Hi Everyone,
I continue to be amazed and grateful for the depth of passion and insight that
is being shared on this list.
As the shares keep coming in like Bruce's below and the many others I can't
help but wonder how we
could address what is showing up in this listserve at the NACS conference this
October. While the conference as
a whole, with its many workshops, keynotes, and plenary sessions, will hold the
space collectively for
these issues, challenges, and questions the complexity and scope of all the
comments won't neatly fit into
one workshop or plenary session.
It is fortunate that the programming committee is "hearing from the field"
right during our proposal review process.
We will listen to the field and do our best to be responsive to what it seems
to be asking for. Also, we will work with
the conference steering committee and board to ensure the energy and passion
showing up here has a place to be
seen, expressed and integrated at the conference in Virginia Beach.
Again, I am grateful for all the points and questions being raised and will
hold this as input from the field
of our global constellation community as we put together the conference agenda
for this October.
Warmly,
Harrison Snow
2017 NASC Conference Programming Chair
________________________________
From: ConstellationTalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <ConstellationTalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> on
behalf of Bruce Nayowith bnayowith@xxxxxxxxx [ConstellationTalk]
<ConstellationTalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, April 26, 2017 9:42 AM
To: ConstellationTalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [ConstellationTalk] Russian workshop - Tension between the pressure
towards Order, and the need to honor the body's own ways of processing
Hi everyone,
Thank you for the very powerful and important discussion here, on the list.
Collectively, we are touching on a number of themes, including:
…issues of trust and power,
… how easily anyone, including the facilitator, can be “in” certain fields that
they are not aware of, which may affect their interactions in the constellation…
…. Trauma and re-enactment
… autonomy and individual style, where to draw the line, what might be ‘too
much’….
…it looks different from inside the field/at an event, and watching it later on
video….
I want to point to another theme – the distinction between:
- clear seeing/brilliant insights,
- and skillful actions that encourage the embodiment of those insights.
I ask that we acknowledge that these are two distinct skill sets.
1-Being able to see/sense what is present, and how it wants to be
2-The skills to help the alignment occur in a digestible manner….
Each has its own sensitivities and competencies…
Each is worthy of honor.
Both are needed to maximize the power of this work.
We may be brilliant in one, and not as skilled in another.
And, of course, we continue to learn from our own work, and from others’ work,
and from feedback from clients, teachers, and colleagues.
And, we can keep on learning from each other….
In the discussion about the Russian workshop, I doubt anyone disagreed about
the clear seeing of 'what needed to happen' in the Constellation.
The disagreement is about whether the intervention of the facilitator was in
harmony with integration of the insight into the client and her system.
I am not going to weigh in on that specific case, as I lack the understanding.
I do want to speak more about some of the dynamics that emerge from the
difference between the mind’s scope and speed of processing, and the body’s
scope and speed of processing….
Clear seeing is a powerful gift.
“To do the impossible, one must perceive the invisible”
Or: “You can walk on water, if you know where the stones are”
As a medical doctor, I might have an insight that a patient is stuck in their
denial about their alcoholism or their high blood pressure.
As a facilitator, I might receive an insight from the Field, or from my
understanding, that someone ‘needs’ to honor his mother.
These are diagnostic insights.
[As I write this, I recall that Bert Hellinger often describes himself as a
‘seer’.
He often sees incredibly clearly how things ‘want to be oriented’ in respect to
each other.
This has been a gift that others have picked up from being in his presence,
from watching him, from his writings….]
Once we have a sense of what is out of order, there comes the next skill set –
what to do, and how to do it.
Here are a few UNskillful interventions to try to set something right:
-As a therapist with a PTSD client, I may try to get a client to re-live their
experience, so that they can ‘release it’ (we know how ineffective, and
potentially harmful, this is now)
-As a facilitator, I might push a client too far, and retraumatize them.
- I may try to get my patients with a drinking problem to face the reality of
their medical situation by sticking the laboratory results in their face,
berating them, or telling them that they don’t really love their family if
they are unwilling to keep themselves healthy….
[…. Research studies in the medical profession show that trying to break
through denial with force is highly unlikely to be unsuccessful. … Motivational
Interviewing has a great deal of insight in to how to encourage people, by
being both supportive, AND, reflecting back to them their own change language,
supporting their own motivation for change. So far, most health professionals
are unaware of the power and skill set of M.I.…]
It can be easy for there to be a split between these two competencies.
Some of this is because of the ‘pressure’ that occurs when something feels ‘out
of order’.
It may feel as if transpersonal energies are at play here, pushing hard to
re-align the system.
This makes sense in Constellations, where we know that, for example, a
grandchild can be ‘forced’ into a position in order to balance a system. Of
course systems have pressures....
And, we know that this intense pressure and ‘greater knowing’ carries a
rightness (and perhaps sometimes a "righteousness") with it that goes beyond
the personal.
The stronger the insight, the stronger the “knowing”, the stronger the Cosmic
Power, the stronger the energetic pressure for things to go into order.
So, it can feel “natural” to feel justified in imposing order, because we may
be in touch with the energy of this pressure, and that is what It wants…
And, the greater the temptation to attempt to FORCE things into order….
As facilitators, we may sometimes be subject to being affected in this way by
these energies, perhaps?
If you look at the laws in the Hebrew Bible, you will see this dynamic at play
- how ‘violations of order’, such as working on the Sabbath, etc were
punishable by austere measures…Forcing order...
Exodus 31:14 “You shall keep the Sabbath, therefore, for it is holy to you.
Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death; for whoever does any
work on it, that person shall be cut off from among his people.”
This archetypal movement is ever-active in the universe…..
When we act from this place of too much force of the impersonal onto the
personal, which is so easy to do, we can intensify the split between the mind
and our bodies, between one ‘world’ and the ‘other’….
Unlike a flash of insight that comes suddenly, embodiment of divine form occurs
over time, and is a slower, more relational process, one that often involved
‘feeling held by’, holding space for, its own timing…..
As we evolve into appreciating this corporeal life as well as the Cosmic Order,
things shift a bit, and I am imagining an additional guideline for facilitating
life-forward movement:
-If the “first sin” (in the original Hebrew sense of sin - ‘missing the mark’)
is not knowing the ‘cosmic order’ imprinted in the stars….
(as a facilitator, we may miss the mark because we don’t see how things are
aligned, so we go off course in the Constellation or therapy)….
I would suggest that the “second sin” may be not appreciating the rhythms and
processes of our bodies and minds, not being aware of the timing imprinted in
our hearts and souls, not sufficiently appreciating how to facilitate the
in-form-ation of Cosmic Order into embodiment through tending to the Tao of the
body and mind….
Ahhh, just when we thought we had figured out how to sense the Field, another
space opens, another series of skill sets that can allow us to serve Life more
and more deeply....
Take good care, thanks for listening, and hope this was of some value to you,
Bruce
Bruce Nayowith MD
“…. seeking to connect the energy and commitment of activists, the guidance and
sensitivity of intuitives, and the paradigms and processes from various healing
traditions, to help us engage the intense challenges of our times….”
