Family matters and the Alpha principal

Of course family matters, they are important because they are our tribe in life. We were born there, we grew up looking each other in the eyes and knowing each other better then anyone else does.
The family has an identity, norms, rules and values that are specific for that family. Part of that identity is inherited from one generation to the other, another part is imposed through the alpha principal.
The most dominant family member colors the identity, often one of the parents and sometimes the children.
The adolescent age serves to consciously define your own identity and here many things go wrong. People either reject completely the family values and end up naked or they live in symbiosis and do not know how to define themselves. A life long struggle with the family is born. If this happens the best way to act is take a distance from the family and start to investigate your values, distinguish who you are, what remains. Don't wait for your family to resolve this because that will never happen. The struggle will go on until you resolve it within yourself and this includes accepting the others just the way they are.

A confusing process, indeed.

But it is difficult to clean your shoes while you remain standing in the mud.
Therapy can be of enormous help to redefine your identity. From there you may start to contact the family again but with a different attitude, a different Self awareness but still the same person-

become your own alpha.

The value of Catharsis

Catharsis means, the cleansing of pent up emotions. Normally it is a intense release of anger, jealousy, sadness or fear with a lot of screaming, breathing and movement. 
In the sixties and seventies catharsis was very important in somatic therapies, it was like a crown on the work. But is it??
No, it is not. It is not the final objective of therapy, not at all.
It may be a door to integration but that depends on many things.
The most important thing is that the client is ready for the cathartic experience, if that is so, it will come as a natural flowing expression from the client.
When catharsis is provoked by pressure of the therapist or the group it seems to be something intense and the client will maybe feel released for a little while and then it will disappear because he or she was not ready. Waste of energy and often re-traumatizing the client.
The important part of the catharsis is the aftermath, the silence where the dust settles down. This silence is different from meditation where we focus on centering.
If the catharsis was true then it opens a door and here we can make the first step into the unknown. The unconscious where the repressed emotions waited for maybe a lifetime to be revealed.
Here many insight can pop up, you can integrate and you do not feel the need to express the same emotion over and over again.
But like I said, many cathartic explosions are only showing off, most of the time unconsciously but not always, so be aware.
If you can focus during the catharsis and there is a deep silence afterwards where you can start to explore you emotional cellar. 
Well, so good for you.