What makes us happy is always a popular topic at this time of year and of course underpins all those New Years resolutions we traditionally make.

A recent New Zealand survey (Grouse and Jose, Victoria University, Wellington) demonstrates that the majority of those surveyed considered family the most important reason to live.

Relationships with friends and colleagues came next – but nowhere near as huge.

When we know that our own family relationships are splintered or fractured in some way, it cuts quite deeply – and most of us would like to find a way back – but are perplexed at how we could ever possibly do that.

Inevitably, as with any big ventures in life, we sometimes we need help to get those important relationships back on track. Strong family connections – as the survey suggests – are important to the creation of a sense of identity and for keeping mental health intact. This is true for all of us – children and adults alike.

As adults we do have some power to change things – but as children, we don’t have that same power.

Think back through generations of human evolution – typically a child would interact with multiple people – especially extended family. These days we have the right to choose whether or not we wish to stay connected with our child’s wider family – and social change has allowed families to relocate geographically, to divorce, to lose connection. This has meant a huge scattering of kith and kin. Often with an accompanying emotional price.

Here’s the scientific problem: the human brain has not changed very much – even though social conditions have. So, for example, if family interactions are confined to one single parent and a child as sole family contact – this is not going to work in the favour of the neurobiological  needs of the child’s developing brain. It is a mismatch between evolutionary needs and contemporary realities. A child needs multiple interactions and understanding about their family identity to protect and foster their developing brain.

If there is a fracture in the family – between a grown up child’s parents  – or between a young child’s parents – then we have a problem. And it is a problem, which will impact the family throughout the life cycle.

Finding some way of letting bygones be bygones – of understanding and figuring out a way forward is worth its weight in gold – no financial sum will come anywhere close.

Help to repair these fractures is available – and very, very important. I see these transformations occurring in my practice all the time, through careful and compassionate work.

Our children urgently need to understand and embrace their full genealogical inheritance. And we as adults need this too.

A new year signals a new start –and taken in small steps, lots of impossibilities can be made possibilities.