My Commitment:
Helping you build resilient family capital.
Money isn't enough.
And family units don't just naturally fall into place by default. The odds of sustaining family wealth across generations are low.
If families want to flourish, they need to work at it.
That's why I have partnered with the MacDermott Method. I am committed to helping you build strong financial capital and strong family capital.
I hope you'll make use of these resources, and start your journey toward growing strong family capital.
Ask Me About the Four Family Meetings
I am a Resilient Family Capital Specialist and am trained in The Four Family Meetings, which were designed by Kristin MacDermott, a licensed marriage and family therapist and expert in resilience. These meetings provide family members with tools they can implement immediately to improve their interactions, strengthen their connections, and foster a sense of belonging.
If you are interested in having your family complete The Four Family Meetings, be sure to ask me for more information!
Meeting #1: Building Connection by Telling Life Stories
The premise of this meeting is that our life experiences inform our paradigms, beliefs, and behaviors. When people have different life stories, they develop varied perspectives, which can lead to conflict and disconnection within families. Understanding the stories about how people developed their different perspectives builds understanding and deepens connection. Families will walk away with:
- A basic understanding of the cognitive behavioral framework that explains behavior: Namely, thoughts cause emotions, which in turn drive behavior.
- A tool for understanding the stories and life experiences that have shaped other family members’ paradigms, beliefs, and thoughts.
Meeting #2: Using Conflict to Strengthen Relationships
The premise of this meeting is that how families argue is often more important than what they argue about. Conflict can be productive if family members use a healthy model of conflict resolution that allows them to better understand each other's perspectives, to feel seen and heard (even when they disagree), and to reach solutions that result in everyone getting more of their needs met. Family members will:
- Walk away with a clear understanding of and framework for healthy conflict resolution.
- Commit as a family to the “Rules of Engagement” that allow the framework to be implemented so that relationships can reset and family units can grow closer through conflict.
Meeting #3: Eliminating Resentment With Boundary-Setting
The premise of the third meeting is that family members are each responsible for protecting relationships from building resentment by setting and enforcing boundaries that eliminate or minimize resentments from taking root. When family members do not set and enforce boundaries effectively, they are hurting the relationship. Family members wil walk away with:
- An understanding that a boundary that is not enforced is not a boundary; it is a wish.
- Tools for holding their boundaries in ways that feel good.
- A framework for talking about needs and boundaries so that interactions with each other are positive.
Meeting #4: Aligning the Family Vision By Honoring Uniqueness
The premise of the final meeting is that families function best when the family culture fosters a sense of belonging for each individual family member. The family can achieve this sense of belonging by honoring and making room for each person’s unique strengths, values, and interests. Family members will leave this meeting with:
- A understanding of and appreciation for each family member’s unique strengths and values.
- Tools to increase the number of positive interactions the family members have with each other by creating a unifying vision for the family’s future and legacy that incorporates and uses each family member’s unique strengths, values, and interests.
Get the Book
When we think of the word "wealth," what most often comes to mind is financial capital. We think about money. Yet, most wealth-holders share a common goal: They want their children to be happy and self-sufficient. Certainly, they want financial capital, but what they want even more is strong family capital.
In this book, with an introduction by me, Tim Belber, you can learn to:
- Raise children with self-efficacy and self-esteem,
- Honor each family member's values,
- Communicate well around difficult topics, and
- Develop a healthy paradigm for resolving conflict.
Email me to request a copy!
Email Me!
Get the Workbook
Are you reading Resilient Family Capital: The 15 Strategies Every Family of Wealth Needs? Get the supplementary workbook here, and download all the worksheets and activities you need to help build your family capital.
About Kristin MacDermott, LFMT
Kristin MacDermott is a licensed marriage and family therapist, as well as the creator of the Four Family Meetings and Resilient Family Strategies. She is the author of Resilient Family Capital: The 15 Strategies Every Family of Wealth Needs.
Kristin's resilience-training programs have been validated in four studies (including two randomized-controlled trials) with researchers from the Duke Clinical Research Institute, published in peer-review journals, and proven to promote clinically significant improvement in key resilience measures, including distress, anxiety, depression, PTSD, and self-efficacy.
Over the past two decades, she has developed resilience-training programs for some of the highest performing people on the planet, including Navy SEALS, the Los Angeles Police Department, and healthcare providers at 20 hospitals across the country. She has created programs for cancer patients, divorcing families, corporate executives, parents, athletes, students and mentors and at-risk youth in inner city Los Angeles.
Her passion is helping families. She believes (and I concur) that families should be our greatest source of joy, love, and support. Her mission is to turn this expectation into a reality for the many people struggling with painful family dynamics.
