The family of origin has a very great impact on a person's growth. Even to some extent, it will affect your three views, way of doing things, and form your own values and outlook on life.
In other words, your choice of career, choice of friends, and choice of mate are more or less inseparable from your native family.
What is a family of origin
We have two homes in our lives. One is the home we grew up in, with mom and dad and maybe siblings. The other is the one where we grow up and get married and start a family, and we call our first home the original family.
◎ What kind of influence does the original family bring us?
Parents' temperament, style of life, family environment, etc., will be subtly copied to the younger generation to imprint. The original family brings us both positive and negative effects.
1. The family of origin affects our ability to express and receive love
There was a paragraph that was very popular on Weibo before:
"I have always felt that a child with a good family atmosphere is lucky, he has seen what good feelings look like, has a keen sense of healthy love, and easily runs in the right direction."
Because I know to run in the right direction, I always live happily, always make different friends, and then get more warmth and love from different people.
So, what about children who grew up in a couple relationship of improvisation, cold war, quarrelling?
"Not knowing what's good, it takes a lot of effort to kick away the bad ones. It takes many years to hit a wall to know which path is right. ”
They were not lucky enough to enjoy more protection and affection, but endured indifferent violence. As a result, he became independent but insecure, behaved carefree, and was full of holes in his heart.
For example, a very beautiful girl with excellent character and learning, when looking for a partner, always looking for a boy with much worse conditions than herself, getting along for a while, and it is difficult to force herself and break up; And when she is looking for a job, she will also feel that she is too poor to be worthy of those good high-paying positions; In the unit, I don't dare to make demands, and I always feel that I don't deserve it.
2. Influence intimacy
1
Some people grow up in cold families, have witnessed parental discord and father's derailment since childhood, feel that marriage is terrible, and are used to turning away all intimate relationships, even if they meet someone they like, when they think of family and parents, they will silently tell themselves: "Forget it."
2
In real life, many people will find themselves strikingly similar to their parents' marital status.
One woman found out after marriage that her father-in-law, husband and son behaved almost exactly the same in the marriage, they were all very macho, and they all blamed and controlled their partners. And the women in the family are the same, all fawning over their husbands and swallowing their anger.
3
Some young people, although they enter marriage, are still controlled by their original family, which is more common in one-child families.
For example, the mother-in-law interferes in the life of the little couple in every possible way, or some mothers-in-law also take care of the housework of the little couple or even raise children instead of the little couple, this impact is also very painful for young people.
3. Affects self-esteem, mood, personality and behavioral habits
Parents are grumpy = I often have trouble controlling my temper
My parents' personality is extremely multifaceted = I have an eccentric personality
Hardly received any praise = inherently inferior, even if you are already on the level of excellence
Growing up feeling often overlooked = severely flattering personality who wants the world to like him
One woman found out that because she played the role of a "domestic servant" (taking care of household chores, taking care of younger siblings; In order to allow her parents to go to work and her younger brother to go to college, she only read elementary school and did not continue school), so she often fell into the mode of humiliation in important friendships and intimate relationships. She wasn't married, and she was disoriented, not knowing what to do.
One man found it difficult to break the habit of going to the bar for a few martinis every three or five days. He found himself in this habit all because he followed the conventions of his father and grandfather.
A woman always speaks quietly because her family forbids her to speak too loudly or be too conspicuous when she was a child. She also did not dare to ask her boss for a raise, because it would attract "special attention" from others.
Many clients who grew up with "cautious parents" found that the older they were, the more afraid they were of taking risks in money, the workplace, and in intimate relationships.
Men and women who grow up in families that are not allowed to express strong emotions, positive or negative, have a hard time understanding their feelings, and certainly less expressing them.
People who are affected in their original families are often very eager to eliminate traces of the past at the first time.
For example, some people want to escape all this by fleeing their families (such as going to school abroad, going abroad, etc.), but find that it leaves a mark in their hearts, those conditioned reflexes, attachment patterns, values, those painful and lonely memories... They never left themselves.
In addition, although a person is very eager to "rewrite the past", he unconsciously tends to involuntarily repeat some traumatic experiences of his early years.
"Compulsive repetition is a psychological phenomenon in which an individual repeats a traumatic event or circumstance, including constantly recreating a similar event, or repeatedly placing himself in a situation where a similar trauma is highly likely to reoccur."
For example, a child who has been humiliated because of him, when he becomes an adult, he will continue to unconsciously create similar scenes that have been humiliated, and then will be humiliated again;
A child who used to be unable to receive good care because his mother was depressed, when he becomes an adult, he will constantly associate with suffering women, thus constantly repeating those painful experiences when he needed to constantly care for his mother, etc.
No one wants to let themselves repeat those painful experiences all the time, but the subconscious mind will lead them to repeat those pains again, and it will be difficult to escape from those experiences without help.
So, how to get rid of the restrictions brought by the family of origin?
◎ 1. Recognizing the influence of your family of origin on you, this is only the first time in your life to grow.
Parents can only accompany us for an hour of life, we must first understand that we are the one who accompanies us throughout our lives, childhood determines the quality of life at the beginning of our lives, but growth is something we ourselves will accomplish in our own lives.
As adults, we are separated from our original family, and we need and are fully able to control our own consciousness and life, which is also an important factor in determining whether we can completely get rid of the negative impact of our original family.
People will encounter a large number of people and things in their lives, and these will affect our character to a greater or lesser extent, help us grow, and rewrite our lives.
The further you go back in life, the more you will find that your parents will have less influence on you.
◎ 2. Acknowledge that the family of origin has its own limitations.
Acknowledging our hatred, love, anger, shame, pain, frustration and other emotions about our native family is the first step to reduce the negative impact of our native family on us.
Parents are also ordinary people, and they are also first-time parents, they can't bring you a good native family, probably because their parents didn't bring them a good native family.
Parents have their own limitations, as well as the limitations of the times, do not let the tragedy of parents re-play in their own body, so as not to cause "forced repetition" passed down from generation to generation.
◎ 3. Take a more open view of early life experiences.
In fact, the negative experiences of growing up do have a profound impact on us, but not just negative effects. An unfortunate experience is not always devastating, it can also have many positive effects on people.
Recognizing this can help us think more about the benefits of our family of origin to ourselves, rather than immersing ourselves in collapse.
Can you think about the ways of thinking and behavior that you inherited from your native family, and do they help you grow or hinder your growth? Is there a better way? Although the process of reflection can be painful, the gains are certainly very great.
◎ 4. Find help from psychological counseling
Once you become aware of some self-limiting behaviors, thoughts, and patterns, you can choose to empower yourself to learn and change.
Learn to accept the way different people think and behave, and understand why they do what they do. If you have a newborn family, you can also get to know each other's native family and understand each other more.
Clarify what your current state is like when you are negatively affected, imagine what your ideal self is like, and then think about ways to change from the present moment to the ideal state.
In this process, it will be more effective to find a counselor and give guidance and feedback in a timely manner.
In a safe counseling relationship, counselors can explore the causes of your entanglement and pain, and can also take you to re-experience the process of interacting with parents in the early years, gaining new experiences and understanding. As a clearer understanding is gained, various compulsive repetitive behaviors can be successfully reduced.
Guangzhou Psychological Counseling Conclusion:
Some patterns and rules inherited from the family of origin may have been necessary in the past, but may now only impose restrictions on themselves.
If you want to have a better life than your native family, try to jump out of the shackles of your native family and actively absorb a better way of thinking and lifestyle.