4 posts tagged “murray bowen”
I haven't started that Murray Bowen book yet. Mostly because I have a paper due in two weeks and I have about a book a day to read until then to be able to congeal my point in my mind and to give it a good foundation. Hopefully. As part of my paper I read a book this weekend about how journaling can speed the process of therapy.
I'm a journal writer by many means. Flashbacks to my high school "journal" are less than eventful or pensive, but I have a minimum of six or seven journals going right now in various forms and stages. There is the one by my bed, the one in my scriputures, the other one by my bed for a listing of things I eventually want to do, one listing things I don't want to forget, one that is actually in tape form for when I need to talk and there isn't anyone to talk to, then my little notebook that I keep to remind me to write something in another journal, then my online journals which number in the four or five range right now although only two or three are current.
Something we talked about in Ethics really got me thinking. We have finally begun the transition between the Ethical Code and the Legal aspects which means that we switch teachers as well because the usual teacher is on a mission trip in Greece this semester. In any case, the new teacher starts off by asking the class of our view of authority. Personally, I never really think of authority in any type of way. I know there have been some instances where I didn't really comply with authority and others where I followed quite easiliy. Then the teacher said that if you look at how you live versus how you want to be perceived then that will tell you what your philosophy on authority is. An example a classmate gave is that of a police officer, which I had to laugh at because of my multiple encounters with officers of the law. The thing is, everyone says I should get a radar detector, but isn't that really acting like I'm the exception to some rule? Isn't that like saying, "I want to break the law and not pay the consequences"? What is frustrating is that I really don't speed that frequently, I just get caught when I do, every time.
Back to authority. I never really imagined myself to have an issue with authority, but sitting in class I realized how many rules I find exception with, or try to. There are many habits I have not developed that are really good, substantiated habits, but don't develop them for one reason or another, but often for absolutely no reason. I think I need to merge how I live to how I want to be perceived, but I think that is the case with most of us.
More court tomorrow, then that's it.
My client didn't show up today. I will survive, for sure. In any case, I did my presentation on Murray Bowen today and it went over rather well. I'm going to start reading his book that I just got while I'm working the front desk. :)
One of the papers I had to do this past week was about the therapist, Murray Bowen. I have always liked Bowen, at least since I had my family therapy class in undergrad. The thing about Bowen is that he has eight main concepts and they just make sense, at least some of them. If you go to the website then you can read all the details about triangles, differentiation of self, nuclear family emotional system, family projection process, multigenerational transmission process, emotional cutoff, sibling position, and societal emotional process. Anyway, there are some that are really good and made me think a lot.
I think all I have to say about the sibling position thing is that has always been something that interested me and I agree with it for the most part. The interesting part to me is that in a book I've been reading, I have the characteristics of each type (first, last, middle, only) with the exception of one characteristic in each list. Interesting, no?
There's the whole differentiation of self that discusses each person's ability to separate logic and emotions. There are people in the world that base their own self upon who they associate with at the time instead of having their own solid foundation of who they are and remaining unchangeable in that. Those that have a low differentiation of self base their decisions upon the preferences of others. I have met people like this. Ones that change their stand on things depending on who they are around whether it be political, fashion, or religious opinion. There is a girl in my program that changes her opinion based upon the professor's opinion. It's exhausting. There is more on differentiation, but that's all I am going to say for now, I'm tired.
The last one that stood out to me is the emotional cutoff one. This is exhibited in two ways. Either a member of the family moves physically away in an effort to be less emotionally involved or the family remains together, but they only talk about superficial "how's the weather?" kind of things. There are a lot of times where I have observed my family in this stage. Particularly when at my dad's and we all go to spend time with him, but all we do is watch TV.
The class that is getting me the most this semester is the sexual abuse class. I just hate to hear about all the things that are wrong in the world. It also makes me very concerned for my sisters who have just gotten divorced. There is a lot of conversation about men who are predators and seek out single mothers and date/marry them because they have young daughters. It's scary to hear about that and not know what is going on with them. I have a lot of opinions about the prevalence of sexual abuse and things like that, but again, tired, almost time to go and I have another book to read, so I'll be back later.
Oh yeah, the new book is called "American Shaman" and it is about the guy that is coming to visit the program in April. We'll see how it goes. :)
I finished my paper close to 5:00 am. I realized about halfway through that I left three sources at home. In most cases, I could just run home and come back, but because the building is locked, if I had gone home, I wouldn't have gotten to finish my paper. Catch 22s are rotten. In any case, it's done and I feel like it's terrible, but I feel that way about every paper and I've been getting As, so I'm not going to complain, too much.
I wasn't going to go to sleep when I got home, but a little before 6 I decided a nap wouldn't hurt. I never heard my alarm and woke up nine minutes into class. They were just done with the annoucements, etc. when I got there so I didn't miss much.
Yesterday when I was out, the UPS man came by to deliver some books on Murray Bowen for my paper due Tuesday. I thought they would be here sooner and I was frustrated that the one time I left the apartment, the guy came. This morning I took the time (even though I was running late) to sign the UPS slip and put it on my door. When I got back the original slip was gone and a 2nd notice slip was there. I was going to read all day tomorrow, well, at least the part when I wasn't sleeping or delivering cheesecakes. With my luck, the guy will come when I'm delivering cheesecakes. I'm going to sign the second slip and see if this guy gets it.
I'm not sure if I've mentioned it, but there is a women's conference this weekend and I've been "hired" to make three cheesecakes for it. I made the first one in the break between class and work. The other two I'll make tonight. It's going to be a long night.
Lately I tend to go off on a tangent in my thoughts while in class. Especially this morning when I was so tired. I'm not sure what triggered it, but I had this memory come across my mind. I was in sixth grade, approaching Christmas break. I was by myself at my grandmother's and had been talking with my classmates about everything that was going on in my life. I somehow managed to convince them that I wouldn't have much of a Christmas and the last day before break they came and had gifts for me and everything. It wasn't really what my goal was, or if I even had a goal. Looking at that event now, I realize that at some point in my life I learned that people only care when there is something big going on, good or bad. I can think of a series of events following, and previous, to that Christmas where I may have acted more concerned about things just to manipulate someone else into acting like they cared. The rotten thing about manipulating people into caring is that after you succeed in the manipulation you wonder if all future affections are a result of the initial manipulation and question the sincerity of others.
I used to go through phases in my other online journal. I'd keep it public, willing to let anyone read some of the depth of my thoughts. Then I'd realize that some of the things I was sharing was basically being thrown around to anyone who would pay attention and that isn't the best thing. Then I'd go friends only, delete most of my "friends" and start over. I probably went through my entire journal five or six times each switching every entry back and forth from public to friends only. If you knew how much I wrote, you would know how ridiculous that is.
I still do it though. I'll not show up places just to see if anyone notices I'm not there. I'll turn off my phone when I'm writing a paper only to realize I don't get any phone calls, or my sister will freak out and call the clinic. :) I'm trying to do it less, but I forget some days that I think that way and it seems so automatic after so many years.
I think that's one reason I pay so much attention to the little details of other people. I remember names, faces, birthdays (even if I don't do anything about it), co-workers, kids names, spouses names, favorites of my friends to reinforce their own visibility and an effort to counteract my own invisibility.
This weekend is one where I have to go invisible. Paper due Tuesday, lots to read. Well, invisible all but Sunday.
