Families are Complex Adaptive Systems

Our families are complex adaptive systems.  Our relationships are complex adaptive systems.  

 

A complex adaptive system is a system where the behavior and trajectories of the nodes/parts/subsystems/people are nonlinear and may not be predictable.  This is because the interactions are constantly changing and adapting to micro-events or collections of events that emerge from the dynamic complexity of the system.

 

Our relationship with our families are complex adaptive systems.

 

Holidays may bring up things for us that we may not be aware of.  And these things are often related to challenges we experience in our families and relationships.

 

 

Our families are complex adaptive systems.  Our relationships are complex adaptive systems.

 

A complex adaptive system is a system where the behavior and trajectories of the nodes/parts/subsystems/people are nonlinear and may not be predictable.  This is because the interactions are constantly changing and adapting to micro-events or collections of events that emerge from the dynamic complexity of the system.

 

Our relationship with our families are complex adaptive systems.

 

Holidays like today - and the social media and celebrations that go with it often focus on the smiling faces, the cakes and candles.  But there are two key emotions I also want to acknowledge:  gratitude and grief.

 

Gratitude is essential for our well-being. It’s important for our brain’s circuitry to have awareness (and the associated neurochemicals) that signal to us ‘what’s right’ about our situation.  This helps us continue to strive and grow.  Without it, we wouldn’t have incentive to keep going.

 

Gratitude doesn't always need to be for the things that are picture-perfect, smiling and what we deem as positive.  Gratitude can also be for the events and experiences that have shaped us -despite how painful they may be.   

 

Grief, on the other hand, is a feeling that many of us try to avoid.  

 

Grief is important.  It allows us to feel a sense of loss of something we hoped we could have or hold onto.   This is important information.  It guides us to acknowledge that there are certain things we would prefer to have.  And that preference is something that we can then add to our future pathways of what we want to co-create with others.

 

If we don’t acknowledge our grief, we aren’t letting our mind-brain-body system create an awareness of something deep, nonverbal and visceral that is affecting us in unconscious ways.

 

If you feel like something is clouding your mind but you can’t figure out what it is..  There’s a chance it is related to grief. 

 

Grief is extremely painful and so our tendency can be to keep it bay as long as we can.  We do this by trying to stay busy and positive.  And these are all good things.  But that busy-ness and positivity can keep us from acknowledging a feeling of grief.  That grief is often tied to the challenging, complex relationships within our families.

 

I know for myself that sense of grief is tied to not having a feeling of ‘home’ and belonging.   This is a blend of childhood and unconscious patterns that I allow to distort my current perceptions.  I’m able to access a feeling of home now when I need, but the grief of not having it within my family of origin is something i have tried to push away.

 

This morning, I stopped trying to avoid my grief.  And as i allowed myself to recognize that i was holding these feelings, i was able to release some emotions that were there just below the surface.  Those feelings had kept me in a type of mental fog. Once they were released, my mind felt clear again.

 

This release of my own feelings of grief also allowed me to feel empathy for the people in my family who have also had very difficult relationships with their own families and within our current ‘system’.  The lack of feeling of ‘home’ and comfort from caregivers has been missing for many people in my family for generations.

 

As my view expanded, I realized that i have absorbed that loss and grief into my own experiences… and have allowed that unconscious grief to lead me to re-create aloneness and lack of ‘home’ in my own life on many occasions.

 

*The upcoming podcast episodes and videos in July will be going much more into detail about how our family’s pasts translate into socio-biological frequencies that affect our current behavior.

 

But here’s the good news..  Our brains are experience-dependent, complex adaptive systems.  We can introduce new experiences that can help us get closer to co-creating what we truly want to have.. A sense of home and belonging, and value and purpose.

 

These ‘experiences’ start within - with an awareness and recognition of ALL our feelings.. Not just happiness and joy, but also sadness, anger, resentment, rage and regret.   All of those feelings give us information about what we want to create NEXT. 

Additional note - I have noticed recently what really helps me move through stages of grief is to very deeply honor and acknowledge the sadness, allow myself to feel it and express it nonverbally - tears, emotional expression, movement.   But then to EXPRESS it as best I can into words… that I then know will help someone else.   If i can bring myself to that place, it transmutes the sadness and loss into something that feels expansive and like a connecting of dots that will allow me to re-pattern my present and future rather than stay trapped by my past conditioning.

 

Happy complex adaptive systems day