Family Constellations

The Ancestral, Generational and Family tree branch lines I facilitate a Family Systems Therapy based on Family Constellations (Bert Hellinger). Looking closer at events of War: Political unrest: Economic hardship: Migration : Emigration, big events that have impacted the family line. The consequences of family line issues include loss of connection to family roots, to origin, culture, friends, loved ones, comes a grieving which creates depression, substance abuse, addiction to alcohol & drugs, physical and emotional abuse from others and to self, sexual rape, murder, suicide, emotion abuses, financial abuse.

What is a Constellation? The technique of a Family Constellation session is deceptively simple. Someone who wants to examine their family dynamic is brought together with a group of people from whom they select individuals to represent different family members, including one to represent themselves. In one to one sessions any thing can be used as symbols of representation Without giving them any explanation or instructions, the client positions these people to stand in’ for original family members by arranging them in the room in any way the client or issue holder feels is correct representation of their family What we have here is a portrait of a family: a configuration that expresses something about the degree of intimacy, pain, love, or sense of abandonment, each family member feels in relation to each other. Very quickly, within the group, the stand-ins begin to feel things that the original family member actually felt, a phenomenon that has been corroborated many, many times by reports from actual family members. It is not uncommon for stand-ins to report a body sensation that turns out to be an accurate representation of a disability belonging to the family member they are representing; someone whom they do not know anything about. Who Can Benefit from Family Constellation? We all come from one sort of family or another and, though we may not be aware of it, we all have something unresolved in our relationship to our family. So everybody who has a mother and a father has something to gain from this therapeutic approach. Anyone who takes the opportunity to assemble their family members in a constellation through the Hellinger work will find that it accurately represents their relationships with each other and reveals hidden significance to the one who is arranging them. But family difficulties may not be the only issue for a Family Constellation session. You may have a problem which appears to have nothing to do with your family. Perhaps, you can’t find a love partner, or are having difficulty continuing a relationship. Or you may be struggling with a job you dislike, or be having trouble making a living. You may even have an illness you sense may have psychosomatic origins. Or perhaps there is nothing specific going on, but you feel that your life is empty and meaningless. Family Constellation can look at anything that brings emotional or practical upheaval in our lives, because most of these psychological problems can be traced back to unresolved family issues. The problems that pull us away from living a joyful life don’t come out of the blue. Just by understanding that my personal difficulties are part of some larger disharmony that involves all the people with whom I grew up, and those who came before, allows me to relax. Article from Svagito R Liebermeister book The Roots of Love

At the core of this approach are what founder Bert Hellinger refers to as the ‘ORDERS OF LOVE’.

Disturbances in these orders might be an unconscious ‘entanglement’ with the difficult fate of a family member, even going back several generations. These disturbances often manifest symptomatically, as dysfunctional patterns such as addictions, depression, conflict in relationships or ill health.

They could show up in our lives as grief, anger or guilt, which despite our best efforts, is never resolved.It can be that we ‘carry’ something that belongs to our parents or a previous generation.

The purpose of a family constellation is to reveal the hidden dynamics of such a situation and point the way toward resolution. It is a way of working with the Sub conscious to restore the natural flow of love.

Families and individuals can address issues such as addiction, marriage and relationship, understand persistent and chronic symptoms and health challenges, mental illness, adoption, grief, employment and finances.

Ancestral or Generational ?

Ancestral and Generational are often words used interchangeably. However there is a difference, Generational being the immediate family line traumas. I have found from the clients I work with at Root Cores, clearing their past generational issues, clears the way for not only them but for their children and future generations. I work closely with generational and childhood trauma as they are entwined as part of the human journey.   Ancestral is far more expansive inluding past lives. Reference to “My Ancestors” in many cultures means more than human life, it refers to all forms of life, rocks, trees, four legged winged ones as in the Lakota prayer Aho Mitakuye Oyasin “All my relations” the interconnectedness of all life. The Soul Journey. It is said our actions now, effect seven generations into the future. (Iroquois Nation 1140). With our human only ancestors we can go back many generations, 7 and beyond, there is a lot of traumas in that for sure.  What I’ve found in my work at Root Cores is there is an enormous amount of trauma just within three to four generations, parents  grandparents, great grandparents, for most of us that is as far as we know, in their physical form, other relatives beyond that, we only know from photographs, or stories handed down, as a connection to our family origins or ancestry, Other people may not have any idea of their ancestry, cultural geneocides, adoption or fostered, big traumas on their own, which I also work successful with.   Through the immediate generations, there are world events of collective trauma. The industrial revolution, before then 95% of humans lived on the land, the potato famine in Ireland, Gold rush mass migration to Australia, New Zealand, California. 1914 -18 World War 1, The great depression in the 1930s, then WW2 1939 -45, A very sustained time of collective tension, fear and anxiety. Many choose immigration to new countries for safer family life. Then more wars Korea, ,1960s civil rights & hippie movements, The Kennedy assassination, Vietnam war, The Cold war, The Cuba missile crisis, the modern-day wars the Gulf and Afghanistan, 9/11 to name a few. Collective fear for human survival.  In our direct family line, members of our family unit have been directly and non-directly impacted in some form by collective traumas, which often lead to generational and personal trauma. some is conscious, much was taken inwards to dwell in the subconscious. Mothers raising children in war times being both parental roles. Mostly young men going to the war frontlines, ultimately to protect their loved ones back home, Soldiers returning shell shocked with PTSD, Alcohol abuse as a way to numb the memories, abusing loved ones, physical, emotional, sexual in those altered states of mind, much was hidden behind closed doors. In some cases, young victims later became adult perpetrators.Babies in the womb feeling the Mother taking on her stress levels, Effects of the home and social environment, spread wildly through generation after generation.  Adopting parents already affected by those collective traumas plus shame of not be able to produce biological children. Children conceived out of wedlock in times of little contraception, given up for adoption, aborted or unmatched couples forced into marriage for fear of family shame or to gain higher social statis.  I’ve barely scratched the surface of hidden family secrets, shames, there is so much trauma alive in those 3 to 4 generations alone, to clear from the subconscious layers.  We are fortunate to live in times where we can safely release those deep buried imprints of trauma, to move beyond just surviving into living fully recovered, that’s the way we can make the greatest impact,starting with self, our own healing, our health and wellbeing, our sense of self-worth, self-love, our self-belief expands as we are no longer under the constraints, bondage, false loyalties of past family events. The ripples go out into future generations, with the past generations cheering us on, in joy, proud of us for being able to break the generational  cycle, thriving not just surviving, taking the healing steps, evolving beyond where their steps finished. We can heal the collective, its starts internally within each individual as healthy humans mind body Soul aligned, love of self brings a return to respect for All life thats when the ancestral healing begins as a side effect of generational healing, “Aho Mitakuye Oyasin” . I am a practitioner of Ancestral,Generational and Childhood trauma healing .