Emotional DNA is the patterns of thoughts, feelings and actions that create mindsets and beliefs that then become the truth.  Only it is not the truth it is your truth, and you can change that any time you want to.  Or can you?

In systemic work and constellations, we often notice how hidden loyalties and blind love keep us stuck.  It’s not the sins of the fathers but the love of the children who perpetuate the patterns that bind us.  To paraphrase Stefan Hausner,” … even if it costs me my life.” Many of us do not dare to do what calls to our hearts for fear of disappointing parents and family. We live the life we believe they expect us to, at the expense of our own dreams and aspirations.  We even repeat the limiting patterns of our parents so that they don’t feel alone or take on our parents’ dreams, completing what they could not.  We call these unconscious loyalties.

While these actions are deeply loving, they can be equally limiting. During a constellation, we quite often notice a client stop right at the point of taking a new step, as though they were waiting for permission to move. This is the place of the unconscious loyalty. Sometimes that permission is not forthcoming but giving the family system a place in our hearts allows us to stay connected and move forward. 

There is another important piece of information that can help anyone in this position move past their hesitation.  It may feel a little scary to take a new step because there is a sense of leaving the family behind. There is a different but beautiful reality. You are in fact never separate from your system.  You are neither an imposter nor a deserter. When you take a step forward, you are actually growing the system and showing others what more is possible. One way or another, you are benefiting the system, and it needs you to grow. 

The next time you do something different, instead of being afraid, simply understand that you are adding to a system that needs you to grow and is always in service of you – just as you are in service of it.

To find out more about unconscious loyalties, how they keep you stuck and how to move past them, visit us at judywilkins-smith.com.