Family constellations is a therapeutic approach designed to help reveal the hidden dynamics in a family or relationship in lodge to address whatsoever stressors impacting these relationships and heal them.

This alternative arroyo may help people seeking treatment view their concerns from a different perspective, and therapists may offer the family constellations approach as a treatment for issues proving difficult to treat with traditional therapy.

  • Development of Family Constellations
  • Family unit Constellations Theory and Technique
  • Issues Treated with Family unit Constellations
  • Is Family unit Constellations Effective?
  • Criticism of Family Constellations

Development of Family Constellations

This alternative approach was developed past German psychotherapist Bert Hellinger in the mid-1990s. Family constellations therapy evolved out of his piece of work as a family therapist and his conventionalities in the energy, both positive and negative, found in familial bonds. Nigh fifty years of studying and treating families led to his ascertainment of patterns of mental health concerns, illness, negative emotions, and potentially destructive behaviors inside families, and he suggested individuals might unconsciously "adopt" these concerns as a way of helping other members to cope. Proponents of family constellations believe the method to be less restrictive than other methods of therapy and support its capacity to let people to encounter unlike perspectives and alternate solutions.

This arroyo draws from a number of other modalities, including Gestalt therapy, psychoanalysis, Virginia Satir'southward family unit sculpting, psychodynamic therapy, hyponotherapy, systemic family unit therapy, and Zulu beliefs.

Family unit Constellations Theory and Technique

A family constellations session typically takes place in a workshop made up of a grouping of individuals who are not related. Members of the grouping stand up in for family members of the person or couple presenting a difficulty or concern. The person seeking resolution of an issue, who is referred to as the seeker, or the group facilitator chooses these representatives and places them into position equally members of the individual's family unit, also choosing ane person to take the place of the seeker in order to complete the family dynamic. The utilize of other individuals to stand for the family is believed to illuminate the disharmony within the family, and the individuals standing in as members of the family are believed to be able to feel and experience the emotions of the person whose role they accept taken on. Hellinger, the developer of family constellations, calls this sense of connexion, which is said to be felt telepathically by members of the group, the morphogenic field.

Although the representatives speak very niggling, the sense of knowing believed to result from the procedure is said to be apparent to all who participate. The seeker watches from the outside to proceeds new perspective on the situation. Even when an event is not fully resolved by the constellation process, the private who presented the issue may even so achieve insight into the effect for which they are seeking help. None of the members of the constellation know the seeker or are enlightened of the underlying issues brought along past the seeker, just they often written report an awareness of specific emotions and feelings directly related to the private's situation. The facilitator may ask members to explicate what they are feeling, specifically in their relation to other members of the family unit. This may shed lite on certain emotions and relational aspects that can be clearly connected to the issue existence addressed.

Resolution may not be immediately clear to the person who has presented the issue. The facilitator in the session repositions members, occasionally asking them to speak their feelings aloud. Members may be moved from place to place in the constellation until they discover a position or are able to make a verbal statement expressing feelings of condolement with their place in the constellation.

Issues Treated with Family Constellations

Family constellations piece of work is considered well-nigh effective in addressing concerns that are systemic in nature. These concerns might include family of origin issues, parent-child relationship difficulties, and intimate human relationship challenges.

Information technology may be used as a potential therapy method for people who:

  • Are seeking to address negative or harmful relationship patterns
  • Want to be in a romantic relationship
  • Are attempting to resolve family unit entanglements
  • Want to overcome inner turmoil
  • Accept experienced significant trauma or loss
  • Are in search of personal and professional person success

Is Family Constellations Effective?

Family constellations is gaining popularity as an alternative approach to therapy, particularly in Europe, America, Asia, and Commonwealth of australia, where it is seen by many equally a powerful and toll-effective method of addressing human relationship-based challenges. Its popularity may exist in function due to the brief nature of the therapy and its unique method of resolving challenges in which others are involved without necessitating the presence of those other individuals.

Proponents of the family constellations approach believe each member of a family unit, adult or child, longs to feel pregnant and observe a identify inside the family construct and support the method every bit a helpful step in the process of achieving this sense of significance and belonging.People who participate in this technique often notice themselves unearthing surprisingly emotional reactions regarding their relationships, familial or otherwise, regardless of their age.

Many individuals report achieving pregnant insight and clarity through constellation work, but because of the subjective therapeutic process and experiential nature of family unit constellations, family unit constellations therapy is not an prove-based approach.

Criticism of Family Constellations

In recent years, Hellinger's approach has come under scrutiny, particularly in German-speaking countries.Critics accept questioned a number ofHellinger's ideas, peculiarly those impacting his family constellations work with individuals seeking aid, and the outcomes of his therapy.

Critics have voiced the following concerns, among others:

  • His patriarchal view of the family unit system typically leads to the conclusion that any matrimonial difficulties are the fault of the wife.
  • Hellinger has expressed his belief that homosexuality is a "disease" to be cured rather than a natural and unalterable aspect of one's nature and claims to have cured an private from this "affliction" with a family unit constellation workshop.
  • The German language critical agency Forum Kritische Psychologiereported iv cases of people seeking treatment for obsessions they reported developing as a result of attention Hellinger's family constellations workshop, and a Dutch psychiatrist reported an additional iv cases of individuals experiencing mental health concerns they said developed after they attended a workshop.
  • I method developed by Hellinger purports to treat trauma resulting from incest (namely, a father's corruption of his daughter) by having the person representing the girl kneel and thank the person representing the father for the experience. This, according to Hellinger, will restore harmony inside the family. Hellinger has also expressed the belief that fathers sexually abuse their daughters when the mothers repeatedly reject their sexual advances, finer placing the blame for the abuse with the mother.
  • Hellinger has stated war criminals should not be blamed for their crimes, as they were just post-obit orders from "higher authority" and has, in family constellations workshop sessions, instructed victims of war crimes to perform a ritual of gratitude to the representatives of those who take committed crimes against them.
  • Participants in Hellinger'southward workshop sessions have reported his anti-Semitic views are often credible. He has reportedly led Jewish participants to view their Jewish descent as a negative aspect of their identity.

Because the vast bulk of Hellinger's books, videos, and writings on his methods are not available in English language, those who offer or participate in this therapy outside Federal republic of germany, Hellinger'south native country, may be entirely unaware of his controversial and potentially harmful ideas. Family constellations therapy does non necessarily operate on basis of these ideas, nor is every practice grounded in all of Hellinger's methods. Since these criticisms have been made, a number of practitioners and proponents of the method appear to have taken steps to distance themselves from these views.

References:

  1. Family Constellations. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://familyconstellations.net/?page_id=971
  2. Family constellations, an interview with Bert Hellinger. (2007, August 28). CureZone. Retrieved from http://www.curezone.org/forums/fm.asp?i=951654#i
  3. FC Explained. (2015). Retrieved from http://familyconstellations.com.au/fc-explained
  4. Nimis, H. (2005, September). Bert Hellinger'due south controversial therapy. Retrieved from http://afa.home.xs4all.nl/alarm/engels/hellinger_e.html
  5. Questions and Answers. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://familyconstellations-us.com/questions-and-answers
  6. Sethi, Y. (2010, December). Does the Process of Family Constellations Better Relationships and Wellbeing? Retrieved from http://familyconstellations.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/research_Dec_2010_doc1.pdf
  7. Wolynn, G. (n.d.). Http://www.hellingerpa.com/constellation.shtml. Retrieved from http://www.hellingerpa.com/constellation.shtml