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Dr. Beth Erickson |
I have so whispered all of my adult
life. First, to junior and senior high school students.
When people would ask me what I taught, I would always reply,
"I'm in the English department, but I teach students."
At the same time, I also became a teacher educator, having
been chosen to be the first Field Associate of Dr. William
Glasser, my first mentor. During this time, he was named
by the National Association of School Administrators as
the single most influential American educator during the
previous 25 years. With and for Dr. Glasser, I taught the
principles of Schools Without Failure and Reality Therapy
to educators, social workers, corrections workers, clergy,
parents, and anybody else who would listen. I spoke in 36
cities in the U.S. and Canada before I was 31years old.
"Grow, grow."
I completed my Ph.D. at the University
of Minnesota, where my dissertation research was on comparing
the results of seminars which I conducted for in-service
educators. My purpose was to determine if it were possible
to generate deliberate adult psychological development,
a theoretical unknown at a time when development was thought
to completed by age 20. At my final oral examination, the
committee of six professors unanimously agreed that I had
advanced the state of the art by ten years. "Grow,
grow."
Watercolor by Dr. Beth Erickson |
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My first position upon completing
my Ph.D. was Chief Therapist at a private child welfare
agency in Chicago. My first day on the job, I realized I
needed to understand how families function and become dysfunctional.
"Grow, grow." So I began two years' postdoctoral
training at The Family Institute of Chicago, which is part
of Northwestern University. In the first six months of that
program, primarily what I learned was how little I knew.
Seeing families as a collection of relationship networks
rather than as a group of discrete individuals requires
a paradigm shift of tectonic proportions. A family system
is like a mobile. If you touch one part, all others move
in response. I completed that program in 1981 and have been
a practicing family and marital therapist ever since.
In the millennium year, when I
was in my mid 50's, I learned to paint with watercolors.
I was pleasantly surprised and thrilled that the very first
painting I did was recognizable and even suitable for framing.
Since then, of course, many of my paintings have been put
into what I ruefully call "the pitiful pile."
However, learning a new and difficult skill at that age
demonstrates that it indeed is possible to teach an old
dog new tricks. "Grow,
grow." By all means, I know I am just an amateur,
but I share some of my paintings here.
