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Thinking Systems Blog

Science of Attraction: a Systems Perspective

December 14, 2025Uncategorized
Couple is attracted to each other. Why?
What Draws You to Your Partner? Most people can describe what attracted them to their partner. Maybe it was their sense of humour, or the way they listened. These conscious explanations feel true and personal. But what if unconscious processes shape

Emotional Pain and Suffering are Different

November 28, 2025Define self
Emotional Suffering can be reduced
Emotional pain does “hurt”. There is a difference between pain and suffering, and sometimes individuals create more suffering than the initial pain warrants. Emotional pain of rejection can hurt because it uses brain areas that are activated for

What does it take to change a relationship pattern

November 16, 2025Define self
butterfly changes slowly and then flies away
Why does it take time to change relationship patterns? What research says. Changing automatic relationship patterns typically requires months of regular practice. Individual timelines will vary depending on the level of conviction to change, pattern

What it means to be helpful

October 25, 2025Uncategorized
Is pain good or bad
Theory Thoughts: Is Pain Good or Bad? A systemic exploration of neutrality and what it means to ‘help’ “When they’re in enough pain, they’ll do something about it” A psychiatrist said that to me once, and it really got me thinking. Years

Conference on Aging – Key Takeaways

October 24, 2025Uncategorized
The Problem of the Elderly and Aging Families
Aging: Individual Challenge or Family Opportunity Our recent conference on aging and families from a systems perspective provide some useful insights. We all are (hopefully) involved with aging because we live long enough! Of course, aging affects th

Responsibility or Blame – a Systems Perspective

September 29, 2025Uncategorized
Theory Thoughts: What’s the difference between responsibility and blame? And what can we take from Bowen Theory to addresses this? “You have inherited a lifetime of tribulation. Everybody has inherited it. Take it over, make the most of it and wh

Aging and Families

September 19, 2025Uncategorized
The Problem of the Elderly and Aging Families
(Be sure to check out our upcoming conference on aging and the family here.)   Canada is amid a profound demographic shift. Our population is aging at an unprecedented rate, and this trend will only speed up over the next three decades. This is

Understanding Forgiveness Within Bowen Theory

August 27, 2025Uncategorized
Forgiveness Post
“When I forgive you, You will no longer define me. " Two very poignant lines from a poem in The Book of Forgiving, by Desmond Tutu and his daughter, Mpho Tutu. In reading these two lines, it’s not difficult to see how I connected the concept of f

Dr Bowen on Aging – Problems of the Aged

August 16, 2025Uncategorized
The Problem of the Elderly and Aging Families
Problems of the Aged - Lecture by Dr. Bowen This talk, from April 1980 by Dr. Murray Bowen, challenges compartmentalized thinking and argues for enlarging systems theory so that human emotional, physiological, genetic, and psychological functioning a

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