When a young child is frustrated or is
struggling with some childish issue of life, the parents will often hand
them a lollipop. The tasty sucker will bring relief from the stress of
the problem by allowing the mind to escape temporarily to something
pleasurable. The struggle of the child is replace with the sweetness of
candy.
Lollipops create a world of illusions where the participants seek to
override the sufferings of life by continual enjoyable experiences. The
problem with going through life seeking lollipops should be obvious. It
never addresses the real issues of the mystery of life. It also
continually requires bigger and better lollipops.
Whereas lollipops attempt to ignore the problems, band-aids do actually
address the issues. Their tendency however is to treat the symptoms of
the disease rather than the actual problem. For example, most marriage
and family experts state that one of the leading problems concerning
marriage and family issues is lack of communications. The band-aid
approach to solving the problem is to teach the participants
communication skills.
While band-aids do treat the symptoms, increase flow of communication,
they often ignore the real cause of the problem. In our example, the
final solution will have to address why communications between people is
so difficult. In treating the symptoms, band-aids can also create a
world of illusions, giving what looks to be short-term success but in
reality long-term failure.
In the human experience, there are certain times in the lives of most
people where a lollipop, and nothing but a lollipop, is desired. Or, the
use of band-aids are the over-riding means of therapy. It seems that
only on rare occasions is the final solution sought by man.
In the course of these 15 sessions on marriage and family, it is the
final solution that will be emphasized. Although there may be a few
lollipops and band-aids sprinkled into the mix, I want to focus upon the
foundations of marriage and family. Whether we understand it or not, all
of the struggles we encounter in our marriages and in our families are
the foundational struggles of life itself.
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