But along with the normal discomfort of seeing your personal eccentricities mirrored by your family members, there can be more serious sources of discomfort at family dinners. Political and cultural differences, for example. Maybe your siblings have turned into people whose view of life is radically different than yours. Maybe you're gay and your family has a hard time accepting that. Maybe you have political or religious views that you have to keep to yourself in order not to wreck the atmosphere at dinner.
Even for those of us lucky enough to have great relationships with our family members, there are often layers of unspoken currents, difficult issues, hidden resentments. The family dysfunctions can burst out during get-togethers, or, just as often, be hidden under a veneer of normalcy that can make such gatherings feel strained and artificial.
If you only see your family members on holidays, it's possible to paste on a smile and skate through the occasion, knowing that you'll soon be able to leave. But at some point, most of us feel the need to evolve our relationship with our families. They are, after all, central players in our karmic drama. No matter how different you may be from the rest of your family, there is some reason you were born into this particular configuration of souls. Regardless of whether you accept the notion of karma, or believe in past lives, the truth is that your family relationships are part of who you are. You can break up with your romantic partners, even your spouse. You can quit your job and stop being friends with people you've grown beyond. But you can't divorce your family—even though in extreme situations you may decide that it's better not to spend much time with them. And at some point it makes sense to learn how to turn them into allies of your growth.
At the very least, being with your family is a powerful spur to self-understanding. You may never get your father to approve of your sexual orientation or your spiritual choices, but you can learn a lot about yourself by looking at your own reactions to him. When you find yourself bossing your younger sister around, observing yourself can give you some important clues about how other people in your life might feel when you tell them what you think they should be doing.
Every member of your family is a teacher. Some of them teach you through their good qualities. Some of them teach you through their mistakes. Even more importantly, your family members offer a mirror of the issues that confront you in this lifetime. They show you your strengths—the skills and competencies you came into this life having mastered. They also reveal your weaknesses, the wounds and triggers that you'll need to deal with sooner or later. A family gathering actually offers you the opportunity to understand some of your own internal patterns, something about who you are and what you need to work on. If you accept the fact that you are with these people because they truly are your kinfolk—internally as well as externally—then suddenly they become teachers in the truest sense. They are the book in which you can read your own character and karma.
A friend of mine had a deep aversion to his mother. He couldn't spend time with her without getting depressed, and so he avoided her most of the time. At one point, a job took him to her city, and he had to live with her for a month. During that month he went through every shade of irritation and impatience. But he also began to recognize that some of the qualities he disliked about her were (big surprise!) also in him. His mother was a stickler for control and punctuality. She always wanted to make sure that everyone around her followed the program she'd laid down. He considered himself to be exactly the opposite—laid back, always urging everyone to get mellow and let things unfold. But while living with his mother, he found himself impatiently trying to get her to relax, and suddenly began to see the inherent contradictions in his attitude. He realized that his insistence that everyone relax and not worry was as much an attempt to control others as her anxiety about making plans and keeping things on schedule. And he began to recognize other traits they shared, some of them positive, others not so positive. Like his mother, he cared about helping the underdog. Like his mother, he was interested in other cultures. Like his mother, he loved gossip. Like his mother, he carried an undercurrent of fear in his being. Recognizing both her positive and negative qualities in himself, he found that he could feel compassion for her, and even began to enjoy her company. When the month with his mother was over, a knot of inner tightness had been released that was so noticeable his friends commented on it. By seeing the karmic, genetic heritage he carried, and accepting that what he saw in his mother was also in him, he loosened its power over him. One of the miraculous effects of accepting your family is that it helps you accept yourself.
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