patterns of cultural influences and personal biographies

where we find patterns, we also will likely find core, emotion-laden ideas within us … internalized messages from daily life (from popular media, family of origin; religious, educational, political, economic, and other cultural influences) and the most powerful of these messages derive from the vagaries of our personal biographies … our earliest relationships and tend to accumulate as a series of reflexive responses to the stimuli of life

these messages tell us what to do