searching for Heroes Understanding the need for a partner , searching for a mythical mate, Love languages

1. Alexandra Piotrowska TSTA Ukraine 2021

2. Meeting for Reason ? — Emotional Growth
Meeting for Season ? — Is our relationship circuimstancial
for example boredom in lockdown
Meeting for Life? — Are our Life goals aligned

3. In 1980’s I studied MSc in Family and Child
Psychology
I worked as a school counsellor with children and parents
In 1990, I trained as a Transactional Analyst
and since then worked in private practice in London
 since 2002 I trained in Family Constellation method in the
UK and with Bert Hellinger
I developed my own methods using constellations
and metaphor working with images, soma, psychological distance
and transferences
 I am also a Trainer, Coach an individual and group Supervisor.

4.  Between trainer and a group
 Feel free to Ask Questions in the CHAT ROOM –
 I will read them in the break and answer most
relevant
BREAKS – during exercise you will have few extra
minutes for tea/ stretch
No recording of the group process

5. ◦ Break out rooms - between participants
please participate as much as you wish
 Confidentiality regarding yourself/client
 Sharing what is appropriate
 What process is present for you ? What emotions
are evoked
 It is alright if your video doesn’t show, we are
happy to have you here!

6. Is it Biological? — Is it about those magical pheromones
and/or physical markers that indicate this is “the one”
Is it Pragmatic or Cultural? — If you can’t love the one
you want, love the one you’re with
Is it Spiritual? — Brought together by forces larger than
of our own making our fate
Is it A Projection? — Is it about what we imagine other
people to be, what we hope they are, what we deceive
ourselves into believing they are
is it IMAGO? — that deep psychological imprint from our
caregivers

7. 1. To what degree do you feel loved by the significant
partner in your life?
2. In a time of need, how have you experienced the love
of a partner and , how did this person show his or her
love?
3. How did you express your love?
4. How successful have you been in giving and receiving
emotional love?
5. How interested are you in studying the nature of love
and learning new ways to express love?

8. When we meet an Imago match, that chemical reaction
occurs, and love ignites. All other bets, all other ideas
about what we want in a mate, are off. We feel alive and
whole, confident that we have met the person who will
make everything all right.
Harville Hendrix

9. Harville Hendrix Imago therapy
“Romantic Love delivers us into the passionate arms of
someone who will ultimately trigger the same frustrations
we had with our parents,
but for the best possible reason!
Doing so brings our childhood wounds to the surface so
they can be healed.”
― Harville Hendrix,
Making Marriage Simple: Ten Truths for Changing the Relationship You Have into the One
You Want

10. People generally feel drawn toward a specific image (“imago”
in Latin) when seeking out partners.
This image, a product of your unconscious mind, is made up
of various personality traits and behaviors you associate with
early caregivers or someone from earlier generations
You might wonder why you want to seek a partner whose
characteristics resemble a parent’s (or other relatives ) traits.
But this is natural — it happens because those strong
childhood bonds are deeply engraved in your consciousness.
Even if they didn’t do everything right, your parents likely still
feel familiar and comforting, and your sense of self is partially
bound up in that relationship.

11. In adulthood, self-identity becomes similarly connected to
a partner’s as you join a bigger unit: the relationship.
Where you once turned to your parents, you might now
turn to your partner to get emotional needs met.
It stands to reason you’d feel attracted to someone with
similar traits as your parent or caregiver.
These characteristics make your partner less of an
unknown.
The unconscious knowledge of walking down a path you
know well can foster a sense of peace and fulfillment in
your relationship.

12. What happens, though, when your parents behaved in ways
that caused pain?
Perhaps, instead of offering you support, they
required emotional support and reassurance from you
Maybe they reacted to your mistakes with criticism, or simply
weren’t there when you needed them most.
People generally want to heal the pain of unpleasant
memories by finding a way to get those lingering needs met.
Though you’ve already become an adult physically, this
healing process allows you to leave childhood behind in a
psychological and emotional sense.
The problem, however, lies in the fact that your partner might
embody not only your parents’ comforting traits, but also some
of the ones that triggered distress.

13.  is focused to limited people,
 is exclusive,
 is based on intense emotions,
 is meant to last,
 is the basis for being a member
of other bonding systems,
 is the basis for group identity
and individualisation.
The most important bonding relationships
 mother-child, father-child
 woman-man
 child-child

14. In groups of Three
1 Protagonist
2 his/ her Partner
3 the Veil
 Set Up the partner and the Veil stand in the distance that you
see clearly both
 Look at your partner for 3 min notice your first feeling
 then gently remove the Veil
 If the Partner has some sentence give it to the Protagonist
CHANGE and go back to your seat

15. In which one partner is saying
“be the Other”… be my mother / father etc…
in order for them to enact earlier scenes…
which they together with the partner work
through to create a new meaning and experience
for themselves.
Transference is the inarticulate speech of the
heart.) Transference… the unconscious
knowing of the unknown”
 (Hargaden and Sills

16. Boyfriend Girlfriend
Mother

17. Negative Positive
DEMONISATION IDEALISATION
Discounting Reality Self Depreciation

18. Imago therapy aims to strengthen relationships by helping
partners develop greater intimacy through:
• becoming more present
• having empathic conversations
• recognizing your separate identities as individuals
• approaching each other with curiosity, not judgment
• expressing appreciation and positive regard instead of
contempt and blame
In short, Imago therapy teaches skills to achieve healthier
interactions and, in turn, relationship satisfaction.
deepen their understanding of each other and important
relationship goals.

19. ◦ Primary Feelings are feelings like anger, hurt, sadness, fear,
anxiety, hopelessness, and helplessness make us vulnerable
◦ Secondary Feelings are feelings like confusion, frustration,
resentment, and rage keep us defended
The Spell of Symbiosis occurs when both partners get stuck in
Feelings like anger, frustration, and rage - these feelings help
us to feel defended, they are comfortable and feel safe..

20. The first ‚’I’ develops in relation
with the ‚’You’ of the mother.
If the ’You’ is not clear, this will
cause SYMBIOTIC YEARNING
• fear • rage • love • happiness
• mourning/sadness • guilt •
shame • pride • pain •
disgust

23. In adult’s life we unconciosly follow the pattern our
ancestor gave us as an IMPRINT OF the relationship. The
unconscious knowledge is being transmitted across
generations
This pattern will influence you in the following aspect
• TIMING Were you able to start a romantic relationship
at the young age or later in life ?
• Ability to stick like a glue to one person in symbiotic
way
or ability to have many partners
• Being pregnant or having a child before the marriage / o
• Being attached to two people at the same time

24. While Freud has focused on the
individual unconscious,
and Jung on the collective
unconscious,
Szondi privileged what he called
"the family unconscious."
The heart of his theory was
the claim that the genes of our ancestors are present in our
unconscious and influence our choices..
Connecting with our collective unconscious through his method
called "Fate Analysis,
" Szondi claimed, would allow us to achieve a higher degree of
liberty, as we become free to follow or reject the "fatal" impulses
coming from the presence of the ancestors in our psychic field

25. Familial unconsciousness
contains aspiration of Ancestors
FATE "Ananke" is derived from the common
Greek noun ἀνάγκη anankaiē), which has two
meanings
1. Limit or constraint on freedom due to some outside
force
2. Blood relation like a family
Thus fate involves both force and family
Directed fatalism – ability to choose fate

26. human's life is in fact a series of instinctive choices
These choices dictate our life path, or our 'fate
he realized that people's choices
are not individually specific,
but instead the reiterations of their ancestors' choices.
 The assumption of fate analysis is that a person's life
(destiny) unfolds in a series of elections:
 MAIN LIFE DECISIONS
 an occupation, lifestyle
 Love partner
 his decisions implicitly selects his illnesses
 and his way or timing of death.
This phenomenon was named "instinct fate" by Szondi.

27.  The conscious and unconscious binding process
functions through conscience
 Conscience is understood as an instrument of the
soul for maintaining balance in relationships.
In this particular way conscience is the capability to
evaluate of behaviour according to the clan.
Con science is etymologically a collective knowledge,
a "knowing with " from the Latin con sciencia.

28. :
Sheldrake spoke of morphogenetic field
‘Hellinger 2004
The real word is SOUL….
A Soul has an aim and it starts movement
towards the aim.
And the soul wants to unite what has been
separated. A field can’t do that.’
He dicoveed universal ORDERS OF LOVE
BELONGING (INCLUSION/EXCLUSION)
GIVE AND TAKE (UNFAIR GAIN)
PRECEDENCE WHAT WAS EARLIEST /LATEST

29. All psychological and relational events
are motivated by the dual structure
on which they are based:
they manifest themselves through
external behavior and are based on
an internal obligation structure."
Ann Ancelin Schützenberger 1988 (
The Ancestor Syndrome: Transgenerational Psychotherapy and the
Hidden Links in the Family Tree “p. 27)#

32. dual structure on which they are based: external
behaviour married a divorcee from a
different background / frown upon
based on an internal obligation structure.
To FOLLOW THE FATE of HIS UNCLE
" to became the excluded
family member living in exile loosing his wealth
and not talking to his brother who would become
The King

33. a) early death of family members (< 25 yr)
b) previous love relationships of parents
c) early or usual death of sibling
d) early hospitalization
e) exclusion or expulsion of a family member
f) adoption, abortion, stillbirth, secret, war
involvement

35. She was replacement boy for her father and followed him
in his manly jobs
around house and in the garage , she always wore
trousers and hated dresses
•Why did she married 20 older man and foreigner ?
# She followed her Grandma who married a 20 years
older refugee from Ukraine
•Why she was not able to get pregnant?
She was scared that the baby will not survive as her
brother died young
• Why was she overprotective of her own son ??
Her behaviour was repetition of her mother worry over
Ella’s baby Brother who died of heart failure

36. Types of UNINTEGRATED TRAUMA creates
imbalance
•Family secret
•Excluded members of past generations
•Bigger systems influence
•Tribal, racial, national or cultural exclusion
•Historical effects of
war/ persecution / deportation
•Collective guilt and innocent
•Collective dignity and shame

37. •Fanita English’s formulation of the ‘Hot Potato’,
(English, 1969)
•unresolved inter-generational issues that have an
impact on the client (Berne, 1972)
•I understand the ‘hot potato’ as unresolved trauma
because clinical experience indicates that the original
owner of the ‘hot potato’ has not dealt with it,
• discounting his/her ability to take ownership of
it. S/he will often have discounted the impact of the
un- integrated trauma on later generations

38. • Boundaries are reciprocal
– That means that a weak boundary
(enmeshment) in one relationship usually
means that the same person is
disengaged from someone else.
– Example is wife who is enmeshed with
child and disengaged from husband

39. Personal boundaries are the limits and rules we set
for ourselves within relationships
◦ Boundaries also represent the point of contact
between the individual and other systems.
◦ . . . . .
Couple Boundary ambiguity is defined as the couple not
knowing who is in and who is out of the system.
The partner may perceive a physically absent person as
psychologically present - ex partner
or a physically present partner as psychologically absent.
In either case, the couple boundary is ambiguous

40. ◦ Boundaries vary in degree of permeability, Ability to
enter and exit the system, Degree to which the
system is Open/Closed
 1. Clear: firm yet flexible - - - - - -
 2. Rigid: disengagement within and between systems
______
 3. Diffuse: enmeshed relationships . . . . . . .
Alexandra Piotrowska TSTA 2021

41. Physical boundaries refer to personal space and physical touch.
Healthy physical boundaries include an awareness of what’s appropriate,
and what’s not, in various settings and types of relationships (hug, shake
hands, or kiss?)
Intellectual boundaries refer to thoughts and ideas. Healthy intellectual
boundaries include respect for others’ ideas, and an awareness of
appropriate discussion (should we talk about the weather, or politics?).
Intellectual boundaries are violated when someone dismisses or belittles
another person’s thoughts or ideas.
Emotional boundaries refer to a person’s feelings. Healthy emotional
boundaries include limitations on when to share, and when not to share,
personal information. For example, gradually sharing personal
information
Emotional boundaries are violated when someone criticizes, belittles, or
invalidates another person’s feelings.
Alexandra Piotrowska TSTA 2021

42. Alexandra Piotrowska TSTA 2021
Sexual boundaries refer to the emotional, intellectual, and physical aspects
of sexuality. Healthy sexual boundaries involve mutual understanding and
respect of limitations and desires between sexual partners.
Sexual boundaries can be violated with unwanted sexual touch, pressure to
engage in sexual acts, leering, or sexual comments.
Material boundaries refer to money and possessions. Healthy material
boundaries involve setting limits on what you will share, and with whom. .
Material boundaries are violated when someone steals or damages another
person’s possessions, or when they pressure them to give or lend them their
possessions.
Time boundaries refer to how a person uses their time.
To have healthy time boundaries, a person must set aside enough time for
each facet of their life such as work, relationships, and hobbies. Time
boundaries are violated when another person demands too much of
another’s time.

43. ◦ Think about that you are in the field
◦ and now there are some boundaries in your family
◦ Where you allowed to get out freely
◦ Were you allowed to bring people I
◦ Were the people eating together?
◦ sleeping together ,
Having a privacy?
◦ Who you feel was excluded and why ??
How did you react ?
ADAPTATION NEGOTIATION REBELLION /
AVOIDANCE
◦ . . . . Alexandra Piotrowska TSTA 2021

44. “Imago” is the Latin word for image,
Imago therapy aims to help couples get in touch with the images
of their childhood relationships that they bring into adulthood.
Specifically, negative images of our caregivers get in the way of
and create conflict in our adult relationships.
We each come into adulthood with an image of what love means
and will pick a partner that provides that same kind of love.
 Imago therapy helps partners become conscious of these
negative images and, through communicating about them
effectively, helps partners become healing for each other

45. A crucial measure of health in a couple is how both
balance the dual needs for dependence and independence
independence relatedness

47. 4
7
Transformation
True love
Decision

48. A crucial measure of health in a couple is how both
balance the dual needs for dependence and independence
independence relatedness

49. A Shared Vision and Mission of Our Future
A Spiritual Practice
A Healthy partnering That Supports Our Emotional, Physical,
and Spiritual Well Being
A Healthy Lifestyle That Supports Physical Activity,
Connections to Community, and Care for the Environment
A Home or Workplace That Promotes Safety, Comfort, Time
for Solitude, and Time for Connection

50. A Sexual Practice That is Based on Love, Affection, mutuality,
Growth, and Exploration
A Financial Plan That Supports Our Goals for the Immediate
Future As Well As for the Long Term
Mutual Support That Promotes Honesty, Curiosity, and
Personal Growth Through Continued Risk and Challenge (Even
in the Face of Loss)
A Healing Path for Past and Future Trauma with The
Recognition That Challenges, Gaps, Developmental Blocks, and
Blind-spots Will be Met And Resolved (if at all Possible) or
Managed if Not

51.  Identify at least one thing from todays Couple
theories that surprised you
 Identify at least one thing that you found useful
for your life.
 Identify one concept that you believe you can
apply to your own practice

52.  I look forward to seeing you again !
 Also Family Constellation online and in London
www.familyconstellation.net
psychologuk@gmail.com
44 7957586656

53. Hendrix H, LaKelly HH Luquet W and Carlson
J. Using the Imago Dialogue to Deepen Couples
Therapy. Journal of Individual Psychology. Fall
2015;71(3):253-272. [Abstract]
Gehlert NC, Schmidt CD, Giegerich V, Luquet
W. Randomized Controlled Trial of Imago
Relationship Therapy: Journal of Couple
&Relationship Therapy. 03 jan 2017
Metcalf, L. ( 2011) Marriage and Family
Therapy : A Practice-oriented