FAMILY IDENTITIES
By: Dr. Mike Jones
In a dysfunctional family system, no one is real, everyone is a pretender when in the midst of others. Family members become disengaged, meaning they don’t show a lack of concern or interest in each other’s activities or welfare. Some of the characteristics of this family are: high levels of anxiety, confused roles, loneliness, and many times, they live apart from each other.
Every person has two parts to SELF – true and false. The true self accepts who they are as an individual. You can see this type of person in 1 Corinthians 12 that I touched on earlier. When you know who you are in Christ, the love of God flows and you see people through the eyes of God’s love. You think no evil nor is easily provoked to believe negative about anyone. This person has a good self image of themselves. On the other hand, false self is created in response to the demands of others. This type of person changes like the weather. Whatever the group says goes.
Each one of us needs our individuality. We need to be “a part” of a whole and at times there is nothing wrong with being “apart” from the family, but you have to maintain a balance. For example, Michael Jordan is synonymous for playing with the Chicago Bulls. In other words, when I think of the Bulls, I automatically thing of Mike. Never the less, he has a home life where he tries to separate himself from the team during off-season. I am sure his wife does not think of the Bulls when she is with her husband. Healthy families encourage members of the family to know their strengths and weaknesses and show respect or all others. Unhealthy families discourage their members from going to far outside of their comfort zone. (TO BE CONTINUED)
Adapted from How the Family System Works: Functional us Dysfunctional families; all Scripture references are taken from the KJV unless otherwise noted.)