Dear vinay,
not surprising that this happened around this topic. Something is still
not allowed to be said. Psychosis is often also present. so the woman must
have sensed that deep fear and did what she could to wiggle out of the
situation. when we sense fear, we need to stop, because we need to have
every person's trust, particularly the real players from the past,
perhaps one would need to work very slowly, just talking around it, gently
exploring, with no purpose in mind, no goal, rather just relaxing and
probably just having a general exploration about the topic, may be others
in the group know the sense of secret also. we respect it and allow it to
be there...include it. perhaps the secret itself may talk later... why it
needs to be there. the hidden-ness could also belong to the past. there
could be other people from the past that do not permit any
opening...sometimes just looking at it with compassion may be enough.
thanks for your openness, Vinay
On Mon, Feb 24, 2014 at 10:03 AM, Steve Vinay Gunther <spirited@xxxxxxxxxxxx
wrote:
Greetings from China
I ran a constellation workshop here on the weekend, and had an interesting
incident, which I would like to hear how others may handle.
One woman brought up the issue of her child's stammer. I proposed three
reps: herself, the stammer, and her child.
She placed all three next to each other, facing the same direction. Ok,
that was an obvious arrow. I tried to discern who they could be facing.
After questioning it seemed most likely to be her grandfather, who was a
policeman during the cultural revolution. As is usual in China, this was
never spoken about, so she had no further information. But it seemed there
was a victim, a woman, and the rep for the stammer indicated this very
clearly.
The work was powerful, and the client, who had experienced no feeling at
all watching it for some time, suddenly burst into tears. Something shifted
through the process.
Afterwards when I fielded questions, one woman played the 'doubting
Thomas' role. She said - well, you have no real knowledge it was the
grandfather. He might have been a clerk. You created the emotion because
you put him in there, and directed the drama. You might be misleading her
unnecessarily, and there is no proof at all that this is really what the
stammer is linked to.
This was a reasonable interrogation of me, the rationalist mode. I
answered as best I could: explaining that we use feelings as guide, that we
notice the structure of the constellation, and do our best to read it,
listening deeply to what it is communicating. I explained the difference
between 'forensic truth' and systemic truth, and tried to communicate the
contrast between linear causal explanations and multiple causality.
She was not really satisfied, and kept on pressing her concern that I had
simply conjured up this drama, possibly deceptive in my confidence.
I finally had to tell her that perhaps we had different ways of valuing
feelings and the fuzzy logic/impressionistic approach of constellation
work, and invite her to notice her own feelings as well as her thinking.
I feel confident of course in my history of how constellations work, and
how they benefit. But it was certainly confronting to have someone strip it
down like that in the cold light of 'rational' analysis. Whilst I can see
that she only views one side, I think she does point out a danger in our
work, subjective as it is...
Well, I open this up to how other facilitators deal with this kind of
objection.
Vinay
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Calm is over all the hilltops,
in all the treetops you can
hardly feel a breath.
The little birds are hushed
in the wood.
Wait,
soon you will be calm too.
- Goethe
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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