This weekend will probably mark the final family reunion cookout
and/or gathering of the summer season. In all actuality, it is difficult to
hold a family reunion when there is no union within the family. Along with the cookout, your gathering will probably
experience fallout. No matter who you are, how old you are, how much money you
have, where you live, or where you work, you are part of a family filled with
many dysfunctions and plenty of issues. But don’t despair; you are not alone! The
family you have always thought was perfect has been perpetrating perfection; in
other words, living a fraud of perfection!
Isn’t it amazing that just when your family gets together for food
and fun, all hell seems to break loose? If family members aren’t verbally
fighting, they are physically fighting or close to doing so. Love and forgiveness
seem to be the exception, rather than the norm. Unfortunately, with the mixture
of alcohol and hidden emotions about past atrocities, and other unresolved
‘stuff,’ the family cookout/gathering serves as the breeding ground and the
main stage for telling each other off, cursing each other out, getting in each
other’s face, pointing fingers, exposing secrets, and inviting family members
to places none of you want to go yourselves. All of a sudden, you look around
and your fun gathering with family becomes a time of mess filled
with stress.
The
cookout or other gathering tends to bring your simmering family issues to a
boil. It seems that all of the negative things that you thought should not be
said are amplified at the cookout. Everybody seems to become brazen and bold.
But the reality is, for many family members, it seems easier to talk trash and
act a fool when there is an audience. The family secrets that have been hidden
away for years and sometimes decades are no longer secrets. Forget it…they become weapons! There is
nothing like a secret-throwing family gathering. Love and forgiveness are out
the door, while blame and animosity take their place.
Your
family matriarch (Maw Maw) and patriarch (Pawpaw) often sit helplessly as the
mess is stretched like a giant rubber band, up, over, and around them.
Unfortunately, it is Maw Maw and Pawpaw who have probably perpetuated a lot of
the mess your family continues to experience. Even though you don’t want to
blame your elders for many of your family ills, they most certainly contributed
to them. There is no disrespect to them, but they are usually guilty culprits who
have pretended that your family does not have any issues, and does not have
secrets or ills. As a matter of fact, you probably watched them hold onto petty
stuff surrounding other family members. They have carried unhealthy secrets
like women carry babies. They have been so pregnant with the truth that at the
first sign of dissention within your family, the secrets are born.
However,
no matter what the situation or circumstance, it is time for you and your
family to learn to love each other unconditionally, as you’ve never loved
before. And if you all had love in the past, it is time for you all to learn to
love gain, unconditionally. But you must remember, with love comes forgiveness.
And
there is no problem with families having issues; all families have issues. There
are NO perfect families! All families are dysfunctional. There is also no
problem with your family holding secrets. However, when the secrets are toxic
to your family, and to the growth, survival, and overall sustainability of
individual family members, there is a grave problem!
Expecting
individual family members, who are made different by the creator to coalesce
with each other, without having issues, is like believing the sun won’t shine.
Aside from the unhealthy secrets held by members of your family and used as
weapons by many of them, another major issue contributing to family ills is your
family members not allowing each to be him/herself.
Along with the aforementioned issues contributing to family
ills and friction are issues of jealousy, insecurity, fear, and hatred that
have been brewing for years. As the rocks and stones of hurtful words and
disparaging looks are hurled at each other during your family gathering, all
sense of reason and care for each other seem to dissipate. The expected cookout
of gladness is now replaced with a fall out of madness.
You
must come to grips with the fact that your family’s blow up, blow out, or fall
out at the cookout or other family engagement didn’t start there. This stuff
has been harbored and brewing in the recesses of the minds and the hearts of
the family members who ‘let the cat out of the bag,’ for quite some time. They
begin to grandstand and are egged on by the audience of other family members and
silent supporters in the room or outside at the cookout. But enough gets to be
enough! It’s time for family members to begin the healing process by first
admitting they have problems. They must be willing to confess their feelings, agree
to work together in order to stop the mess, and pull out all stops to eliminate
the stress!
However, if your family is not willing to step up to the
plate to stop the madness and finally deal with their issues, YOU have to be
the bigger person and get the ball rolling! Someone has to do it; and who is
better than you?! You will become the first model for your family in showing
love and forgiveness. Unfortunately, if some members decide to continue the
mess, it means that there will be several family members less at the next
gathering!
Steps to healing your family ills with love
& forgiveness:
- Admit that the
family has problems.
- Each family
member lists their concerns about other family members; why you carry angst
when dealing with them.
- Stop playing
the blame game.
- Look at the
thumb pointing back at you instead of the finger pointing at your family
members.
- Accept
individual and family imperfections and difference.
- Uncover family
secrets by talking about them in a private setting and not during
gatherings. Remember, skeletons will eventually rattle if meat is not
placed on them. Finally remove the skeletons in each of your closets one
by one.
- Confront your
fears and family fears of healthiness and wholeness as a family.
- Use your “I”
messages to give feedback to family members.
- Learn to speak
in the positive instead of the negative; see the glass as half full
instead of half empty when dealing with family members. Learn to see and
focus on the good in them, instead of the bad about them.
- Practice
saying ‘I love you’ to your family members and mean it!
- Practice using
positive and healthy touches, such as hugs and pats on the back.
- Make up your
mind to love, forgive, and release the family members you are troubled by
or with.
- For each of
the issues you listed in number two above, list what it will take for you
to forgive the family member who has crossed you. And if you need to be
forgiven, list what and how much you are willing to do in order to be
forgiven.
- If you and
your family have difficulty confronting and managing your issues, Bring in
a professional to help you all to engage in a family intervention.
You and your family will never be
totally free to just be, until you learn to love each other and forgive each
other…UNCONDITIONALLY! I know YOU can do
it!
©2015; J. Morley
Productions, Inc.; P.O. Box 1745, Decatur, GA 30031; www.doctorjoyce.com; 770-808-6570
