Heart Healing Constellations

Family Constellations

Constellation work deals with the very roots of our lives. Our parents, grandparents and ancestors are at the foundation of our having life. From this simple giving and taking emerges an intricate web of relationships and bonds that makes us part of our family, and part of all the good and bad things that ever happened within it.

Most families have experienced tragedies, wars, illnesses, injustices, or even crimes. When one person in a family is devastated by a trauma, others in the family, including future generations, energetically carry, and subconsciously try to balance, the wounded energy, never fully stepping into their own lives. Without our awareness we carry those burdens and entanglements in our souls, repeating the experiences of those who came before. We express these in the form of difficult relationships, "hereditary" illnesses* and accidents, depression*, addictions*, lack of money, and more. By exploring our family systems, we can see the cause of the imbalance, allowing the potential for disengagement from the past, so change and resolution can surface.

Based on psychotherapist Bert Hellinger's observations over many years, tragic events that happen to one person in the family affect the whole family, present and future. Events that can affect future generations include: abandonment, adoption, premature death, missing person, being disowned or ostracized, war trauma, death during military service, famine, murder or other serious crime, emigration to another country, lost fortune, severe and/or chronic illness, physical or mental disability, suicide, child born out of wedlock, abortion, miscarriage, stillbirth, person not honored, ignored or not respected.

The Family Constellation process quickly and precisely reveals hidden dynamics, and restores balance to the family system on a soul level. By seeing what caused the original trauma and honoring each family member's fate without judgment, we can openly take what is given to us and allow the flow of life to pass from our ancestors through us in harmony to the next generation. If you personally have experienced any of these traumas, this process is a powerful way to achieve self-discovery, transformation, and healing.

There are two lasting bequests we can give our children:
one is roots, the other is wings.

Orders of Love (principles that are required to allow healthy relationships to flourish):

• Everybody in the system belongs equally (including children who died at birth, or an uncle who became insane).
• Each person has his rightful place in the system (including a parent's first love, or a deceased or divorced first spouse).
• Whoever enters the system first has precedence over those who come later .
• Those who come later take from those who came earlier, whatever the price.
• The order of precedence between systems needs to be followed (a new family system takes precedence over the families of origin; a second marriage assumes precedence over the first).
• Parents give, children take.
• In a relationship between parents, the giving and taking needs to be balanced.
• Guilt and merit belong with whoever earned them, and after an appropriate time families must be allowed to forget what is past.

Constellation healing takes place in an atmosphere that is safe, confidential, supportive and loving.
Everything that comes to light is held in the strictest confidence.

For those who don’t want to divulge what happened in the presence of others, a private consultation with the facilitator can be used to set up the constellation and the representatives can do it ‘blind’. That is, they don’t know who they’re representing or what happened. Nevertheless, the results are the same. A constellation can also be done ‘long distance’ when people can't physically attend a workshop. A phone consultation before and after the workshop is given to reach similar results as when you are present. The members of the workshop represent the people or issues involved and a full report of what took place is given afterwards. 

If a person wants to do a constellation privately, it can be done one-on-one with the facilitator using visualization and figures to represent those involved.

 Being a representative is a deeply moving, healing, enriching experience, as you witness and feel for yourself what makes love work in relationships, what causes and solves entanglements, what unresolved issues you may be entangled with and their solutions, how to prevent entanglements for yourself and future generations, and how to deal with various life situations from a soul level. All you need to do as a representative is be present and report what you are feeling and thinking at the moment. A representative participant also deepens his own healing by participating in the healing energy field.

Representative participants report that when they take part in a constellation, often they get in touch with a part of their own family soul. A woman might be chosen to represent a girl who is still grieving for her father, who died when she was a child. “Coincidentally”, her own mother experienced the same fate. By being in this role, she gets in touch with her own family trauma, and discovers that healing occurs in her family soul as well.

What is a constellation? A constellation is a group of related individuals, such as a family, a military unit, a business or organization. There is a system to all these groups—a hierarchy of age, experience, power, etc. In the case of a family, someone started it and passed on life and experiences to you, as you pass them on to future generations. The older ones are in charge of the younger ones. In the case of a business, organization, or military unit, someone also started it, and passed on the organizational culture. Those in charge are in that position because of their experience and knowledge, a slightly different systemic dynamic in some ways. Sometimes those in charge are older in age, and sometimes not, which creates a more complex system. Regardless of one’s position in any of these groups, all belong, including those who have died or who no longer have contact with the others for one reason or another.  The family has the strongest influence on our lives and relationships, even if we grew up not knowing them, or being estranged from them.  A military unit runs a close second, many times bonding people together closer than their own families. Businesses and organizations tend to put us in situations that reveal what we have to become aware of in our families, for instance a boss who reminds us of our parents and helps us learn to stand up for ourselves.

 For information on Business Constellations, click here.

For information about upcoming workshops, go to events page. To schedule a workshop in your area contact Diane.

For more in-depth information about Bert Hellinger's work, you can read one of the many books on the subject, such as The Healing Power of the Past, by Bertold Ulsamer, PhD, or Love's Own Truths by Bert Hellinger, available at www.ZeigTucker.com, or www.bn.com. Many of the early books by Hellinger contain transcripts of his workshops, or you can read transcripts of some of his lectures at http://hellinger.com/international/english/hellinger_lectures_articles/phenomenological_approach.shtml

 "Systemic Family Constellations" is the name used for a mind/spirit healing process developed by Bert Hellinger.

*Constellations are a Complimentary Healing Method and do not take the place of a physician. For any physical or mental condition, your are strongly urged to consult a physician and follow his recommendations.