Shadow Constellations Safety Rails

Safety rails first – These are the safety rails for the Shadow Constellations workshops and trainings, as well as for group sessions.

1. Please Feel Comfortable 

  • Physically comfortable – feel free to stretch, move, to release through the body, to grab a glass of water, use the bathrooms etc.
  • Content-wise, please feel comfortable to only take in what resonated with you from what I say. Do not let me being the teacher here today to override your beliefs, opinions, understanding, worldviews etc.

    If something doesn’t resonate, you can just leave it here, or, even better, to share what feels imprecise or wrong to you, what you have learned or know to be different – when possible we will discuss it.
  • Instruction-wise, please feel comfortable to only do what feels right or at least okay to you.
    Please view my instructions as suggestions rather than orders.
  • If you feel like you “have to do” or expected to “do as required”, or perhaps that you do not want to disappoint someone, or that I must know better as I am the teacher, please acknowledge this to me and the group instead of doing despite not wanting to do.
  • When you feel like that, it is typically a sign that in the system we are in right now, someone already ignored themselves or was overwhelmed by the needs and demands of others. We would like to acknowledge this rather than repeat it.
  • Maintain your safety at all times
  • If a representation feels overwhelming, you can always ask to tune down or completely step off it.
  • If you need us, as a teaching team to do something differently for you to feel safe, please let us know and we will do our best.

This minimizes the re-enactment of trauma chance and enlarges the healing potential.

2. Projections and other dynamics

  • This is a study group with powerful healing elements. It is for professionals and professionals in training.

     

  • It is natural for personal content to rise in such settings and we welcome it as professionals – remaining in touch with our responsible adult parts.

  • We are invited to acknowledge and give space to our projections, judgements, triggering etc. with curiosity, openness, and to treat them as learning material instead of letting unconscious dynamics control our behavior in the space. This is true for both participants and the teaching team.

  • Feedback, requests for change and sharing what wasn’t right for you is welcome and appreciated. We will do what we can to own, learn from and improve when we can.

3. Privacy and content sharing

  • You are free to share your own experiences, insights etc.

  • The experiences and sharings of other participants are theirs to share and for you to hold in confidentiality.
  • Photographs may be taken for personal use. They are not to be shared anywhere.
  • Recordings are only for the participants and must never be shared.

  • You are welcome to incorporate parts of the training content into your practice and teaching with the following request:
    • Make it yours first – practice and use it enough so you integrate it inside of yourself, that you have enough experience with possible variations to offer it safely for other people.

    • Always name the source (be it myself or someone I named as a source of a piece of content).

4. For online trainings – Open camera policy

  • Participation is with an open camera.

     

  •  It is for your safety – Open camera allows us to notice if you seem to be needing our attention or help.

     

  •  It is for the group’s sense of safety – so we can see and feel each other better across the online medium.

     

  • It is to help you stay present and be able to notice more easily if you check out or feel like it’s about to happen.

     

  • Nevertheless, if you feel that you need to close the camera briefly to regulate yourself, you can do that, just please let the group know in advance that this may happen rarely.
 

5. For in person trainings – Touch

Touch is welcome and has a great healing potential. However,

  • Many have experienced inappropriate/abusive touch (on the receiving and/ or giving end of it).

     

  • Even if someone is comfortable with touch and even if both of you are used to touching each other, you may still be in a role of someone who finds touch challenging.

     

  • Before touching, ask if it is okay to touch in the way that you would like to (Can I touch your shoulder, can I stand very close to you, can I rest my head on your lap etc.).

     

  • Pay attention not only to the verbal response as some people will say yes automatically – notice if the other person’s face is responsive, if their breathing isn’t constricted from the question, if it feels like their body is saying yes as well.
  • Once you receive a “yes” that you trust, still move slowly, allow the other person to realize what is happening and to respond in a way which is right for them.
  • A “yes” is not eternal – at any point you can take back your “yes” and ask the touch to stop or to be applied differently.

If despite these guidelines, touch happens without consent,

  • It is often a sign that this has already happened in the system in which we are working at the moment.

     

  • We would like to acknowledge that in addition to reminding again to pay attention so that we can repair the sense of safety.
 

6. Handling Aggressive/negative impulses 

While representing, you may sometimes feel very aggressive, abusive, belittling… sensations towards other representatives (or the facilitator). If that happens:

  • Acknowledge this rather than role-playing it.

     

  •  It belongs to the representation and to what asks to be acknowledged in the system. Be clear that what you feel is from your representation to another representation and not from you to them as people.
  • Look for ways to describe the general felt-sense rather than explicit urges.
    For example: I feel very aggressive towards your representation, I feel my hands twitching as if they want to strangle something, rather than “I want to strangle you with my bare hands”.
  • In general, hold such energies in your own sphere and do not send them towards the other person.
 

7. Communicating over safety

  •  Ask for what you need – We can’t tell what exactly you need to feel safe unless you tell us – you can add/change that during the training.
  • Tell us if you feel that something is wrong or is ignored – even if it’s not about you, it is possible that you will notice something which we are blind to, and is worth mentioning and acknowledging.
  • Maintaining the group safety is a group work.
  • Suggest if there is something that you feel is needed to maintain safety that we did not mention. This is true also for you who have read this page and would like to contribute to it <3

 

Sharing the Shadow Constellations safety rails

You are free to share and/or adapt this document

it is not copyrighted in any way. I wrote it based on over 20 years of working with people.

It is shared freely to promote safety in healing spaces.

Acknowledging the source will be appreciated of course.

Thank you.