The Origins of You: How Breaking Family Patterns Can Liberate the Way We Live and Love

From licensed therapist and popular Instagram relationship expert Vienna Pharaon (@mindfulmft, +631K followers) comes a profound guide to understanding and overcoming wounds from your Family of Origin—the foundation of how we relate to others, ourselves, and the world around us.

None of us had a perfect childhood; we are all carrying around behaviors that don’t serve us—and may in fact be hurting us. But it doesn’t have to be that way, says licensed Marriage and Family Therapist Vienna Pharaon. Our past might create our patterns, but we can change those patterns for the better...with the right tools.

In The Origins of You, Pharaon has unlocked a healing process to help us understand our Family of Origin—the family and framework we grew up within—and examine what worked (and didn’t) in that system. Certain dysfunctions (or “wounds”) in that Family of Origin will manifest in our adult behaviors in surprising ways, from work challenges to interpersonal struggles. But the good news: armed with the knowledge about our past, we can actually rewire our programming to meaningfully improve our relationships and our lives in the future.

It doesn’t matter whether you’ve been in therapy for decades, or whether therapy isn’t for you. It doesn’t matter if you have loads of memories from childhood, or struggle to remember anything at all. All that matters is your willingness to look inside yourself, and your determination to find a new way forward. Complete with guided introspection, personal experiences, client stories, frameworks for having difficult conversations, and worksheets to complement each chapter, The Origins of You will teach you how your family can both build you up and break you down...and how you can heal yourself for good.

About the Author

Vienna Pharaon is a licensed marriage and family therapist and one of New York City’s most sought after relationship therapists. She has practiced therapy for over fifteen years and is the founder and owner of the group practice, Mindful Marriage and Family Therapy. She received her Master of Science in Marriage & Family Therapy from Northwestern University, and trained extensively at The Family Institute, Bette D. Harris Center. Pharaon has been featured in The Economist, Netflix, Vice, and Motherly, and has led workshops for Peloton and Netflix, amongst others. She currently lives in Upstate, New York with her husband and son. The Origins of You is her first book.

Author Residence: Rhinebeck, New York