Dysfunctional Families And The Shame Cycle
The Internet Therapist presents a short film explaining the shame cycle that comes with dysfunctional families. Showing the dynamics of dysfunctional families, the film shows you how shame develops in such environments and how to solve it. This leads to a healthy family and an escape from the shame cycle.
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Step 1:
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The First Rule
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These rules are embedded in the culture. So think of yourself as a child growing up. Think of the culture or the TV, the way that people act, and I think you'll see it rather readily.
The first rule in a shame-bound family system is to always be perfect; and that "always" is just as crazy as the "perfect". No one who is human is consistent. It just simply cannot be done. All we can do is try to do the best we can, and intellectually I think most people understand that; but if you see dysfunctional families, often what will happen is a child under the age of six will drop their milk and what you'll hear the parent say is "Why'd you do that?"
Well, that means that they, that the parent thinks that there was some intentional behaviour of the child to misbehave, or that the child should be perfect -- which is an absolutely crazy thought. The child didn't wake up and decide, "Well you know it really would be nice to get yelled at this morning before I had my breakfast; I think I'll throw my milk on the table". Nobody does that.
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Step 2:
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Being Number One
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Our society tends to be way, way too perfectionistic. A number of years ago I was watching a Ball State Indiana football game -- just at the tail end there was nothing, nothing to do and I was just kicking around turning channels -- and at the end, Ball State won and two of the players came up to the camera and said "We're number one. We're number one."
I feel very confident that I will die before Ball State is number one in football in this country, and there is no need for them to be number one. It is fine to be simply good, or simply trying. The problem that we have is that we don't value human beings for who and what we are, which is fallible. Should we try to be as good as we can? Fine, absolutely fine; but you've got to be humanistic about common human frailties.
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Step 3:
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The Second Rule
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The second family rule is about control, and not only control of yourself which is impossible enough, but somehow I'm supposed to control somebody else. Now that is absolutely impossible.
If I tell you what to do, the tendency is you're going to want to do exactly the opposite. There is no way that somebody can control somebody else; but we're told that if we really love people we'll make sure they're OK. We'll make sure they don't drink, we'll make sure that they tow the line; and we're angry at ourselves and angry at them if they don't allow themselves to do it.
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Step 4:
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The Third Rule
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And that's the third rule in the dysfunctional family system: if you're not perfect and if you're not in control, you've got to blame someone else or blame yourself. This is the trilogy.
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Step 5:
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Breaking The Cycle
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If you follow these rules you're going to be incredibly unhappy; because at that point I feel that I should be perfect and know that I'm not, I believe that you are so I can't tell you about my weaknesses. And that leads to an incredible amount of isolation in a family system, and a real sense of unreality.
Now if you don't think that you follow these, then that means that you've never gotten stopped by a red light and screamed and cussed, or you've never gotten defensive.
Because that's the way shame works, is you say "Jef, I think you've made a mistake", and I say "Well you made it too!". What I did is felt shame, which is about personhood, not feeling good enough about, as a person, and I threw it back at you to make you feel lousy. Whereas if what I was looking at is behavior which is simply about guilt something over here; there was a mistake; "oops, sorry, I'll change it". If it's about behavior, then what I can do is step back, detach, and say "Oh, really, where?". Because it's in my interest to change the mistake.
