Our families offer opportunities to generate soul

"Take heart when it comes to family dysfunction" incorporates Thomas Moore's observations about families in Care of the Soul. For The Joy of Life blog, Gene Meyers considers family occasions that escalate in tension :

"On the reality of family Moore writes: "It always has its shadow, no matter how much we wish otherwise. If we don't grasp this mystery, the soulfulness that family has to offer each of us will be spirited away in hygienic notions of what a family should be."

Moore seemed to be saying that if you are constantly trying to fix your family, you'll miss what it has to offer. I'm always trying to fix things and smooth over rough patches. Leaving them alone? It was a notion that would have never crossed my mind."

Myers includes Moore's view, "But care of the soul doesn't require fixing the family or becoming free of it or interpreting its pathology. We may need simply to recover soul by reflecting deeply on the soul events that have taken place in the crucible of the family."