These are some of the issues addressed by the Kardeners in Breaking Free: How Chains From Childhood Keep Us From What We Want. Why do our best intentions so often go awry? What prompts people to engage in behaviors that have the opposite outcome from what they wished to have happened? What attracts us to our mates and then alienates us from them—only to find similar difficulties in subsequent relationships? How and why do we get in our own way of success? What contributes to distress within a person, between people, communities and nations?