What makes our Culture different?

Generally, when you think of differences in cultures, you will generally think of different nations, tribes, or clusters of people and not really analyze the culture you yourself live in. This culture is influenced by the people you live with in your community as well as those that are even closer to us than that. In our individual families we all have different experiences that change or impact the way we live our lives.

What is culture? 

Culture is the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular people or other social group. Our culture, like everything else in life, is strongly effected mostly by the amount of money a family is able to acquire which in turn effects the other variables that can impact a family's culture. Some of these variables are the location that the family lives in, what sort of occupation or vocation the parents are able to acquire, what income comes into the home, the social connections, how this family looks or appears, the language that is spoken in the home, what a family possess, even what race and education is able to be provided for the children. All of these things have the ability to change the outward appearance of the culture of a family but like everything a culture changes and adapts just like how a family does. 

Can a family culture change? 

Absolutely a family culture can change and its effected in ways that may seem common at first but through analyzing families in a long run you can see that it has a lasting impact on how the family functions. 

I will use my family as an example through some of the events that happened when I was a child. My dad quit his job and decided to start his own business. For anyone who has ever created their own business knows that it takes a lot of work and also time. Rather than having my dad come home every night at 5 pm and spend time with me and my younger siblings he would come home and he would spend some time with us but he would for the most part keep working. As his business grew my dad spent even less time at home and soon he was gone five days out of the week. This greatly effected the structure of my family. My dad has always been the head of household, and he still is however now my mom carries more of the head in our family since she is the one that has been home for most of our lives. 

With my mom "inheriting" this added responsibility of playing both roles for a majority of the week she had a harder time keeping six kids all in line this meant as the oldest child I took up more responsibility in caring for my younger siblings. Now that I'm older and have moved out of the house I no longer carry the role of being like another mom but some of my sisters still associate me as such and will come to me with problems that they would have otherwise gone immediately to mom with. 

When I was in high school, my dad struggled a lot with being gone from his family and sometimes he still does struggle with flying all over the world and hardly being home. Because he was gone from us for so long he developed some depression and that made it harder on my mom as well because she was his immediate support system and slowly my dad had to work his way back into our family. Personally, I hardly had any form of a relationship with my dad and even still it's hard for me to talk with him and rely on him because it feels like he hardly knows me. 

Since my high school days my dad has been working on developing a relationship more with my brothers and sisters and I can happily say that he has changed our family culture to a point were I can see that they have a stronger relationship with him than I did. My relationship with my dad is still strained but it has gotten better the older I get. 

I hope that this gives hope to some families who are struggling with relationships within their families. It is never too late to change the culture but the sooner it gets done the better off your family will be.