Introduction
If you are like me, you've realized how much we need today to tap into alternative and heart-centered methods of dealing with life's challenges and making sense of our lives and the world around us. We realize that the traditional approaches fail us in living effectively and joyfully.
I discovered the method (Family Constellations, Systemic Constellations, or simply Hellinger Constellations) during my own journey of exploration through the landscape of traditional and alternative methodologies. What attracted me is the unique perspective on addressing profound deep-rooted systemic issues within living systems. What made me bring it to the center of my practices is that no other approach I have come across had such an effect - quick and profound.
I experienced it for the first time at the beginning of 2016, and later that same year, I got trained as a facilitator. Gradually, I put that method in the center of my work. In parallel, I have seen how it has gained significant attention and acclaim globally. Today, it's an honor to take people on a sacred journey- an exploration of interconnectedness and the path toward profound healing, integration, and harmony.
In this article, I delve into the fascinating world of Systemic Constellations, exploring its principles and potential benefits.
Discovering Constellations
Hellinger Family Constellations is one-of-a-kind approach birthed from the compassionate wisdom of Bert Hellinger. He was a revered German psychotherapist who has woven together threads of aboriginal wisdom, psychological insight, and systemic awareness, with divine guidance and love.
Bert Hellinger is often quoted saying with humbleness:
"Family Constellation existed before me, I only encountered it"
Hellinger Constellations recognize the symphony of interconnectedness between family members, embracing the understanding that unresolved wounds and traumas within the family's fabric can reverberate through generations, casting shadows upon individuals in the form of emotional distress, stuckness, or physical conditions.
What started as a method of exploring the family system is now applied to any living system- team, organization, community, or society, Nature.
In my experience, this approach invites us to acknowledge and illuminate the entanglements that hinder personal and group growth and harmony. It especially helps to deal with repetitive issues that we can't seem to get rid of despite our efforts and logical reasoning. They could be personal- related to our health and well-being, money and success, careers, and overall - the ability to move effortlessly and joyfully through life's challenges. Or they could be organizational- related to the hidden dynamics and entanglements that govern life there and don't seem to go away when dealt with traditional change management and leadership methods.
On a personal level, I recommend the method in any case when you want to:
GET UNSTUCK, MAKE A BREAKTHROUGH: Achieve a significant breakthrough and shift difficult relations and/or persistent challenges.
DEEPEN YOUR KNOWING GAIN CLARITY: Deepen your understanding of yourself and the systems you belong to by making invisible dynamics and patterns visible.
RECONNECT & REGENERATE: Find healthier and life-affirming ways of joining, belonging and leaving systems you're part of personally or professionally.
GET AHEAD EASIER,HEALTHIER & WISER: Tap into your intuition and inspiration to make way wiser and out-of-the-box personal and professional decisions.
Unfolding the Dance
During a Hellinger Constellation session, a facilitator, known as the "constellator," guides the process. Participants usually seek a resolution to personal or professional issues. The constellation typically begins with a brief conversation between the constellator and the participant bringing the issue. The constellator gathers essential information about the participant's issue, the structure of the living systems it belongs to and identifies the elements that will be constellated. That helps create a map of the living system.
Next, the participant chooses a visual representation of these elements. During one-on-one constellations, the constellator may use figurines and other virtual or physical vizualizations. During a group constellation, the representatives are selected from a group of individuals present at the session. What's unique about this method is that participating as a representative (for various members or elements within a living system of someone's constellation) has been proven to be as impactful for participants as when their issues are constellated.
Then the representatives (people, virtual or physical objects) are intuitively placed according to the participant's perception of the system's dynamics. This arrangement forms a living representation of the participant's constellation. As the constellation unfolds, the representatives experience physical and emotional sensations corresponding to the people or elements they represent. This embodied experience shows hidden dynamics in the system, entanglements, and unresolved traumas.
The constellator facilitates the process by guiding the representatives to express their sensations, emotions, and perceptions. By acknowledging and addressing these hidden dynamics, the participant gains insight into the underlying issues and potential paths to resolution.
The Potential Benefits
Hellinger Constellations offer a range of potential benefits for participants seeking personal growth, healing, and resolution of repeating personal or professional issues. I personally have identified the following key advantages:
JOURNEY: Reconnecting to the essence and getting clarity on the next steps of your journey (personally or professionally).
UNSTUCK: Making progress when stuck in drama, persistent challenges, or being easily triggered in a personal or group setting.
PROSPERITY: Re-establishing healthier relationships with money, authority, power, well-being, and success.
ZEST: Getting back your balance, energy, and zest for life by reconnecting to life and its essence.
CLARITY: Making progress by bringing clarity to complex, multilayered, and difficult-to-understand contexts (personal or professional).
CONNECTION: Re-establishing healthier relations with self, others, the personal and professional systems you belong to, and Nature.
CHOICE: Getting new perspectives on personal or professional choices and getting empowered to make a choice that feels right.
CHANGE: Getting to the heart of personal or organizational transformation and change, facilitating it, and dancing with it with ease.
Conclusion
Family Constellations, developed by Bert Hellinger, provide a unique and profound approach to exploring the hidden dynamics within family systems. His students have widened the application of Systemic Constellations to issues experienced within any living system. I have also made my own personal discoveries, and I can't keep being amazed by the power and possibilities that the application of this methodology offers.
This modality offers an opportunity to illuminate hidden dynamics and get profound insights, nurture wholeness and integration, embrace harmony and wisdom, expand self-awareness and fulfillment. The method is mystical and magic, an invitation to dance with the hidden melodies of life's symphony, reweaving the tapestry of our lives with love, compassion, and profound interconnectedness.
Natalia Blagoeva
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