“I’m in charge of Los Angeles.  And I come here; I feel like a little fat girl.”

We usually think of time travel as something that happens in science-fiction movies.  Images of “Back to the Future,” “The Time Machine,” or “The Time Traveler’s Wife” come to mind.  The reality, however, is that it’s really quite common.  In fact, many of us will time travel this summer.

The above quote is spoken by Jane Fonda’s character, Chelsea, in the movie On Golden Pond (1981 ).  Chelsea manages a contentious relationship with her father by moving to the west coast and staying away for long periods of time.  When an impending marriage brings her for a visit to Golden Pond she finds herself living in the past – again.  Though she has built a successful career and feels “in charge” in L.A., she quickly travels to the time of feeling “like a little fat girl.”  Somehow the years and miles don’t seem to matter.  With different specifics, most of us can probably relate to Chelsea’s experience.

The dynamics of our first family create powerful energy patterns that time and distance do not erase.  There is something about going home that triggers these dynamics by default.  Sometimes it’s as palpable as a force field.  Sometimes it’s much more subtle; catching us by surprise after we vowed to ourselves that it was going to be different this time.

In psychotherapy we refer to these ingrained patterns as “scripts” that reflect the role each of us learned to play in our first family.  When we recognize that our old script no longer fits who we are (or who we want to be), changing one’s script often becomes a therapeutic goal.  The good news is that with persistent practice we can learn to relinquish restrictive scripts and adopt new ones that are more useful to us.  We can learn to stay in the here-and-now.

This kind of time travel happens with greater frequency during the summer months of family reunions, vacations, weddings and extended stays with our families.  These are great opportunities for noticing your own experience when you’re together with your family.  Do you find yourself feeling anxious or defensive for no current reason?  Do you feel accepted for who you are today or like you’re caught in an old photograph?  Do you have expectations of others based on their scripts? 

Although time travel sounds like an exciting adventure, most people find that learning to stay in the present allows a life of greater ease and more authentic relationships.  We have the ability within us to redefine what it means to “go home."