{"id":48,"date":"2026-10-03T14:11:35","date_gmt":"2026-10-03T14:11:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/?p=48"},"modified":"2026-10-03T14:17:52","modified_gmt":"2026-10-03T14:17:52","slug":"alternatives-to-no-contact","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/alternatives-to-no-contact\/","title":{"rendered":"Alternatives to ‘No Contact’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

There\u2019s a trend called No Contact I\u2019ve been watching for the last year or so, in which people consider or choose breaking off communications with their family, or certain family members.  I have many thoughts and feelings on the subject as I continue to think about it and reflect on it. I plan to share more in future essays.  This first one might serve as a brief overview of some of the terrain I\u2019ve covered myself as well as in exploring with hundreds of clients their own painful challenges with family dynamics. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I support each person\u2019s choices and what gives them their best sense of autonomy and agency. There are times when creating distance and separation in order to heal from abuse is necessary for healing.  At the same time I\u2019ve seen how that decision might be a part of the longer process of coming to peace, and that there are additional considerations we might not know about without further exploration and guidance through the dimensions of the family soul. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the healing we practice there is an emphasis on seeing one\u2019s self in the larger picture of the family system and the ancestral lineage.  It\u2019s hard to understand the influences of the ancestors\u2019 lives from the limited perspective of the individual self.  It might help to think about the way a hologram works.  An original holographic image is produced using a laser beam split into two parts.  One part- the reference beam- is directed by mirrors onto a photographic plate directly.  The other, called the object beam, is directed onto whatever\u2019s being photographed- let\u2019s say a coffee mug- in a way that scatters the beam so it lands on the same photographic plate while carrying all the information about the mug.  The way the two beams interact on the photographic plate creates an interference pattern.  When a clean reference beam is passed through that plate, the illusion of a three dimensional mug appears floating in space. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s the part I find fascinating, and relevant to family healing.  You could break the original plate into pieces, choose any broken piece- whatever the shape and size- and pass the reference laser through it and still recreate the 3-D image of the mug. The difference is, it wouldn\u2019t be as sharp as the image from the original plate.  You\u2019d have to put all the pieces back together to get the clearest picture of the coffee mug.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my experience, it\u2019s just the same with us and our part in the family.  We can only see from our place and from a limited understanding until we include in the picture all the lived experiences, memories, loves, struggles, losses, strengths, and healed wounds that reside in the ancestral lineage.  And in almost every case I\u2019ve seen, underneath all of the burdens, somehow, there is love to be found and restored.  I\u2019ll give one personal instance from my life that I didn\u2019t understand until I was in my 40\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was 15 years old, loved music, and wanted to go to my first rock concert with some of my best friends.  I didn\u2019t need money for the ticket, I just needed permission- and my dad said no.  There wasn\u2019t an explanation.  Just no.  The next summer I took driver\u2019s ed in preparation for getting my driver\u2019s license when I turned 16.  When I did, I asked my dad to take me to the DMV to take the driving test so I could get the license, and he said no again.  He didn\u2019t think I should rush into it.  I shared this disappointment with one of the older guys at my summer job, and he offered to take me on our lunch break.  It felt transgressive, but I was willing to risk the guilt that would come from defying my dad in exchange for the freedom of driving.  Thanks to Mark Chism, I got my license, and I felt like I outsmarted my dad.  It didn\u2019t help our relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Years later, thanks to Family Constellations training, I came to understand my dad better.  When he was in his 20\u2019s my dad\u2019s older sister Angie died in a car accident.  She had gone on a road trip from Detroit to Florida with friends.  They were driving at night, the driver fell asleep, the car went off the road and rolled over and my Aunt Angie was killed.  She was the first to go to college.  She worked at a law firm and from what my dad and others in the family told me, she was the academic star.  It was expected that she would become a lawyer.  It devastated the family.  The pain of that loss came from the deep love the family had for her, and that love got translated into a fierce protection my dad had for myself and my sisters.  He didn\u2019t want to lose one of us.  As a teenager I only felt anger, frustration and judgement toward my dad, but as an adult, seeing more of the picture, I found compassion and understanding.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s a risk we may take by trying to separate too fully from the family.\u00a0 Going no contact may be helpful in the short term by providing relief and the space needed to stabilize and grow.\u00a0 In my experience, there is further to go and more to explore to help us keep open the heart of compassion and find deeper healing and understanding.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[Originally published September 8, 2026]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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There\u2019s a trend called No Contact I\u2019ve been watching for the last year or so, in which people consider or choose breaking off communications with their family, or certain family members.  I have many thoughts and feelings on the subject as I continue to think about it and reflect on it. I plan to share […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51,"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48\/revisions\/51"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/constellationjourneys.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}