| IV/of V.
Blending Families
A couple came in wanting to work on how to blend their families. After marrying, they had created a home that included the wife's two adolescent daughters. A couple of months later the husband's son, who had lived in another town with his mother, was kicked out due to his extremely violent behavior. The father literally found his son on his doorstep with no forewarning. The father had divorced his son's mother very early in the son's life and had not had a major role in his life up to that point.
The appearance of the son created a great deal of family distress. The son had been violent on several occasions and had trashed his mother's house. There were also concerns regarding his lack of boundaries with his stepsisters. In light of his felt obligation to try to turn his son's life around, the father rented an apartment for himself and his son. The couple maintained their relationship the best they could under this arrangement. At the time of our beginning sessions, six months had gone by since moving to the apartment and the husband was feeling a strong desire to blend the families. The wife was skittish and unsure.
In coming to know them, I learned that the father, when under high stress, would sometimes lose his temper. His wife described his anger as, "I look in his eyes and he is not there." In essence, she was describing dissociated rage. His history revealed he had been beaten as a young child on an ongoing basis by his mother, and that she had spent time in mental institutions. The wife's history included relationships with men who had abused her. Her oldest daughter was complaining of severe depression and feelings of not wanting to be alive. Her younger daughter was having problems as well.
In the course of our working together, I eventually did soul retrievals for all the family members. In journeying on what to work on for the bigger issues in the family, I was directed to tell the parents we were going to do a "family constitution" ritual. The spirits gave me a number of questions that were to be addressed by each family member in terms of rights and expectations for being a constitutional member of the family. Within a ritual context that included drumming, singing, speaking truths, and sitting with one's truths over a few days, the family finally agreed to a constitution which included rituals for anger release and community response for the breaking of taboos in the constitution. The signing of the constitution was followed by a feast with friends of the family.
There were no more outbursts by the son. He got straight A's the rest of his high school career and went on to college. A couple of minor sessions were held with the parents regarding concerns they had with the youngest daughter, which were easily resolved.
Community Healing
My keenest interest in this work has been in community conflict healing and working within the natural groupings in which it occurs. A couple of years ago, I befriended a group of people who were building a spiritual gathering place in rural Wisconsin. One of the members of this group is a shamanic practitioner and teacher. I really appreciated their open heartedness and the purity of intent in their dreams.
As they were beginning to build, a multinational corporate farming group based in Belgium bought the farm next door with the intent of building a factory pig farm. For all the people of this particular valley, it would mean weeks of awful smells as well as a number of environmental impact concerns. For the people I knew, it meant the end of their dream if this factory farm were to be built. A number of interventions took place. One group member who is an attorney, drafted a new zoning ordinance, which she placed before the county board. The intent of the ordinance was to limit the size and scope of pig farming and its environmental impact. In researching the issues involved, it was found that the State Department of Natural Resources policy was to grant permits and not do environmental impact studies until a minimum of six months had passed (if ever). At this time also, news reports described negative environmental impacts of factory pig farming in North Carolina.
The drumming circle community did soul healing work for the land the corporation was attempting to buy. It had never been well cared for. Non-local owners had bought it a couple of years prior and stood to make a huge profit on their investment. The community of a few thousand had split over the issues involved. A poor county, there was the promise of new jobs. Farmers in the county feared any ordinances that might limit the freedom of how they ran their family farms. County Board meetings were packed with concerned citizens. A number of journeys were done to try to bring understanding, healing, and clarity to the issues involved. Full effort was made to make contact with the corporate president, who was attending these county meetings.
The positive side of this conflict was how the issues allowed the spiritual community to become known by other community members and how it demystified for all what they were doing and who they were. The zoning ordinance passed the County Board. At the same time, it was recognized there were a number of legal issues which might overturn this ordinance.
Toward the end of this process, an attempt was made to conduct a community healing ritual for the conflict. It had consumed weeks and months of people's lives. Attempts were made to invite a wide spectrum of community members. A conflict healing dance occurred similar to what was described earlier in this article. As is generally the case, the most immediate impact of these rituals was an increased sense of understanding and compassion for the complexity of issues involved.
The real impact of the ritual came the next day. The non-local owners cancelled the contract with the corporation and agreed to sell the farm to a group of locals for the price they had paid. It was a bolt out of the blue. It meant the owners had given up the opportunity to profit greatly. The corporation looked at a couple of other sites in the area, but eventually gave up. |