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Notes on a Workshop with Bert Hellinger in
NYC, 2004
The truth is it becomes more and more difficult to write about
these workshops because language is meant to limit experience.
By definition. To communicate in writing one wants to capture a
moment, rein in a feeling, focus the reader’s attention,
light up one end of the stage.
The truth is I would really rather sit beside you so that we might
each share in the experience, each take away something of our own.
But we cannot always sit together, and so here I attempt to offer
only the tip of an idea, a glimpse, an image, a fleeting sense
of what occurred at a workshop in New York City on a Friday, Saturday,
and Sunday, in early October.
It seemed as though I had hand-picked this group of people. Mature,
open, skeptical, they had come from across the world and across
town to join Bert Hellinger for this workshop. We met in an auditorium
that is part of an organization that shelters young people who,
for one reason or another, have ended up on the streets. The kids
are provided with a place to live in return for which they participate
in education, counseling, and training. The food for our event
was catered by kids who hoped to someday be bakers, and cooks,
and restaurant owners. Their energy was a powerful container for
our group.
This part of New York City – Chelsea -- is alive with the
full assortment of humanity. It is the city I grew up in and continue
to be in love with. So, where else would I invite Bert but to my
home. And, of course, where he goes, one can expect scores of guests.
And we too were a full assortment, brought together by many things – anticipating
nothing or everything or something in between.
***
Once Bert begins to work, most of us are not be able to recall
what we had expected anyway. A crazy kind of rhythm is immediately
set into motion so that minutes seem to last forever and the
day slips away between thoughts. Perhaps the direction given
is “Close your eyes.” Perhaps the client is asked, “What
is it?” Perhaps the client is encouraged not to talk, but
to get to the feeling and then to stay with it. Or maybe the
client is told to choose representatives for specific members
of her family and then to set them up. The constellation then
unfolds, easily or painfully, and resolution begins to take shape.
For clients, it has been a long wait, sometimes decades, to return
to a time back in time, the juncture at which they became paralyzed … maybe … or
took a wrong turn … or turned back … or, out of love,
chose not to go on. Bert “tunes in,” as he calls it,
so that he is fully present not only before them, but in the face
of their entire family system, sometimes many generations, and
sometimes encompassing an abandoned country or faith or fate. Whatever
wells up from the system, he is ready to accompany the client for
a while. He stands before the enormity of the client’s gathering
past, reserved and ready and without judgment.
What will give this client strength or this family or this system?
The family constellation can reveal the deep lineage of strength
in the particular community. It can also show where the legacy
became fragile, where family members were lost, and just when life
became a threadbare fabric with little warmth or protection to
spare for those who would come later. The family constellation
is anchored in the soul of the family system; it moves, like the
soul, at its own pace -- bypassing all manner of convivial dialogue.
In the regular hours of a daily living, most of us do not have
access to this broader view or to the information buried in generations
past. The family constellation provides a portal to the essential.
Sometimes it is overt – representatives are set up and dynamics
are uncovered through their movements. Other times, loyalties and
entanglements and other distorted expressions of love emerge out
of internal work. They do not appear to the group, but the client’s
face registers a deep shift when the soul has spoken.
***
What happens? In this workshop, in every workshop, we come in
as mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, victims and perpetrators,
young and old, starting, restarting, or ending. On one level, way
down in the depths of shared human experience, there’s little
difference. At the same time, each person has his or her own story.
The father of an adult narcoleptic son. A mysterious figure from
the past steps forward to wake the son from his slumber, showing
him that it is safe to open his eyes and live full-time. The father
waits as the very gradual movement unfolds; he waits with the circle
of men in the family. His son is in other hands. Eventually, they
too join the group, a circle unbroken.
The mother of a young autistic boy. A constellation flips the
snapshot of the needy boy. The needy mother actually leans on her
child. A different lens perhaps leading to a new family portrait.
A man in his seventies, looking toward the end, closes his eyes
to see his parents. As though it was yesterday, they stand in strength
and beautiful life behind their baby boy. He has more time – and
with it, he’ll embrace all the rest of his days.
One, two, more people sit down, but having already connected to
their solution through other people’s work, have nothing
more to do once there. For them, the chatter of resistance and
denial has quieted, allowing the essential to rise to awareness.
The room goes through every piece of work together, every person
giving and receiving … and separately, every individual connected
to his or her own family system, a messenger of life.
***
Following this workshop, many people have written to me to let
me know how much they appreciated the opportunity to be a part
of Bert Hellinger’s temporary community. Some of them have
wanted to know more about exactly what took place. They bore witness
to moments of deep transition, they felt it themselves, but what
was the mechanism that fostered these shifts. I am comfortable
in talking about the underlying observations embedded in this work,
about how dynamics buried in a thousand yesterdays can affect our
lives today … but really; trying to explain what happens
in the moments when the field opens up is like taking a yard stick
to try to measure the sky.
Copyright © 2004 by Suzi Tucker
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