Systemic work or the Heller method in the lives of individuals and families

One of the most powerful methods of working with people that I have learned so far is systemic work, based on the principles of fieldwork discovered by the German psychotherapist Bert Hellinger. I have been learning this method myself since 2018 - Systemic Constellations Centers Riga (SCCR) training, and now I am starting to feel confident enough to explain in my own words what the Heliger systemic approach is and what it is. I hope that as you read the following lines you will gain both insight and interest. The article is both about my personal experience with systems work and a small theoretical background about the method itself.

Get out of prejudice

It seems that the first thing to get rid of when you come across the word "Helinger" is any misconceptions about it. These exist in society because the method is used by different people, for different purposes and often in quite a misunderstood way. It is therefore only normal that the first reaction to the word is based on prejudice. I had to come out of them myself.

Until a few years ago, my understanding of the word "Helingers" was quite narrow and, frankly, far from the truth. Somewhere in the back of my ears I had heard about some people who, using some mystical Helinger method, take people back to the past where they can resolve their relationships with their loved ones. I had built up a picture in my mind that this was something like regressive therapy or spirit invocation, very esoteric (in the negative sense of the word) and definitely not for me. What can I say... I guess this is the society we live in - a society that, by retelling other people's opinions and gossip that they have heard somewhere, creates misconceptions in each other about the meaning and purpose of things.

Fortunately, I had the opportunity to face the perversity of my preconceptions.In the spring of 2018, I met Iveta Apini through some fortunate coincidences, SCCR founder and leader, who has been working with this method for more than 10 years and also runs training courses in Latvia, where it can be learnt in the context of both families and organisations. The training is organised in partnership with Bert Hellinger Instituut Nederland (Bert Hellinger Institute), one of the world's leading organisations in the use and development of this method. Experienced and world-renowned foreign trainers are also regularly invited to participate in the training in Latvia.

If I had to answer the question whether I chose to learn this method, I would say hardly. Rather, the method chose me - life gave it to me unexpectedly. I met Iveta at the beginning of the week and by the end of the week I was sitting in the training group with my mouth half open, feeling grateful and thinking, "I'm not a fucking idiot after all! I am not the only one who sees and perceives all this! There are already people in the world writing about it, talking about it and putting it into words!" In a way, I felt redeemed. This does not mean that my life became easier (or that "since that day I became successful and happy"), but there was more clarity about the order of things. 

"Knowledge of intergenerational loyalty is not stored in the mind, but at deeper levels of system, genetics and cellular consciousness." (Gottesman & Hansen, 2005, as cited in Cohen, 2006). 

I think this quote could be called the basic theory of family systemic arrangements. It is an excellent definition, but I believe it calls for an explanation, which I will try to give below, step by step.

What is the theory behind family systems?

Family systemic ordering is a method that looks at the individual not only in the context of their personal biography, but also in the context of their family system, touching on intergenerational issues. Systemic work involves therapeutic interventions drawn from systemic family therapy, existential and humanistic psychology, and the respectful treatment of ancestors by the South African Zulu tribe (Cohen, 2006).

What did Bert Helinger discover?

Bert Hellinger worked with people - a lot, in fact throughout his adult life. Bert Hellinger also devoted a large part of his life to the study of human functioning - existential therapy, psychoanalysis, hypnotherapy, gestalt therapy, neuro-linguistic programming, etc. Around the age of 60 (1985) he was in private practice in Germany and his performance and the methods he used in demonstration training were appreciated by the eminent German psychiatrist Gunthard Weber. Another 10 years later, Bert Hellinger was an internationally renowned author of books and methods (Cohen, 2006).

Over many years of work, he discovered that there is a certain order, a certain set of patterns - a certain way of doing things and why - in the being in which we exist (the cosmic consciousness that contains each one of us). 

This theory proposes that our lives are influenced not only by our individual consciousness (will, desires, attitudes, values, etc.) but also by larger forces beyond our ego. One of these is systemic consciousness, the systemic force. Drawing parallels with the theories of the Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung, it can also be called collective consciousness. It could perhaps be said that Jung discovered the existence of the collective field, while Bert Helinger discovered the principles of its operation.

The systemic (collective) field exists and there is order in it. There is only one problem: in our daily lives, through very simple and seemingly understandable actions, we often confuse this systemic order and even work against it. As a result, we become ill (both physically and mentally), have difficulties in our relationships with our fellow human beings, find it difficult to achieve or even set goals, and various other anchors and obstacles that are familiar to all of us. 

Bert Helinger defined these regularities or principles of both individual and systemic consciousness, and created the method of systemic orderings through which one can access the information in the systemic (collective) field, and perhaps even use its state. As a result, changes can begin to take place in the client's life.

Over the years, Helinger's principles have been incorporated into the work of various helping professions - psychiatrists, psychologists, biologists, organisational counsellors, and education professionals. For example, the author of the morphic resonance hypothesis, a doctor of biology Rupert Sheldrake; PhD in biomedicine and psychology, author of the Somatic Experiencing method in trauma healing Peter Levine u.c. (Cohen, 2006).

What makes this method a bit special?

First, the work is with the unconscious (meaning something that is not really conscious). In everyday life, these are problems that are most likely to be found in the systemic (collective) field - problems that we simply find ourselves in over and over and over again. They are our attitudes, behaviours and actions that we cannot change even when we are aware that they exist (and we have tried at least 10 methods to change our habits, without success). Systemic in nature are situations in which the conscious will is powerless, because the systemic force is something much greater than that. I think we all have at least one such case in our lives. The good news is that with the Helinger method you can get the impulse or the step towards a solution even in situations where there seem to be no options.  

Secondly, the focus of the work is on the system in which the human being is embedded, not on the individual. For, whether we like it or not, not only does each of us have interests, but each system in which we are involved has its own interests (family, work, school, country, European Union, etc.). Often our personal interests and the interests of the system conflict with each other. And whether we like it or not, the interests of the system are always stronger than our personal interests (and if we do something that harms the system as a whole, we get hit - there are consequences). 

Thirdly, family systemic arrangements address the intergenerational issues already mentioned. What does this mean? The theory behind the method is that traumas, tragedies, illnesses, strong seemingly inexplicable and unjustified feelings or, on the contrary, the absence of feelings and other problems in our lives can be symptomatology that calls us to pay attention to events, to cases in our family and family history - to pay attention to a trauma that someone (or several) has experienced but has not survived.

A small digression

It should be mentioned here that trauma has an interesting nature and an even more interesting interplay with the human psyche. Everyone's life is full of events, and these events are not always pleasant. Strong negative events cause psychological trauma, and not all trauma can be processed immediately by the psyche. In extreme situations, the psyche shuts down the traumatic event, unable to bear the emotional pain. In metaphorical terms, it cuts off a part of itself from consciousness so that it does not have to feel pain. The whole part of the psyche is preserved and the person continues to function - to survive. Yet - trauma heals itself by repeating itself. Therefore, one can only get rid of trauma by going through it, by experiencing the unlived pain. Yet, not all traumas can be resolved in a lifetime.

The idea behind the Helinger method is that any unprocessed trauma experienced by a member of the family system tends to repeat itself (actualize) with the aim of integrating the lost part back into the whole system. This actualisation of the trauma is realised through a person belonging to the system in future generations. For example, in the case of a family, the trauma of grandparents may be actualised through grandchildren. Thus, it is likely that the failures of our lives are not limited to us as individuals - it is likely that we, as members of the system, have received them (and will pass them on) from one generation to the next. 

The sad news is that this happens whether we personally want it to or not, because deep down we are loyal to every system we belong to. Especially to our family system.

Each smallest particle encodes the information of the whole

The good news is that this lost information can be accessed. Why? Because we are not just bodies with an operating system called "brain" that only has access to information we have experienced in our personal biography. In every cell, in every smallest particle of the material and immaterial world, there is information about everything that has ever existed, exists and will exist. It may be hard to believe right away, but the evidence is mounting - even at the level of official science.

For sceptics, just 150 years ago the world believed in the idea that the human mind had only a conscious part. The idea of the unconscious only became popular at the end of the 19th century. Today we take it for granted. Looking at modern scientific knowledge, it seems to me personally that in another 150 years the idea that information can be extracted from the field will seem just as logical. We are doing it today (I certainly am), we are just not fully aware of it yet.

Here, back to the topic... The information about what has happened, or at least the information that the system needs to restore order (integrate the disjointed parts), can be accessed through the systemic ordering method. Essentially, it is a way of accessing information that is stored outside our brains - in the field or at a deeper level of system, genetics and cellular consciousness.

How is the work on family systemic arrangements going?

The process of systemic alignments is phenomenological, which means that the client is not directed towards a specific goal and looking for answers outside (in circumstances, events, attitudes, etc.), but on the contrary - working with what is revealed, born, opened in the process of work (Cohen, 2006).

This phenomenological principle, or the state in which an answer, a next step or sometimes a solution can emerge, is also called the empty middle and is a key element of the method. Helinger himself described it precisely: "There are two inner movements that lead to revelation. One tends outwards, wanting to understand and control the unknown. This is the scientific approach... The second movement occurs when we pause for a moment and stop our efforts to understand the unknown and allow our attention to flow - not towards the parts that we can define, but towards the whole... We stop the outward movement, take a step back until we reach an inner stillness where we are able to face the vastness and complexity of the greater whole" (Hellinger, 2001, p. 2).

Incidentally, this same principle and access to the empty middle is described at length, at length and with infinite wisdom in Klaus Otto Scharmer's book "U-Theory".

What exactly is happening in family systemic arrangements?

In practice, the systemic arrangement looks a bit strange and goes something like this: a group of people sit in a classroom. A leader (facilitator) sits in front of the group. Each participant puts forward a topic (situation, problem) they would like to work on. The group leader chooses one of the participants who comes to the front of the group and sits next to the leader who asks him to restate his question. The participant tells the situation in a few sentences. The group leader briefly interviews the participant, trying to get information about the system that might be behind the problem (which people in the family and what events might be involved). The facilitator then asks the participant to choose people from the rest of the group who could replace their family members (e.g. mum, dad) or other elements (e.g. secret, illness) in the system. The participant is asked to place the substitutes in the room - according to their feelings. Once this is done, the participant returns to his/her place next to the leader. 

The room is silent for a while. The only task of the facilitator, the participant and the substitutes is to take in the information from the field (as far as possible without mixing in their personal attitudes, value system or themselves in any form). The task is to turn the attention inwards - to enter the empty middle state described above and to read the information that is revealed while in this state. 

The leader, taking into account the regularities of the family system as defined by Bert Hellinger, and also the information he perceives while in the empty middle state, interrogates the members of the arrangement. The leader then intervenes or allows the movements that are necessary for the client to take a step towards the solution of his/her problem. Interventions can be, for example, turning to face one or the other substitute, a participant entering his/her place in the arrangement, sentences being said, for example, to a mother or father substitute, etc. During the arrangement, there is most often a certain tension in the room - the field energy of the participant's family system is perceptible. The arrangement is most often over when the client has taken a step towards a solution, received the information they need or the tension (field energy) has dissipated.

One arrangement takes about half an hour to an hour. Alignment activities are slow, fluid and sometimes it takes time for a participant or a substitute to be able to, for example, take a step towards another member of the alignment or just be able to look at someone. Sometimes (most often), it is not possible to explain what exactly happened during the arrangement. ...and it is not necessary, because processes happen in the unconscious even if we do not understand them. 

It's not theatre. It's life

It is important to understand that systemic alignments are not role-playing (as in psychodrama, for example) - substitutes do not play scripts and do not perform any predefined actions. They are simply being, perceiving what exists here and now in the moment, and reflecting on it when asked. Moreover, this perception is not active, but rather passive - not as an attempt to sense something specifically, but simply to read what is already there.

I would also like to stress that the ability to perceive systemic energy is not supernatural or something that is unique to highly sensitive people - we all do it every day. Everyone is capable of perceiving system energy - without exception. For example, when we walk into a room and feel tense for reasons we cannot understand. Or when we meet a person who is friendly, but we want to stay away, and many others. The work with systemic alignments is designed to perceive, read and possibly transform exactly this type of information - information that we register but often do not understand where it came from (and most often question at a conscious level what we have perceived, especially if it is not in line with what is "externally visible").

It is also significant that strong emotions and feelings, strong bodily reactions, can be experienced during the alignment (as if out of nowhere). I have personally felt dizziness, shaking knees, inability to speak and other physical and emotional manifestations during alignments. From the point of view of Newtonian physics, these reactions have no reason to occur and cannot be explained by the mind. They are caused by the field - by contact with information stored in the field, by reading information from the aggregate at the cellular level.

Sometimes, systemic ordering is not an easy job. Sometimes the step towards a solution requires allowing yourself to be vulnerable in front of other people. However, as I get to know this method better and better, I can definitely say that there is something very, very deeply healing about this process and it really gives a different level of springboard for development - whether we believe in the existence of the field and the system or not. 

Jump on board the train of new thinking models

I think we are living in a very interesting time. A time when what was true yesterday is false today, or at least a half-truth, because yesterday's knowledge has been supplemented by new knowledge. It is extremely interesting and challenging at the same time, because we have to look more and more carefully at what we believe and, at the same time, bear in mind that tomorrow we may have to abandon our beliefs. 

This awareness may sometimes cause anxiety, because the mind is used to seeking stability and predictability, but there is also something infinitely beautiful about it. There is an infinite amount of flow, trust and faith - faith that the field knows what it is doing. It leads. All we have to do is surrender to it. To open ourselves to the unknown. So my final wish to myself, to the sceptics (of which I am often one) and to those who take it all for granted is: to be open to the information that comes to us; to the future that wants to come - to be open to the field.

This free content is produced in my spare time without pay. If you see value in what I do, I'd be happy to make you a coffee! It's like a spur to create new content! 🙂

Sources:

Cohen, D.B., (2006). "An Innovative Systemic Phenomenological Group Process From Germany. The Family Journal: counseling and therapy for couples and families, Volume 14(3), 226-233 

Gottesman, I. I., Hansen, D. R. (2005). Human development: Biological and genetic processes. Annual Review of Psychology, 56, 263-288.

Hellinger, B. (2001). Love's own truths: Bonding and balancing in close relationships (M. Oberli-Turner & H. Beaumont, Trans.). Phoenix, AZ: Zeig, Tucker & Theisen. (Original work published 1994)

Charmer. K.O. (2018). "U-Theory". Star ABC