Human constellations: getting the bigger picture

Last week it was brought home to me just how important constellations are as the language of humans in relationship. A group of relatively new South African systems coaching practitioners was meeting on Skype, coming from a variety of dimensions of our world – working in the cities and the townships, in companies and the public sector. What struck me was the way our group benefited from observing the patterns of interaction amongst people, that are very much like the constellations of stars. The configuration of people in a group tells every member so much.

Hearing all the voices in the team yields better results

It was the night before our local government elections. As each person checked in, it emerged that every single one had been using constellations in their work around the country.

Here are some of the voices:

• “With a community group working with stress and change, we used a constellation at the end of the day to help them check on their alignment.”
• “We are going to Kimberley soon and we will definitely use constellations”
• “In our diversity work, we found that constellations work really well for emotive topics, where people are scared to say the wrong thing in words. Simply moving to express themselves is deeply empowering.”

Working with differences in a good way

So much of our work is about seeing, feeling and hearing the system and revealing it to itself. And so much of what our country needs is for all voices to be heard. Yet we often lack a common language. Sometimes the power dynamics leave people feeling unsafe to say what they really want to say.

What touched us all on the call last week was how the relatively light, open style of informal constellations creates space for the delicate and vulnerable process of all people expressing themselves and being heard. And how it enriches our democracy to have more ways to be heard than only the (albeit precious) ballot box.