A Bridge to Adolescence: "Just For Us"
An interview with Carole Isenberg
by Raz Ingrasci, President (Edited
by Shawn McAndrew)
Carole Isenberg (CI) is the founder and director of "Just
For Us Workshops," which expand and strengthen family and individual
communication by focusing on parent-child relationships. She took
the Hoffman Process in October of '97.
Raz Ingrasci: What was your inspiration for creating
"Just for Us?"
Carole Isenberg: For my entire adult life I've
been a teacher in one capacity or another. I've also produced films
(Including "The Color Purple") that dealt with women's issues. From
the research for the films, I became very aware of what's going
on with adolescent girls. When I stopped producing to look at what
my next step would be, I read Mary Bray Piper's book, "Reviving
Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls", and it galvanized
me into action. I wanted to address this issue in a proactive way.
I realized that the logical group to work with is just before puberty,
before we begin to change. I started with girls.
RI: In the Hoffman work, we would say that a child
looks to have his or her love needs met within the family up until
puberty. At puberty the child begins to look outside the family
to have his or her love needs met, eventually moving to independence
from the family. It's incredibly potent to realize that just before
the onset of puberty there is a window of opportunity for parents
and children to reinvent their relationship, an opportunity that
basically goes away once puberty sets in. Unfortunately, so many
parents try to extend the childhood relationship into the teen years,
only to discover they can't control their kids the way they used
to and every effort to do so only drives the kid away more.
CI: That's true. It just backfires. On the other
hand, if you develop good skills, tools and a vocabulary with your
child before he or she goes into puberty, there's a bridge. In more
rocky times, you can appreciate what's going on. Ultimately, it
also helps parents to let go when the appropriate time comes.
I must say that parents are extremely egocentric in some ways.
When kids are in puberty and going through such a huge range of
changes — physically, emotionally, and psychologically —
parents think that it's all about them. In fact, it has nothing
to do with the parents. Parents who have had a very rough time with
their own parents can completely replicate with their child exactly
what they hated with their own parents and not even know they did
that. If parents remembered that we all go through puberty, there
would be a bit more compassion.
One of the realities is that we are born to one generation and
we raise our children in another. There is a separation. To varying
degrees parents are wedded to whatever happened when they grew up.
It's often very difficult for them to even recognize that their
children are growing up in a totally different time. Many of the
things that were operative for parents are just no longer operative
for their kids. I know my mother always wanted it to be the way
it used to be.
RI: A friend who has a couple of teenage kids
was complaining to me about his kids, kind of blaming them. I said,
"The only thing worse than having teenage children, is being one."
He looked at me kind of funny and then he softened. But it's true
— parents often don't have compassion for their own children.
CI: I'll tell you an interesting piece for me.
I did not have the relationship with my mother that I would have
wanted. When I did the Hoffman Process, I was at a beginning stage
of this work (i.e. "Just for Us"), and it was such a gift to go
through so much healing in my own relationship with my mother. I
could then bring a deeper level of healing into this work. In a
way, creating "Just for Us" was a little valentine to my Mother.
RI: How else has the Hoffman experience served
you in your work with "Just For Us"?
When I left the Process, I had a spaciousness inside. It was a
place that previously had been filled with a lot of anger and the
feeling that I was given a raw deal. After the Process, I completely
recontextualized my relationship with everything in my past. Now
I can allow my future to pull me in a powerful way and not be hounded
by "It should have been... It would have been... It might have been...
They should have done..."
My parents really did the best they could do without tools. But
the best that I can do now is so much better than anything I could
have done before. I'm so much more compassionate - for myself, also,
since the Quadrinity Process.
When I bring a group of mothers and girls together, I watch the
control going on on the part of the mothers. They often say they
have good communication with their daughters and yet won't really
let their daughters express what they need to express. Of course,
you can't tell anybody anything, we create mirrors so they can actually
see their behavior.
RI: So your work is experiential.
CI: Very experiential. Very interactive. My biggest
job is getting out of the way and letting them find the answers
for themselves. They have to discover. And it's been very powerful
for both mothers and daughters, and fathers and daughters. Many
men feel that their wives have a proprietary relationship with their
daughters. They don't know where they fit in. Men are afraid of
many things in terms of what goes on with their daughters.
One of the first things I do with the dads is to have them look
at their relationships with their mothers and their fathers, so
that they can begin to become conscious of what they're bringing
into the relationship with their wives and their daughters. I ask
them, "How did your father treat your mother? What went on between
your father and your mother? What did you see in that relationship?"
How can you work with parents and children and not have the parents
take a look at what went on in their own relationship with their
parents? You can't separate them. Many people have never gone down
that road.
RI: It must be an eye opener for a lot of people.
CI: It's always an eye opener for me, too, because
I always learn. Sometimes there are guys who think they've done
everything and they have all the answers.
Sometimes it's very humbling. Sometimes the most interesting aspect
of the work is not even the way I deal with the men, it's how the
men deal with each other, and what they say to each other. They
really notice each others patterns in the way they complain or express
what's going on with the family.
When I step out of the way, the men really talk to each other about
how they see a man not taking responsibility in his own family —
for his interaction is with his wife, with his daughter, with his
son.
RI: Do you use your Hoffman tools?
CI: One of my favorite pieces is the Spirit Guided
Path meditation. It's another aspect of having people learn that
they have a huge wealth of information. We need to learn how to
access it and how to become more trustful. So much is made of women
and self esteem, but what does that mean? Where do you access it?
Do you have a sense that you are competent and capable and that
within you, you have the ability to make good choices for yourself?
Those are the things that really nurture good self-esteem.
RI: Self-trust and self esteem go together?
CI: Absolutely. And what I love about the meditation
is that you get an answer and if you act on that answer, and it
proves to be positive, it reinforces the fact that you have those
answers inside you.
RI: Can you share with us a story about changes
you've witnessed in "Just Between Us"?
CI: A girl, who was a real toughie, and her mother
came in. She didn't want to participate. She had an attitude and
I think she was annoyed that her mother had made the decision to
enter the program. But gradually over time, as we did more interactive
experiences, she began to participate. In the beginning she was
almost a behavior problem. About the time she finished, she was
also preparing for her Confirmation. Whoever was working with her
in confirmation asked her when she had had a spiritual experience
similar to what she was going through in confirmation. And she said
that she had that experience in "Just For Us". That was kind of
amazing to me that she was able to see the spiritual foundation
of "Just For Us".
RI: Well, congratulations and thank you. ø
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