© Els van Steijn, Utrecht, the Netherlands, 2016

First Edition October 2019

Originally published in the Netherlands under the title: De fontein, vind je plek, November 2016

Author: Els van Steijn

Design: The Green House Amsterdam, Brechtje Baars and Leonoor Verplanken

Translation: Natascha Barton, Margot van der Krogt

Printing works: Wilco Amersfoort

Special thanks to: Guido Keff

ISBN 978-949-233-1847

NUR 770

All rights reserved.

Robbert, Job and Mette and all others dear to me:
you have a big place in my heart!

With thanks for the abundant source of my family system.
Full of gratitude for my teachers.

With deep respect for everyone who dared
to open up his or her soul to me, allowing this book to be written.

CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1

Being happy

1.2

The undercurrent

1.3

Inner attitude

2. THE FOUNTAIN

2.1

Receiving

2.2

Connect

2.3

Three sources of strength and energy

2.4

The metaphor of the fountain

2.5

Your family system

2.6

Leaving your place

3. FEELING GUILTY AND INNOCENT

3.1

Sweet, good little girl/boy syndrome

3.2

Your conscience

3.3

Accepting your guilt

3.4

Taking responsibility for your own life

4. YOUR DESTINY

4.1

Worries are relative

4.2

The destiny

4.3

Consequences of ascending in the fountain

4.4

Your destiny and accompanying emotions

4.5

(Innerly) absent parents

5. ASCENDING, METHOD ONE: TAKING OVER UNDUE RESPONSIBILITY

5.1

Leave someone his destiny, or leave someone to his destiny

5.2

Making an unconscious appeal to your child as parent

5.3

Needy parents

5.4

Signs that you have ascended due to taking over undue responsibility

5.5

Presumption and arrogance due to taking over undue responsibility

6. ASCENDING, METHOD TWO: MAKING JUDGEMENTS AND DISCONNECTING

6.1

Someone doesn't see you, do you see them?

6.2

The other person doesn’t see you

6.3

Examples of ascending due to preconceptions/judgements and disconnecting

6.4

What does ‘making a judgement’ mean?

6.5

Signs that you have ascended due to judgements and disconnection

6.6

Combined ascending

7. ASCENDING, METHOD THREE: UNCONSCIOUS IDENTIFICATION

7.1

An invisible world

7.2

Unconscious identification or being entangled

7.3

Family conscience laws that cause an unconscious identification

7.4

Signs that you’ve ascended in the fountain due to unconscious identification

7.5

Nuances

8. ACCEPTING YOUR PLACE

8.1

The person I was, I am no more

8.2

Effects of descending

8.3

The process of descending

8.4

General basic steps to descend in the fountain

8.5

Losing a small piece of yourself

9. DESCENDING

9.1

Letting our light shine

9.2

Descending after method one of ascending, taking over undue responsibility

9.3

Descending after method two of ascending, judging and disconnecting

9.4

Descending after method three of ascending, unconscious identification

9.5

Signs and pitfalls

10. YOUR PARENTS

10.1

Parents are a package deal

10.2

Your mother

10.3

Your father

10.4

When do children feel safe?

10.5

Complicated systemic situations

11. PARTNERS, RELATIONSHIPS, DIVORCE AND CO-PARENTING

11.1

A successful relationship

11.2

Finding and keeping a partner is tough

11.3

Difficult moments in relationships

11.4

When is a divorce successful?

11.5

Co-parenting

12. WHERE DO YOU STAND?

12.1

In what place are you?

12.2

Do you want to get it or do you want to be happy?

12.3

Different fountains

12.4

My place and yours

SOURCES

THANKS

1. INTRODUCTION

‘THANK YOU FOR ALL THE GOOD I’VE RECEIVED, I WILL USE IT WISELY’

1.1 BEING HAPPY

A nine-year-old boy asks his father, ‘What must I do to be happy?’ His father replies, ‘Come, get your backpack and your donkey. We’re going on a four-day trip.’ On day one, the son sits on the donkey with his backpack. The father walks beside him, his own backpack on his back. The people they pass comment to each other, ‘What a lack of respect that son has for his father. He’s not that small anymore, and yet still he sits on the donkey. His father isn’t getting any younger either; ridiculous.’ On day two, the father sits, wearing his backpack, on the donkey and the son walks quietly beside him. Again, people talk about them. ‘What a despicable father, he puts his own comfort and convenience above that of his son. What’s more, the father’s not that old and the son is just a little boy.’ On day three, both the father and son, backpacks and all, sit on the donkey. ‘How selfish! Animal abusers! How can they do that? We’d never do such a thing.’ On day four, both the father and son walk alongside the donkey with their bags. And again, people gossip about them, ‘Those two don’t understand what a donkey’s for. What a couple of idiots for not using the donkey.’ When they arrive home, the father asks his son, ‘Has your question been answered?’ The son nods.

In order to experience happiness and satisfaction, it’s worthwhile to give meaning to a situation yourself, regardless of what the other person thinks. Always of course within the limits of law and reason. After all, everyone has an opinion about something, just as you and I do. Often though, this opinion is formed without any background knowledge or understanding of the situation at all. In your judgement you reject others, and sometimes feel superior too.

You give meaning to your life by acting as far as possible according to values and standards important to you. You feel comfortable and powerful when you and your environment fulfill these values. On the other hand, you lose energy when your environment doesn’t adequately align with what you need and find important in life. By living according to your own values, you avoid becoming a rubber ball, bouncing everywhere and nowhere, among everyone and everything. And of course, you have an inner compass to guide you. It directs you, regardless of the advice your environment, invited or not, gives you. Providing you with something to hold onto and a sense of calm.

‘YOU GIVE MEANING TO YOUR LIFE BY ACTING AS FAR AS POSSIBLE ACCORDING TO VALUES AND STANDARDS IMPORTANT TO YOU.’

Nevertheless, living according to the standards and values important to you isn’t always enough to make you feel satisfied. You may experience an inner emptiness, remain unfulfilled or wanting for something, even when by current standards you’re relatively, or even very successful. Sometimes, analysing the facts alone isn’t sufficient to enable you to understand specific crisis situations in your life. You feel something you just can’t quite put your finger on, but have no idea what, where and why. There seems to be an invisible undercurrent significantly influencing what you do, how you function and your wellbeing in both your private life and in society as a whole.

1.2 THE UNDERCURRENT

In my work as coach I’ve come across many situations in which people are affected by the undercurrent, without knowing how to deal with it. They find it difficult to maintain relationships for instance, put themselves constantly at the back of the queue, or get caught up in battles with ‘authority’.

The undercurrent is often elusive. It’s usually difficult to put your feelings of restlessness, reasons for lack of success or a loss of energy into words. Frequently these are repetitive, extremely persistent patterns. You probably know from experience that good intentions and discipline alone are not always enough to help you get a grip on your life.

In my work as team trainer, coach, and family and organisation constellation therapist, I use two principles as starting point:

If invisible patterns are made visible, they become more manageable.

Facing reality is healing.

The first principle ensures you can influence the undercurrent if you expose it. This involves a certain amount of responsibility. The question is whether you want to bear this responsibility. Once a pattern has become visible, you can no longer claim ignorance. You can however decide how you want to deal with it. Confronting your destiny gives strength. Sometimes though, you may prefer to remain ignorant. That’s fine too. Although such a choice does have different consequences for your day-to-day life. The price you may pay is the rubber-ball effect or a feeling of powerlessness.

Regarding the second principle, I’ve the experience that facing reality, however tough it may be, provides the greatest relief and sense of space. Reality may mean for example that your parents were insufficiently able to give you love and attention. Or you’re dealing with addiction or have rejected a religion very important to your family. By saying yes to reality, you allow it to have less of a toxic influence on your life. The louder you say no, the harder what you reject bounces back at you. The trick is to say yes to what is there and acknowledge it has happened (or is happening), to then be able to separate yourself from it.

‘SURRENDERING TO WHAT IS INEVITABLE GIVES YOU STRENGTH.’

The son from the story with the father and the donkey realised that saying yes to reality made him most powerful. Regardless of what you do or don’t do, someone always has an opinion about you. This is the reality and will never change, however hard you fight it. Surrendering to what’s inevitable gives you strength.

Systemic principles

Water always chooses the path of least resistance and travels straight down, never against gravity. This is a law of nature. Fighting it achieves little and costs energy. You can though get this principle to work in your favour, by for example installing water irrigation techniques on lower-level farming ground or building dams so that water is kept out of specific areas.

The undercurrent also harbours laws that are not always visible, but whose effects are noticeable. Although the undercurrent is complex, it can be reduced to a few basic patterns and essences you can depend on and use to define the effects.

You experience the undercurrent in various aspects of your life. It doesn’t matter if you live alone, with your partner or with your family. Additionally, you’re also part of various groups, like a club or an organisation, but also a town and country. Look at every group you belong to as a system. Systemic means recognising the enormous web that connects all the people and events within a (family) system, and how these affect the past, present and future.

Every system involves laws or systemic principles that you can get to work for you. They help you shift into a positive spiral, so you can improve your relationship with yourself and your environment. Many of the systemic principles were identified by the German missionary and psychotherapist Bert Hellinger (1925), who elaborated on the experiences and insights of others. My work is based on Hellinger and I’ve developed a metaphor to make the systemic principles more understandable and insightful. I have called this metaphor ‘the fountain’.

The metaphor of the fountain

The systemic laws that I describe using the fountain, concern processes within your family system, processes that you are not, or are barely aware of. The fountain clarifies your place within your family system. And when you can take your place within the family system, you’ll also be able to more easily find it in other aspects of your life. By standing firmly in your place in the fountain, you can live your life freely and enter into relationships without being swept along by the instability of others.

Imagine a beautiful fountain with different tiers of water, flowing into each other. At the top are your great-grandparents, the tier under that belongs to your grandparents. Under this are your biological parents. Your place is the tier under them (in the birth order of the children). Maybe you’ve also passed on life, meaning that your children are under you and, beneath them, your grandchildren etc. Take your place, and you’ll receive an invisible strength essential for feeling fulfilled and powerful.

Often though, you’re not in your rightful place. For various reasons, you may have ascended to a tier above you. Meaning you no longer receive, but give instead. Although you may feel big and important, you’re actually building up a deficit. You become needy.

The trick is to get to your place and stay there. Leaving your position in the fountain can happen both consciously and unconsciously. You’re not always aware you’ve shifted. But because you’ve changed place in the fountain, you’re unable to adequately capture its flow. Meaning you’ll have to stand on your own two feet in life, without the natural support of the fountain. You’ll also often feel a sense of inner emptiness. The good news, is that the fountain is always available, provided you’re in your own place and you say yes to what is there, to the good and the bad. You learn to receive.

Constellations

A means to making systemic laws and the resulting dynamics visible, is the family or organisation constellation. A constellation is a visualisation of how the fountain of your system flows.

During a constellation, all elements of the force field of your problem or ‘stalled’ process are mapped out. This is done by focusing on a specific problem, for example how much of what you do doesn’t end well or that you often take on responsibilities that aren’t actually yours.

Other participants serve as representatives of the people close to you and position themselves in a certain way in the space, replicating your situation. During a constellation it becomes clear how you stand in relation to others. Patterns and any accompanying dynamics become visible. After the diagnosis, possible interventions are explored, so that you and your system can be even more empowered. Through a constellation, solutions present themselves. You get a different perspective on the situation, which will also work through into other aspects of your life. What you should do often naturally becomes clear.

1.3 INNER ATTITUDE

The wonderful thing about having insight into the fountain is that by actively working on your inner attitude, you can claim your rightful place. And what’s particularly welcome, is that you’re not dependent on anyone else to do this. Only you, by changing your inner attitude, can take charge of your life and take your position in the fountain. Your place is the position where you’re most powerful and where you can access your individuality and flair. It’s related to your family system but - strange as it may sound - it doesn’t matter whether family members are living or not, or what they have done well or even badly in their lives. It concerns only your inner attitude in relation to your family system. Of course, some people have a more challenging life than others. Your destiny encapsulates all the circumstances that have led you to being who you are today. In my experience, everyone who truly faces their own destiny can not only cope with it, but draw strength from it too.

‘YOUR PLACE IS THE POSITION WHERE YOU ARE MOST POWERFUL AND WHERE YOU CAN ACCESS YOUR INDIVIDUALITY AND FLAIR.’

It can sometimes be extremely painful and difficult to accept your own destiny. Turning a blind eye feels easier. Which is why you often focus on something or someone else. Perhaps frustratingly though, it’s not possible to take over somebody else’s destiny. You only make yourself and the other person weaker by taking responsibility for something that’s not yours. By facing what is yours (your destiny), you create strength within yourself, and surprisingly, within the other person too. This is a golden rule you can always fall back on.

Systemic working is about your inner attitude in relation to your family system. Who and what that comprises, will be discussed later in this book. My clients often tell me they like the fact that the people in their family system do not actually have to be involved in this process.

Effects of patterns from your family system on your current private and working life

It’s striking that the patterns from your family system with which you (un)consciously live or struggle, repeat themselves in your private or working life. To put it very simply, you can often link a pattern, for example regularly clashing with senior organisational layers, to something that you probably still have to figure out with your father. Another dynamic results from the pattern of ‘feeling over-responsible’. Almost certainly there’s a pattern within your family system that means you’ve cared for at least one of your parents in a particular way.

So many of the dynamics in your current life can be traced back in this way to your family system, and this pattern repeats itself in your own family and your private or working life.

I don’t want this book to suggest that the systemic perspective is the (only) truth, that it’s the sole trustee of wisdom or that there’s no other way to empower yourself. I do hope though that this book gets you thinking and gives you new insights you can relate to your own experiences. Relief, energy and space often come about once the effects and workings of the systemic principles are clear. The objective of this book is to present you with another perspective. After all, a different interpretation can provide you with a new field of vision. And this is how you expand your possibilities and potential.

In this book I discuss several themes concerning living, rather than being lived or surviving. In addition, I want to help you find your place in the fountain, so that you can (continue to) claim your own position. Personally, I’m convinced that the systemic approach gives access to a button able to trigger many useful mechanisms. Please be aware that this book can never replace professional guidance when experiencing psychological distress. In my opinion, it shows more courage to acknowledge your limits than to exceed them. It can also prove worthwhile to request the help you need on time.

I wish you the courage and strength needed to stand, when desired, even more so in your rightful place!

Els van Steijn

Utrecht, Bujumbura, Molkwerum, Montolieu 2014-2016

2. THE FOUNTAIN

‘YOU BELONG’

2.1 RECEIVING

Years ago, during a visit to St Tropez, I learned something important from my mother. My husband and I were visiting my parents for a few days during the summer holidays. A good friend of my mother had also flown in for a week. We decided to spend a day people and boat watching with a bit of window shopping thrown in. Enjoying the good life. My mother’s friend and I wandered down a narrow street where we saw a beautiful raw-silk shawl hanging in a shop window; various shades of blue with sparkling beads and sequins, just enough without being over the top. I thought it was stunning. The friend saw me looking at it and asked me if I would like it. I protested, but before I knew it, she’d manoeuvred me into the shop. Close up, the shawl was even more beautiful. It cost 350 euros. No way would I ever spend that kind of money on a shawl. But my mother’s friend said, ‘I can afford it, and it would give me pleasure to buy it for you.’ My timid response was, ‘No, thank you, I just can’t accept it.’

During lunch my mother cleared her throat. Ever since we were young, my sister and I knew that there was no escaping what she was about to say, ‘Els, you needed to go to the toilet too, didn’t you?’ In the lobby of the toilet she said, ‘You must listen to me. Sometimes you need to accept something from somebody else, simply because they so badly want to give it to you. Get over your sense of guilt. Allow the other person to give, without taking it out of pity. Accept it as a wonderful gift and be truly grateful. And feel the happiness the shawl gives you,’ she added.

An inner struggle, but I can tell you that the shawl is still hanging in our bedroom over the back of a chair. Every time I look at it, I’m proud I had the courage to accept it. Accepting the gift has made the relationship between my mother’s friend and I even stronger. Since my mother died in 2007, I go out to dinner with this friend every year around the time of my mother’s birthday. It’s always a precious evening for both of us.

Relationships are established on the ability to receive

Accepting the shawl taught me a life lesson. Giving was always much easier for me than receiving. And generally speaking, giving is viewed more highly than receiving. What I’ve learned is that relationships are established on receiving and not giving. It requires courage to accept something you’re not sure you can reciprocate. The feeling of owing something to someone else can be experienced as negative. A sense of giving power away. The question is whether this is actually the case. Because by accepting something, you can actually become more powerful.

‘RELATIONSHIPS ARE ESTABLISHED ON THE ABILITY TO RECEIVE AND NOT ON GIVING.’

When I accepted the shawl, an exchange of giving and receiving took place between my mother’s friend and me. Everyone gives and receives in their own way. Every exchange can be different in format. This creates a wonderful, jointly-generated back and forth of giving and receiving. This exchange is felt as a sincere relationship.

Before a connection is even made of course, there must be a trigger, in the form of giving. The relationship only takes shape when both the giver and receiver can receive. I hadn’t understood this enough up to that point. I thought that by giving, there was a relationship. Giving gave me a feeling of safety, while receiving made me vulnerable. I was afraid that by receiving, I would lose my sense of independence and autonomy. Quite the opposite was true. Once I started to receive, I could give even more than I could before, and now without becoming empty myself. And precisely this made me strong.

At that time, I had no understanding of the invisible principles behind living a good life. I learned that being able to receive in your family system works its way extra positively through into all aspects of your life. If you receive based on your family system, you have the ability to nurture healthy relationships elsewhere. Without the inner-connection with your family system you are unable to receive and must do everything yourself. Temporarily, this is manageable. But eventually you’ll feel empty and unfulfilled.

2.2 CONNECT

Connecting means being able to both give and receive. It’s totally okay if you give more for a while than you receive, or the other way around - provided that at some point this settles. Should we give exclusively and accept nothing, and this pattern continues to repeat, we’re looking at an unequal relationship. In all relationships, except those between parents and children, there should ultimately be a balance between giving and receiving. Parents give more than children can ever give back. This imbalance will be rectified by the children, through their own children and other life goals.

‘BY CONNECTING IS MEANT: BEING ABLE TO BOTH GIVE AND RECEIVE.’

Through trial and error, and self-reflection, I noticed that people who are connected to others are strong. They seem to be able to take any knocks life hands them and are more grounded. People who are unable to (successfully) connect with other people lack something essential in their charisma and in their lives. They lack vitality, a natural determination and zest for life. They frequently miss that twinkle in their eye.

In the absence of connection, you go in search of compensation in the form of kicks, (less)harmful habits, and addictions to alcohol, pills, drugs, gambling and sex. This also includes disorders connected to the use of Botox and health products, addictions to shopping, exercise or work. Peaks are needed to take away the dullness. Only then will your zest return. Or, you become demanding and critical because the lack of sufficient connection causes inner emptiness. You often feel insatiable, and although you may look powerful from the outside, it’s questionable whether that strength is also present on the inside.

The stand-by setting

An alternative to addiction as a result of not being able to connect, is excluding yourself.You put yourself on stand-by, evading the process of giving and receiving and withdrawing. You shut yourself off. Because if you don’t accept anything, then you also don’t feel any obligation to give something back. What you do, you do on your own. This is exhausting, and people notice, particularly those closest to you. They’re unable to understand and connect to you. After all, you won’t accept anything.

If you cannot or do not want to receive, you build up a deficit. This happens first and foremost because you’re not in your place in the fountain. If you connect to something or someone, you’re able to both give and receive. A connection means you surrender to what is there, with all that goes with it. Which is not necessarily always pleasant. Receiving includes both the good and the less good. As a human being, you also have to find a response to the unwanted gifts. How you can accept the things you don’t actually want but are there anyway, is discussed in chapters 8 and 9.

Connections versus ties

The opposite of stand-by also exists. Sometimes it seems as if people are too connected with other people. They can’t let the other person go. They stay angry, disappointed, accusing, dependent or for example over-concerned towards certain people. When any of this happens, there’s talk of a tie instead of a connection.

With a tie you need to try and imagine that an invisible, short, taught rope is stretched between two people. Whenever you want to take a step, you also need to carry along the burden and weight of the other person. When they move in a different direction, you need to try and keep your balance, and not get pulled along. This isn’t a welcome way to live your life.

A connection between two people also includes a non-visible rope, but one that’s long and flexible. Every time one of the two people move, the rope stretches and provides the space needed. At the same time, you feel connected to each other, which allows and enables you to accept strength and energy from the other person. In a connection, the giving and receiving flows smoothly.

A tie comes about when you (at least) are not standing in your place. There’s a good chance that more people from your system are not in their place, something you then unconsciously react to. The good news is, only you have to stand in your place to transform a tie into a connection, irrespective of what the other person does or doesn’t do. It’s about your inner attitude. So that you can claim your place in the fountain and take responsibility for your own life. Let go of what is not yours and take what is yours.

2.3 THREE SOURCES OF STRENGTH AND ENERGY

The correct balance between giving and receiving makes you powerful. Finding that balance is connected to the extent in which you draw from three essential sources of strength and energy. Or in other words, can you connect with the following sources, and unequivocally receive from them too? These three sources are:

The first source of strength: the rationale

Many people have a generous helping of mental strength, and this comes from the rationale. It enables you to do what you have to or want to do. This can create beautiful, good things, allow you to achieve your goals and tackle the more unpleasant things in life. In short, a useful resource that’s needed to be successful in life.

In times when your body protests against high demands or when unwelcome emotions rear their head, you can use mental strength to ignore them. Which is fine, as long as you start listening to your body at a certain point. Your rationale has the tendency to push away certain thoughts and unpleasant feelings. For example, the question of whether you’ve actually made the right decision, the realisation that you’re falling from your pedestal, that you and your partner are growing apart, or your body is giving off signals that point to more than just a hefty dose of flu. To be able to do without and carry on are meaningful qualities. Up to the point that the rationale keeps you away from whatever’s demanding attention and shouldn’t be ignored. Once you are no longer able to structurally experience any (positive or negative) feelings, your alarm bells should ring. If you cannot feel sufficiently, you’ll also no longer be aware of your deepest needs and will become alienated from yourself.

The rational ‘off-button’ is sometimes difficult to find. Voices and inner-dialogues stay active. Often, an extreme physical signal is required to tell you that the body or a particular subject needs attention. The rationale is then ready for rest after rationalising and pushing away all those unpleasant feelings emerging from your body.

The second source of strength: the body

The body has a wisdom that our rationale cannot understand. Who doesn’t recognise the impulse, the moment your intuition took over, or the gut feeling that suddenly told you what was good for you? Or your feet leading you somewhere, that in hindsight turned out to be just what was needed.

Your body responds before your rationale realises that something’s going on. Your body has issued tens of signals before your head even notices that you’re tense, feel ill or are mentally exhausted. After all, your body is always in the here and now. Your rationale can flutter away, to the past or to the future. Rationale and body can only exchange if they’re connected to each other.When connected, they’re able to strengthen each other. With one head elsewhere, it’s difficult to work together.

‘THE BODY HAS A WISDOM THAT OUR RATIONALE CANNOT UNDERSTAND.’

The trick is to consciously notice your body’s signals. These signals can vary from curling your toes, sweating more, tilting up your chin or perhaps dropping your head and shoulders, pushing your upper arms against your body, clenching your teeth, scratching an itch, grinding your teeth, biting nails, talking and walking faster, not listening etc. Everyone has their own repertoire. Learn to recognise these signals at an early stage. If you don’t (sufficiently) recognise your reactions, your body will give off increasingly powerful signals to make it clear that you apparently have to do something. Refuse to listen to your physical reactions, and you may eventually be overcome by palpitations for instance, headaches, fear/panic attacks, (phantom) heart attacks or a burn-out. These are indications that you’ve something to acknowledge that you’d rather avoid (both consciously and unconsciously). Realise that although the signals may be painful, frustrating and difficult, they’re actually friends with your best interests at heart, wanting to do something good. For example, encouraging you to take some rest, ask for help or lean on someone.

Contrarily, learn to recognise your personal signs and characteristics of relaxation, such as the space created in your abdomen when experiencing relief, your jaws that relax and your mouth that no longer feels dry.

The poem ‘The Guest House’ by the Persian poet and philosopher Rumi (1207-1273) illustrates how the connection with both your rationale and your body is essential.

This being human is a kind of guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honourably.

He may be clearing you out,

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice.

Meet them at the door laughing

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whatever comes.

Because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

Often, you can only decide in hindsight and after a long time whether something has been good, bad, useful or meaningless. It’s possible, for example, that losing your job was terrible because you needed it to pay the bills, but it did give you the space to make a career switch. Or your partner breaking off the relationship, which was distressing, but you’re now able to be true to yourself again. Or when you broke your leg, which meant you couldn’t go on that trek, a trek during which a number of the group lost their lives. The trick is to delay your final judgement.

‘THE ART IS TO DELAY YOUR FINAL JUDGEMENT.’

Wandering heads

People who live primarily according to their rationale, I call wandering heads. It seems as though their head and body are separate. The head appears to float a few centimetres above the body, meaning there’s no longer any interaction and connection possible between the body and head. A pity, because it’s precisely this collaboration that’s so extremely powerful. One is no better or worse than the other. They are different, meaning they need each other. The signals from your body must be evaluated by your head, and the signals from your head must pass through your body and heart.

If your head connects with your body, you have more potential. You’re also more firmly planted in the here and now, meaning you’ll have more impact. The following quotation from Italo Magni, an internationally-renowned speaker, describes wonderfully the effect on others when you talk respectively from your head, your heart and your soul: ‘If you’re talking with your head, you’re going to speak to their heads. If you talk from your heart, you’re going to reach their hearts. If you talk from your soul, you’ll enter their soul.’

Occupying your body

Being, and staying in your body is thus important. In daily communication the 80-20 rule applies. Remain 80% in your body and use the remaining 20% for communication with others from your rationale. Experience has proven this to be more than sufficient. If you manage to stay with your body during a discussion, you’ll notice that you’ll regularly get brainwaves and will spontaneously start to ask questions that really make sense.

In particular when relaxing (sports, yoga, fishing, hiking), wonderful alternatives and solutions for problems that you’d previously not thought of can present themselves. In any case, relaxation proves a welcome opportunity to dim the volume of the inner dialogues in your head. It’s advisable to find a structural form of sport and/or other means of relaxation. Also try, during all forms of communication with others and yourself, to remain in good contact with your own body and the signals it sends out.

The trick is to stay in your body and occupy it completely. It’s not uncommon to have a lesser relationship with certain parts of your body. One of the laws of working systemically is that nothing or no-one can be excluded; all (body) parts belong. Dare to come into contact and go in search of connection with the very part of your body you reject. You’ll notice that from this part of the body there’s growing strength and wisdom. Those rejected parts of your body have an important message to tell you.

The third source of strength: your family system

As a human being, you’re more connected to your family than you could ever imagine. A family is a system in which everyone has their own place and is inextricably linked to the other. A family system is intertwined by destiny.

In a family system, a family soul or conscience prevails (see 3.2.2). In practice, there’s a kind of radioactivity in a family system: you don’t see the influence, but the effects are tangible. You notice that in families, generation after generation, there is addiction, illness, aggression, abuse or suicide. Or that children care for their parent(s) in a particular way, rather than the other way around. Or that fathers are absent.

‘AS HUMAN BEING YOU ARE MORE CONNECTED TO YOUR FAMILY THAN YOU COULD EVER IMAGINE.’

To pick up the third source of power and energy you must stand in your own place in the family system. Everybody has his or her unique place, determined by seniority of your system of origin. You have your place and others have theirs, regardless of what you think of them and they of you. One place is not better or worth more than the other place. See section 2.5 to determine where your place is.

The power of your own place

In your place you receive the power and invisible, but essential, nourishment from your family system. Without this nourishment, you feel empty inside. When in the wrong place, you’re less able to receive the nourishment. Only in your own place do you develop your individuality and flair, and feel life flowing spontaneously towards you. You seem to prosper. This is the place where you should take root. A place that’s there whatever happens; it belongs to nobody else. The question though is whether you’re in your place. How you can arrive there, if not there already, is at the heart of this book.

‘IN YOUR OWN PLACE YOU RECEIVE INVISIBLE POWER FROM YOUR FAMILY SYSTEM.’

Circumstances can mean that you’re (no longer) in your place. For example, because as a child you were structurally the go-between for your parents, because of their unresolved, long-term conflict. You then come to stand between your parents instead of beneath them. Out of love, children unconsciously carry what another cannot or does not want to carry. By doing so however, you take on a responsibility that’s not yours, meaning you’ll be unable to thrive. You can, and may, only carry what is yours to carry. This theme is further elaborated in chapter 5.

In practice, you see that you either consciously or unconsciously take the patterns that come about from your system of origin with you throughout the rest of your life, both in your private and working lives. Were you the bringer of harmony for example in your family system, then there’s a real chance you repeat that behaviour within your own family or at work. A repetitive pattern is often characterised by a certain stubbornness. Discipline, good motivation and an ability to learn are not always enough to break through these patterns permanently. In my opinion, the desire to change patterns is often sought in the wrong areas. Of course, there are all kinds of methods, skills and alternatives to make your pitfalls more manageable, but there’s a pretty big chance you’ll fall back into your old pattern if it isn’t tackled at the source. In almost all cases, the cause lies in the fact that you’re in the wrong place.

Imagine, you’re unable to occupy your body properly (wandering head), because you were confronted in your family of origin with physical aggression or with long-lasting, contradictory signals from your parents. A logical response is no longer wanting to feel your body. Working on better body awareness alone doesn’t solve the problem though, because you also have something to solve with your parents in the system.

Together, the rationale, the body and strength of your place in the family system form a strong trio. Two sources are not always enough. If you can draw from three sources, you’ll get extra strength. In the yoga lotus position (meditation position) you also have three pressure and support points: your one knee, the other knee and your bottom. If someone gives you a push from behind, you still have two knees to provide grip. If you get a push from the left, you lean on one buttock and your right knee. See the three sources of strength as your steadfast tripod, providing stability in your life.

2.4 THE METAPHOR OF THE FOUNTAIN

Your family system, containing your own place, can be compared to a fountain. Imagine again the beautiful fountain, consisting of multiple tiers of water at different heights. Water flows abundantly from the higher tiers to the tiers below. The tier below also overflows, spilling water into the underlying tiers. And so on; an infinite fountain.

Somewhere in the top tiers of the fountain are your predecessors. In the layer beneath you’ll find your great-grandparents, with all the members of the family system from the corresponding generation, including miscarriages, stillborn infants, aborted children and even children given away. In the tier below that of your great-grandparents, you’ll find your grandparents. The tier below that belongs to your biological father and mother. The tier underneath is yours, with any brothers and sisters in birth order. The tier under yours is meant for your children. Grandchildren can be found under this again. The fountain thus grows endlessly as long as children are born into your family. With every generation, a new tier is added.

Your place is in the tier of the fountain where you belong, per definition under your parent’s tier. You will always remain the child of your parents, even though you may have had children yourself and perhaps even grandchildren. You will always be their baby, just as you will always be the grown-up in the eyes of your children. The trick is to stand, and stay standing, in your place. Leaving your place can happen both consciously and unconsciously. You’re not always aware of the shift. The effect of not being in your place, is that you’re unable to adequately receive the flow of the fountain. This means that you’ll have to stand on your own two feet in life, without the natural support of the fountain. The good news, is that the power of the fountain is always available, as long as you’re in your own place.

Your biological parents are in the fountain tier above you. It doesn’t matter if your parents are still alive or have passed away, or if you have even ever known them. It also doesn’t matter systemically if they were actually able to care for you. Sometimes, all that parents can give is the ‘passing on of life’.

Your parents give you who they are and what they can give. This is what they pour down the fountain. They give you all the positive, and negative, available. Positive is for example care, warmth, love, seeing you, hearing you, encouragement, physical contact, comfort and support in whatever form.