WORK IN PROGRESS
THE Personal Effectiveness E-zine
October 2005 Learning from Family Patterns
Tomorrow I will be teaching a class on the creation of genograms. A genogram is pretty much a family tree, except that its focus is on specific patterns of behavior. In the context of the course of which this class is a part, the focus will be on substance abuse, because the class is for students who plan to become addictions counselors. However, genograms can focus on any behavior, and we can learn a lot about both ourselves and our families when we create them. We can learn to understand better. We can see more easily what is so easy for some to forget - that not only were we at least partly shaped by our parents, but that they, too, were shaped by theirs and so on back. We can see patterns that we might choose to avoid, and gain a greater understanding of patterns that we have followed, sometimes without even knowing why.
I now understand why my father was so concerned about being "proper" as we grew up - something that caused considerable friction when I was in my rebellious teens. He had worked so hard to overcome a background in which little was expected, a background where education was not valued, and where most of the aunts and uncles sought little more than lives as domestic servants. I have one of my father's school notebooks in which he worked a math problem. For purposes of learning to calculate volume the exercise involved calculating how many cubic feet of manure would be needed to cover a field of a certain number of acres. That is what was expected of him, that he would become a farm laborer. Indeed, one of his first jobs was as that but, by hard work, by taking courses, by working to correct his "uneducated" accent, he became the person he wanted to be. In World War II he attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, something that rarely happened in those days if one did not have the benefit of "the old school tie." Now I understand his distress - he saw our youthful rebellions against propriety as steps backward down a path along which he had labored long and hard.
Another example - is it coincidence that I live over three thousand miles from the country of my birth? Or is there a connection with the fact that of my mother, my aunt and my uncle, my mother was the only one who stayed in England? My uncle established a dynasty in New Zealand, and my aunt died in India. Going back a further generation, is it a coincidence that among my grandmother and the other five siblings of that generation, all raised as children of a church minister in a sleepy rural village in England, only two stayed in England, although three of the others eventually returned? Is it a coincidence that my own daughter lived for over five years in the Orient?
I have to thank the Girls Scouts for setting me on this path. In 1976 in celebration of the Bicentennial, they created some special badges designed to connect with history. One of them involved learning about one's ancestors. In helping my Girl Scout daughter with this task I became hooked on genealogy, and to this day it takes up more time than it should.
You may have no interest in genealogy. (My mother used to shrug her shoulders when I raised the subject. "They're all dead," she would say. "What difference does it make when they were born?") However, my suggestion is that you start asking questions about events, patterns, behaviors. What can you find that links you in the chain of existence? That might explain things that you have wondered about, or even that you have never thought about. Some of my friends do a double take when I mention ancestors because of the time involved. You see, looking at the pattern of child-bearing in my mother's line, the average age of marriage of the last four - that would be my mother through my great-great-grandmother - was almost 29. The average age that they had their first child was almost 30, and the average age that the four women were when they had their last child was 40. So in this family two generations cover a time that is covered by three generations in many families, which often leads to confusion when I talk with friends whose families all started their families much earlier.
I know, none of these details are likely to be of interest to anyone who is not connected. I am simply using them as examples with which I am familiar, so as to demonstrate the extent to which family patterns may continue to play out even if we are not aware of it. The extension being that I believe that you, too, may find some insights into your own family if you begin to ask questions.
Some people fear to ask about family, because perhaps there may be skeletons. Somewhere in one of my lines the record shows that, after one twig from the family tree headed to Mexico in hopes of making his fortune, the records later showed a "notorious gunfighter" in Mexico, perhaps balanced out by the fact that his sister was a Mother Superior of a Convent! Skeletons in the family don't reflect on you, they reflect only on the people involved. We do not need to be ashamed of mistakes made by others, even if we do share their genes. Genetic heritage does not set our course for us, for we are creatures of free will. In fact, knowledge of our genetic heritage can guide us as to where we need to be perhaps more careful than some others need to be. There is sometimes a genetic component to alcoholism, but it does not predict that any individual will become an alcoholic - only that s/he may need to be a little more careful in consumption of alcohol than are some other folks.
Who in your family is the holder of the memories? You have no idea how many questions I wish I had asked my father before he died, or even his mother who, the last of my grandparents, died when I was a child. Ask them, while their memories are still available to you. Much may be revealed!
(I do understand that this piece may be frustrating to those of my readers who were adopted, and who do not know their antecedants. I apologize for any distress this may cause, but I feel that there are so many people who may benefit from tracking their family patterns that I should not withold this. If you are seeking, then I wish you luck in your search for the families connections that you are presently missing.)
[In the 1880s, when she was in her mid-twenties, my grandmother, that daughter of a rural Vicar, trekked for six weeks through Kashmir with a brother and younger sister. She kept a diary, which is in my possession. For years I have wondered what to do with it. It seems a shame that it should be hidden away, and yet it covers no historical insights, no high drama, and I have not known what to do with it. Today I have decided that I will transcribe it at my blog, piece by piece as I have time. You will find it at http://blog.choicecoach.com/ - but not today because it is Halloween, and there is candy to distribute!]
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