THE MYTH OF "PROXIES" (REPLACERS) AND THE SO-CALLED PHENOMENA OF CONSTELLATIONS

Abstract

In Hellinger's family constellations, as well as in the (systemic) constellation work of practitioners who do not directly refer (or no longer refer) to Hellinger, the concept of substitution plays a central role. Its roots go back to occult ideas. It is assumed that in constellations, the participants, called "substitutes", act as true representatives of the real members of the system and are supposedly able to reliably reflect their internal states and relationships with each other. In this article, we will critically examine this assertion, which is fundamental to the constellation process and has been called the "constellation phenomenon". Contrary to the assertion that we are dealing with a phenomenon that is incomprehensible from a naturalistic point of view, it is shown that the process of constellations can be easily explained with the help of psychological mechanisms, some of which have been known for a very long time, as well as in the light of recent discoveries about so-called mirror neurons. According to this, there is no mysterious "transfer of information" between the participants in the constellation and the members of the family system, but rather a creative and highly error-prone simulation in order to reconstruct the depicted system.