Constellation

do organisations have emotions?

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

image

We were contemplating this today.

As human beings so much of what we do is driven by a felt sense, gut, emotion. We combine this with cognitive thinking; adding reason, logic, judgement. Together these ‘brains’ afford us sense making, a motivation, value, direction.

Organisations are good at the cognitive often. The logical behind the vision, the strategy, the goals, the measurement, the success. By and large, organisations try to connect with employees cognitively. They are often not so good at connecting with the individual’s emotions. They talk about engagement or about hearts and minds, but attempt to influence, inspire and manage these cognitively with data, plans, employee surveys, roll-outs.

And what of the organisation itself? Does it have a system brain over and above the collective brains of the component people? And does it have its own emotions?

Systemic Constellations theory might suggest it does. The system behaves according to its own needs, maintaining the integrity and balance of the system itself. So, if that’s true and if it’s working well, is the system pleased, happy, excited? If the system is struggling to maintain itself, does it get upset, annoyed, disillusioned?

If organisations do have feelings, how do we engage with those and what are the implications for the workplace?

…the guilt of growth

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

image

I wrote yesterday about the innocence of belonging. The compelling sense of loyalty to the tribal rules, thereby securing our belonging.

Yet growth and personal development draw us to move to new systems of belonging – school, university, new organisations, new teams and maybe to create our own family system. As we grow and develop, we risk belonging to earlier ‘clans’ by electing to behave in different ways in new tribes. Behaving and acting in the fashion of the new clan customs ensures our belonging in the new group, but risks our belonging in earlier groups on our life journey.

This tension between growth and belonging, guilt and innocence is described in Systemic Constellations theory as ‘Personal conscience’. Sometimes particular ‘rules of belonging’ to older clans can entangle us later in life. Holding us back, like a rubber bungee, making freedom and growth hard.

When you feel stuck, look over your shoulder and ask yourself, “to whom or what am I being loyal in staying stuck like this?”

What you find there may surprise you.

Acknowledge what is.

 

the innocence of belonging…

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

guilt innocence personal conscience

As a child you may well have travelled to your grandparents with your family.

Perhaps at one set of grandparents, you were allowed to spread your toys out on the floor and generally make a mess? Perhaps at the other grandparentjs you had to wait to get down from the table after tea, and keep your elbows off the table? Maybe your family visits were to aunts, uncles, cousins?

Whatever your personal experiences as a child at your relatives, you somehow knew the rules. The actions and ways of being and behaving that were the family customs in that house; that clan, that ‘tribe’. By complying with those actions and customs, you cemented your belonging.

We do this following our sports team. We wear the uniform, travel in groups, sing the songs, tell stories of the history. We do this in organisations too, we call it the culture around here, and we (often) unconsciously comply in order to create belonging and connection.

This search for belonging starts in our family of birth. We learn the ways of being and the customs and actions that are the norm in the family. The clan culture. By being loyal to those customs and ways of being, we ensure we belong. We are accepted into the tribe by remaining ‘innocent’ to those tribal rules. This is a crucial learning for one so young.

Our sense of need to be loyal to the customs of belonging, particularly to our birth family system, is strong. Very strong. This need to belong, to remain ‘innocent’, is compelling. When we stray from it, in a sense, we experience ‘guilt’ – guilt that we are risking our belonging.

This ‘guilt’ and ‘innocence’ form part of the theory of personal conscience, from Systemic Constellation practice. More tomorrow…

 

when we would do well to be the beach

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

What is is

When you go to the beach, you walk on the pebbles. You see some pebbles are rounded, polished, worn smooth in the rub of nature. You see some are sharp, jagged, fractured in the storm of collision. Some pebbles carry history in fossilised form. Some are small. Some large. Some brown. Some grey. Some multicoloured. And you observe this and you allow it.

When you go to the beach, you see the sea. Water crashes in foam, surging for freedom. Water retreats in liquid fellowship. Foams, retreats, foams, retreats, foams, retreats in enduring rhythm. And you see this and you understand. And you accept the way that it is.

And in all of this, you don’t get emotional about it. You appreciate the beach. The pebbles. The sea.

What is, is.

But when you meet other human beings, you lose all that.
You say “he’s too this” and “I’m too that”.
You say “if only she wasn’t…” and “I should be…”.
You say “They are different” and “I am not enough”.

Judgement comes in.

Maybe we should see people as the sea and the pebbles, and appreciate them as they are.

What is, is.

Inspired by Ram Dass

 

the direction of love and hate

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

love hate constellation personal conscience
I was reminded yesterday of a this quote…

The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him

GK Chesterton

It was offered in the context of the recent Paris attacks, but it reminded me of the truth in this for us all, not just for the soldier, the man on the battlefield, the terrorist. We all have a bond, a love of what shaped us, what gives us belonging, those ‘like us’ who give us a place. We feel strong ties to our formative experiences; strong connections to our family of birth; a place where we learned the unspoken rules of belonging. Where we experienced love. We all have strong attachment to familiarity, to the system we operate in, to its customs and culture and to the way of working we have become aligned to. It too gives us a sense of place, a sense of belonging.

Perhaps this in part explains why change can be hard? We have to let go of connections, friends, customs, behaviours, ways of being which have given us a security.

Maybe we don’t hate the change we face, but rather we resist it from a place of love for what has gone before? What is, or will be, behind us?

#prayforParis

we are merely part of the ceaseless becoming of the universe…

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

illuminate your self
I watched a BBC programme the other day on the ancient world and the philosophies of Buddha, Socrates and Confucius. This episode followed the life and ground breaking thinking of Buddha.

One moment stayed with me.

A part of Buddhist philosophy says … “We are merely a part of the ceaseless becoming of the universe”.

What an interesting and beautiful idea.

The programme showed that our sense of self, the notion of “I” does not begin with birth. We exist in the womb. We exist in the genes of our parents, and they in the genes of theirs. Our ancestors literally make us. Our version of “I” is constantly evolving, influenced by culture, society, experience. In this way the self is merely an imagined entity, manifested from your journey. It existed before you were born, evolves through your living and doubtless continues in your children and the legacy you leave in the universe.

I am not religious but I am attracted to this philosophy.

As the programme hypothesised – Buddha was espousing cognitive psychology twenty five centuries before it emerged. But for me also this connects to another interest of mine – the systemic constellation – the notion of the significance of the system and our relationship to other parts in that system.

Buddhism offers wisdom and compassion as a way forward. Not wisdom in the conventional cognitive, intellectual, knowledge sense but in the old Sanskrit sense of awareness, discernment, insight and consciousness.

That with compassion for yourself and others makes sense to me.

So… maybe bringing into awareness, into consciousness, with insight and compassion your sense of who you are, is a good step forward?

… maybe bringing into awareness your relationship to the rest of the universal system you belong to, is a good step forward?

… maybe having an emerging sense of why you’re here and what your legacy to the universe will be, is a good step forward?

Be your own lamp.
Illuminate yourself.

what does the map say?

~ steve.ridgley ~ Leave a comment

constellation map
If you have a family, you may have heard yourself say something like this…?

“My brother looks to his eldest sister…”
or
“Our daughter is closer to her mum…”
or
“There’s always been distance between me and my brother…”
or
“There was a time when we were close…”

This language seems to suggest that we have an unconscious map inside, not only of the relative proximity of ourselves to other family members, but also their distances and orientations to each other; almost a sense of who is looking which way, where their attention is drawn, where they ‘stand’.

These maps would appear to be deep in our subconscious and in some way describe ‘what is’. They represent a form of truth.

The maps exist in our organisational worlds too. Individuals, teams, departments, functions, divisions can all have hidden relationship maps. Connections that can also exist through time – loyalties and ‘closeness’ to predecessors, founders, old colleagues lost through the last ‘organisational transformation’.

As with families, these maps inform behaviours, present and absent, they provide clues to broken connections, hidden loyalties, deep stuckness.

If you’re feeling stuck and have tried to logically find a way forward, try a different approach to finding a way out.

Build a map.

Decide the context and use a space on your desk to represent it – maybe it’s team dynamics, or the relationship with a colleague, or why the project doesn’t move forward?

Now find something to represent the most important parts. Any object will do, you just need to be able to indicate orientation (where attention is drawn). I sometimes use those little UHT milk jiggers. Place the most significant representative piece. Often this might represent you.

Where are you in this system, and where are you ‘looking’? Take some time to notice this – what does it feel like, what’s true, what’s new to you?

Now place the next most important piece of the map. Trust your instinct, don’t over think. Again take time to notice this piece’s relationship to you, where its attention is drawn. What does this feel like? What’s true? What do you notice?

Build the map slowly. Take time to acknowledge what is, don’t rush to make changes.

This approach is a method related to systemic constellations – a technique for exploring the truth of relationship systems. It was developed from family therapy and is now used in coaching and organisational development.

I recommend some research and a great book by John Whittington, who you can find here
http://www.coachingconstellations.com

Meanwhile, stay curious about your relationship maps and this hidden truth in your subconscious.