ATTN: Rejecting my parents

i could only be who i am because of this fact that my father and mother are who they are. There is no separation possible, for i am half my father and half my mother.

The beginning of life is sexual intercourse between a father and a mother. According to Hellinger, a child is absolutely helpless to this basic fact. When a child has judgement over one of its parents, it denies its rightful place in the family order and in fact leaves this place. The penalty for doing so is a deep felt restlessness - thinking of The Wandering Jew here. It can be felt as a black hole inside the body, constantly begging for attention. Sometimes illness is used for a blanket, to cover up this black hole.

A few years ago, this woman who had cancer asked for a family constellation. She wanted to find out what the message was that the cancer might carry for her. There were three representants: the woman, her mother and the cancer. I represented the cancer.

We all stood apart. I felt deep affection for the woman, and this feeling was mutual. When she made an approaching step towards me (the cancer) , i stepped closer to the mother. The woman stopped, feeling confused. I made another step towards the mother, and the woman retreated.

The facilitator stood by the woman, and suggested her to say: "mother, i would rather have the cancer than i would have you". This was most painfull for the woman to say. She cried her heart out, yet she felt these were the right words for her to say.

If i learned one thing in family constellations, it is that staying alive is not the most important of values.
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Ron
ClubLeader@ (A)ttention as a Product-(B)elief Management-(C)reativity Network
Freedom is about stopping the past
- Lawrence Lessig