Love’s Hidden Symmetry

Love’s Hidden Symmetry is the evocative title of one of the most important books by the founder of Family Constellations work, Bert Hellinger. It’s one of my favorite books, which I re-read most years. I always find something new in its pages!

But as I have been preparing for a workshop I am currently leading in New Zealand entitled “Splits in Self and Society,” I’ve found myself chewing on the title itself. I’ve always loved it, and felt it’s poetic power. But now I am beginning to notice its profound wisdom, and its potential guidance for those of us (all of us?) who struggle with internal fragmentation and conflict, as well as suffering alongside our society’s brokenness and division.

As I chewed, a story came to mind. It’s a story you’ve heard before, in various creation myths and metaphysical summaries of how we got here. This is how my very simple version goes:

“In the beginning, all was wholeness. It was beautiful, but it was boring. There were no ants or ocean waves or Redwood trees or old women. Then, difference! Specific things came into being. Each reflected the whole, but were not the whole. And together, something new could arise in their various combinations. Such symphonies! Dances! Jazz! Forests! Coral reefs! Deserts that meet mountain ranges! But it was also sad. With difference came separation. There was now distance and loss and difference and conflict. The differences made us happy. The differences made us sad. Which brings us to today…”

We are the children of this story. Our world is always trying to navigate this tension. How do we stay grateful for diversity while managing the inevitable loss it includes?

Perhaps more than ever (although always be cautious about that claim – why should we claim such special-ness?) we feel ourselves struggling with division, and all the violence and heart-break that comes with it. How do we recover a sense of joy at difference and diversity, while still seeing the unity and wholeness of everything? And what difference might that make, both internally and externally, if we could figure it out?

Difference is not the opposite of unity. Wholeness is not the enemy of diversity. This is true despite our enduring sense that they are. We are therefore in the land of paradox, where conventional logic doesn’t help very much. In conventional logic, if a=b, and b≠c, then a≠c, always. But we are in a space where if a=b, and b≠c, then a=c is still possible, and, in fact, might be necessary. We aren’t trained to think this way, generally.

However, there are some subcultures where paradoxical thinking is the norm, and we need to turn to them. One of them is the realm of poetry. Poetry deals in paradoxes all the time, because it’s where metaphors and symbols mean at least as much, if not more than, equal signs. We move from mere arithmetic to very advanced calculus (which also deals in paradoxes, but most of us don’t have ten years to spend in advanced education to understand it!). And all of us have poetry, if we are willing to wrestle a bit.

Bert Hellinger was more of a poet than a conventional logician. Indeed, he is rather famous among we constellators for driving us crazy, saying a=b at one moment, and then with equal authority saying a≠b the next, all with an enigmatic smile. His understanding of human systems is profoundly influenced by his poetic spirit, where the basic rules of human gathering can be called, paradoxically, “the Orders of Love.”

“Love’s Hidden Symmetry” is a title that also lives in that paradoxical landscape. “Love” is about wholeness, unity, something deeply universal. Except it’s also something that exists between beings, as expression of connection, which means multiplicity. “Symmetry” has a similar dual purpose. It can imply muliplicity (things can’t be symmetrical if they aren’t more than one thing). One the other hand, one perfect thing can indeed be symmetrical.

So, the most important word in the title, I think, ends up being “hidden.” Hellinger is inviting us to see inside the dance of love that humans struggle with and exalt over, the persistence of a unity, a symmetry, a continuing reflection of perfection in the limitation and loss and heart-break and specificity of things.

This is all lovely, but how might this work practically? Does it, or is it just abstract and pretty reflection? Actually, constellations teaches us that this vision has enormous practical and healing impact.

Let me offer an example from my past life as a minister. It is not uncommon to find congregations that are cranky about their pastors. I am not talking about pastors who are engaging in explicit misconduct. The congregation simply feels that they aren’t there enough, or aren’t good enough at something, or seem to need too much time off, or don’t talk quite correctly at meetings, or…the vague list goes on.

And, I’ve also noticed a lot of pastors similarly cranky at their congregations. They feel underappreciated, that they don’t see how hard they are working, that perhaps the congregation really isn’t stepping up and doesn’t understand that a pastor can’t do and be everything.

From each point of view, the other one is legitimately the problem. Therefore, the solution may seem simple – get a new one, a better one, a more suitable one (parish or pastor). However, what if neither of them is actually the root issue? What if the real issue is that the larger institution of the Church under-resources both the clergy and the parishes, so that, in a way, they are both doomed to failure (or perhaps ongoing inadequacy, which is almost worse). What if the apparent opponents are actually allies in the same messed up system that surrounds them? What might happen if they could see each other that way? What if they could see the hidden symmetry of love in their partnership?

This is not a theoretical issue. Recently, I was talking with an irritated church-goer who was in this situation. When I proposed this new way of seeing it, she instinctively sighed in relief. It allowed her to recover her love for her pastor, and still retain love for herself and her fellow congregants. She could go forth with newfound strength and optimism about what might be possible, when she’s not enrolled in the story of us vs. them that requires so much self-protection.

This kind of situation endures all around us, and inside us. What might happen if you see some of our culture’s divisions in a similar way? Or perhaps a conflict you have with a friend? Or maybe the internal conflicts you suffer from (a part of me wants to be healthy and eat well, and another part wants to feel the deep satisfaction of eating the whole pint of icecream!)? What if these di-lemmas are almost always an expression of a larger whole that needs us to see it?

The awesome thing about Family Constellations is that when we set up these “opponents,” we almost always immediately see the larger symmetry of love around them. The affect on everyone in the room is similarly immediate, profound, and relieving.

We don’t need to wait for a constellation to see these larger wholes. If we are strongly identify with one side of a division, then it can be challenging (again, our self-protective fight/flight mechanisms can be very compelling), but with an act of imagination, it is possible to begin noticing the larger symmetry that contains both us and “the other.”

What is your experience of Love’s Hidden Symmetry? Is there an internal or external division that you currently carry in your heart that might benefit from this act of imagination? Or, perhaps you’ve had this experience in the past when suddenly, you see how the warring parts belong to each other? Please share your stories, thoughts and questions on my blog, below!