My goodness Logan, the transcript I shared was from the workshop on Trauma
given by one of the earliest facilitators who studied directly with Hellinger
in the early days. Berthold was also one of my earliest teachers as most of my
training f was in Germany and other parts of Europe. So this transcript is NOT
to be confused with a conversation a real father has with his real daughter,
but rather was transcribed from a constellation that Berthold Ulsamer set up
for one of the attendees at the two part training—a week in December followed
by a week in May. This may not even have been an actual piece of personal work
that someone asked to do but it could very well have been a demonstration of
how to handle a difficult situation in a constellations setting—we were
facilitators seeking advanced training in trauma from him.
No one is inferring, and certainly not me, that I have my client say these
things to his real daughter! You’re quite right that would be a violation. But
if these difficult topics cannot be addressed using representatives to gain
insight into what might have taken place or to reconcile the situation which is
what happens in the post of Berthold’s work. In the same manner as we would
return mother’s fate to her, the person to whom it rightfully belongs, so the
father admitted his feelings, and that he also had feelings towards his mother,
but he separated and said to daughter—I leave you with what is yours and I take
with me what is mine {in this case the sexual attraction} and thereby
reconciles the guilt—whether the guilt is over an actual event or merely the
guilty thoughts.
Liz Jelinek, PhD
On Jun 7, 2017, at 6:48 PM, Logan Sparks sparksrl@xxxxxxxxx
[ConstellationTalk] <ConstellationTalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hello,
My name is Logan. I am a facilitator in Albuquerque, NM (and also very
mobile). I know many of you in this group. So it is nice to see your names
and comments popping up in my inbox.
If you don't mind me jumping on in this thread, I noticed that it seemed that
the father, in this case, admitted his feelings of sexual attraction towards
his daugher, verbally. After that, it seems, there was a discussion about
whether he commited any violations of his daughter after that, that he may
not consciously remember.
To be frank, telling your child that you desire her sexually is already a
violation. The daughter stepping away would be a very natural response.
In systemic work, I feel that we are used to high levels of disclosure and
maybe we don't always think about these elements of what is best kept silet,
and out of the field of a child who cannot and should not carry the burden of
a parent's sexuality. Hellinger has said that often it is best for a person
who has cheated to keep the guilt to him or herself rather than telling the
partner. The reason being that this puts systemic pressure on the
non-cheating partner as they must then respond, forgive, etc...thus somehow
placing responsibility with them, rather than where responsibility rests.
This is not meant to at all be crtical of the wonderful work being done in
this case (most likely the situation was previous to the constellatino, I am
guessing) but just something important that I want to share. I have seen this
dynamic a few times, and there is also a value for non-disclosure as a way of
respecting the place of a child in the system.
In much of the constellation work I have done, and seen others do, I am very
aware that many people still do not fully see the child int he child's place,
something particularly rife in western culture and in the U.S. where children
are often sexualized. I have seen that facilitators, for example, helping me
to work with my parents, unconsciously seem to think that, as a child, my
representative should be doing the right things in order to make the parents
love him. With others it is the same. There is a pressure for the child to
surrender to the parents etc...in a way that sort of assumes that I am
increasingly seeing how not engaging in this way leads to resolutions that
may be slower, but go deeper, with the child finding his or her place more
naturally and truly in healthy order, rather than holding a tense space on
behalf of a client and a group of adults that have been gathered together to
fix something.
Guarind this sacred child-space seems to work real miracles.
Thank you,
Logan
