The Intimacy Paradox: Personal Authority in the Family System - Hardcover

Williamson, Donald S.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0898621062 ISBN 13: 9780898621068

Publisher: The Guilford Press, 1991

Synopsis

"How does one leave home emotionally and yet somehow still remain lovingly connected within the family of origin? It is my thesis that this is both the fundamental psychological issue and the essential relational challenge of adulthood....'' --From Chapter 1

Although most people physically leave home by their early 20s, emotional separation from one's family is a more difficult process that can continue for a lifetime. THE INTIMACY PARADOX addresses the struggle of adults to establish individual autonomy without sacrificing family connections, and offers a psychotherapeutic approach designed to simultaneously foster both personal development and family of origin intimacy.

As viewed here, the key to achieving the goal of personal authority (or autonomy with intimacy) is to facilitate a deconstruction or ``demythologizing'' of the parents in their parental roles. This allows for an adjustment (sometimes tranformation) of mutual expectations, leaving the adult free to experience parents in a new way, with every admirable trait intact, indeed highlighted. By changing present relationships with parents, the book shows how one can change the present meanings of past memories and thus generate new possibilities for healthier and happier future experiences.

Williamson's theory of personal authority in the family system is offered as a synthesizing construct, which reconciles the opposing pulls of differentiation from parents and intimacy with parents. Personal authority therapy prepares clients to talk directly to their parents as adults and equals and, therefore, without fear. Through hearing the personal narrative of each parent's life firsthand and exploring the private meanings of significant events and relationships, sons and daughters can both demystify and humanize their parents. It is this humanization that ultimately resolves intergenerational intimidation. The goal is to create a family of former parents and former children who share psychological freedom of action and interaction as adults. This creates the conditions for intimacy. The former parent no longer has any special position of power, control, or privilege inherent in the old role; the former child no longer has any obligation to attentiveness, obedience, or overriding loyalty. What is now given, is given freely.

THE INTIMACY PARADOX demonstrates that psychological power and control can and must be redistributed across generational boundaries, so that parents and (former) children can achieve psychological and relational equality. For all professionals engaged in family therapy, this work presents an innovative psychotherapy method for ending intergenerational intimidation while fostering intimacy, love, and a renewed sense of family identification.

About this title

About the Author:

Donald S. Williamson, Ph.D., Baylor College of Medicine

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

I. Personal Authority Theory 1. Personal Authority in the Family System: An Overview 2. Background Theoretical Assumptions 3. Personal Authority: The Construct in Theoretical Context II. Personal Authority Method: The Play's the Thing 4. Setting the Scene: Playful Interventions as a Method of Therapy 5. Auditioning and Casting: Background Preparations for the Conversations with Parents 6. Black Out Sketches: The Group at Play 7. The Rehearsal: Preparing the Client for Political Renegotiations with Parents 8. Scheduling the Performance and Contract Negotiating with the Players 9. Writing the Script: The In-Office Agenda for the Primary Triangle/m-/ Part 1. The Parents Speak 10. Writing the Script: The In-Office Agenda for the Primary Triangle/m-/ Part 2. The Client Responds and the Consultant Reflects 11. Performing Outdoors: New Life at the Graveyard/m-/Renegotiation with a Deceased Former Parent 12. Production Problems: Limitations to the Method III. Personal Authority Contextual Issues 13. Personal Authority: The Personal Story 14. Personal and Professional Authority in Professional Life 15. Personal Authority, Professional Authority, and Physical Health 16. Personal Authority and Gender Differences: Typecasting, Linda M. Walsh 17. Beyond Personal Authority IV. Personal Authority Research 18. The Personal Authority in the Family System Questionnaire: Assessment of Intergenerational Family Relationships, James H. Bray

About this edition

• Publisher: The Guilford Press
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 0898621062
• ISBN 13: 9780898621068
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 305