Symptoms

I had a co-worker one time who had recurrent ear infections. She was on her third or fourth round of antibiotics and was frustrated that she couldn't get well. She asked me if I had any ideas. Yeah, quit smoking. She looked at me with a strange look and said that she doesn't see how it is related. She did not want to look at the real problem. She just wanted to fix the symptoms. I went on to talk about respiratory tract infections. Besides, I told her, every time you suck on the cigarette it is messing with your ear pressure. That is why you are having so many problems.
As long as I knew her, she smoked. She also continued to complain about ear infections, not having enough money and all sorts of things. All of these 'symptoms' would have gone away with fixing the problem. This is very true in health care as a whole. Most people will go on medications to treat symptoms instead of loosing weight, dieting, exercising. While the medications help manage symptoms, the body ends up growing weaker.
I the same things hold true in families and other systems. When I see children struggling with something, I can see where it can simply be a symptom of a bigger dynamic. One time, I watched one of my children struggling with nervous ticks. My very strong initial reaction was to try to 'fix' the child. That was, by far, the easiest and quickest way to dispense of the symptom. However, I realized that there were other factors at play. I made some parenting adjustments and worked on myself. In turn, many of these symptoms began to disappear and our house became less anxiety ridden.
Children are like our ears or throat. They are the first ones to show symptoms of a problem. In most cases, we simply try to start fixing them. I tried homeschooling, spanking, yelling, crying, changing bedrooms, taking away TV, giving things, etc. It might have managed a symptom for a little bit, but the disease would just cause a different problem. I think a lot of times, this ends up leaving one of the parents as a martyr. That is not pretty.
So, this is the main part of my journey in life. I have worked on getting my own house in order. My own Spiritual House. This has been far more grueling than trying to fix everyone else's house. Trust me, I'd rather fix yours.