Family Constellations - Practice with Me

HOW TO Summary

1) Set up a circle with your dolls just before the session.

2) Ask the client, "What's the issue?"

3) Get clarity on it.

4) Ask the client to pick up the dolls accordingly.

5)Express your own feelings to the client.

6)Then ask them, "How do you feel about this, about this image?"

7) Look for the trauma.

8) Tell the client you're going to say a few words and they can adapt them to their voice.

9) Use Healing Sentences.

10) Ask them "How do you feel?"

11) When they say words such 'relief', 'in peace'...

12) It's the end.

Mary is a student of mine. She took the offer to have a session/lesson with me.

When asked about the theme, about her issue, Mary began telling me she had done a lot of work on her mother's separation but would like to have another view on it. Then she said, "I will explain it to you."

I had to interrupt her.

Here is why: Stories and perspectives are not of interest for us. They are her viewpoints. They keep the clients where they are. It's what they believe. Constellations are about facts; traumas. On top of that, a lot of people have years of talkative therapy and they know an incredible amount of details about their problems. And problems are symptoms of something much deeper called the unconscious. We can't possibly know what's hidden. It is HIDDEN, it's unconscious. Our job is to bring it to the surface; to make it conscious.

"What is exactly that you want?"

This is one of the most difficult questions to answer. That's why life coaches exist. They help you with that. So that's why we say to the client any question will do. What's missing now? What would you like to have, be or become? What is bothering you now? These are substitute questions that might help you get it out of the way quicker. The unconscious will show up in non elaborative responses anyway.

1) I have a lot of tension I'd like to solve when I interact with people. I moved to a country that speaks a different language than mine and it's a bit hard for me.

2) I'd like to have friends. I feel I'm missing in the communication with the outside world. But I am busy with my children. I'm also studying.

3)But I also would like to improve the communication with my mother and that takes a lot of her energy. "She's quite dependent on me." And I noticed this pattern of having become her parent instead.

Here we have a three topics; the tension, making friends and mother's issues. All three have one thing in common - communication issues.

And  that would be the issue. But when I was preparing for the session, as I was putting the dolls in the field, one child doll fell four times. Then an adult doll also fell. I knew there were deaths issues to be looked at. So I asked Mary, "Did you or your mother lost a child?"

She said, "Yes, my mother lost my older brother at 33 for drug addiction."

Please pick a doll for your mother.

She chose a white doll with brown her and I placed her in the middle of the field.

Choose one for yourself.

She chose a white doll with blonde hair and asked me to put it facing her mother.

DETAILS OF THE DOLLS:

They were both white. We see the connection straightway.

Her mum was looking to the left.

Her doll was looking down.

A daughter facing the mother is confrontational, seeking attention. But as se looks at the floor, besides showing to me she was looking at the dead it also gave me the sensation she somewhat humble.

SENSATIONS:

I had chills throughout the session, specially when I mentioned the dead. A sign you are in the right path. Remember to keep asking your clients 'How do they feel' and it's ok to feel nothing and where in their body. You just want to know how the emotions are moving and transforming.

I put a dead adult for her dead brother in the direction her mother was looking at. The same doll that fell just before the session began.

"Did you have an abortion?"

"Yes, four."

"Are you angry towards your mother?"

"Yes, maybe about a few things I didn't like about her like partying, smoking and drinking. I wanted her to change."

"So you don't agree of who she is?"

"Yes, but not in the way of who she is but more the way she behaves. I was protecting myself from those actions. I wanted to teach her."

"The way she behaves is part of who she is. Protect how?"

"She was not an alcoholic and as a friend I could have accepted it. But not as her daughter. But the smoking near me. I had stopped smoking and I couldn't stand the smell of it."

"When those issues with her started?"

"We got together when my brother died and my father left her for her friend later in life. We kind of had to support each other."

I put the four children in between the mother and the daughter.

"How does that make you feel?"

"They separate us. It's like I'm telling her 'Look at that'."

"And she's still looking the other way - at your brother."

"Yes."

"Were your abortions before or after his death?"

"After. One year after. It's interesting, yeah."

"Do you get the feeling I'm getting?" (chills from head to toe).

"(Silence)Yes."

"You're calling your mother's attention to you?"

"Yeah."

"It's like you are saying, 'Your pain is my pain.' You lost a child, I lose a child. But she didn't change and you kept losing more and more out of blind love."

"It's funny because I also felt the pain of losing my brother."

"Remember when you told me that you and your mother had to support each other? How did you support her?"

"Hmm, by that. Interesting. Hmm!"

"I'm feeling chills all over. How are you feeling?"

"Like it's a bit terrifying."

"You put yourself in front of your mother to attract her attention, but it didn't work. Noting to do with her partying, drinking and smoking was a worry and the illusion a child has that she can protect her mother from more harm. And also a way to show to her despite your brother being gone, you are still there. 'Look at me and at what I've done for you. I love you.'"

"Oh, I don't want to see it... (covering her eyes) I don't want to do that anymore. I want to be free."

"You are now conscious and can't unsee what you have just seen. Do you understand the power of the unconscious? I feel chills. How do you feel?"

"I'm just terrified."

"Where is it; this terror?"

"It's this tension in my head. It's like I don't want to see that. I realise it, but why? Why did I need to do that? I don't want to. I want to be free. I don't want to give life for that."

"It's finished now."

I explained that her mother's behaviour had to do with the way she coped with the death of her son and nothing to do with her. Now matter how many more children she might have, mothers get stuck in their  losses; not in their gains.

HEALING SENTENCES

"Mum I see now."

"Mum, I see you." (Lots of crying)

- Tell client to allow the emotions to follow, after all this is why they are here. It's not they will be able to stop the floodgate from happening, but they might try to resist it. It's just suffering more to let go.

"I can look at the situation now."

"I'm so sorry things happened in the way they happened."

"It's so hard."

"I've been trying to get your attention for so many years, staying by your side all this time."

"This is too big for me. You're too big for me."

"I'm only the child, small."

"And even though I want to help you, I can't."

"You stay big, I stay small."

"The death of my brother was difficult for the both of us. But I cannot carry your pain. I already have mine."

"You are strong. You can carry your pain and your destiny. I can only carry mine."

DEEP BREATH

"How do you feel?"

"It's a relief. Hope. Hope because I got rid of this responsibility that is not mine. I was instinctively trying to protect her. Being loyal. I didn't know it'd go that far. That's a big price to pay. The tension in my head is gone.

THE OLD IMAGE OF THE UNCONSCIOUS

Mary faces her mother.

THE NEW IMAGE OF THE UNCONSCIOUS

Mary's mother is now behind her. And all her children are in front of her.

"How does that new image make you feel?"

"Like that's the right one."

THE END

ALL THE MANY ISSUES HERE:

We work on one issue per session. Mary has many more entanglements to work on.

- The older brother dying and her staying alive.

- The four abortions.

- The fathers of the aborted child.

- Her relationship with her husband and the aborted child together.

- The children who survived in the middle of all four deaths etc.

Peter came to me asking to work on relationships in general. He said that even though he's a guy who meditates a lot and looks inside himself for clues of what's wrong, he couldn't figure out as to why he's not able to develop a relationship.

He told me that he believed his very religious mother could be the reason. Peter said she always told him and his brother that she didn't want them to marry anyone because Jesus Christ was coming back, that had had an damaging effect on him.

I asked about his parents' s relationship. And he told me his father was always drinking and that his mother spent life complaining about him, telling her sons how bad their father was and how much her life was also bad because of his attitudes. But because his father was never abusive,  he and his brother just distanced themselves from him.

When there's a relationship problem, the first thing I want to know is about the parents' s relationships.

I asked him to pick a doll for the mother, one for the father and one for himself.

DOLLS DISPOSITION

The mother was looking down.

The father was distant, on the opposite direction and parallel to her.

Peter chose a child doll for himself and placed it in front of his father. When I placed his doll in front of his father, the doll fell.

"Do you feel weakness and tired on your daily life?"

"He said yes."

"Has your mother lost a child or had an abortion?

"I don't know."

"She looks very depressed and sad. Is that how you see her?"

"Yes."

"You are in between your parents and trying to get your father to see you. You miss him a lot, don't you? You are a little child asking to be loved and allowed to love him. How do you feel?"

"I feel this is right."

A CHILD CANNOT DEVELOP AN ADULT RELATIONSHIP.

All Peter sees is his father. But he's afraid of making his mother sad. So he stays by his father. He hasn't grown up as a man because he was not allowed to model his father openly. But this doesn't mean it's the mother's fault either. To believe that, is to get entangled in more judgement and create more problems.

HEALING SENTENCES

To the father:

"I'm sorry I came in between you and my mother. This relationship belongs to the two of you. I'm leaving it now."

"I love you. I've been near you all these years trying to call your attention. I couldn't openly declare my love for you because I was afraid to hurt my mother."

To mother:

"I'm sorry. I got in between you and father. It's not my place. I'm leaving."

"I see you have your own pains but I am only your child."

"You are big. I'm small."

"You stay big. I stay small."

"You are strong and able to carry your destiny."

"I can only carry mine."

"Please bless me so I can grow and have healthy relationships with whom I choose. Not better, not worse than your; just different."

HIS FEELINGS THROUGHOUT THE SESSION

- Tension in the chest.

- Relief and light.

- Sudden and very strong desire to fall asleep.

"Is this sleeping sensation good or bad?"

"Very good. It's like I've been carrying a load on my back and now I was allowed to put it down.

CAREER

Marsha is a client of mine who agreed to have her session taped so you could all learn from it.

Her issue is very common, and here are a few symptoms related to a disconnection from the father figure and similar to career.

- Don't know what to do.

- You're doing something you don't like but can't change or don't know how.

- You have difficulties finishing what you start.

- Maybe you have a profession but it doesn't develop to its full potential.

- Professionally lost.

- Don't know how to make money.

- Can't have or never had a career.

- Make money but spend more than what you make.

THEME: MORE SUCCESS

I'd like first and foremost to say thank you to Kuhoo, who's also one of my students, for volunteering and making this session possible.

And I am certain it will also help many people become aware of how powerful the unconscious mind is and how difficult it is to deal with problems and their "unrelated" symptoms when don't even know we have them.

"Just because we remembered something, doesn't mean we forgot about it," Bert Hellinger.

- What's your issue?

- It's not related to me. It has to do with my husband's family.

And I allowed her to explain a little bit to see if there was something in there it could lead me to the real cause. But then I stopped and told Kuhoo we cannot do a session for somebody else. It had to be linked to herself, her life, her wants...

It boiled down to, "I could have some more success."

As you can watch the session, I will write here only my own insights about it.

1) Chances are most people who will come to you for a session will have probably had some form of therapy before and therefore might believe they have already worked on a relevant issue that might be key to the session with you. Again, chances are there are still things to be uncovered.

2) Dolls falling are rarely accidental. Take notice. They might develop into an important information later.

3) We are working with deep traumas. Sessions might start lighthearted, but they quickly turn heavy. You are not here to feel sorry for the client, you are here to be of service. But be open to the complex connections and allow them to affect(feel) you not always trying to understand them. Then a sudden understanding will tell you where to go.

5) "Theories and books do not replace experience and what you see," Bert Hellinger. Be attentive to your feelings too. Chills might indicate you are going in the right direction.

6) In this session, there are multiple themes. So be aware of that and do not try to solve one's entire life in one session. It began with wanting to be more successful in the career as in 'fame'. Then besides the two dead children linked to it, there was also a miscarriage. That would have been another session. Then there was the teaching and Q&A which normally shouldn't occur.