Allison invited two friends to share her session. None of them had ever experienced a constellation, so after a brief introduction a guided piece was done to help them become more centered.

Allison asked to work first. She appeared collapsed through her shoulders and torso: "I just don't know what to do. My husband said he'd take care of me, and now he just expects so much of me. I never satisfy him, and I'm disappointed with him 95% of the time. If we didn't have kids…"

After a bit more conversation it seemed to Jan that feelings might be coming from elsewhere: that perhaps Allison was identified with her father. In this position the daughter often has unrealistic expectations of men and imbalanced loyalties toward her mother and father. Those often-hidden loyalties can cause a woman to feel disconnected from the 50 percent of her life force that comes from her female lineage. In other words, she is not in her full strength.

In order to help Allison step into more her power, Jan started by having Allison sense where she felt support beneath her and breathe gently into her chest. A subtle trembling began through her arms occurred as her body slowly released some of the sense of helplessness she was holding.

Jan then asked one of the friends to stand in as Allison's father and the other to represent Allison's mother. When the representative for Allison's father stepped in, he had no awareness of the representative for his wife. He felt his attention being drawn to the floor in front of him. The representative for his wife looked at him, angry and resigned (much like Allison's feelings toward her husband.) Footprint cut-outs were then placed on the floor in front of her father. Jan asked if the father had lost anyone early in his life, and Allison responded, "He lost his mother at 12."

As she shared this information, the representative for her father knelt down to touch the footprints. At this point, he became aware of his wife's representative, whose expression had turned from one of helplessness to empathy. It was clear to everyone that he seemed to want her to see him and the full picture of what the loss of this person, his mother, was like for him.

The representative for Allison's mother slowly moved toward her husband's side, and gradually they looked at each other, in true contact. Jan took the footprints from in front of Allison's father and now placed them on the floor behind Allison's father. She placed another set of footprints beside his mom to represent his father. After a moment, with his parents behind him and his wife now beside him, Allison's father appeared to come to a peaceful quiet strength.

Jan then experimented to find the right distance for Allison to stand facing her parents and still remain grounded. As she looked at her parents who were together she was at first disoriented by her father's greater presence and his new sense of intimacy with her mother (a position Allison had long occupied). After a time she began to notice that she was feeling a more equal affection toward both parents and an equal love emanating toward her. Gentle tears began as she moved toward her parents, in the right place at last. Then, after giving the new image some time, Jan ended the constellation.

With this constellation completed, the triad moved on to work for the next member around a concern related to his drug-addicted son. The third participant then worked with an issue of infidelity that turned out to be related to the impact on her family of the suicide of a grandparent before she was born.

Later Notes on Allison: As her triadic experience continues to unfold within Allison, she is increasingly able to draw on the strengths of both her paternal and maternal lineages. With the old tasks allowed to fall away, she is able to more clearly and sympathetically see her husband and his family system. And the decisions she makes from this new place are informed by an expanding sense of love and ease.