Overcoming a Creative Block

Medicine Stories

Session summaries shared with permission (all names have been changed) illustrating ancestral origins of problems and how a family constellation can bring resolution.

Presenting Theme: Overcoming a Creative Block

Catherine’s themes: overwhelming anxiety when approaching her painting leading to a creative block. Oscillating between over inflated and under inflated sense of worth, when regarding her creative work. A persistent anxiety that alot of money had been spent in order for her to be able to create. She felt judgement about the value of her work relative to what had been invested in it.

The Family Constellation: Systemic Causes of the Creative Block

We constellated on Skype using visualisation, movement and breathwork. Catherine’s family tree revealed that she is the second child of three, the first and third being still born. We explored the theme of a creative block in relation to this aspect of her family tree. We used systemic sentences to discover what felt true in her body in regards to her creativity. These sentences were they keys that unlocked the subsequent healing movement:

• “There was a great cost to my creation” (i.e. producing children “cost” her parents alot in terms of grief and as the only surviving child, she unconsciously carried this cost)
• “I am always creating for three, so what I do is never enough.”
• “Whilst creating for three, I always over estimate what I can achieve”
• “I have always held you both”

Catherine in her subconscious was aware of the stillborn siblings, and had a life long pattern of over compensating for their absence. She realised she was creating not just for herself but to compensate for their missing lives too. Additionally there was a sense of shame about taking “too much” because unconsciously, she was taking what she felt they should have received but never had the chance to. This lead to a difficulty in allowing herself to receive. She also felt responsible for the care of her dead siblings, as if she were holding them in her own body.

The session was a long slow movement of separation from the siblings that she had carried with her all her life. Once completed she felt lighter and more peace. During this process her body moved spontaneously in gestures that were, she commented, like moving down the birth canal. There was a sense of lightness and liberation in this movement. By the end she felt more peace and could very much imagine moving beyond her creative block!

Post Session Integration and a New Creative Work:

After the session she drew a picture with her ancestors including her siblings, all standing behind her. She meditated on receiving their love and support, visualising it as a river of life that carries her. She placed it at the head of her bed, so as needed, she could meditate on being held as she falls asleep.