Family Relations
Nature Girl
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: By The Lake
Posts: 60,328
Family Relations
Sunday, July 8, 2007
You are reading from the book Touchstones
He was shut out from all family affairs. No one told him anything. The children, alone with their mother, told her all about the day's happenings, everything.... But as soon as the father came in, everything stopped.
--D. H. Lawrence
Many of us men are on the outer edge of our family circles. The closeness between our children and our wives often seems more comfortable, more intimate than our relationships with them. Perhaps it's similar to the closeness we had with our mother while our father was outside. It is painful to us and probably not entirely our own fault. We were taught that our main job was outside the home - supporting our family by earning a living. But it is up to us to change the situation.
Many of us learned from our own father that grown men stay aloof from emotional relationships, but this has hurt our relationships and alienated us from the people we most care for. Learning to know our feelings and how to express them helps us move into the family circle of intimacy.
Today, I will let go of my aloofness with my family so they can know me better.
From Touchstones: A Book of Daily Meditations for Men ©1986, 1991 by Hazelden Foundation.
You are reading from the book Touchstones
He was shut out from all family affairs. No one told him anything. The children, alone with their mother, told her all about the day's happenings, everything.... But as soon as the father came in, everything stopped.
--D. H. Lawrence
Many of us men are on the outer edge of our family circles. The closeness between our children and our wives often seems more comfortable, more intimate than our relationships with them. Perhaps it's similar to the closeness we had with our mother while our father was outside. It is painful to us and probably not entirely our own fault. We were taught that our main job was outside the home - supporting our family by earning a living. But it is up to us to change the situation.
Many of us learned from our own father that grown men stay aloof from emotional relationships, but this has hurt our relationships and alienated us from the people we most care for. Learning to know our feelings and how to express them helps us move into the family circle of intimacy.
Today, I will let go of my aloofness with my family so they can know me better.
From Touchstones: A Book of Daily Meditations for Men ©1986, 1991 by Hazelden Foundation.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: NSW
Posts: 2,907
Hello Ann,
Inside my family is the hardest place to try and work the program. Patience and tolerance is sometimes hard to come by. It's getting better though, a day at a time. I have real relationships happening now and I do appreciate all their little idiosyncrasies.
And they in turn tolerate mine.
Inside my family is the hardest place to try and work the program. Patience and tolerance is sometimes hard to come by. It's getting better though, a day at a time. I have real relationships happening now and I do appreciate all their little idiosyncrasies.
And they in turn tolerate mine.
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