamics… when lovingly speaking and living our truth can clear and heal so much.
Keeping up appearances is quite the sham… everything is energy and so everyone can see and feel the lie – and yet we continue living the pictures.
So true Paula, and it is exhausting to live in a bubble full of pictures while leaving out transparency, honesty, and truth.
I agree that there are a lot of beliefs about what a family should look like or be like in society and these put a lot of pressure on people to live up to a certain picture or model when the reality and purpose of real family is much deeper than that.
The traps, the hooks, the ideals, the beliefs, the shackles of duty, the tolerance of abuse…the list of forces that we allow within our families is long and very, very oppressive and damaging. Why? Why is there so much in place to make family life so hard, challenging and destructive? Why is there so much negative force directed toward this institution? Is it possible that all of this enormous force is needed to stop it from being the incredible breeding house of power that it can be? If true family didn’t have so much potential as an evolutionary catalyst, then it wouldn’t need so much effort to stop it from being that.
What if…living in families is really challenging and tricky, and we are all re-learning how to do it in truth? Thus, thank you to this blog, this conversation, these comments and the inspiration from Universal Medicine to look under this jolly big rock.
Indeed… perhaps we are all re-learning how to be and live as one universal family.
The key, along this journey of learning, is not to settle for ‘better’. This is what I find very challenging; better can be a very tempting station to stop at.
Yes, they can be very tricky and much of it can be re-learnt.
“You can choose your friends but not your family,” It’s facinating to feel how the energy of this expression, which is so prevalent in most families, would affect everything. For example, imagine sitting down for dinner with someone and them turning to you and saying “I didn’t choose to sit next to you”. Not exactly conducive to a transparent, honest and intimate conversation is it?!
Family does present its dilemmas and problems. I know speaking for myself, I have often avoided family members to avoid conflict and discomfort rather than look at what could be developed and shared.
Same here Rachel, we also either put up with family in ways we would not put up with strangers. How amazing though to change our entire relationship with family to be one of evolution and growth.
‘I have often avoided family members to avoid conflict and discomfort rather than look at what could be developed and shared.’ – Nailed it Rachel, this is common. Could it be that we attempt to avoid the incredible learning that is on offer, if we but care to take a look behind the discomfort.
Agree Rachel. And that avoidance can come in different forms. Playing nice.
Ooh you nailed that one Otto! As a kid, playing nice is something I quickly learned to counter aggression, jealousy and nastiness that came my way. I worked out that if I was nice it lessened the blow. What I didn’t read however, was the sickly quality that came with it and that I lost myself in true expression.
Yes – and also the real evil of playing nice is how it is thus saying ok to the lies; and so it builds a foundation within the family, that then ripples out to the world, that lying is acceptable, that tolerance is a positive attribute.
It also sets us up to accept abuse in families we would never accept at work or in friendships – most will admit to having bad family relationships, disliking Christmas when we are expected to spend time together. The word ‘family’ is used to excuse behaviour that should never be allowed, when family should be defined by love and not only by blood.
“What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?” What a great and thought provoking question this is ladies. If this were taken seriously, and everyone were humble enough to understand it in full and take thier own responsibility for thier own part, what a turn around it would be for all of humanity. Thankyou for posing the question.
I have met many people over the years whose parents stayed together because they believed they had to keep the family united for the sake of the children, or in some cases were expected by those around them to stay together no matter what. And without exception each person has shared that they wished their parents had separated because being in this family who weren’t living the truth was so very hard to do, and affected them in many harming ways.
In truth we are not hapless victims of anything except the consequence of our own choices. What an empowering moment it is when we truly take this on board and begin to pay attention to everything we think, say and do, as therein lies the power to fundamentally alter the course and quality of our lives.
There is so much healing to be had by looking at the dynamics of the families we are assigned to at birth, and to see if we do or have done the same behaviours. What I find interesting is that we can avoid or resent being with family members and yet we have taken on the same behaviours but don’t want to look at them.
This is a great description of what can happen in families when there is no commitment to addressing hurts and evolving together – we live ‘in the isolated, arm’s length disconnection from one another as we all collude in the pretence of ‘keeping up appearances.’
“you don’t get to choose your family” – the perfect ‘woe is me’ story that enables us to wallow in the circulation and festering of family issues. If we accept that we did choose them and also that we chose them for a very specific and perfectly constellated purpose, then we are more likely to commit to the possible evolution that is being offered.
Love what you offer here Otto… responsibility and true purpose.
A superb blog that invites us to see the purpose of family rather than the duty of family.
When we are so specifically placed in families to learn and evolve it is crazy that we wish we could choose another based on an ideal or belief and to seek to find an arrangement where nothing is presented to us to deal with, learn, re-imprint and heal.
In some cultures elders are respected and revered but this gives them free reign to manipulate, abuse and exploit younger family members. When reverence comes at the expense of self there is a price to pay. Not until we reject the notion that we are less because of age, standing or gender can we free ourselves from family abuse and exploitation.
What ifs, allow us to question everything and the way we are living, can assess the cause and effect it has in every relationship we have!
I’ve always found it mad how different family members can be from each other, same parents, same upbringing, schooling etc and yet we can be so chalk and cheese like we are from different planets even. I feel nothing happens by chance and we are there in our families to learn from each other or correct past differences and move on. So this is a great reminder that although the human race is one big family, there is still purpose in our own little family as well.
Family extends way beyond biological connections. I have many families. The client I work for and live with is family to me and I’m considered part of her family. My father lived in a dementia residential care home for eight years until his recent death, staff there became part of our family. Everyone we meet is a member of our universal family.
Family extends way beyond biological connections. I have many families. The client I work for and live with is family to me and I’m considered part of her family. My father lived in a dementia residential care home for eight years until his recent death, staff there became part of our family. True family is not restricted and nuclear but universal and infinite.
Yes it is easy and common to discard our family because they are embarrassing or just not what you yourself want to be associated with. But it is far greater to take it as an invitation to learn and take responsibility for ourselves and the part we play in the family. That does not mean we need to be there all the time and ‘sacrifice’ ourselves but it does mean that we can always be decent and respectful towards them.
Imagine breaking your leg but continuing on imagining everything is fine. Yet this is the reality of how so many of us live in relationships, especially family. It’s so much less pain in the end to admit you are hurt and let yourself begin to heal.
It is interesting to look to the fact that we have choose our family we currently live with and that we have to learn something from it, which of course is for everybody different. But it feels too that we might have chosen this family because it gives us the comfort of living for instance a life in disregard, a life of competition, a life in doing good, a life filled with abuse… etc. A way of life in which we do not have to evolve but instead can stay where we are, or even to dive a little deeper in this life of creation.
That what is on offer with living in families is very much underestimated. We might think that we are the victims or lucky ones to live in the family we do live in and with. But when we look to a deeper level, the more energetic part of it all, then we might observe a completely different picture. Instead of feeling blessed to be born into a wealthy family, you can come to the understanding that there is a huge responsibility in how to deal with this and to spend it purposefully instead of recklessly spending to show off your financial wealth. But too for the one that has born into a poor family there is a responsibility in understanding that life is not only about the financial wealth but more so about wealthy relationships that are filled with love and where the financial wealth will come as a result of living that. These are just some examples that came to my mind and are not examples of how it should be, but more so examples to get the understanding that in every family there is something to learn and heal from.
YES Mary-Louise this question is a real game changer in terms of not being a victim anymore: “What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?” It is such an invitation to get a deeper understanding what is really going for each of us in our family – wonderful!
“What if there is actually no accident in terms of who we end up with in family; that we in fact choose our family for the learning and experience we need this time around?…” This brings such a grand perspective to the meaning of family and really helps one stop blaming, take responsibility, and evolve.
Our choices are the pavers of the path ahead.
Mary-Louise when I read your description of being in a family that is modelled on being ‘acceptable’ and ‘looking good’, I was reminded of my own upbringing. The fact that no one in my family openly expressed their anger, frustration or irritation does not mean that it was not felt by everyone else, on the contrary, we were all swimming in the stuff! But what it did mean is that things never got dealt with and I grew up with the same inbuilt behaviour of trying to keep the outside nicely veneered over, much to the detriment of what was going on in the inside.
There are a million trillion different beliefs that are held in the world but one belief that is common to us all, is our belief about what family means. That’s not to say that we all hold the same belief, because we don’t but it’s to say that pretty much everyone has a belief about what they perceive family to be.
Yes, it totally assumes we’re victims to the circumstance we are born into. But what if who and where we find ourselves is actually divinely placed for us to grow? I understand this is very hard to consider when circumstance is challenging and difficult, but what if each challenge is a God-given opportunity to evolve?
Every house or every person in the world should have this ‘what if’ list to read and reflect on. Great blog exposing that perhaps absolutely nothing is by ‘circumstance’.
Just the title of this blog is enough to stop us in our tracks: honouring the purpose of family – have we ever considered that there is a true purpose of family, and if so, what that is, and what it might feel like? To me, to honour the purpose of family means to understand that family means a whole community; all of us, and to respect everyone equally in it. To treat them with the same amount of love, not more because they might be related to me by blood, or less because they’re a stranger. With honouring, there is a respectfulness, and a humbleness: an acknowledgement that relating to one another as family is a way in which we can build and deepen our relationships.
Eloquently expressed Bryony, for when we establish true family in the way you describe it is a beautiful and joyous experience.
I reckon the reason why so many of us often experience family issues is that we avoid the learning, responsibility, and growth that family offers.
I know exactly what you mean Richard, I have been working on letting go of judgement too and being more understanding when I receive it. The huge weight you are referring to can make us feel very restrictive, compressed and stuck but when we let this go, it feels light and we are free to be who we are. Also, being judgemental kills any form of connection and further cement our separation and loveless ways. Why would we choose to go into it when we can choose to be open, loving and understanding?
“What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, and that sometimes” if not every-time life is giving us the lessons for us to evolve and that includes everyone so our family has just expanded. Wow! Imagine if we all treated everyone as “family” the world would certainly be a different place.
People can often speak with their friends and even strangers in a deeper and more respectful way than they actually do with their blood family and the expectations and burdens that this relationship often brings.
“What if some relationships need to ‘break’ for there to be true learning and development?” I think this one is a cracker and is a key one that stops us from there being true learning and development. Not a relationship as such but I remember working on a project that was going to fall over and I was like ‘not on my watch’ and was going into huge amounts of drive to stop it, and a friend lovingly pointed out, what if it was meant to fall over, what if that was actually everyones true learning? It was incredible food for thought.
It is always a joy to know that family does not have to fit into a box of being nice. I am developing what family truly is, and this is changing all the time. The fact is that we can re-imprint family and make it about the truth, reflecting a different way, and working together.
Ideals and beliefs and the resulting rules and regulations about relationships keep us in a reduced and caricature form of the glory that we could otherwise be living. It is great to support one another to spot these and break their hold on the way we relate to one another. I have found this invaluable with my blood family when it prompted me to drop some false behaviours and deepen the loving ones. In the process I have also been discovering that family is not limited to blood family or the like – a blessing all round.
Yes to that and it begs the question how we could have made life and relationships into the unpleasant, hard and complicated ways we have.
That is true Ester, we tend to make family a burden but then we do not appreciate the evolutionary offering that is presented to us by this specific constellation of people.
Super blog Mary-Louise. I have taught so many kids who feel broken because of the families they come from, The fact that they feel broken just proves that we are all made of love because when we don’t receive it we feel hurt and react in so many ways. Since we all know what love is, is it possible that as kids (karma notwithstanding) that we may be born into a family to support the members of it evolve? Does not then every member of the family have a responsibility to support every other member?
Great point you make here – why do families break people down and give them issues they then spend the rest of their life dealing with or trying to get over when families have the potential to support, grow and build us up?
When I reflect on the quality of family life generally, the dysfunction within them is quite shocking and this is even within families that look good from the outside. So much goes on within the family – it jostles because of everyone’s need to be individual, to be recognised, because of insecurities, jealousies, emptiness, the need of others within the family to service this need etc. This all has a compounding effect because frustration, resentment and bitterness build when each member of the family fails to deliver what everyone is desperately craving, which is simply to be met for who we are without our role hats on. If we understand that we are whole and have a responsibility to bring that whole to everyone around us, but within the family first then the potential springs from there.
There are 7 billion of us on this planet, there are far far more people we never meet than the ones we do, and in that we are born into a collective of people called a family, but what about those ‘random strangers’ we share a bus ride, an office space, or pass each other on the streets? If we are able to appreciate every encounter as a learning opportunity whether that is a lifetime or just a couple of minutes, life gives us a totally different meaning.
‘What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?’ This one is a crucial point for many of us, it is so easy to hold back in order to keep the peace and to avoid a reaction, whereas holding steady can inspire and help pull others up.
“You can choose your friends but not your family,” I am so grateful to myself that I have actually chosen my family by quality first.
By approaching family in a way such as “What if the true purpose of family is to learn and grow” it changes our very relationship with our family.
Absolutely. And if I did in fact choose my family, then why? and what work is there to do? It’s a big wake up call. I can also feel how that purpose then takes me to a deeper love of my family and a stronger understanding of each piece of that family jigsaw.
If we extend our family and live with a new concept that we are all one-big-family then we would be open and trans-parent with every-one, now that would be expansive.
This feels the true understanding and meaning of the blood family we have chosen Mary Louise. I love your list of ‘what ifs’ that turn around all the beliefs we can have about the family feeling dysfunctional, but what if that is the way that it’s meant to be, to learn in this lifetime? There’s an acceptance in this for us all to feel thank you.
And so the myth about ‘Family’ is exposed. What if it is not a random event but a deliberate alignment based on choices, ideals, beliefs and actions we have implemented in a past life that leads us to our families, so we have no choice but to front up the ‘not so pretty’ and in doing so receive the most amazing learning in the process.
Families are so often difficult – we let things happen in family relationships that we’d never allow in friendships or in work relationships. So yes, I hear you loud and clear – there is much learning to be had in our families. And it’s worthwhile remembering that while one party may be ready to change, that learning or change may not always be welcomed by everyone.
As long as we accept that everyone is on their own path, there is always an evolution.
Wise words. And here in lies the trap. Do we stay back, protect and sympathise…or do we walk toward God, irrespective of who may or may not welcome that inspiration?
These expressions (‘can’t choose family’) are often taken as a truth without question – I used to, and probably still do, treat them this way. But it’s important to discern what we hear and what we’re told.
When we realize that sometimes things have to ‘break’ for there to be a true learning it stops us from feeling devastated when we could possibly have done if we were to be holding the picture as true – rather than its breaking being an essential part in learning what is true and what is not. In this way we don’t take it as failure, in fact quite the opposite.
There are so many beliefs and dogmas that come with the label of family. What we can comply with and what is okay not to. In these constrictions we are unable to connect to our true nature and live life from the impulse of the inner heart.
We can often struggle with family members, having family feuds and the like but it is no coincidence we are in our families and there is so much to learn and so much on offer for us to learn and evolve from this learning.
When we struggle with family members it is often because we are resisting the love that is there and we cover it up with issues and drama so as to avoid our connection.
As I learn what true family is, the awareness of what is not true family becomes more apparent, and how much we accept ill and sometimes abusive behaviours from family that we would not ever allow from the man in the street.
If we consider that reincarnation might be a possibility and that we are born into a family in order for us to learn something and evolve then we realise that we are not a victim to circumstance or family dynamics and that we have far more say in how our life is than we at first realise.
Your what if questions are fantastic, ladies, placing the responsibility for our emotional wellbeing squarely back with ourselves and freeing us from the blame culture that is so convenient within family dynamics.
Appreciating our family in terms of what we are here to learn changes the dynamic of what we feel we get trapped into when being around them and we can be more open, more loving and more accepting in every way.
Learning to appreciate all that our family brings to us is paramount to growing and evolving. Family issues may be hard to deal with, but if we can see them as nuggets of gold to overcome, learn from and bring us closer we can unlock the love that is underneath all the hurt and come together in a unified and understanding way.
When we understand that we have a choice in where we choose to be born into, as in our family, it is very difficult to then go into blame. I find this level of understanding supports us to take responsibility for where we are.
What if the way to solve the issues within our families is about making it about the one family we are all from, knowing that our squabbles and dramas affect everyone not just those around us? And in this seeing that there is much great potential we could bring as a family which the world is missing out on.
You can choose your family, as family is nothing you belong for the rest of your life. Family is for me, people I love to be with, because they choose a life of constant reflection and evolution, without perfection, instead of indulgence, comfort and security. This is a family that moves and lives with true joy and I want to be part of.
And, the family you describe is never about the bloodline we were born into as being more important!
Never Steve- in fact I experienced that you can “grow out” of the bloodline family, as you moved on in life and worked and healed what needed to be healed through the reflections that were on offer. It does neither mean that I love the bloodline family less, but there is no attachment or further importance than anyone else in my life. Everything is there to reflect where I still hold back in not stepping into my true power. So everyone I meet is an equal gift.
This understanding that family are chosen for what we need to learn, experience and grow from in this life is a game changer. Rather than railing against the injustice, or not understanding why this… its puts us in a different situation altogether where we can observe the stresses and conflict (or the separation, or whatever plays out) and realise there is something very specific for us to learn from in that situation.
Family has come to mean many different things in today’s world, highlighting that there are many different ways in which we are interconnected, interdependent and can come together to support each other than the traditional model.
The New York Police Department considers itself a family and has a code – The Blue Wall of Silence – by which it means that you NEVER rat on your fellow officers. The Mafia considers itself a family and has a code – The Omertà – which means much the same thing. I have recently been doing a lot of research about these two organisations and studying the deep, deep corruption and abuse that existed within both these families, enabled 100% by these two codes. Blood family is exactly the same; an organisation bound by codes and, thus, a rampant breeding ground for abuse and corruption. Think about it. Think about all the stuff that we do, allow, accept or ignore because it is ‘family’.
I’ve witnessed the wounds and scars inflicted within families with people deeply scarred for life by betrayal, manipulation, and lust for power by the very family they trusted and loved. Unpicking this and understanding what is truly going on for both ‘victim’ and ‘perpetrator’ is not always easy. We are empowered only when able we remove the tinted glasses and see the truth of what is going on.
Love this Kehinde. Your words could so easily have been written about the Mafia or the NYPD, this proving the level of corruption and abuse. Indeed I would go far as to say that it is worse in family because of what you say in the combination of your two comments. It is hidden..and it is accepted…and it is between those that we love. An evil, evil concoction.
This is a great one to nail Otto. There is a dark side to family, hidden from view and accepted within its confines. Time to expose the depth of corruption and abuse that exists within families.
I’ve grown to love family and all it offers. Each time I react, my vulnerabilities are exposed, this brings new awareness of a perceived block and deepens understanding.
“You can choose your friends but not your family,” So perfectly designed to allow us to absolve ourselves of all responsibility – which is so damaging and capping because these relationships are our most intimate and constant in our whole lives and thus the richest of our training grounds.
How do we consider ourselves justified to, or worthy of the right to, parent our children if we have not yet parented ourselves? This has been one of the biggest learnings that I have got from family – it has shown me stuff in myself that I clearly hadn’t resolved or dealt with…and it continues to do so. It is an ever-evolving process and more I get rid of this imposed expectation that I should have it all taped and know what I am doing, then the more supportive. transparent and understanding I become to myself and to the rest of the family.
And that in itself is deeply inspiring for others to feel and observe. There is no perfection but a constant opportunity for learning and unfoldment when we are open to it. Love it.
Each of your ‘what if’s’ brilliantly loosens that chains and shackles that so many of us are bound up by.
‘One of the many ills of living with pictures is that they keep us in the isolated, arm’s length disconnection from one another as we all collude in the pretence of ‘keeping up appearances.’ Reading this I can feel how pointless it is to ‘keep up appearances’, I can feel that It is in the honesty that our relationships can develop and evolve.
What struck me reading this blog is just how much we have grown in our understanding from the teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine because if we were honest none of us knew any of this until Serge Benhayon started presenting back in 1999 what true family looks like and it looks nothing like the pictures we have built around the ideals and beliefs of family.
I know!! What this blog and many of the comments express about family is truly game-changing. The seeds of inspiration are sown – it is now each of our responsibility to water, nurture and grow them so that more and more seeds are produced.
As I come to a place of acceptance and begin to embrace all that is on offer within my family I get a sense of detachment and make my purpose within the family my focus.Everything is constellated and is being constellated to support me and everyone to evolve.
Do we make a storm in a teacup and batten down the hatches to ride it out during family squalls or learn from sliding on the waves as they go up and down?
There is no mistake about anyone who presents in our life. Everyone is there to reflect something quite precise. Whilst we see them turning up as inconvenient or unfair we totally miss the message they are bringing for us to hear.
I agree. Because when that mess has passed there is more space without the ideals, pictures or beliefs and if it so happens that people come together again then it is fine so from a truer foundation of what has been claimed.
A timely read that brings perspective to, and deconstructs the socially assumed idea and meaning of ‘family’, and parenting.
A great aspect you both bring to light here is the embracing and accepting of the family we are born into. And not seeing it as a crux or a blame or an excuse in life to be irresponsible. If we come from the truth of who we know we are and what family means in truth we are able to appreciate the learning and opportunity the family we are born into may present, and even offer for each of us a way of letting go of false untrue ideals, patterns and beliefs around ‘family’. It is also important that we do not carry a picture about how this aspect should look either because sometimes it may be more gathering in nature and other times it may be messy or have breaks in it, however the important thing is that it is true, and allows for truth to be lived. This laying a foundation for the true quality and love and family to be in our society as the norm.
Though I’ve definitely started to appreciate each reflection each family member brings, reading this I can feel there is far more there to be revealed.
Being able to understand, that where we are in life is because of our choices, we are then given the opportunity to see and feel the cause and effect of those choices which will enable us to make different choices if we so choose.
Beautifully expressed Jill, I totally agree and I find this level of understanding is very supportive. It cuts out the possibility of blame and inspires us to take responsibility for all our choices.
This article really turns our beliefs about family on their head. The saying ‘you don’t get to choose your family’ says a lot about the ills that occur in family. But it doesn’t offer the perspective that we choose our family to learn and outgrow old patterns that are not true for us. We don’t like to think that the patterns we see reflected in our families our ones we may have chosen before in previous lives, but this allows us to have more understanding and responsibility for how we then decide to live.
“we choose our family to learn and outgrow old patterns that are not true for us” This perspective of family cuts out blame makes us responsible for what happens within family and puts us in charge; not hapless victims but forever students learning as we go.
Yes this saying reveals that most of us feel the tension of living in families and all the dynamics that come up as a result. But do we see these dynamics as just something to be endured and put up with or can we see them as actually reflecting something back to us for us to grow and develop as human beings?
Family can be a great learning ground once we accept what is presented there and what we ourselves offer, if we make everything about the quality of who we are and not the pictures we think we need to be or have, we are a long way towards living with each other in harmony and as we do … we support and evolve each other to come back to be the love we all naturally are.
Beautifully expressed Monica for to break free of the curse of ‘family’ that has been laid over humanity for centuries is a great learning indeed.
Absolutely Richard… understanding this changes everything about life and the way we live.
In truth, we are one big universal family.
Yes. Family is not held by blood or borders or culture but by quality.
Being attached to a picture or ideal of how we think family life should look gets in the way of us truly connecting with what we can sense is needed and is true in our expression (and is imposing on those around us too), and it makes it seem like there is a ‘perfect’ end point to aim for rather than a continual opportunity to learn and deepen in love.
Family does not mean – living happily ever after- true family means work on yourself and receiving a constant reflection who you are and what you are not choosing to be. Not the paradise-the perfect picture of family that gets sold, where everything is just “perfect”, as no boat gets rocked or get looked deeper. It is a constant review and pulling up each other, which is not comfortable at all, but the only way to arise from the lies of the creation that exist in this world.
Beautiful Richard I really like that and funny enough I was told the same thing by someone else this morning, I think I need to embrace this teaching!
I don’t even feel I have scratched the surface of the amount of insidious pictures I have around the shoulds in life especially in relationships be that family or work etc. The patting on the back if something goes well to fit the picture totally obscuring if indeed what has occurred is loving or true.
Equally for me, and often totally missing the point of the situation that arises, the opportunity that lies within rather than the inconvenience of that situation from my being comfortable.
Since I re-connected to the fact that the true purpose of family is to learn and grow, it totally changed how I view me and my family. It dropped resentment and blame and opened me up to a whole new way of looking at my circumstances.
It detaches also from belonging to any kind of blood family. The moment we heal our hurts and what got reflected through the family we have chosen to come into this life, the feeling of belonging fades away. It gets revealed that it is our choice/ alignment to what “family” we want to be part of.
I hear that particular saying a lot and have never really given it a great deal of thought. But it’s true what you say about offering us a point where we can stop and question it much more deeply, for the saying itself is not true. I can feel the avoidance of the responsibility that is available in all of our relationships, which we all choose. There is learning in everything for all of us.
Same for me Jennifer, I hear that saying a lot too and it often comes with a blaming energy. But when we are open to seeing that we do have a choice in life and where we are, I find this can potentially change everything.
Is family our number one value (no matter what the quality the members live with each other) or do we have qualitative values that we then apply to family and make it the standard of how we want to be as and in family?
How often do people expect from life to deliver something great to them to then say: I have a great life and I am loving it. If something happens that does not fit that measure, you get called cursed or being someone with a lot of bad luck etc …What if the many challenges and moments that are not so easy to handle are the greatest gifts we get offered to grow with its revelations, to eventually realise that nothing can make us more happy than being ourselves in everything that we do.
“What if as parents we stay in dysfunctional and unhappy relationships ‘for the children’ because the world says that two parents together are better? And from the adult role models in their lives, what does this teach children about relationships, integrity, truth and love?” It communicates that it is ok to suffer being unhappy, denying your feelings and enduring situations that are not self- loving. And we think, we do something in the name of the child, when in fact we abusive ourself and in effect the child.
This totally calls us to take responsibility in how we are with ourselves and others. That we can always reflect and look at our role and what we are bring to our relationships.
Very good point. This breaks the idea that we have to have it all together and be responsible at work etc but let everything go in the home with the ones we live with. Everyone deserves a true reflection from each and everyone of us and it is our responsibility to be that with everyone in and out of the home.
We can learn from each other, when we let each other in – as we are all family. Lets learn what we can learn.
So many great points here about the way we reduce, limit and trap ourselves with ideals and beliefs about family.
I have been reflecting how the greatest level of human expansion happens in relationship, and in our earth existence the blood family, or equivalent, is the most immediate access to relationship most of us have. It is an opportunity offered to us on a platter to learn, expand our understanding and awareness, heal issues, deepen our level of responsibility as well as how to live in oneness and true support of one another. Even when what we see is the exact opposite of all of this, it will be a perfect reflection of all that we still need to learn, heal and embrace in pretty much all areas of life.
Yes, beautifully said, Richard, life then starts to make a lot of sense.
If we embrace the learning that is presented to us through the mere fact of living and working together there is much to be gained.
Much to be gained from every moment, every interaction, every person in life. Seeing life from this view makes life about opportunity and expansion, and not something we drag ourself through.
I agree, we have made life the opposite of what it offers us to be.
‘we are more likely to be open to the learning on offer’ this is true when we understand the true purpose of family and appreciate the numerous reflections that are offered to us every day by our siblings, children and parents. And we can extend the word family to include everybody we know.
“The key point of devastation here is the simple fact that we are living beholden to external rules, rather than the innate qualities and standards that we hold within which make us who we are.”
Now in this statement I find the trap that I for one was caught deeply in. The feeling of degradation, disappointment, dissatisfaction and sense of given up that is felt when we live to outside rules and ignore our qualities is a world wide reality. Could believing this is how we have to live is behind so much domestic violence, depression, substance abuse and checking out on screen time? Our qualities are desperately needed, let’s live them with grace and honour.
When we right our relationship with ourselves, we right all our relationships – whether that is with family, friends, work colleagues, the shop assistant – it includes everyone.
“What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value…” Holding steady to what we know is true is foundational for our evolution.
Family sure does come with its own dynamics and learnings – and we have been sold the American dream of a nice big house and a happy bunch of people who get on well. But what is shared here is that in family – it is a group of people who have the ability to come together and learn from one another. And presenting a happy picture does not actually ask us or any other family to evolve.
This can be really challenging for us, “What if blaming our adult behaviour on experiences from childhood is a futile and irresponsible indulgence?“ However if we stop for a moment and reflect it is super empowering to stop blaming and playing victim and choose to arise ourselves. This is true unfettered freedom.
It is a milestone and very empowering for an adult to realise that you don´t have to react like a child anymore, as you can handle any similar situation, that used to be very hurtful, totally different as an adult.
What you write applies to so much of life and not just family. We have all these ideas about things but the truth is very different and much more simple.
True. The moment we have a picture of ‘how it all should be’, we have already removed ourselves from how it actually is.
What you say is so true and so simple as truth always is. Amazing how hard we work to make things complicated and then wonder why we get exhausted!
Great blog in exposing we are in fact not the victims of life but choose our life and therein get the opportunity to learn the lessons we need to truly expand and evolve to who we truly are. In truth the world is our family .. we are all one. And to add to this, what if we are in fact the ones that choose our own name and this gets passed to our parents rather than the belief that our name is chosen for us! There is so much truth we either do not want to feel or hear, or currently as humanity are unaware of.
It feels like the pictures we have around families are what keeps us stuck in the false roles and ideals, which feel deeply uncomfortable, but are what we have normalised and accepted for the most part as ‘how things are’ and what family means. As we start to get more honest about the roles we play and our own pictures and investments in family, the pictures start revealing themselves in more intricate detail. The choice then to either keep perpetuating these pictures or to express what we actually feel then becomes more apparent – and so do the consequences.
Some great points here for consideration. We do tend to ‘accept our lot’ and groan about it instead of seeing our situation as an opportunity for growth. It feels amazing when we turn this around. It’s very empowering.
The idea we have of family – of ‘loved ones’ who are close is a lie. The true family we are part of is human kind. It’s crazy we’ve turned the people close to us into our whole world when they are just another member of the human race we have potential to evolve with.
It’s great to ask the ‘what if’s’ around family, Mary Louise and bust through some of the things that truly hold us back from building great relationships within our family units.
When we come to the understanding that we choose our family it suddenly blows apart all the old generational and very ingrained beliefs we have lived with, usually without question. The blaming of family for everything that is ‘wrong’ in our lives would be the first to go, as would the belief we can treat our family any way we feel to as they will put up with it because ‘we are family’. How families and the world around us would change if just these two beliefs were totally dismantled.
Love the list of ‘what ifs’. So many pictures and expectations exist around family that do not truly support healthy and vibrant relationships.
A great post – thankyou both. “We work so hard at keeping everything looking alright on the surface, no matter what is going on behind closed doors.” So true, Born in the 1950s never was this more true for myself and my peers. And still prevalent today – not only in families but in organisations. ‘Don’t wash your dirty linen in public’ was a phrase commonly used to keep less palatable truths from leaking out. What does that say about integrity?
“What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?” I can very much relate to this May-Louise and Matilda, making the switch from accepting what is considered by current norms as the correct or right way, yet know within myself that it is absolutely not the true way, and from this awareness make the next move.
Great to expose the myths behind families and the strong Ideals and beliefs of what a family should look like. This is the first stumbling block, we are so held in making families look good, the outer appearance that we are willing to cover up and ignore things that should be spoken about. When we understand that families are for us all to learn and expose really old patterns that have held us back for life times, then it becomes much easier to embrace the family we are born into ‘warts and all’ as they say.
One of the joys of making inroads into busting my own pictures has been that I can relate to others more openly – that arm’s length disconnection from one another is dissolved when there is no ‘keeping up appearances.’
What if the parents didn’t ‘know it all’ and children are equally wise and should be involved in making choices about the family? Or what if children can help maintain the household rather than being moaned at or resented for not helping out? What if a family is not just blood related but can be equally strong with flat mates? There is always ‘what if’s’ that question the status quo and exploring them, exploring the energy underneath it all, rather than resisting them brings much needed change to that which doesn’t work.
Life is not a roulette game where at the mere spin of a wheel we end up in a random place unbeknownst to us. It is a carefully orchestrated schema that adheres to a very specific and highly attuned universal order that ensures we are each placed precisely where we need to be in order to learn what is there to be learned from the landscape we find ourselves in and those that inhabit it alongside us. The more we honour this simple truth, the more we speed up our evolution back to the truth of who we are. That we do not yet all see it this way is indicative of the steps we still need to walk and the ultimate responsibility we each need to eventually embrace.
Yes… where we find ourselves and the situations we are in have all been of our own making – each one of us is responsible for the life we currently have… and in every moment we can make a different choice.
There are so many ideals and beliefs around family, relationships and how everything should be. So often we put so much pressure on them wanting to be a certain way and look a certain way that we miss out on deepening the quality of love and relationships we have right in front of us. We can learn something from everyone and so often our family members bring up and trigger a lot for us to look at and learn from, not only because we spend a lot of time with them but also because whether we want to accept it or not we chose to be with them for a reason, and that reason is to be and live more of the love that we are. Yet so often we see families as dysfunctional and doing the very opposite thing.
As I break free from the beliefs and ideals that have kept me locked in behaviours that have not supported me, I can sense what it means to ‘stand on my own two feet, laying the path ahead’ with the choices I am making and to keep going not allowing any self-doubt or victim hood to get in the way. We can come up with many justifications to not get on with life and our relationships within family can be certainly one of those many excuses to delay and not commit to what is being asked of us.
One of the biggest lies about family is that family is only related to blood or through bloodline. The only thing family is about is true love. And the evolution of that love, irrespective of “blood”.
The family model as it currently stands is sorely due for a much needed review and overhaul as the way we are within our families often leads to so much abuse and heart ache that domestic violence inevitably stems.
The common picture we hold of what family means is one of the most, if not the most, imprisoning of all the different pictures that limit the full expression of ourselves.
I love the understanding that we choose our family, whether we are aware of this or not. Knowing this does indeed free us from being victims and allows us to get to know our family of origin in a whole new light.
I am aware that this judgement can remain even when we think we may have dealt with or ‘got over’ issues which were present earlier in life with family. Amazing how family can shape us through our choices until we choose otherwise and go back to understand the root cause of the judgment and why it is there.
“What if we all have the responsibility and wherewithal to hold our own and stay steady to what we know is of true value, whatever the world or others might be saying?”
I had experience of this recently in a work situation, there was no way I could possibly join in with what was being asked of the sales team, the thought made me feel sick. The only thing I can do is to stay strong and steady no matter what the circumstances that are being presented.
‘If we can accept and embrace the family we are born into, then this forms the foundation of our relationship with family and we are more likely to be open to the learning on offer, knowing we are blessed by everything that unfolds, even if it does not look pretty.‘ Wonderfully stated here. It gives space to receive what there is to feel and learn without pictures and how it should look like, be or unfold. Just be in the midst of the unfoldment with loving observation.
It totally changes everything when we know what true family is about.
Yes, and it can be very confrontational – I’m not sure how ready the world is to accept this truth.
Mary-Louise and Matilda, I love what you are both sharing in this article; ‘knowing we are blessed by everything that unfolds, even if it does not look pretty.’ What you are sharing makes our relationships about learning and evolving and reading this I can feel the true purpose in our relationships, rather than staying in relationships for comfort or security.
When I read this blog my whole life and evolving relationship with family came into focus. From a woman trapped and weighted down by tendrils and expectations of family, to a one enriched by the opportunities offered within family to heal, become wise, open and accepting. The world is in fact family in micro. In other words right our relationships within family and we’re on our way to do the same in life.
Yes kehinde2012, our relationships within family are a reflection of our relationships in the world. Very often we can react to family and run away yet what we are running away from is exactly what we are to learn and master. Master the relationships living true love within family sets the foundation for true love in every relationship we encounter in the world.