Bert Hellinger, the development of his work and experience with autism.

The Healing Sentence

Friedberg, 2004

Interview with Gerhard Walper
Bert Hellinger will be holding constellations with autistic people, parents, their teachers and other participants in the framework of the regional Hessian Conference dedicated to ‘The effects of assent’.

HELLINGER: Apart from the constellations dedicated to autism, I would like to use this day to present the development of Family Constellations; a development that I have observed in myself, and which is that when one really exposes oneself to a situation and then waits, a decisive sentence comes to one. When it is verbalised, you don’t need to do anything else. This sentence has a very particular force and acts by itself.

A while ago there was a man with me who does mountaineering with young offenders and also works with constellations. We were talking together; I said to him ‘wait a minute, I want to find a sentence that you can use when you climb with young people’. The sentence was: ‘this is where it ends’. It is a sentence with many levels, as what and where it ends is open. It could be for example a behaviour they have had in prison….

In Rome I said to a woman: ‘he who wants to live according to his desires, loses his life’.

It’s about how you get these sentences. I want to show how one touches the deepest layer of the soul; that’s where one of these [sentences] suddenly comes from. Whoever offers such a sentence gets to reach a good result. There is something poetic in it and in the end it is not therapy. So, I want to practise with the participants how to find these sentences. Once we have heard some of them and let them sink into us, we will know how to find them later on.

Many of these sentences are koans. I have once defined a koan as ‘something contradictory that makes sense’. They are very condensed in appearance and do not let go. I will also use other means of proceeding, depending on how it is given.

WALPER: Where do you concentrate when you close your eyes and wait for the sentence to come to you?

HELLINGER: I concentrate on the person and her system, and I wait until a sentence comes along that changes everything. You can’t make this sentence up nor search for it. You wait while remaining open and suddenly it is there. Surprisingly. When we work like this, with the soul, we yet feel something else. We reach deep into the soul, that’s where we find some dragons. At first we think they are ugly and bad. They guard a special treasure. When we face them and if we reconcile with them, they guide us to something essential.

WALPER: Last February, during the day in Garmisch, you reported some observations on constellations of autistic children. Would you have any new ones?

HELLINGER: In Taiwan and China I made two constellations with autistic children who were present.

A 14-year-old boy was with his mother, a psychotherapist. We looked into his family and discovered that there had been a crime. The victim seemed to be a perpetrator as well, that’s how it appeared through the constellation. In any case, at the end they were all lying on the floor. The murderer of the grandfather’s brother stretched out one arm sideways. Then I made the young man lie down next to him. The perpetrator took him in his arms. The young man calmed down completely and became completely normal. He stayed for the whole course and later attended Netra’s (organiser in Taiwan) course because he was fascinated. He spoke again, he was completely normal, very intelligent. At once a channel had been liberated in him. Netra told me about it later in China, he was astonished.

In any case, it is about opening up new perspectives within the system so that love flows and a liberated environment is created.

I would like to see how families with autistic children can be helped on your September event. The aim is not to cure a child. In the case of an illness as difficult as this one, that would be presumptuous. I see it more as a community project where you and others, for example Sieglinde Schneider who also had many positive experiences with autistic children, could contribute with your experiences. Well, I would like to continue with that.

WALPER: In Garmisch you formulated the following hypothesis: the autistic is retaining a cry or perhaps a word. When this word or this cry is expressed, something opens up in the soul. Love can flow again, the autistic can perceive again and come into contact.

HELLINGER: Yes, I have already had experiences with autistic people in the past and I wanted to test this in a constellation in Garmisch. The word that the child could not pronounce at that time was ‘’mum‘’.

There are many different links here. In a course for psychotics in St. Barbara, there was also a family with autistic people. The constellation was very dramatic and another new aspect became apparent. Autism cannot be reduced to a simplified scheme, that would be too simplistic.

The autistic person is someone who takes on something out of love. He finds peace when someone takes him in with love, especially the one for whom he has taken over, who can often be a perpetrator.

But I don’t want to reduce it to this either. I remain attentive and if something else comes up, I consider it and adapt.

When we meet during the September course, we will observe together what happens and we will share with each other. We will certainly come to many insights. They will help us to handle such destinies more smoothly and more carefully. We shall devote ourselves to discovering new territories with fresh curiosity and motivation. With all caution yes, but with courage.

WALPER: thank you for the interview and the beautiful conclusion.