Psychic Wholeness and Healing for the Family

Conrad W . Baars

Abstract generated by AI: This paper discusses the meaning of affirmation and its importance for psychic wholeness and healing within the family. The biological birth of a child must be followed by what may be called a “second birth” or “psychic birth,” through which the child is opened to the goodness, worth, and lovableness of his own being. This gift can be received only from another person, especially from an affirming father and mother. When children are not adequately affirmed, their emotional lives remain undeveloped, and they may grow into adults who feel insecure, inferior, unloved, and dependent upon the approval of others. They may then seek to affirm themselves through achievement, power, possessions, sexuality, or other substitutes that can never give them the gift of themselves. True affirmation is not a method or technique; it is something that a person is. The authentic affirmer is present to another’s goodness, is emotionally moved by it, and allows this response to be seen. Yet affirmation must also be intellectual: it includes teaching the truth, correcting, admonishing, and strengthening. Christ, the first Affirmer and Healer of mankind, provides the perfect model of this affirming life.

Keywords: affirmation; psychic wholeness; emotional development; family; deprivation neurosis; Christian anthropology.