“When we look at our parents, we see that behind them are their parents, and behind their parents are other parents, and so on through many generations. The same life flows through all of them until it reaches us.”
Bert Hellinger
Our families contain a colourful array of personalities. If you trust that the Universe has a higher purpose for everything, you must believe that family members are in our lives for a reason. On some level, we chose our parents, grandparents, great grandparents and so on all the way back to 7 generations. These are our ancestors who came long before we did.
In family constellation work, we strive to create a flow of love through this family line by giving each person their rightful place, even if they’ve been shamed or forgotten. During this process, we honour these energetic ties. Even if we struggle with someone in our family or don’t like them for whatever reason, they are still part of our family.
Family constellations are a therapeutic approach which can be practised in a group or in an individual setting. It focuses on uncovering and resolving hidden dynamics within the family systems that can affect a person’s behaviour, health and relationships.
During a family constellation session, participants usually represent different family members or key aspects of the client’s life. Through this representation, underlying dynamics and entanglements within the family system become visible.
Our families help us see where we have come from so that we may more clearly decide where we’d like to go. If we can learn to accept our families for who they are, then we go out into the world, capable of dealing with anyone. Some families are better than others at preparing us for the world, while others aren’t.
What we learn from our families forms the basis of our identities. Rather than denying our connections, we can choose to accept their presence in our lives. Acceptance does not mean we have to like them; we simply acknowledge our connection to them and honour that connection because, like it or not, there is a reason. When we can embrace all they bring into our experience, we may be grateful for all we have learned and will learn from them, while we experience everything that comes with family.