The family is a very important part of our lives. It helps us improve our personality and shape our character, teaches us the value of love, affection, honesty, self-confidence, and provides us with the necessary tools to succeed in life.
A family is a safe place where you can be yourself. It is a place where they accept you as you are. It is there where you are free of tension and everyone is there to help you. The family encourages you when you are surrounded by problems. They help you survive in difficult times and fill your life with joy and happiness.
But during the last decades, some families have lost sight of family values. A recent survey indicates that 60% of Costa Ricans think they don’t spend enough time with their families; In fact, one in four see their loved ones less than an hour a day.
For some it is due to work, for others, it is addictions or a family feud that keeps them away. For example, a family member who is addicted to alcohol causes the whole family to suffer. Although a single member can destroy an entire family, it is also true that another can save it.
We often hear the phrase: “the family is the cell of society” and it seems that it is referring to an organ of our body, a system, but the reality is that in that cell there is information and processes with specific functions. It is in this cell, this family nucleus, where we learn the most valuable things in life. It is where we learn to work, to behave, to respect and how to make a living in a fair, correct and honest way.
It is in the family where all the necessary values are instilled and that will be reflected in later life stages. It is where not only values are encouraged, but feelings, negative relationships or positive situations, those that destroy the dignity or those that build respect for each member and that will increasingly affect not only the family but society as a whole.
The family as a mirror of society
Just as we belong to a family we also belong to a society, we are citizens of a city or a country, and we have to understand that what we are doing is reflected in society, in the nation.
Unfortunately, in Latin American countries many problems give us a sense that our society is not doing very well. For example, in Latin America, 4 out of 10 marriages are disintegrated, and another 3 out of these same 10 have severe problems; either with their children or the couple.
Regarding young people, for example, in Latin America is ranked third in the world in suicide among young people, and is the second cause of death of young people between 11 and 19 years of age. It is a worrying reality because they are young people who instead of thinking about their life projects, looking at all the opportunities for progress that exist, according to this statistic they seek to interrupt and take their own lives.
In this case, we can conclude that there is a basic problem, something is not working well within the family nucleus, it takes love, communication, understanding to avoid conflict.
Sometimes it is very easy to point to others, see the mistakes of wives, husbands, and children; but seeing ours is an urgent capacity we need for these complicated times, regardless of what is happening around us. We must begin to work firmly in our lives and above all in our family
When we review the statistics of all those problems in which our young people are involved today, and the imbalances that exist in society, it is evident that things are not going well in our families, the necessary bases of education are not being formed, respect, responsibility, and commitment to ourselves.
The family is the place where love should be sown, only in this way can we ensure the construction of a society that progresses along the good paths, with people willing at all times to strive together for constant personal growth and the strengthening of a good society.
