What Good Can One Session Do? Exploring the Effectiveness of Family Systemic Constellation Therapy in Individual Sessions

Intervention: Each participant will receive one 60- to 90-minute FCT session in a private videoconference setting. Sessions will be conducted by one psychotherapist in private practice for 25 years, who is also a certified FCT practitioner (trained by FCT founder Bert Hellinger) with 20 years of FCT facilitation experience. Sessions will strictly adhere to the Individual Family Constellation Therapy (FCT) Session Procedure. Individual Family Constellation Therapy (FCT) Session Procedure: The individual FCT session serves as the experiential core of the study. 1. Opening Interview: The participating therapist (PT) opens the videoconference session with a warm check-in and reaffirmation of informed consent. The PT briefly explains the purpose and structure of the session and reminds the participant that they may pause or stop at any time. A. Goal Clarification: The PT engages the participant in a short, focused interview in which the participant shares their presenting issue from the Personal Questionnaire (PQ). The PT listens for key relationship dynamics, unresolved family trauma, systemic language, or recurring patterns. The PT inquires about known traumatic events or major challenges in the family history. This becomes the orienting center of the session. The PT then invites the participant to clarify their intention for the session, phrased as a goal. B. Decision Making: The PT, in collaboration with the participant, decides on which parts of the family system to work with. 2. Phenomenological Inquiry and Systemic Intervention: A. Systemic Positioning: The PT guides the participant to position physical objects (e.g., paper triangles) to spatially represent an inner image of their relationship with select family members, key figures, or abstract concepts (e.g., patriarchy, fear, guilt, higher self). B. Systemic enquiry: The PT invites the participant to observe their bodily sensations, emotional responses, and felt senses as they engage with the spatial configuration in the “Knowing Field.” Led by the participant’s somatic and verbal cues, the PT tracks strong emotions and emerging ancestral/relational patterns. C. Spatial Reorganisation: In a reflective dialogue, the PT facilitates the spatial reorganisation (re-ordering) of the physical objects (e.g., paper triangles) to explore systemic dynamics, often revealing deep emotional themes such as inherited burdens, unconscious loyalties, exclusion, interrupted belonging, hidden grief, or inherited guilt. D. Application of Healing Sentences: As systemic entanglements emerge, the PT may offer or co-create healing sentences. These are short, resonant phrases spoken aloud to acknowledge systemic truths, restore order, and to support emotional release, inner movement and systemic reconnection. These may include phrases such as: “I see you. You belong.” “You are the big one, I am the small one.” “I am just the child. You are the parent.” “I carry this for you with love, and now I give it back.” “Please bless me if I go forward in life.” “What happened to you was too much. I honour your fate.” The PT may invite the participant to speak aloud or imagine these phrases internally and/or reflect on how they feel when hearing them. The PT may invite participant to imagine small relational movements (i.e., emotional steps or gestures such as turning toward or away, bowing, or stepping out of entanglement) to support the integration of the healing movements and sentences at the somatic and systemic level. The PT pays particular attention to the participant’s patterns of emotional charge and release, always moving toward expressions that reflect emotional shifts and somatic easing. Steps 2B through 2D are repeated as required. E. Final Image: The PT works with the participant to gently facilitate a shift toward a resolution in the participant’s spatial imagery. The final spatial outcome will reflect a sense of systemic balance, order, and/or acknowledgment to the extent possible (e.g., repositioning, including previously excluded members, affirming hierarchical orders). 4. Reflective Integration As systemic movements begin to settle, the PT gently invites the participant to take in what they notice both in the relational (spatial) field and in their bodily sensations. The PT does not interpret but listens for meaning that emerges from within the participant’s own embodied knowing. The PT may invite the participant to engage in an optional short ritual (e.g., hand on heart, closing breath, symbolic gathering of the objects). The PT invites the participant to reflect inwardly on the emotional and systemic insights gained and stay with the final feeling, which is generally a feeling of lightness, softness, or warmth, or a final healing sentence, or image of their rightful place in the family system. The PT may help the participant integrate these insights emotionally and cognitively, using grounding techniques as needed. The PT informs the participant that integration may continue in the days that follow. 5. Closing: The PT reminds the participant of the follow-up resources available on the Aftercare Support and Referral Sheet provided in advance of the session by the Principal Investigator (PI). The PT informs the client that it is best to let the process settle naturally and to avoid discussing the process or journalling about it for at least three days. This is done to enable the session to be absorbed deeply in the unconscious mind without being hijacked by cognitive analysis and overthinking. The PT closes the session after ensuring the participant is in a sound emotional state. 6. Documentation: The PT will document the session notes in a de-identified format, ensuring that no personally identifying information is recorded. Each entry should include the session date and a unique participant code. Notes will include session goals, key configurations and placements, major emotional or systemic themes, healing sentences used, and observed shifts. The PT will forward the session notes to the PI after the session. The session notes will then become part of the case data for thematic analysis in the study. The PI will monitor adherence to the intervention.