What is really healthy for children?

The biggest gift you can give to your children after unconditional love is to come to some resolve or peace with your own roots, so that you can be free of any baggage that you carry for your family, so that your children will not feel that they have to carry you in some way. You may have little to do with your family, or feel that they don’t understand you, perhaps because you are so much more educated or knowledgable than they are, or live a very different sort of life to them. If this is the case you are not yet at peace with your roots.

Another gift if you are still living with the other parent of your children is to regularly make time for each other as parents, where children are not included. This may be called “our time” or “adults time”. This very clearly puts children in their rightful place in the family and helps them to avoid entanglements in the relationship or with either one of the parents. The child may lose a little in terms of a feeling of importance or bigness in the family, but on deeper level be set free to be an innocent, free child, doing whatever is appropriate for their stage of development. In addition all children will like the idea that they are a product of the love between their parents, whether you are still together or not. This is a very helpful and supportive feeling for the child.

Try this exercise

Picture Mum and Dad if you can. Notice the feelings that come up in you, or notice if it is hard to picture or feel them. Notice how large or small they feel to you. If you can do this exercise and feel both parents as a strong, warm influence on you and also bigger than you, then you are in a very strong place to provide the same sort of strength for your own children, particularly if you can also provide some good clear boundaries as well.

If this is not the case, it is likely that you have cut them off or feel superior to them in some way. It could also be the case, that you feel rejected or mistreated in some way as well. This is not a healthy dynamic for you or your family. Bert Hellinger says that we should not be too surprised that when we reject our parents that our children also reject us at some stage too. “What goes around comes around”.

The process of Family Constellations is a wonderful gentle and safe process of uncovering the dynamics of families in order to heal and beak unhealthy patterns and help the client find a suitable solution for themselves.

What if your parent was mentally ill, abusive, neglectful, irresponsible or any other difficult state?

According to Bert Hellinger Family constellations works at a soul level, encouraging each member of the family, through representatives to take full responsibility for themselves, leaving the you free to do the same. It is a process of helping you to accept “what is” and move on from that point and free yourself.

Remember you are not responsible for Everything

It should also be acknowledged that some children do have quite strong fates of their own, that has nothing to do with you personally. For some situations, all you can do is support them in accepting their situation, as best they can, which might be a disability of some sort. Again feeling strong within yourself will help you in this.

What’s different about Family Constellations?

You do not have to take the whole family with you to a workshop or private session. Only you need to attend. The rest of your family may never know what you are doing for yourself, if you prefer. Constellation work tends to ripple through the family group and down to the children via the energy connecting all family members. All of us want to have great relationships with our children and also for them to be free and strong. This starts with you being free and strong as a parent.