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Bowen Family Systems Theory can be a mental model for life, work, and relationships.
A mental model can change your framework for thinking about experiences, provide a different perspective, and change your relationship functioning.
In fact, we use Bowen Theory as “a theory of practice for ministry” in the Leadership in Ministry program at the Center for Lifelong Learning. With its eight interlocking concepts and two variables, the theory offers a different way of looking at life, work, and relationships. Over time, it can change the way we think and function.
It may look like this:
You become more aware of your functioning in relationships.
You become less reactive and less automatic in your responses. For example, you may become more aware of how you function in your relationships based on your sibling position in your family of origin.
You think twice about helping others when they can help themselves.
You become more aware of the reciprocity dynamics in relationships. You stop overfunctioning and invading boundaries. You stop enabling underfunctioning in others.
You take more responsibility for yourself and less for others.
You understand what you are responsible for and for what you are not responsible for. You can say a legitimate “No” to invitations that require you to take inappropriate responsibility. You can better choose what, and to what extent, you will be responsible for something. You can set more responsible boundaries.
You cultivate your Solid Self, your core self, which is informed by your values and principles. This way, you can exert more agency over your life and decisions.
You are aware of the influence of the generations before you.
You accept the gifts of your multigenerational family system. You are aware of emotional legacies and liabilities inherited from your family. You can blame less, appreciating the limitations of what people before you could do. You can understand the emotional and relational patterns that surface as automatic responses to anxiety.
You are more mindful of the generations that will follow you.
You understand how your functioning can influence multigenerational transmission (cut off, etc.). You become more intentional about staying connected to your larger family system.
You stop questioning people’s motives for their behaviors.
You understand that observing people’s functions is more revealing than what people say. You know how triangles and other anxious emotional process behaviors are ways to manage anxiety and reactivity. You understand how anxiety hijacks people’s thinking; therefore, you may increase capacity for forgiveness and grace.
You can differentiate without cutting off.
You can stand for yourself, your values and beliefs, without cutting yourself off from others. You can continue on the path of becoming your own self without dismissing others who choose differently.
You can choose how to be in relationships, even toxic ones.
You can discern the relationships that are worth investing in and those that are not worth cultivating. You can better navigate the triangles you are unwilling to participate in.
You may develop a clearer ethic for living in the world, including how to respond to societal emotional processes and issues.
You can be less anxious about things that don’t matter and more responsible for things that do.
You develop discernment and can better steward your time, resources, and anxiety. That’s not always as easy as it sounds, but having clearly defined values and principles helps discernment.
You see your church not only as intergenerational, but also as multigenerational.
You can see your church as a system of relationships. You can see the interconnectedness of the ecology within your congregation, including its triangles.
You focus on your position in the system and take less responsibility for others. You take less responsibility for people’s spirituality and relationship with God (a triangle). For example, parents’ anxieties about children and baptism, or an anxious response to people’s financial stewardship.
You focus more on process and less on outcomes. Y
ou can become adept at defecting in place without feeling guilty if that will help your congregation become more responsible.
You appreciate that you’re the leader in the middle of the story.
You accept that you are responsible for your time at the congregation and not for what came before or will come after you leave.
Have you been using the Bowen Theory as a mental model? How has the theory changed your functioning or perspectives?
In what ways has BFST influenced change in your functioning in relationships?
How has BFST influenced your vocational and/or work functioning?
Israel Galindo is Associate Dean for Lifelong Learning at Columbia Theological Seminary. He directs the Pastoral Excellence Programs at the Center for Lifelong Learning.
