Early to rise, early to bed

8/31/09

Well, I did get to bed early, and rose on time, we’ll see if it makes me healthy, wealthy, and wise. I know “happy” didn’t necessarily enter into the picture. Actually, this phrase probably came from Ben’s Puritanical upbringing, and I don’t think that happiness was big in their belief system. While we are in his background, I’d like to explore his family of origin, (foo) as it is called in the field. One of the things that bothers me in the field of History is that they are doing a lot of psychological interpretations, but they are not trained particularly well in psychology. It is like one of those commercials where the guy is doing open heart surgery and a nurse asks him, after a dubious procedure, “Are you a doctor?’ To which he replies, “No, but I did sleep at a Holiday Inn last night.” Many historians and current political pundits try to interpret people, but it is based on some simple analysis, that often just suits their fancy, but is not very in depth. Part of what I will be doing, is seeing history, and specifically Ben Franklin, through the eyes of an experienced psychotherapist. Much of my training was in something called, Family Systems Theory, which includes a Genogram, which is looking at family dynamics through the generations to get a better understanding of the current patient. When you don’t have the actual person, this is somewhat limiting, but one can still get a basic understanding. I believe, with Ben, because he wrote a very thorough and reknowned autobiography, one can get a very good idea about what influenced and shaped him during his growing up.

When I get a history of a client, my goal is to understand how they were shaped both generationally and within their own family of origin for the purpose of helping them heal from their pasts and enable them to choose new ways to go through life. What is the point of understanding Benjamin Franklin? I mean , he is already dead, so what is the point of understanding what made him tick. I think I know, but it is now the end of the day, and this early to rise thing can really make one have to go early to bed, so I will discuss it more tomorrow.