5 4° N o r t h J o u r n a l

Family | Families | Value & Beliefs

A nuclear family

Quote

“Learn to enjoy every minute of your life. Be happy now. Don't wait for something outside of yourself to make you happy in the future. Think how really precious is the time you have to spend, whether it's at work or with your family. Every minute should be enjoyed and savoured.”

Earl Nightingale

Now is a good time to reflect and consider the importance of families. I’m sure that in our daily lives, we do not take time to consider their importance and value.

Let’s start by examining the variety of family life.

Have you the big picture?

Let’s start.

Families thrive and exist throughout the world in contrasting communities, cultures, and societies. In the ideal world, the glue that holds it together is based upon trust support, affection, intimacy, and support. The concept of family refers to a group who are related by emotional, strong psychological, adoptive, sexual, or biological bonds. From the birth of siblings and in the early years the family is the primary object of individuals orientation.

On the shadow side and in the reality of everyday life there may be tensions preventing the effective functioning of the family unit.

There are many variations of the family. Our self-selecting social groups may inhibit the awareness of the many types of families that make up society.

A newborn baby and mother

Different types of families exist in our communities. These may be the traditional nuclear family:
 

Wife and husband with biological or adoptive children.

A single parent and children.

Husband and wife without children.

Siblings without parents.

Other forms of a nuclear family may be based upon:

Children living with guardians.

Unmarried heterosexual couples living together.

Same sex couples living together.

So, there you are. That is a lot more than you may have considered.

How do we begin to provide structure, support, guidance, and education to develop or promote the well-being of the family?

Grandparents  are family and extended family

It’s taken me a long time to recognize this, but here is my starting point. It starts with a good early years education not only in a nursery but by the nuclear and extended family in the home providing a framework.

Different culture and religions provide guidance in the socialization of the family. Within the Christian doctrine a christening provides a pathway and direction to their values and beliefs.

Here, a child will be baptized with water to initiate the journey of faith. It’s the start of a process to help them make the right choices in life, both for themselves and others:

Providing support and sensitive guidance for making good choices.

Support and help through good and bad times.

Helping the child to talk about the big questions of life:

Hope

Faith

Love

Charity

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“My parents were in the local church choir, and I used to go along and sing and play the organ at all the weddings and christenings.”

Dolores O’Riordan

Go your own way – via Europe 2 Paris

My reflections of a niece returning home to her birthplace and a family gathering.   

Last week thirty-two extended family members celebrated the return to the UK of one of its loved relations. Babies, great grandparents, proud parents, brothers, and sisters shared the jubilation and joy of seeing someone they love who emigrated to Queensland ten years ago. 

It was a poignant occasion. 

A mother, grandmother, aunty, and sister-in-law - The importance of family

Image - Cousins at family renuion

Everybody enjoyed the occasion.

They cared for these distant relatives. 

I think for many, it was a powerful and touching event. 

Families are important. 

After everyone left, I was left thinking, considering, and reviewing why people travelled hundreds and for some, tens of thousands of miles. 

During the darkness that night, I think I had a personal revelation, an epiphany, and redemption about the influence and power of blood ties and families. I may have neglected this in my earlier life. 

For some considerable time since urbanisation, the impact of work, careers, and jobs, lifestyle have disturbed and disrupted the concept of family. 

Roles and responsibilities have become more fluid. 

Yet, the nuclear family and through blood ties, the extended family still has significance.

Do you benefit from or support relations? 

A grand/great grandmother and mother on family relations.

Quote by a Mother, Grandmother, Aunty, and Sister-in-Law:

"I think family is very important. It is like the social glue that binds everybody together. I think the relationship you have with the different generations very important, especially as you get older it helps you stay young and in contact with new and up to date things. And I think when we have large family gatherings, it's good to see everybody that's related to you."

Are blood ties, across families important?

A grandson and lost grandfather

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