So I've had a long history with Murray Bowen and his famous theory. My very first lecture as a professor was on Bowen in theory.

At the time I was 26 and terrified out of my mind. The night

before I had to give the lecture I almost quit my assistant teaching gig because I was so terrified. I remember I was

pacing back and forth in my apartment and so close to just picking up the phone

and saying I give up I never mind I don't want to be a teacher

this is too terrifying for me I'll just be a therapist and that'll be that

but I didn't make that phone call and the next day I stood up and gave my lecture on Boanyan theory and as I think about it right now

Perhaps Boan himself might have told me at that moment as I gave that lecture or the night

before when I decided that I would actually do it instead of quitting, he might say that

my intellectual guidance system had prevailed over my emotional

reactivity thereby I was expressing my differentiation.

So since that first lecture, I've continued lecturing on Boanyan theory to my family therapy students

and counseling students.

I've also supervised post-grad therapists who

considered themselves to be Boinean therapists. Among other family therapists, when I talk to them we often use boinian terminology

Mainly we use words like differentiation and triangulation because there's really no other words in our field that capture what those words mean that

Bowen invented.

I've also used this theory in my own work with my clients. And as a professor in a family therapy program for the past, well,

since 98, so almost 17 years now. I've used his model of self-differentiation as a model to

encourage therapists and

I teach in training to grow as a person and become better therapists. In other words, in the program that I teach,

one of the things that we require that all the students do

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