Family Strengths

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Family Strengths

• Assessing the Family Roles

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Healthy families have high levels of the
following

• Trust, commitment, and respect for one another
  These factors underlie everything else
• They facilitate healthy interaction and other
  behaviors, attitudes and beliefs about the family
  and other relationships.

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What do we see in healthy families?
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Affirmation and support for each other

• Family members are supportive of each other in
  the face of stress
• Family members encourage each other in both
  stressful and non-stressful times

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A strong sense of membership in the family

• Family members know who is in and who is out of
  the family
• Family members also feel valued in that family
  membership

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Sharing of responsibilities (and flexibility in
carrying out tasks)

• Family members extend their responsibility beyond
  their ownthey watch out for each other and help
  each other out.
• If someone in the family needs help, others step
  in.

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A balance of interaction (sharing some
information, respecting privacy in other ways)

• Information is shared when needed and, when
  privacy (not secrecy) is desired, its respected

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Effective communication (of both thoughts and
feelings). This includes listening, one of the
toughest things to do.

• This is crucial for maintaining relationships.

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Family rituals (especially critical are rituals
of connection)

• Families maintain connection through ritual
• Family membership declared through ritual (I.e.,
  who is in and who is out of the family)

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A clear understanding of rules, but flexibility
in implementing them

• Remember that most rules are hidden
• Rule sets are coherent (I.e., consistent with
  each other)
• Absence of double binds and inconsistent
  application of rules

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An overall positive outlook

• Since you find what youre looking for, if you
  look for positives, you ll find them if you
  look for negatives, youll find them, too.
• Positive outlook increases likelihood of positive
  behavior being reinforced.

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Playfulness with one another (i.e., family
leisure, recreation)

• The family that plays together stays together
• Gives you opportunities to let communication
  happen (e.g., son and dad at batting cage,
  talking about school)

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A sense of humor (affirming, not hurtful)

• Humor, in and of itself, isnt enough. It has to
  be affirming/gentle
• Humor helps you get through tough times reduces
  stress
• Evidence that humor/laughter improves a persons
  immune system

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A shared core of religious/ spiritual/ values/
beliefs

• Essentially, this is a shared world view.
• Shared world view allows you to see and relate to
  things similarly

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Behavior that indicates knowing right from
wrong along with efforts to do right and avoid
wrong

• It is not enough to know what is moral, but to
  act on that belief
• Remember the saying actions speak louder than
  words

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Valuing of service to the community (i.e. to
others)

• Make contributions by doing things like
  volunteering time or helping out (e.g., coaching
  youth sports, helping with blood drives, leading
  church choir)

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An ability to come together to cope effectively
with a crisis

• Dont single out one person as the problem who
  has to solve her/his own problem
• Work together as a team to solve a problem

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A willingness to recognize that they may have
problems that are bigger than they can handle and
are willing to seek outside help

• Just because they are healthy doesnt mean the
  can deal with all problems
• Healthy families recognize their limitations and
  seek outside resources when needed