Field Transference, Field Occurrence and Family Constellations
Transference and Counter-Transference in the therapeutic relationship is a well documented phenomena, that helps therapists and consultants make sense of what goes on in the consultancy room. It helps to understand what stops the client from having a more fulfilling life outside therapy.
When talking about this phenomena the popular understating is that it is the internal and primary parent – child scenarios of the client that affect his relationships with the outer world.
Family Constellations help us to observe, how therapist and client’s relationships are influenced by more then just transference issues that relate to primary scenarios. In fact, figures, elements and stories from relationships and history that belong to a much wider field are transferred.
This wider field is the client’s larger familial, trans-generational, cultural and archetypal field.
It is from this wider field that unresolved feelings, relationships and stories get transferred to the client’s inner and outer relationships, and thus occur also in the therapeutic relationship. This phenomenon is Field Transference. The transference of the client’s larger field into his and her personal life and into the therapy room.
We can also call this ‘field occurrence’. Describing the phenomena of a certain field, that holds unresolved stories and information from the Client’s personal and ancestral background, that is occurring in the here and now, affecting the people in a current relationship. Looking at it in this way takes the responsibility away from the client into an occurrence, a field that holds the stories and information that needs to seen and processed.
Family Constellations is a method that interacts with this field. It works creatively with Field Transference/Occurrence, in its many aspects and brings change to the issues that get stuck in the therapy room and in the client’s life.
Working and perceiving in this way is a moving and expansive experience that enriches clients and therapists.
Yishai Gaster