Unconscious loyalties to groups to which you belong, whether they be through family, religion, co-workers or other sources, can influence you in the way magnetic lines in the Earth’s field pull the needle of a compass to orient northward. The forces are invisible and subtle, and can exert a low-level background influence on your life and choices. By examining your loyalties, you can become conscious of which values are helping guide you along the path your soul chose for you in life, and which may be creating resistance and uncertainty. It’s a perilous thing to write about your family members while they’re still alive, and about your own formative experiences as a child. And in writing that sentence, the ocean of feelings behind it tell me I’m approaching the depth of this topic. The loyalties I developed to family messaging when very young are being challenged to do their job- to...

When you are at peace with your parents, there are two powerful openings that occur in your life. First, you’re able to look at your mother and father and accept them just as they are, without judgment, and without wishing they were or had acted any differently. This allows for you to be receptive to the full power of the life force that they passed on to you, with all the conditions to which your soul agreed in order for you to have your life. You can experience all the strength that comes through your ancestral lineage without any dilution. Secondly, when you’re free from any entanglements with your parents’ fates, the choices they made in their marriage and their parenting approaches, you no longer have to use any of your energy in secretly trying to change anything about them or any of the ways that they have acted in life- either...

One of the strong medicines in the healing method of Family Constellations is the valuation of acceptance of all that has happened in our lives, over the practice of forgiveness of another. Before I came to this work I had more understanding of forgiveness than of acceptance, both at the cosmic level through the sacrament of confession in the Catholic Church and the forgiveness of sins, and through my socialization which impressed upon me the necessity to do what it takes to eventually forgive another who has hurt me. When younger, I felt that the compulsion to bestow forgiveness came from a place of superiority, and the vague sense that I would prevail as a better person than the bully who insulted me if I didn’t hold a grudge against him. I would rise above his unworthy level. It’s clear to me now there was a twisted sense of revenge...

I recently traveled with Kelly Lyn, Wilma Pollard, and Amy Jackson to Montgomery, Alabama for the opening of the Equal Justice Initiative's National Memorial for Peace and Justice, the first site in the United States dedicated to remembering the thousands of African-Americans killed by lynching between 1877-1950, and all those terrorized by the practice. As we see in our healing work, those who are lost from the family without proper grieving and honoring leave an influence on the descendants. Sometimes a descendant unknowingly takes on symptoms of illness or depression as an unconscious attempt to restore the one who was suddenly or traumatically taken back into the family's awareness, even several generations later. In any system, balance and harmony is disrupted until all elements are given their place. A family system is no different. This trauma is held by all of us collectively in the U.S. on the systemic level, and as citizens we have an obligation to raise our awareness of how the unresolved energies of slavery, racism and lynching affect us all and keep us entangled in history. Regardless of your family's participation in slavery, or when your ancestors migrated to the U.S., you share the same responsibility...

A constellation can be a safe way to open a window into the deeper energies that make up the ongoing streams of your family’s story. Setting up and working through some of the layers of a constellation allows you to observe and explore, with trained guidance and from a little distance, some of the sticky and confusing threads in which you have been suspended in your family life since your soul agreed to incarnate into your unique circumstances here on Earth. The word ‘constellation’ signifies that you are one of many members of a family system that is part of a much larger lineage of many generations. By expanding the lens and looking at more of the picture, you may come to see hidden connections that channel much larger forces that have been directing the system without your knowing. After working with hundreds of clients we have seen in most cases that a simple historical fact like: -my father has an older brother that died just a few weeks after birth; -my grandfather died of a heart attack at age 45; -my mother’s youngest sister was sent away to live with other family members because it would be safer...

KELLY: “The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists, who are dedicated to justice, peace, and brotherhood. The trailblazers in human, academic, scientific, and religious freedom have always been nonconformists. In any cause that concerns the progress of mankind, put your faith in the nonconformist!” -Martin Luther King, Jr., civil-rights leader (15 Jan 1929-1968) CHUCK: "We are coworkers with God, trying to bring about the kingdom of brotherly love and peace. If He sees fit to use us, we must accept His will, knowing that all things work together for good for those who love the Lord. From this belief, I gain consolation and the faith to continue. I believe very strongly that a person must dedicate himself to what he believes. When you decide to give yourself to a great cause, you must arrive at the point where no sacrifice is too great. This is the first demand that is made of us in our great struggle for civil rights." Mrs. Coretta Scott King, quoted in New Lady Magazine, 1966 Write up of Constellation for Healing Gun Violence - Monday Jan 18, 2016 King Day Attending: Chuck, Kelly, Rose, Barbara, Lea, Colleen, Lisa We began with the quotes above, and then followed our agenda. We acknowledged all the other cities across US who were participating (more-or-less) simultaneously. We also reminded everyone of the potentially intense nature of the energies we would be invoking, and we were trusting them with their own responsibility...

Regardless of the stories you carry about your family- what happened in the family history, how you feel you were recognized, treated and supported in your likes and dislikes as well as your talents and longings, and how you feel currently about the state of the relationships you have with all your family members- there is a simple practice that can help shift the way you carry your family in your heart, and bring you peace and resolution. It is the recognition that of all your gifts, the greatest you were ever given was life, and to acknowledge this gift with a bow. You are the literal product of the lives of your parents and all your ancestors. Through their struggles and successes, through their traumas and delights, through all their experiences, life flowed through them and came to you. They lived so...

Three Levels of Healing In the practice of Family Constellations, there are a number of levels of consciousness to move through in order to reach the deepest healing at the level of the soul. The three levels are called Acknowledge, Accept and Agree. When a person begins presenting the issue for which they need peace and resolution, they will likely begin in either the mental or emotional level, or a mixture of the two. The mental level is the facts of the personal and family story- what has happened, and what is known to be true. It is best to stay with the facts without going into speculation, opinions or judgment, because that leads to cycling in the story without opening a possibility for change. What is already known and has been experienced is from the past, and healing- replacing the current limiting image carried in the unconscious mind with something healthier- can only take place in the present moment. Acknowledging the truth takes the form of simple statements: You are my father. I am your older sister. You died when I was 18. Stating and facing what is true allows for deeper connection to the body...