The Family Constellations series : Honoring your ancestors

🪔In this solo episode, I talk about the injunction to "heal our ancestors" that we've been hearing more often these past few years, and how this stance is actually not very strengthening for your own life. Plus I take you through a short visualization to honor the fate of your own ancestors. 

If you have no idea what constellations are, I recommend listening to S1 Ep5: Family mythology, the told and the untold or read more about it here : https://www.laureporche.com/modalities

🎬You can also watch :
Another self : https://www.netflix.com/fr-en/title/81380432
Ep 5 of Sex, Love and Goop: https://www.netflix.com/fr/title/81459349
This great video on hidden loyalties by Shavasti: https://youtu.be/Sd7umLz77Cw

❔For any questions or requests for this series, you can reach me through my website http://laureporche.com

Get notified when the Silken Mirror membership opens in 2023 : http://eepurl.com/dxzCk9

Follow us on Instagram @moonlitpathchannel

This podcast is hosted by Laure Porché: http://laureporche.com. You can follow me on Instagram @laureporche
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Transcript

[00:00:00] Laure: Welcome to a new episode of the Family Constellation Series. In those solo episodes, I keep exploring the stories that we have about our system or our family, or our ancestors that I find most common and to be the least helpful in our life.

[00:00:24] And one of the stories, the one that I wanna talk about today is a bit of a derivative from the last one that I talked about, the right size, you know, to not be in your right size. And it's a story that's very common, and that's more and more perpetuated, especially in I guess spiritual circles or new age circles or you know, self-help kind of environment. And it's relayed by social media and all of those outlets. And it's the story that we are here to heal our ancestors. And I've seen so many people come to me either in individual sessions or constellation workshops saying, I feel that it is my responsibility, or it is up to me to heal whatever is going on in my family systemically. And I'm the one that should, you know basically solve the problem. I understand the intention, I certainly understand the urge behind it. I spent years trying to put my great-grandmother's spirit at peace through a whole lot of means by looking for her grave, by writing a whole solo show about her, so I'm, I'm not speaking about it from a place of judgment or not having experienced it myself. But I speak about it from a place of having understood how weakening that is as a position and how also inaccurate most of the time, because I feel like we have this understanding of our ancestors' lives very often that is through the eyes of today, right? It's through our own eyes of the time that we live in, we look at our ancestors' life and we feel something akin to, oh, poor them. That must have been so hard. Again, I'm super guilty of this. Most of the time it's not that it wasn't hard, like of course it's accurate, of course, you know, most of our ancestors lived in environments and in situations and circumstances that were much, much harder than the ones that we live in today. And as my dad very, very recently told me, he said, you know, if any of us were put in the situation that our ancestors were in, they wouldn't make it for a day. And he's not wrong. Even if things were difficult or if they didn't have the same freedom that we have, or, you know, if they went through wars and through like a lot of hardship basically that doesn't mean that they didn't live full lives. And that doesn't mean that they were not fully present in their own life.

[00:03:22] And you know, very often people think about this. I'm thinking for instance, of the case of arranged marriage. People today look at arranged marriage as something that is terrible, right? That is, oh my God, that must have been so hard. But that's not accurate for a lot of arranged marriages. Like my great-grandparents were an arranged marriage. They were introduced by a matchmaker. And my great-grandfather was I think 20 years older than my great-grandmother. And they had a perfectly happy marriage. They adored each other. They shared same interests. They shared a love for travel. If you look at divorce rates today, I don't think that non-arranged marriage is a gauge for happiness either. So it's just an example of like the ideas that we can have about the lives that our ancestors lived I think is skewed by our own experience and our own understanding of life.

[00:04:17] And we also forget that very often what they lost in freedom, and I'm not talking about people who were enslaved, I'm just talking about, you know, people who lived in a societal context that was more coercive or more strict than ours in terms of uh, what you could or could not do. And what they lost in freedom they certainly gain in a sense of belonging because for years and years and years, right? The very strict rules of society were way to offer a sense of belonging, which is why it's so hard, right? To leave any very structured community. I'm thinking of extremist religious communities, because people who leave those communities have to give up everything basically. Not just you know, their life, but they have to give up their sense of belonging to their own group. And that's a really hard thing to do. And so if you don't live in one of those very structured, strict communities, we live in a society where the sense of belonging has dimmed greatly. You know, you, you would have like a sense of belonging to your family maybe, if you conform in many ways but the sense of belonging to society, like to, to a larger body of people, I think is becoming less and less present for most people. Just because, the, the rules of society whether they're implied or whether they're externally imposed, the rules of society are not as directed towards the individual as they used to be, and not as repressive either as they used to be. Belonging is not guaranteed anymore in a way.

[00:05:59] But yeah, the number one myth that I see is I'm responsible for healing my family or for making my family functional or for you know, stopping this pattern that is happening. That has been happening for generation. And very often when people come to me with this view, there's a sense of pity for their ancestors, which is really, really weakening to them. Because basically it's as if they were placing themselves above their ancestors and looking down on them and saying, don't worry, I'm gonna help you. I'm gonna save you. Except that it's completely out of place. Because your ancestors are actually the ones that were there before you. So you cannot be above them. Your existence is dependent on them, on their existence and on their survival. And so in no way, shape or form can you ever look down on them and think, I'm gonna help you. That's really, really out of place. You can have great love for them. That's, that's one thing. And you can see them and honor their life and their fate, and that's pretty much all you can do. I find that honoring is the only appropriate stance when you're looking at your ancestors, your ancestry, and your lineage. That's the only appropriate stance is I honor you. I honor your fate and your life exactly as it was, and I honor your strength for surviving it. And that's all. That's all you can do.

[00:07:37] Because you have to understand that what we call dysfunction in families are, and I've, and I've talked about this before in the episode with Amber McBride, what we call dysfunction in the family is actually a function of survival. Like any dysfunction that you see in a family system at some point for someone in that system was a function of survival. And so any system's main objective, and I'm talking family system here, any system's main objective is survival. Is to survive and to pass down life. And so any information related to survival will be treated as paramount and will be passed down through generations.

[00:08:29] I remember working with a friend years ago and this friend had been diagnosed, she was having manic episodes, basically like hypermania. And this had started or became incrementally worse when she immigrated to the US from Iceland. She didn't experience that in Iceland. It started when she moved to New York. And so she came to me for constellation session to work on this. And when I looked at the symptoms, like the list of symptoms which include kind of like hyper vigilance and optimism you know, being able to go for hours without stopping and having this like, kind of like over the top energy. Maybe also struggling to see the things that are wrong, like not really seeing what's wrong. Kind of like functioning on a very, very amped up battery, if you will. And when I looked at the symptoms, and I asked myself, okay, in what situation would someone need these kind of symptoms in order to survive? And so I asked her, did anyone in your lineage, in your family did anyone immigrate anywhere before?

[00:09:41] And so she told me, oh yeah, I have this, you know, I don't remember if it, I think it was with her great-grandfather or great-uncle who immigrated to the US in the thirties, I think in New York. And so you might imagine what immigrating to New York in the thirties or in the early nineteen hundreds, I think he was coming from the Philippines, would entail, you know, and the amount of energy and optimism and ability to go on and that would demand in order to, to survive and to make it. And so basically what had happened is that she had moved to New York and that information in her system had gotten triggered of, this is what you need to survive here, because that's the information that had been encoded uh, years before. And so by acknowledging that and working on that and honoring that ancestor she was able to recover, like to just, you know, stop having manic episodes. And that's, that's one example. The other one is the example that I gave in the episode with Amber, which is I'm hyper mobile, which means like my joints are very lax.

[00:10:47] And one time I went to see an osteopath and he asked me who in your lineage was committed either to an, you know, like insane asylum or prison or who was incarcerated? But he really asked me first, like, who was committed? And I said, my great-grandmother, that's actually where she died. And so he said, oh yeah, cuz usually people who have hypermobility, somebody in their lineage has been in incarcerated in some way and very often it's committed because the hyperlaxity is to be able to get out of the straight jacket. That's the information that's been passed down. You know, or to get out of tight spaces, to get out of, you know, spaces where you're not supposed to get out of. So those are dysfunction, like they're their actual, you know, physical dysfunction that I can think of. But any dysfunction really that comes down through a family very often starts with what can I do to survive?

[00:11:43] And sometimes it's emotional survival. Like for instance, you can see very often women. You'll have someone who come with there's a disconnection from the mother, a very strong disconnection from the mother, and there's no reason for it, like there's not, you know, nothing happened at birth and there was no separation and the mother hasn't really lost anyone, cuz that's some of the reasons why that might happened. And then you might go back a few generations with the grandmother and the great-grandmother and you happen upon a woman who lost a bunch of children, because generations back obviously a lot of children didn't make it to five years old. And when you get to that woman, to that ancestor, she looks at her children and she says, I feel nothing. And that's a function of survival because the grief is so much to bear that in order to continue living she would've needed to stop feeling it. And, and so if you stop feeling grief, then you can't connect, you can't bond to your living children either. And so that gets passed down, you know? But originally it is an emotional form of survival of, you know, what can I do? Like I cannot live with this. And so, either I'm gonna die or I have to stop feeling it. And then that creates a whole chain in the system. 

[00:13:07] But regardless the idea that we can heal our ancestors is really hubris most of the time. It's hubris, it's not being in our right size or being in our right place. It's having a judgment on their life and feeling like, oh, poor them. You know, their life was so hard and la la la and I remember I was really schooled in this once by a Russian f facilitator called Elena Veselago, who is quite amazing. And who is also very, she's very straightforward, she's very blunt. And I did a piece with her about the same great-grandmother that I was talking about who had come from Russia and who had a difficult life obviously, and who I had made my mission in a way to save or to reintegrate in the family, or to save her memory in a way, if you will.

[00:14:05] And so I, I had brought this to this Russian facilitator because I felt that it was appropriate because basically my whole Russian family line, I have no information on them. Her parents and her siblings and her grandparents, and all of these people got lost in the Russian revolution. And so I brought this to her and she did a very simple piece of work with I think me, my great-grandmother and my great-grandmother's gift to me. And basically what came out of the work was: stop wanting to look back. You're not allowed to look back. The reason why people left Russia in the early nineteen hundreds was to have a better life. You have a better life because she left and now you're not allowed to look back. You have to honor her gift, like the gift that she gave to you by leaving. You cannot honor it if you wanna look back. And that was really eye-opening for me. I remember feeling like, okay, because it basically was saying like, you cannot receive her gift or the strength that she's passing down to you if you're trying to undo her life. Which is basically what it is. If you're looking at her choices and feeling pity, or if you're looking at her choices and wanting to look behind that veil, the wall that her choices created between you and the people that came before her then you're basically, you're undoing her gift to you, which was to leave Russia and to survive long enough to have a child and so that I could be here now. And so I find this is a really sober place to be. And it puts you back into your place and it's not especially comfortable, partly because of course it brings you back to your own life and what are you gonna do with it? Because very often what I see, what I notice in people who come up with I need to heal my ancestors and I feel that my great-grandmother or my grandmother has a terrible life and I feel connected to her and I feel like I need to do something for her. And very often what I notice in these people is that they really have trouble feeling their own pain and also taking full responsibility for their own life.

[00:16:25] And in a way it's easier to say or to feel, you know, oh, I'm gonna heal my ancestors. Or, oh, this is, it's coming from there and so I need to just fix it there rather than feel it in yourself and be present to it, to the reality of it in yourself. It's much harder. It's not as appealing as thinking, I'm gonna resolve this equation. I'm gonna solve this problem. And it's also not giving credit to our ancestors and to their choices. We are weakening them and we're not seeing the richness of their lives by reducing their life to the difficulties that they had to go through. Yes, people had to live through extremely difficult times and sometimes had to endure difficult customs or difficult societal constraints. But they still lived and they still made choices and they still had children and, you know, they lived to the best of their ability and we forget that. They also found very often, they found a lot of joy, a lot of belonging in the lives that they had.

[00:17:35] And I feel like this thing of saying I'm gonna heal my ancestors is basically you're turning your own ancestors into victims. And how can you gain strength from that? There's just no way. Like if you look at your ancestors like victims, you cannot gain strengths from that. I'm not saying that people were not victimized, they were. But there's different ways to look at them. You can look at them with their dignity or without their dignity. And I find that very often that sense of, I'm gonna help my ancestors, people are looking at their ancestors without their dignity, because otherwise, if you looked at them with their dignity and their strength, you would never presume that you would be able to help them.

[00:18:19] You know, like if I really look at what my ancestors went through and if I really honor it, the good, the bad, like everything. And, and you know, part of my grandmother's family, all of her extended family died in the concentration camps. So it's not like I don't come from a system that was oppressed as well. But if I look at them and really honor what they went through in their life and the life that they did live and their death, never in a million years would I feel like I can say I'm gonna help you. Never, ever, ever, it would be so disrespectful. If you truly feel into your ancestors' struggles and if you truly honor them, it would not even come to your mind to think that you can, you know, make it better for them. And that's what's really strengthening is to really look and to really honor everything, including when your ancestors were oppressors, you know, at anything less than looking at reality, looking at the truths of things and honoring what happened and all involved. Anything less than that weakens you. And so if you do come from a lineage where you know, people were perpetrators basically, and side note, family constellations was partly created to help the descendants of the Nazis deal with what was happening in their lives as a result of what their parents and grandparents had participated in, and the loyalties that the descendants had very often to the victims of that.

[00:20:08] But yeah, if you come from a system where your ancestors were oppressors or perpetrators. It's the same in a way. It's like you can't take on yourself what they did. It's not an option. You don't have the strengths for that. And you're not in the place to do that, and you also can't villainize them because you don't know what it is to live in a time where group consciousness says something inhumane is okay. And so the only thing that you can do is to honor all involved and to be really clear in yourself about where you stand. But without entanglement with those ancestors. And I guess that's a whole other subject that I might touch on at another time.

[00:20:55] But either way, you know, you cannot help your ancestors in any way, whether it's to save them from their own lives or like heal them from their struggles or to take on the weight of their crimes. Either way it's not up to you and you don't have the shoulders for it. And if you do that, you'll probably mostly crumble under this. And it will also keep you from actually living your own life and taking full responsibility for your own life, which is way more important than to heal your ancestors because they survived so that you could be there, they survived whatever they had to survive so that you could be here. So your job is to be here, not to go back for generations and see what was there.

[00:21:41] And in Constellation I've seen, you know, if the descendant is in the wrong place meaning that in the constellation they attempt to appease their ancestors, that will not fly. The ancestors will be, absolutely not, you know, they will not, either they will get mad or they will feel that it's really wrong. And the one thing that is usually welcome is honoring, is when the descendant stays in their place and says, I see you. And that's all you need to do is just to see them, see your ancestors. So let's do a little, a little exercise.

[00:22:24] Just think of someone in your family system, and it can be, it can be a parent, but it would be interesting if it was a little, you know, a few generations back, but think of someone that you've heard the story of and that you felt pity for and, and close your eyes.

[00:22:44] And just imagine that they're standing before you and they don't have to be very close, especially if they're a few generations back.

[00:22:54] And just notice in yourself the urge to fix and notice in yourself the pity that you feel for this person. Or you know, the, oh, poor them. Oh, that must be been so hard. Notice that movement in your body and feel in yourself how weakening that is.

[00:23:25] And now truly look at them. Really look at them. And you can see them, or you can have just an imagination of them or a sense of them, but just like actually focus on them. They're a real person with a real inner life who made real choices for themselves, no matter how hard they were.

[00:23:49] And see that person with their dignity intact, and if you see them with their dignity, you cannot pity them and you cannot wanna fix whatever happened. Just look at them and see them holding their life and holding their fate and surviving in whatever adversity and having enough strength and enough life in them to then pass down life so that it could reach you.

[00:24:26] And just say to them out loud,

[00:24:32] I see you.

[00:24:34] And thank you.

[00:24:38] Thank you.

[00:24:41] And feel if that is not a little more strengthening in yourself than the other stance. And it might create other feelings. It might create anxiety, it might create lots of things, might have grief that comes up, and all those things are okay.

[00:25:04] And you can add I take your strength and the rest I leave with you.

[00:25:16] And just really feel in yourself how this is none of your business, and how their life belongs to them.

[00:25:31] And when you feel that you have a good felt sense of that, you can open your eyes and let the image dissolve.

[00:25:41] And that's it for today, and until next time, may you be well and may you walk with the strength of your ancestors.