01. The Healing Practice That Changed Everything for Us | Alicia Acosta & Cindy Biggs

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What happens when family wounds ripple through generations, shaping not only our personal lives but entire cultural dynamics? In this powerful episode, John Acosta, Cindy Biggs, and Alicia Acosta dive deep into the transformative practice of Family Constellations, reflecting on their personal healing journeys across continents—from Romania’s Carpathian Mountains to the heart of the United States. Cindy shares her life-changing introduction to this modality during a pivotal moment in Romania, while Alicia and John recount their profound first encounters with Constellation work. Together, they explore how generational trauma manifests in family systems, education, and society, offering insights into breaking cycles and finding collective healing.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Zulu One Podcast.
Join my mom, sister and me aswe share how family
constellations and meditationtransformed our lives.
We discuss trauma, theimportance of self-healing and
announce our November 17thworkshop in Chicago.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Tune in for insights on personal growth and To close
your eyes, uncross your arms andlegs and ground your body where

(00:37):
you are Now.
We're going to take three deepbreaths.
Take one deep breath for you,in through your nose and out

(01:11):
through your mouth.
Now one for your mother, in andout, now one for your father.

(01:39):
Inhale and exhale.
Inhale Now.

(02:00):
See your mother behind yourleft shoulder, close to your
heart, supporting you, even ifyou do not know your mother or

(02:22):
you had a difficult relationshipwith her.
Be in gratitude to her forbringing you into this world.
Feel her presence Now.

(02:50):
See your father behind yourright shoulder, Supporting you.
Feel his presence Now.

(03:15):
See your mother's parentsbehind him and your

(03:37):
great-grandparents behind themnow.
See all your ancestors standingbehind you.
Invite all the excluded ones tojoin them see the warm glow to

(04:08):
join them.
See the warm glow cascadinglife force, experience,
intuition and ancient knowledgecoming towards you.
Feel their presence, supportingyou moving forward.

(04:32):
Sit in that feeling for amoment.
Now, when you're ready, comeback to the space.

Speaker 1 (05:07):
How was that one?
Oh wow, oh wow.

Speaker 4 (05:14):
What kept coming to my mind is I can see my mom in
the screen and my dad.
I know exactly what he's doingat your house, right?

Speaker 1 (05:22):
now yes.

Speaker 4 (05:23):
Sitting on the couch.

Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yep Watching TV.
Yes, yes, what came out foryour mom.

Speaker 5 (05:33):
Oh, I just really felt both of them here.
I just felt a really, reallystrong connection.
You know the fact that both ofmy parents are deceased.
It touches me in a very deeplevel, and what came up is how
very proud they both are of thework that you are doing to help

(05:57):
heal yourselves first andforemost, and then all of your
loved ones, and then a largercommunity.
It's really beautiful, Thankyou.

Speaker 1 (06:07):
Wow, I'm going to get emotional.
Jeez, we're going to just startwith everybody crying Golly man
.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
Jeez.

Speaker 1 (06:15):
That's what this is all about, right?
So let's everybody start crying.
That's great.
You're not crying.
I'm not crying, you're not.

Speaker 5 (06:21):
I'm not crying, you're crying so what came up
for you?

Speaker 1 (06:25):
um, so what came up for me was the first, first
consolation that we did which iskind of a mirror of what we're
doing right now, us three onthis conversation.
You know, having this continuelike what the 8, 16, 18, 20
years later?

(06:46):
um and dad sitting on the couchwhich, and he's supporting in
his own way, which- is reallycool it's like, it's like full
circle and and for the audienceto to know and this is this is
very personal to me and I knowyou had a different experience,
mom and alicia on your side youhad a different experience as
well, but my first constellationwas you at the front, um,

(07:06):
alicia and I behind you, uh, andwe were in this emergency
dynamic and dad kind of on theon the outside just looking in,
trying to like, find a way andto find that out right.
So it's a lot less aggressivethan that, um, and it's in a new
, complete way, in a different,almost like a different rung of

(07:29):
the ladder towards healing,which is really cool.
That you know, recently dad'sdone a constellation and that
was just, you know, reallyinteresting and really powerful
and just how much that'saffected my life and my kids'
lives and I would imagine yourguys' lives as well how much
he's done healing as well.

(07:49):
So, yeah, this is it's reallycool.
This is what I'm calling thehome team.
Excuse me, what I'm calling thehome team I'm stealing this
from another podcast that Ireally like is we're the
foundational members of Zulu One, this movement that started in
2006,.

(08:09):
Mom, in Romania 2007?
Actually 2000,.

Speaker 5 (08:15):
It was 19 years ago.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
Yeah, so 2007, right, yeah, when we were introduced
to this work of familyconstellations.
Right, and so tell me, fromyour perspective, if you could
talk about it a little bit,about how you came to this

(08:37):
incredible modality.

Speaker 5 (08:41):
you've alluded to the fact that your father, who is
staying with you right now.
For a brief period, we weremarried for 20 years and after

(09:25):
the breakup of, after ourdivorce, I joined the Foreign
Service.
I was a Foreign Service officerfor the US government.
Lots of people don't know whatthat means but it's simply part
of a team of people within USgovernments of Commerce, helping
US manufacturers find clientsinternationally and helping

(09:45):
international assigned to livein Romania.
That was my second assignment.
After the divorce, the three ofus moved to Monterey, Mexico,
and then I was assigned to theUS Embassy in Romania.
In Romania, and you had joinedthe Air Force at that point and

(10:08):
were no longer living with usand Alicia was taking a gap year
before she started university,working at the US Embassy, and
we had all kind of approachedthe divorce in different ways
and I for one did not handle itwell.
And we were walking down thestreet, Alicia and I.

(10:30):
Alicia and I were walking downthe street and she stopped and
turned around and looked at meand she had big tears coming
down her face and she said thatshe was ready to go to
counseling.

Speaker 4 (10:44):
Which I do not remember that moment at all oh
wow.
So I don't know if she made itup or if it really happened.

Speaker 5 (10:53):
Well, I contacted the embassy and they actually
provided me with a wonderfultherapist who started working
with Alicia.

Speaker 4 (11:02):
And I thought well, deanna.

Speaker 5 (11:04):
Deanna, I should have told you.
Oh God, yeah.
So I thought, well, if Aliciacan do this, I'm going to do it
too.
So I started also going to seea therapist and I was a couple
months in and I had starteddating a wonderful, wonderful
man and he came to Romania tovisit me.

(11:28):
We'd been dating for threeyears and so he came to Romania
to visit me and then my parentscame to spend Christmas with me
because the two of you were inVenezuela visiting your father
and he called me.
He was in Zambia visiting hisdaughter, and he called me.

(11:51):
His daughter was working on arefugee camp as a volunteer, and
he called me and he was sittingright next to his daughter and
we were just talking and I said,before I hung up, I love you.
And he kind of hesitatedbecause his daughter was right
there.
He was a little bit embarrassed, but thankfully he said I love

(12:13):
you too, and an hour and a halflater he was dead.
I got a phone call.
He had been killed in a head-oncollision and my world stopped.
Everything on me hurt, my hairhurt, everything hurt.
I didn't know what to do, so Icalled my therapist.
Luckily, my parents were withme.
I called my therapist and toldhim what had happened and he

(12:38):
immediately told me to come andI went there and we started
working through the griefprocess and he said you know, in
July there's going to be agathering up in the Carpathian
Mountains and with a group ofpeople, and I think it would
help you a lot and I was sodistraught that anything if he
had told me to set my hair onfire and run down the street

(13:00):
naked, I would have done itbecause I was in so much pain.
So I had no idea what I wasgetting into.
I packed my bag for 10 days, goup into the Carpathian
Mountains, and it turns out thatthat was my introduction into
Bert Hellinger's FamilyConstellation Therapy and of the

(13:22):
people participating.
There were 33 peopleparticipating.
They had brought in afacilitator named Alberto, from
Spain because they were foundingthe Romanian chapter of the
Family Constellation Therapistsand they were all.
All of these people, it turnsout, were therapists, with the

(13:44):
exception of three of us.
So that was my introduction andwe did family constellations
from morning.
You know to the why Romanianpsychologists wanted to bring
constellations to the country.

Speaker 1 (14:13):
Can you, can you talk about that a little bit?

Speaker 5 (14:16):
Ceausescu after.
So Romania.
Not to get too much in theweeds about Romanian history,
but Romania was under Sovietcontrol.
When the Russians pulled out,ceausescu and his wife Elena
imposed a kind of communism onRomania which made the Russians

(14:41):
look a little a bit morepreferable their form of
communism as opposed toCeausescu's.
And he was upset because theyhad taken out a loan from the
International Monetary Fund andthe country didn't have the
money to pay back the fund, topay back the money that they had

(15:03):
borrowed.
And he was embarrassed.
He was a very proud man.
He proceeded to turn Romaniainto an agricultural country, so
he moved everybody in from theoutskirts of Bucharest into
Bucharest and turned off theelectricity.

(15:26):
They didn't want to buy energyfrom other countries, so they
would turn off the electricityin all of the country.
They were forced into labor, sothey were out working in the
fields picking strawberries, allfor exports.
So they were hungry, therewasn't enough food, they were

(15:47):
cold and Ceausescu was trying togrow the Romanian population
and so contraception wasoutlawed and women would be
brought in and examined to seeif they were pregnant several
times during the year.
So as a result, you have apopulation of people who are
terrified of being sent to aconcentration camp.

(16:09):
They're hungry, they're coldand they're starved for
connection.
So you can only imagine whatwould happen with couples and
families and the women would getpregnant.
And if you've got starvingchildren at home, another
pregnancy could mean bothparents and the existing

(16:30):
children would perish.
So, as a result, there were anawful lot of abortions performed
and many, many, many women died.
And in fact, when Alberto Iturbe, the facilitator, the Spanish
facilitator went around thecircle when we were first

(16:51):
meeting, he went around thecircle and he asked people how
many siblings do you have?
And people would say I'm anonly child.
And he'd go around to the nextperson I'm an only child, I'm an
only child.
He caught on what was going onand he started saying how many
times were your parents pregnant?

(17:13):
And some of them, one woman inparticular, said 33 times and
she's an only child.
Another woman said.
Another participant said Iremember my mother being
pregnant two times a year andshe again was an only child.
So there was this need inRomania.

(17:34):
There was just this desperateneed to heal the wound on the
psyche of Romania and it's justbeen amazing to watch how that
country has advanced in terms ofhelping to heal the wound of
their ancestors.

Speaker 1 (17:55):
Yeah, that's the way that I always describe Romania
is that, and I got the chance tovisit you a bunch of times when
you were there and also go anddo constellations, which will be
a you know conversation downthe line but I always describe
Romania as a beautiful womanthat was in an abusive
relationship for 30 years.
You know, it's just like there'ssuch wounds on the psyche of it

(18:16):
and you know when we're talkingabout constellations and what
this does and we haven't reallytalked about what a
constellation is.
So I think a simple descriptionof it and if you're listening
to the podcast you kind of knowwhat this is right.
It's a very obscure type of uhto deal with unresolved trauma
and family systems basically,and as countries are, they're

(18:40):
built by family systems, they'rebuilt by social systems and
there's this idea that trauma iscarried in the systemic or
collective memory of a, of aculture, and obviously you, you
could see that that was verypresent and palpable in the

(19:00):
Romanian culture and I can'timagine how shocking that is at
the beginning, but also kind oflike a full circle of Vlad the
Impaler being in Transylvania.
Now it's Alberto the Healer inthe Carpathian Mountains, like
now it's, you know, alberto thehealer in the Carpathian
Mountains saying you know, I'mhere to heal your soul.
You know, rather than it beingthis.
You know, it's a kind of fullcircle thing.

(19:21):
Rather than sucking energy outof people, it's like we're
healing souls, right, and that'swhat this constellation work
really does at the end of theday.
So I think that it's a reallysuch a beautiful story of out of
so much pain can come so much,so much beauty.

Speaker 5 (19:58):
Yes, and then the following year Alicia came with
me and participated with thesame group of people that had
grown at that point.
And then the next year you cameand it got even bigger and
honestly, that has to be one ofthe most beautiful memories that
I will cherish forever is tosee the two of you working
addressing these issues.
This generational trauma atsuch young ages and then to have
taken to that so immediatelyand in such a big way and then

(20:19):
to reach the point where we areright now is just such an
incredible, incredible blessingfor me.
It's hard for me to articulatehow proud it makes me.

Speaker 1 (20:32):
Thank you, I appreciate that yeah, thanks.
So, Alicia, what was your firstimpression about mom coming
back and saying, hey, I'mlooking at this modality and
this is a weird kind of thing?
What was your first initialreaction about it?

Speaker 4 (20:50):
So for me, I was going through a process of
moving to the United States togo to college.
I was going to go to CharlestonCollege of Charleston and
things didn't work out and Iended up going to Michigan.
So I was like in a transitionalperiod.
I decided to stay longer inRomania to be with mom because,

(21:13):
after you know, tom passed away,I didn't want to leave her
alone.
So I got a job at the embassyand mom would tell me about this
and it would go through one earand leave the other.
Obviously I wasn't ready tohear and to fully understand how
deep she went in her healingand how vulnerable she was.

(21:34):
So when she invited me thefollowing summer, she said hey,
just come to the hotel, it's inthe Carpathian Mountains.

Speaker 1 (21:45):
You can hang out by the pool.
You can hang out.
I swear to God, there's no pool.
There's no pool there.
You can hang out by the pool.
You can hang out by the pool.

Speaker 4 (21:53):
You can, you know, just relax and enjoy the hotel.
You can go hiking.
And I was like sure that soundsgreat, so I get there and I
really had zero interest inparticipating.
Also, it was pretty expensive,so I did know that.
So we get to the hotel and itwas like bare minimum.

(22:13):
Yeah, there was no pool, therewas no TV, there was only like
three channels.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
And they're all Romanian.

Speaker 4 (22:21):
Yes, they were.
They're all Romanian.
I couldn't go hiking becausethere were bears everywhere.
Ursus.
So, I couldn't go hiking bymyself, so I basically, for the
first day, just stayed in thehotel room watching TV, like
that's all I did.

Speaker 1 (22:37):
Watching Romanian TV like Romanian soap operas.

Speaker 4 (22:40):
Yes, exactly.
Well, a lot of them wereVenezuelan and Colombian soap
operas.
Translated into Romanian no, no, no in Spanish.

Speaker 1 (22:47):
Oh, wow, okay.

Speaker 4 (22:48):
Yeah, so Romanians are very skillful with their
languages.
A lot of them learn Spanishthrough soap operas.
And a lot of them fromColombian and Venezuelan soap
operas, so that was really neat.

Speaker 1 (23:02):
There should be a global class on just learning
languages through soap operas,Because so many of the people
that we know have learnedlanguages through soap operas.
Right, mom?
Yeah, so what was okay?
So you're bored out of yourmind in the hotel room.

Speaker 4 (23:21):
And I mom comes like mom's, like yeah, you're going
to be able to see me.
I never saw her, only for lunch.
And then I see all these peoplelike super excited.
And then that night she talkedto Alberto and she said you know
, when it's my turn to do aconstellation, because when
you're in a group constellation,they put everybody's name in a

(23:41):
hat, um, and throughout theconstellation they start picking
out names and if your name getscalled, then it's your turn to
work on something that you arestruggling with or something
that you want to see, somethingthat is very important for you
at that moment.
So she asked him if, when it'sher turn, if I could be there.

(24:04):
So I was like, ok, yeah, I'lldo that, like I'll do anything,
like I was bored out of my mindand we're going to be there for
10 days.
So you know I sit down in thecircle and I'm like, okay, you
know, this is really exciting.
She starts to work on herconstellation and the first
thing I noticed was the personthat was representing me.

(24:25):
This is a lady that I've neverseen in my life.
I don't know any of the peoplein the circle.
The only person I know is mymom and my therapist.
My therapist, diana, was there,participating in the family
constellation as well, and Istarted to see that she would do
movements that I normally dowhile she was representing me.
And then there was anothergentleman that was representing

(24:47):
you, and then I started to seethe interaction between the two
of us, the two representatives.

Speaker 1 (24:53):
I remember this, yes.

Speaker 4 (24:54):
And I would be like tickling you, like trying to get
your attention all the time,like the representatives and I
was sitting there and being likethat's totally our relationship
and I'm always looking for hisattention, especially tickling,
because you don't like when Itickle you.

Speaker 1 (25:11):
Nope, I do not like that.
No, no, no, I don't like when Itickle you because you get blue
and nervous.
Nope, I do not like that.
Nope, nope, no, I don't likethat.

Speaker 4 (25:14):
So, when I was able to see the physical similarities
.
That's when I was like, oh wow,this is super powerful.
And then, when I was able torepresent someone, then I was
able to feel the energy ofwhoever I was representing and I
was like, oh wow, this isincredible.

(25:34):
So, little by little, the moreI participated and the more I
saw, the more I was able tounderstand what Family
Constellations was all about.
And then the following year,when you did it, how did you
feel?
Now it's your turn to tell yourstory.

Speaker 1 (25:54):
When you guys first told I don't remember where we
were, but we were sitting at atable, I think, in Marshall.
So my mom's side of thefamily's from Michigan and my
dad's side of the family's fromVenezuela, that's kind of our
dynamic, right.
And you guys live in Chicagocurrently and I live in South
Florida.

Speaker 4 (26:11):
So that's why sometimes you'll hear them say
my name as Alicia, becausethat's my American name that I
don't go by but that my brotherand mom use all the time, and
that's totally fine.
Or sometimes you'll hear themsay Alicia, which is the name
that I go by because I'mmajority surrounded by Spanish
people.

Speaker 1 (26:32):
So I think we were sitting in a round table and you
guys started telling me.
It was like this big, not asecret, but you guys didn't
really want to tell me, liketalk about it until you guys
were both there.
Okay, it was like you guys wereboth had to be there for
telling me.
And you guys started telling meand I was like you guys are in
a cult.
You guys have lost your mind.

(26:54):
This is crazy voodoo.
You know crazy stuff.
This doesn't make any sense.
How could somebody understandthe representation of the energy
of another person, of theirinternal dynamics, through
because of unresolved trauma?
I don't even know whatunresolved trauma was, so I was
like extorted, my skepticism wasa thousand, right, right.

(27:14):
I was like trying to figure itout.
I'm like they and I waslearning about like neural,
neural linguistic programmingnlp, I think it's called and I
was like, oh well, they're doingelicitation or they're trying
to figure out.
Like you guys had filled out aquestionnaire about the family
and I was like trying to, verymuch in my head trying to figure
out what, what it was, and Iremember kind of that summer

(27:38):
coming around and you're like,hey, you know same, you know we
both felt for the same trick.
Be like, hey, you want to cometo Romania and I have some
friends in space like you can gohang out by the pool, you don't
have to come and blah, blah.
I'm like sure, and I was in, Iwas in Louisiana at the time.
I was when I was stationed inLouisiana and I went there and I

(27:59):
was in a band like still in themilitary 20, I was 26, I think
25 or 26 at the time, um, andjust a punk right, a punk punk
ass kid and um I, I remembercoming in there and I was like
just completely in culture shockbecause very similar.
But I'm very curious.

(28:19):
So I was like what are thesepeople doing?
And it's like I'm gonna figureout how they did the trick.
You know like how they, howthey're, how they're scamming my
mom basically and somebodypicked me to represent, like so
it's, this big ballroom with atthat time was one of the biggest
, one of the bigger ones.
Right, it was like 55psychologists and psychiatrists,
romanian psychologists andpsychiatrists.

(28:40):
None of them spoke Spanish orEnglish.
So it was you, you mom andmyself, right, and Alberto and
his two sons that speak Spanish.
So we were, the constellationwas translated from Spanish into
Romanian and we were kind of,we were listening to all of it

(29:00):
in Spanish, right, and somebodypicked me to represent something
, and it wasn't the dog.

Speaker 4 (29:06):
I know the dog is the first thing, it was the crazy
uncle.

Speaker 1 (29:08):
It was the crazy.
I didn't know.
Was it the crazy uncle?
The first one.

Speaker 4 (29:12):
Yeah, that you wanted to steal.
He was mentally ill.
Yes, yeah.

Speaker 1 (29:15):
So I was picked to do a very powerful or very intense
representation and I was likeI'm feeling things that doesn't
belong to me and it's not apossession, right, it's not like
you're not there, but you'rekind of allowing your body to be
a representation of somebody'sinternal story and I didn't

(29:38):
realize.
I mean, all these years later isnow I understand what that
representation looks like andwhat it feels like, and that
you're still obviously in yourmind.
You can still be like thisisn't, this is wild what I'm
feeling, but also be a, a veryclear vessel to the
representation of the internaldynamic of the family system.
That does the currently thefacilitators working on, and I

(30:00):
was, I was hook, line and sinker, I was after that
representation.
I'm like this isn't um, so inthe here and now, right, it's
like it's, it's, it's visceral,it's a visceral representation

(30:21):
and, um, I, I felt this thingand I'm like, okay, I now I have
to figure out where it comesfrom.
And this podcast, in manycapacities, is the exploration
of this phenomenon from acurious perspective and from a
technical perspective.
So yeah, that's how I started.

Speaker 4 (30:40):
Because it's so hard to explain when you're with this
group of people that youbasically don't know at the end
of the constellation there'sjust such a huge bonding
experience because it's a soulto soul connection.
So imagine we did this.
I did it for two years, Mom didit for three and you did it for

(31:00):
one with the same people, for10 hours a day for 10 days with
the same 50 people.
So at the end, like the loveand the connection that we had
was incredible.
And to go outside of theCarpathian Mountains and explain
that to someone, of course theywere going to think we're
cray-cray.

Speaker 1 (31:21):
Yes, yeah, exactly.
And to find resonance withsomebody that you're completely
alien to.
Yeah, there was Romanian peoplethat I was like I love you,
you're the coolest person in theworld.
I just want to hug you and yoube my best friend, and you can't
even understand each other.
It's the most I don't.

(31:43):
I don't know how else to explainthis and what you said is
absolutely correct is the soulconnection that you, that you
share this experience with.
It's almost like a near-deathexperience, right as everybody's
in the plane and they're allgoing to.
You know the plane's going tocrash and it doesn't.
The pilot saves it, and theneverybody went through the
shared experience.
That was extraordinarilyintense.
And then you have this lifelongbond and I still have people on

(32:07):
Facebook that are Romanian,that they write stuff in
Romanian.
I'm like yeah, I hope you'redoing awesome, you know, and
it's Te pup, te pup, I give youkisses.

Speaker 5 (32:20):
One of the things that, for me, was so profound
because I had that vantage pointof seeing people for three
years in a row.
I saw the growth and thetransformation from the first
year and the next time theywould come back, they would be
doing better and by the thirdyear the change was just.

(32:41):
The transformation was just soprofound.
It was, it's incredible.

Speaker 4 (32:46):
And also we.
I think we had an amazingfacilitator.
Alberto Iturbe was phenomenal.
His patience and authenticityand his connection to the field
and Integrity His integrity andthe respect and for his two sons

(33:06):
as well was truly incredible,and we were fortunate to be able
to learn from him and see whata true facilitator looks like.

Speaker 5 (33:14):
Yeah, I think that's an excellent point, anissia, and
it's something that listeners,viewers, should keep in mind is,
when they're exploring thismodality, it's really important
to do your research and do aconstellation with a facilitator
who is somebody who'strustworthy and well-known.

(33:35):
That's that's of criticalimportance.

Speaker 1 (33:37):
Yeah, and that has integral respect for the process
.
Yeah, yes, because there's, youknow, and, and, as a
facilitator, you startunderstanding.
You're like, oh, here are thetraps that people can fall into
very easily, because most peoplewant to want to fix other
people.
And it's like, and it's, it'sso, um, ego driven to be able to

(34:01):
do that Right.
And it's like you, you justcreate the place where they can
do that, and that's it, that's.
Your only responsibility is toto hold the sacred space of
where that healing is happeningand go as far as the person is
ready to go at that moment, yeah, and it may not be a happy
ending.

Speaker 5 (34:18):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (34:20):
And that's okay.

Speaker 4 (34:20):
Yeah, that's why we have to keep reminding ourselves
that, you know, maybe in thislifetime they're not ready and
it's okay.
But I think that's the hardestpart.

Speaker 1 (34:31):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, part, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I, I know that, um, I, I I feelvery weird that I don't
struggle with that, like Istruggle from from me, as as me,
as the person, but as thefacilitator, you're just like
this is what it is, and that'sit, and it's like, yeah, you
just kind of like it is, this iswhat it is, this is how far
they're gonna get, and that'sokay, and then you just move

(34:53):
forward from there but as aperson oh yeah, as a person, I
can have understanding, yeah,and then really really
understand where the where theperson's coming from.
Yeah, but it's, it's like that,that, that position, as like I I
, when I first met alberto, Iwas like man, he's so rigid in

(35:15):
his boundaries like that was.
It was my internal judgment ofmy ego, like not understanding
why his boundaries were so rigid.
And then you, after all theseyears, you really understand is
that you know that, that thoseboundaries create structure, and

(35:35):
structure you can build upon.
And you can build upon thatdeep healing right.
Because if you don't havestrong boundaries and you're
loosey-goosey with those rules,it just it muddies everything
and entangles everything.
And the thing that we're tryingto do as putting on these
workshops is to disentanglepeople from unresolved trauma
that doesn't belong to them, notto re traumatize and reentangle

(35:58):
them into another dynamic andyou, as a facilitator, not
protect yourself and thesanctity of the space to be able
to create that that that safecontainer.
Yeah, that safe container.
Yeah, that's a good way to putit.

Speaker 5 (36:11):
It looked like rigidity to you is actually
integrity.

Speaker 1 (36:14):
Yeah, that's a good way to put it.
So what looks like rigidity toyou is actually integrity.
Yeah, a hundred percent.
A hundred percent.
Yeah, hi guys, I'm John, hostof the Zulu One podcast.
At the Zulu One podcast, wefocus on having conversations
about unresolved trauma andcultural and family systems.
If you like what you're hearing, please consider becoming a
monthly supporter.
The link is below.
Thank you, please considerbecoming a monthly supporter.
The link is below.
Thank you.
So you know, I think, over overthe next, you know, over the

(36:41):
next few years, we're going tobe doing this on a regular basis
, coming back to do the, the,the home team, right, and I want
to, I want to do, I want topick up some heavy stuff.
Like you know, we just had awild election that we went
through to go and have somecommentary on, you know, the
stuff that we're looking at itfrom a systemic perspective,
from a systemic lens, and havesome hard conversations about
what that looks like.
And I can't um, I can't um wishfor two better people that I can

(37:05):
, that I can do it with, and I'm, I'm really happy about this.
This is, this is this is goingto be a lot of fun, and you, you
know some of the people that Ihave the most spirited debates
with in the world are the twopeople that are that are on this
podcast.
Right, and I hope to have someof those hard conversations and
spirited debates here, right, um, for us to be open and
vulnerable and and authentic andwho we are and have and have

(37:26):
that conversation and if wedisagree and that's okay we're
going to be able to disagree andwe're going to be able to do it
with love and coming from aplace of understanding and and
build on this um, I I think thatwe have an opportunity to, to,
to show people what it is todisagree and detach with love
right still from a place ofrespect, still from a place that

(37:47):
we disagree on several things,but we know that at the end of
the day we're we're looking atthe best version of each other,
right, and from a place of love,and from a place of connection
and understanding, rather than aplace of judgment and
entanglement.
And that's what the power ofconstellations is you can take
what's yours and leave the restbehind and just keep moving

(38:07):
forward, right.

Speaker 4 (38:09):
Well, and the reality is we're at this state right
now because we've worked so muchon ourselves through all these
years, starting in Romania untilnow and have that real
connection is to take away allthose layers of entanglement and
messiness and carrying thosepatterns and traumas that don't

(38:41):
belong to us.
It helps us have more authenticrelationships with each other.

Speaker 1 (38:47):
Yeah, the thing that I'm concerned about the most and
you brought up a good point,the thing that I'm that I'm
concerned about the most, thatyou brought up a good point is
that you know, we we see intoday's language talking about,
you know, traumas andentanglements and patterns, and
all this stuff from an excuseperspective, not from a.
This is the track of healingperspective.

(39:07):
Yeah, and, and that's like,that's such a.
It's such a worrisome thing forme that you know, this language
has been popularized but it'sbeen popularized on the on the
180 of where it should be Right.
Am I?
Am I looking at that the rightway?

Speaker 5 (39:22):
Say more about that, John.

Speaker 1 (39:24):
So, you know, people are like I'm the way I am
because of my trauma.
It's like, well, you can, youcan not be that way if you deal
with it as an excuse, they'reusing it as a weapon and they're
saying I'm, they're weaponizingtheir, you know.
So there's their trauma dumpingon everybody else, rather than
saying, hey, yes, it's greatthat you've identified that now

(39:47):
you can actually do somethingabout it, like if you, if
there's abandonment, if there'sabuse, if there is neglect, if
there was emotion unavail, ifthere's abuse, if there's
neglect, if there was emotionunavailability, whatever those
things are, I completelyunderstand gaslighting
narcissist and we're having allthese conversations about that
person, the narcissist.
It's like let's get to a levelwhere we can really start having
a conversation and be like.
If you're entangled with anarcissist, there's a lesson

(40:09):
that you have to learn, right?
If you're if you're in a're inan abusive relationship, it's
maybe recalling to yourchildhood of where that came
from.
So let's look at that and startgiving people the tools and
really educating people aboutthat.
These wounds are pathways tohealing rather than being
patterns that we have to repeatout of loyalty to our family

(40:29):
system.

Speaker 5 (40:30):
Yeah, that's so well put, John, but darn, that means
I have to assume responsibility.

Speaker 1 (40:36):
Yeah, that sucks it does.

Speaker 5 (40:38):
Who wants to do that?

Speaker 1 (40:39):
It sucks, it sucks, it's terrible.
I know, and I didn't want toassume responsibility.
You know, I'm like.
I'm the person that has toassume responsibility for every
action in my life.
I am the common denominator ofeverything that happens.
Yes, in my life I am the commondenominator of everything that
happens.

Speaker 4 (40:57):
Yes, both good and bad, and that's a tough pill to
swallow, yeah, but one of thereasons why we have these
podcasts is to teach people, isto make them aware of this
healing modality that we've seensuch a huge change in our own
lives and that we're sopassionate about that.
We, you know, created thisspace to be able to share with

(41:18):
the world.
You know, as an educator, Iteach in Chicago and Chicago
public schools and I talk alittle bit about my students,
about, you know, generationaltrauma, and we meditate and we
do activities of being gratefuland, little by little, we start

(41:41):
to help people become aware ofthese types of patterns so they
have the opportunity to be ableto heal them when they are ready
and that's the hardest part iswhen they are ready to do it.

Speaker 1 (41:54):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I couldn't, I could.
I could definitely see howpeople won't be ready for a
little while, right, until theystart getting educated about
that, and that I think that'sthe point of this right Is to
have that conversation.
But, you know, I think fromyour perspective, it would be
interesting from yourperspective to understand, you
know, because you're on thefront lines, right.

Speaker 5 (42:12):
Like I was.

Speaker 1 (42:12):
I was at, you know, our my kid's school today and we
were talking about you know howmuch teachers are dealing with
mental health issues.
You know it's like it's, like somany people have, just after
COVID, after everything thatwe've gone through, are just
literally like screaming forhelp and they don't have

(42:33):
effective methodologies ofdealing with that.
Therapy is great, medicationhas its purpose all those things
are have their purpose, but Ithink we've we're evolving to
some more to need some moreeffective tools, and that's why
I'm such a fan of constellationsis like that.
You can.
You know what, what if wecreated a world, you know people

(42:54):
got the mental health supportthat they needed to be able to
break these generationalpatterns and they're not trauma
dumping on their students.

Speaker 2 (43:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (43:00):
Because, at the end of the day, that's what it is
right.
One of my kids, you know, wassaying that their teacher had
lost their husband right in theprevious year to cancer and she,
just, like trauma, dumps on onon the, on the kids that are in
class and it's like man I, Ireally feel for this person.

(43:21):
But they should, they should,they should get the help that
they need, right, that theyshould have the effective tools
to be able to deal and cope withthis, with this stuff, because
you have such influence overyoung children that you really
have to have the right tools tobe able to deal with that.
Do you see that in yourenvironment, in your ecosystem?

Speaker 4 (43:42):
Not necessarily with the teachers that I work with,
because they're very consciousof the topics that they talk
about with their students, thetopics that they talk about with
their students, and we're I'mfortunate to work in a
department where we're aware ofour feelings and everybody's
working on themselves.
So it's not we don't have theopportunity.

(44:10):
Other departments it may happenor not, because the reality is
we get to spend an hour withthese students every single day
and many of these students'parents don't get to see their
child at all during the daybecause they're working.

Speaker 1 (44:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (44:27):
And then when they come home they have to cook, do
laundry.
So we have the ability toinfluence them quite a bit and
more in the elementary setting,because they spend the whole day
with their teacher.
In high school they just spentone hour and then they switch.

Speaker 1 (44:45):
So that influence can be positive or negative right.
Is that kind of?

Speaker 5 (44:49):
what you're saying, that influence, like you have?

Speaker 1 (44:51):
such a staple in their lives that that can be.
And, yeah, I think it's we, youknow, saying Correct, like you
have such, you're such a staplein their lives that that can be.
And, yeah, I think it's we, youknow, rather than and we have
this conversation happens inpolitics a lot they're like oh,
with the education system anddepartment and blah, blah, blah,
and they all point fingers butnobody has solutions, right?
And I think you're.
You're an example of being likehey, just by being somebody
that's aware of the power ofdealing with your crap, right?

(45:15):
Let's just put it in that,whatever modality that looks
like, whether you do meditation,kung Fu, yoga, you know
religion, however you find that,but the power of actually
dealing with your demons, thatyou have an influence in your
sphere, right that you have.
I've met a lot of your teacherfriends and they're all about,
you know, working on themselvesand becoming the best version of
themselves and dealing withtheir crap, and that's really

(45:36):
admirable.
There's there's this sea changethat we can actually have a huge
influence on, on on the countryin a in a positive way and say
here are some tools.
It might not be for everybody,but this has been effective.
This has worked for us.
Us let's talk about it, let'shave that conversation and start
giving people tools to be ableto kind of put these things to

(45:56):
rest, rather than spreading themout and having that type of
wrong influence on on on kidsand exacerbating and continuing
the patterns of trauma andcreating the patterns of of of.
You know pain and you knowsaying you are your wounds, you
are your identity, you arewhatever, whatever has hurt you
in the past.
You are identified as thatthing and we can really give

(46:18):
people the tools for change yeah, and I, and I think that's the
hardest.

Speaker 4 (46:23):
Sorry, go ahead, mom no, no, please and like today,
we had a meeting with theprincipal because they're going
to see if they're going to renewhis contract or not, and then
we had a meditation that a groupof teachers and I did together,
and one of the things it wasabout gratitude, like being
grateful for what you have andthe power we have with our
presence, just with our present,with our eye contact that we

(46:45):
have with every single one ofour students in our classroom
every single day.
And what I said was that'sreally hard to do when you have
a lot going on, when you have alot that you need to heal and
work on.
And the more you work on yourlike our slogan, work on your
shit the easier it is to be ableto be fully present for our

(47:09):
students and for our teachers.
So that's what really comesdown to.
I've tried to really throw howdo you say throw a hook in
school to see if anyone isinterested.
I'm like we're doing a workshop.
I sent a mass email, which Iwasn't supposed to, but I still

(47:30):
did it, and there's just a lotof people that are not ready
right now, and I think that'sthe hardest part.

Speaker 1 (47:40):
But I think just even doing gratitude and meditation
is humongous.
That just that opens the cracksthe door a little bit, that
there's people that can't evenbe.
Are you grateful right now, forright now can't come up with

(48:01):
one thing?
Well, if you can't come up,thank you.
Um, can't come up with onething.
Right, they can't say I'mgratitude, I'm grateful, I'm
gratitude, I'm grateful foropening my eyes or for being
here, right, that I can breathe,I'm not in pain, that I'm
sitting in a chair, that I havesome light, that I have
electricity, whatever thosethings are.
To really give people the toolsto change their mindset,
because if they're in a negativethought pattern, that vortex

(48:22):
pulls everybody in and it justhas such power.
Whether you're in a positivemindset or in a negative mindset
, you can pull everybody intoyour vortex and make it
contagious.
And that contagion it goes bothways, for both positive and for
negative feelings.

Speaker 5 (48:39):
Well, is it the Brazilian school system that
utilizes family constellations?

Speaker 1 (48:44):
No.
So the Brazilian court systemFor a divorce mediation.
So imagine in a court wherepeople are, you know divorces
are wanting to take everythingfrom each other and take the
kids and do this stuff ratherthan destructive.
You know a give and receiving,an exchange principle.

(49:14):
Everybody has their place inthe family system.
Nobody is excluded.
You really have those things tosay and not from exclusionary
to say everybody's kind of themodern definition of what that
looks like, that everybody fromthe family system has a right to
belong in that family system.

Speaker 4 (49:33):
Yeah, and it's remarkable that Brazil is doing
that at that level, and I thinkthat the percentages of divorce
rate has gone down by 50%.

Speaker 1 (49:46):
Really.

Speaker 4 (49:46):
Which is remarkable.

Speaker 1 (49:48):
Oh, wow, jeez.
Yeah, I didn't know that that'sa-.

Speaker 4 (49:52):
Wait, let me fact check that right now.

Speaker 1 (49:54):
Okay, I would fact check, because that's a, that's
a big we might have to factcheck that one.
So we might have to well, maybewe'll have to, you know, put a
correction out there on ourwebsite on the 50%, you know,
decrease decreasing 50%, yeah,where's.

Speaker 5 (50:11):
Joe Rogan's Jamie.

Speaker 1 (50:11):
Yeah, exactly Where's Joe Rogan's Jamie?
To fact check that.

Speaker 5 (50:15):
Yeah, I was just going back a little bit from one
of the phrases that I foundvery frustrating that I read the
other day.
It said not everybody wantsyour help.

Speaker 1 (50:26):
Oh well, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 5 (50:29):
But I think one of the things that I've heard from
people who are resisting,looking at working on their shit
, is that they no, no, I don'twant to open up that can of
worms, I'm just going to let'sjust leave it as it is.
You know, I've reached thisstage, viewed in that way, and I
think there's so many differentoptions to get to the place of

(50:51):
healing, and one of the thingsand I've done them all, I've
done many, many differentmodalities but one of the things
that I find most appealingabout Family Constellations is
sometimes you can see therepresentatives showing you

(51:15):
something, shining light onsomething, a hidden family
dynamic, and it's one and doneand that's the end of it, and
all it took was you havingsomebody representing that
dynamic standing in front of youwithout, with you, saying very,
very few words.
It's represented, you see itand it's resolved, which is

(51:40):
that's why it's so difficult toexplain.
You have to yeah, to experienceit, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (51:45):
it's like telling somebody like what it is to go
to a movie that's in imax and 3dwhen they've never, you know,
be be them into a movie theater,right.

Speaker 5 (51:52):
That's the.

Speaker 1 (51:52):
It's just, it's such a difficult and that's like you
know, and I'm, I'm just so, I'mblown away by people's humility
and trust when they were like,okay, I'll go, you know they'll
like I'll try it.
And then they go and they'reblown away and they go through
this thing.
It's like I'm just, I'm like sohumbled by how much trust
people put on you and to say Ireally trust you that I'm going

(52:15):
to do this thing.
That sounds insane.
That sounds like I've like thisis the most insane thing I've
ever seen.
It may be some form ofbrainwashing that they're, but
you start explaining it to themit may be some form of
brainwashing and then they're onthe other side of the looking
glass, right, and they have thislike extraordinarily cathartic,

(52:39):
profound healing experience andthey're like, okay, now I get
it.
And you're like, how do you?
How do you?
It's almost designed not tosell or to to promote or to
build with people because, likethere's people that have done it
and there's people that haven't.
And you know, you just kind ofhave to trust and get enough
moment, systemic momentum, toget enough people to do it.
That they're, you know, theechoes of their healing
reverberates to their family andsocial system, and then, little

(53:00):
by little, we can change thetide of being connecting rather
than separating fall, todemystify it a little bit.

Speaker 5 (53:15):
So let's say I decided I would like to do a
constellation and I'm in Chicagoand I signed up for a family
constellation and I go on Sundayat 11 o'clock and I walk into
the room and what happens?

Speaker 1 (53:28):
Oh, so good thing that you brought that up.
Just happens that November 17ththis coming Sunday, we're going
to be hosting a familyconsolation workshop at the
Harpens Arts.

Speaker 4 (53:39):
Center in Chicago in Logan Square in Chicago,
Illinois at 11 pm Central time.

Speaker 1 (53:49):
No 11 am Sorry 11 am Central time.
It's a good thing that youbrought that up.
What would they expect?
So about 25, 30 people sittingin a circle?

Speaker 5 (54:01):
Why a circle?
Why don't you sit in rows?

Speaker 1 (54:04):
Why a circle and why don't you sit in rows?
That's a great question.
I think this goes into ourancestral DNA, that you know.
We would all go through the thefire pit right or the the fire,
and as a tribe we would sitaround in a circle and everybody
would communicate and commune.
Um, I think there's a lot ofpower in a circle.
Um, a meetings are in a circle.

(54:26):
Al-anon meetings are in circles.
Um, you know, prayer circles thecircle is a very, very powerful
dynamic and everybody is issitting on the same basic, the
same dynamic, right, or the samepain, right, they're equal,
right.
Everybody's sitting around in acircle and what actually

(54:50):
happens, what I, what I do, whatI start with, is usually an
exercise, and an exercise iswhat we would consider a mini
constellation, and that exercisewould be a way to everybody
ease into the process ofconstellations, because the
reality is that this work isextremely deep extremely deep we

(55:10):
go, we jump into the deep endvery quickly and um, what ends
up?
you know, some people may ask,like what if I don't know what
to talk about?
Or what if I don't know what towhat to say?
Or what if I don't know what toask?
Or what if I don't know what Iwant to work on?
Um, what usually comes up islike the first order of business
, is like how I like to put it.
And so you can say I'd like towork on the relationship with my

(55:32):
mother or the relationship withmy father.
You can start that I want towork on the relationship with my
parents.
I may not have a goodrelationship.
They might be emotionallyunavailable, whatever dynamic is
there.
And then the circle right, andthen you pick a representative
to represent your mother andsomebody to represent your
father and somebody to representyou, and then represent your

(55:54):
mother and somebody to representyour father and somebody to
represent you, and then thedynamic plays out, magic begins,
the magic begins and why?

Speaker 5 (56:00):
why wouldn't you just have?
You're my facilitator and thisis my constellation.
Why don't I just go in thecircle?
Why is it important thatsomeone represent me?

Speaker 1 (56:11):
um, so many times, people are in there.
So the family constellation,the work is a work of the soul,
not of the head.
Right, we're uncovering thehidden dynamics that are inside
of ourselves, rather than saying, oh, the stories that we tell
ourselves from our childhood orwhatever that looks like that,
oh, I had a perfect childhood,nothing happened.
And then you put theconstellation together and then

(56:32):
there's these dynamics thatyou're like, oh, that's actually
deeply resonates with who I am.
So you usually pick arepresentative, that, that
somebody that represents you, soyou can sit at it as a
bystander and get and gain a newperspective of the family.

Speaker 5 (56:49):
And if I were in that circle, my loyalties to my
ancestors would prevent me.

Speaker 1 (56:55):
It would stop it would block it Right, says I,
because I am a member of thisfamily.
Out of loyalty, I'm going tocarry this pain and we take on

(57:17):
burdens that don't belong to us,right?
So that's what you might see,and different burdens are
carried by different siblings,right?
You might say there's, you know,a lost child in the family and
one one, one child may carrythat burden.
For the other child there mayhave been a divorce and the one
child carries that.
So different disorders appearin the family by different

(57:41):
members of the family.
There may be the golden child,or the rebel, or the champion,
and they all fill their rolesout of loyalty to the family
system and they say I'm so loyalthat I'm going to carry this
for you because they want tobelong to the system.

Speaker 4 (57:55):
Correct?
We all have this huge urge tobelong to something it's the
most important because it'simportant to talk about also,
like what not belonging means.

Speaker 1 (58:04):
I think ancestrally, not belonging means you get cast
out of the tribe and youliterally die.
So not being part of the tribe,not being part of the family
system, is you, are, you are,you're going to, you know, go
out and into the savannah orwherever, and to the jungle and
you're going to perish.
You don't have the power andthe refuge of the, of the, of

(58:24):
your, of your peer group.

Speaker 5 (58:46):
Yeah, yeah, oh, go ahead on the German-Austrian
border.
And he was a Catholicmissionary who went to the Zulu
and he lived with the tribes andsaw how they dealt with people
of the tribe who fell outsidethe agreed-upon norms for that
culture.
And rather than ostracizing thepeople, they would bring the

(59:08):
people into the fold to figureout what had happened.
And so he came back.
He was so moved he left thepriesthood, got married and
started the Bert HellingerFamily Constellation Therapy
Center along the Austrian-Germanborder, and from there it's

(59:30):
just grown throughout the world.
And what I find reallyfascinating is that his work
continues.
He's died.
His wife, his second wife,continued on a bit of a
different realm of familyconstellations, but the

(59:50):
Institute still exists to thisday and you can find
facilitators who actuallystudied alongside Bert Hellinger
and they say that toward theend of his life, when he would
facilitate constellations, youwould go into, you know, sit
next to him in this big, hugecircle, and there were no words

(01:00:11):
exchanged.

Speaker 4 (01:00:11):
No, it was an auditorium.

Speaker 5 (01:00:14):
Yeah, because there's no need for words, because what
happens in that circle, whichis denoted as the field of
consciousness, everything isknown.
So words are unnecessary andwhatever lessons you need to see
, whatever truths you need tosee, you will be shown in that

(01:00:39):
field of consciousness.

Speaker 1 (01:00:41):
Going to deep cuts, deep cuts right now, going into
the weeds.
Yeah, I mean, I know that thatmay be difficult for some people
to understand, but it is.
There is profound movement inyou know, when you get the
people together and get intothat circle to be able to, to
have that, that that healingmodality take place Right goes

(01:01:13):
back to what we were talkingabout.

Speaker 5 (01:01:14):
The importance of connection, which is my
definition of spirituality, iswe're all connected and we're
connected to whatever you wantto call that source.
And even before, when I sign upfor that family constellation
on Sunday, even before I arrive,I am already connecting to the

(01:01:35):
universe, to the source.
And there may be impediments, Imay get a flat tire, somebody
may call me, somebody who's inmy life, who is uncomfortable
with me growing, because they'reafraid that they may be left
behind.
There's going to be impedimentssometimes that pop up that
prevent us from breaking awayfrom that, from that loyalty.

(01:01:58):
And then when you get into theroom and you feel this
connection that Alicia wastalking about, it's there, it's
just, it's absolute magic.

Speaker 1 (01:02:11):
Yeah, the systemic resistance of not allowing you
to break free from what thatloyalty is right, and every
excuse in the world will be ableto show up.
It'll be like, hey, my kid'snot.
Am I kid sick?
Or you know, I got a flat tire,like you said, or my car broke
down or whatever that looks like.

Speaker 4 (01:02:29):
One time I broke my toe.

Speaker 1 (01:02:31):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:02:31):
Two days before a constellation.
Oh, wow that I was attending inMiami with Eric Lopez.

Speaker 2 (01:02:38):
Oh, wow.

Speaker 4 (01:02:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:02:40):
Wow.
Yeah, that's profound systemicresistance.

Speaker 1 (01:02:44):
I wobbled.
Yeah, you just waddled waddledon over to the constellation.

Speaker 4 (01:02:49):
I'm like, I'm not going to miss this Toe and
everything, and I'm so grateful,because I'm so grateful that I
went, because now Eric comes toChicago twice a year and he does
shamanic family constellationsthat are extremely powerful as
well.

Speaker 1 (01:03:05):
So you know and I think that's a good good thing
to kind of transition to is thatyou know family constellations
are not very popular in theUnited States yet I think, it's
right before where yoga was inthe 80s, right Like really at
the cusp of becomingextraordinarily popular, but it

(01:03:27):
has entered the zeitgeist insome capacity.
Right, there's been some Disneymovies about it.
Right, encanto is and I talkabout this way too much on this
podcast but the movie encanto isabout family constellations,
about unresolved inheritedtrauma and family systems.
That's really what it's.
And you know, people like ericand our and we've kind of over
the years, amassed thiscommunity of people that are

(01:03:47):
really into this modality ofhealing, that are and that are
really creating their ownversions of the work too which
is really cool and and reallyevangelizing what this I mean
evangelizing is not the rightword, but really amplifying the
voice of what this work is.
And I think we're about toexperience and even with
everything that's going on inthe political space, everything

(01:04:08):
that's going on in the culturalspace, I think, ultimately and
this is my own thought, right,so I won't speak for anybody but
I ultimately think that what'shappening in our cultural
landscape is the systemicresistance before the healing.
Yeah, yeah, it is that systemicresistance.
I hope, I really hope it is,because I can't, I can't

(01:04:30):
attribute it to anything else.
You know, I can't attribute itto anything else.
Regardless of what yourpolitics are, regardless of what
your views are, if you'reconservative, liberal, if you're
a GDI, as my grandfather wouldcall me, you know, whatever that
is, like you can.
I think that this is, at theend of the day, what this, this,
this, this signifies is thatsystemic resistance, because
we're at the cusp of it andthere's no coincidence that this

(01:04:51):
work and the systemicresistance is happening and all
the distractions that we'reexperiencing, and all this stuff
is all coming into it at onepoint and one intersection.
And we're relaunching the ZuluOne podcast, talking about
healing, and you can't imaginehow many people have been like
I've never heard somebody put itthat way.
I've never heard anybody put itthat way.

(01:05:12):
I've never heard anybody talkabout trauma in this way.
It's not left versus right,it's not up versus down, polka
dots versus stripes, it doesn'treally matter.
Like great, you know, you haveyour views.
That's awesome.
More power to you.
What we're talking about is thething that unites us all, which
is our shared experience, andthat systemic connection between
our members of the same family.
Everybody came from a mom,everybody came from a dad,

(01:05:35):
unless you are immaculatelyconceived.
I'd love to meet that person,right?
We all came from two parentsand they came from two people,
and they came from two peopleand they came from two people
and they came from two people,and so on and so forth, until
the first ancestors that everwalked out of the ocean or
whatever the hell happened.
Whatever anybody knows whathappened, we all came from a
system and we can all.
We have a shared experience.
We have a shared collectivemomentum that came into

(01:05:58):
expressing what we are today, ofeverybody before this shirt.
The shirt was designed by allthe people that designed shirts
from the past.
Everything, this microphone,everything is a is a continuous
expression of the of ofeverything that came before it.
Why wouldn't our trauma and ourculture be the same thing?

Speaker 4 (01:06:15):
And people don't realize how their trauma can
translate into their workspace.

Speaker 5 (01:06:24):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:06:26):
And I feel like that's what's happening at my
school, like what we're seeingin the government is starting to
translate into our school, andit's just like, oh, wow.

Speaker 1 (01:06:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:06:37):
Well, often we go into the circle with an idea in
mind oh, I'm going to work onthis problem or this problem.
90% of the time, the issuestarts with your family of
origin.
That's the great starting point.
Starts with your family oforigin.
That's the great starting point.
And to Alicia's point, Icertainly felt that when I was
in a leadership role, I wouldlook at the dynamics of some

(01:07:00):
people, some coworkers, and Iwould think to myself I bet
anything.
This person has issues if theywere rejecting me, had issues
with their mother If they wererejecting my colleague, a male
colleague.
Issues with their father Ifthey were rejecting their
co-workers.
Issues with their siblings.
The system just continues toreplicate.

Speaker 1 (01:07:25):
It's like having a superpower.
It's really weird.
So should we have a?

Speaker 4 (01:07:31):
big Z on our shirts.

Speaker 1 (01:07:33):
No, no, no, no, no, no.
Yeah, a big Z.

Speaker 4 (01:07:35):
For Zulu 1.

Speaker 1 (01:07:37):
Yeah, exactly, we should have a big H for healing.
Yeah, geez, a big H for healing.

Speaker 5 (01:07:42):
So, just going back to what you were saying about
everything that's happening atthis precise moment, I find it
really interesting that it comeson the heels of the big pause
which was COVID.
Right, covid cracked the worldwide open and now we have a
chance to do this reset.
And I was thinking about I wasactually talking to Alicia's

(01:08:04):
husband yesterday and I foundmyself getting we were just
talking about politics and Ifound myself I was sitting on
the couch right behind Aliciaand I found I hadn't really
processed what I was feeling.
And we were just having thisexchange and I was talking, and
talking, and talking and all ofa sudden I got tears in my eyes

(01:08:27):
and I felt the emotion coming up, felt the emotion coming up,
and I remembered your words,which you have repeated to me
several times, and that is wherelogic isn't present
entanglement is and I realizedthat my reaction was so
oversized that I've got somework to do around that exercised

(01:08:52):
that I've got some work to doaround that.

Speaker 1 (01:08:55):
What a gift.
I mean, at the end of the day,that's a gift.
And to be able to identify thatand not get pulled by that
trauma activation of what thatis that you had, that in itself
it creates such a self-awarenessto say like, oh crap, there's
something here that that I gottadeal with and this doesn't
belong here.
Like this belongs to the otherthing, this belongs to.

(01:09:16):
Whatever happened for whateveryou know thing.
I wasn't, I haven't been ableto resolve, whatever that looks
like.
It's like it's such a giftbecause it gives you a map to be
like deal with this next, it'ssuch a gift.
I mean, I'm I'm beyond ecstaticthat we're relaunching the
podcast, that we're having thisconversation, that we're

(01:09:36):
creating this momentum towardshealing, that I'm doing it with
my some of my favorite people inthe entire universe, right, and
I'm like I'm just I'm, I'mfilled with gratitude.
It's, I'm so excited about this.
It can't, I can't.
I can't think of a more worthycause than to do this and to do
this with you guys like this isjust like such a, it's such a

(01:09:57):
blessing and it's such a gift Iget.
I can't I get very emotionalwhen I even think about it,
because it's it's being deeplyaligned with your purpose and
it's um they're the japanesecall, call, call this like um I
can't remember what they call it, but it's a word with I, it's
like, or something, and yeah,ikigai, exactly ikigai.
Thank you, ian, um, it's.

(01:10:18):
It's when you're, when yourpurpose aligns with, with what
you're good at, it's like this,it's like you're just like in
this profound alignment of whatthis, what this looks like, and
it's just, it's such a, such acool thing and everything in our
lives has led us to this exactAll the pain we've had.

Speaker 5 (01:10:37):
we've experienced several deaths in our family,
untimely deaths very difficultdeaths.
But I'm not going to say, youknow, I wish that would happen,
but there's so much goodness andso many lessons contained in
all of those experiences thathave led us here.
And I was going to say, john,it's not just the three of us,

(01:10:59):
it's the three of us and all ofyour father and all of the
ancestors behind us, because,you know, we walk through life
thinking we have to whiteknuckle it.
I feel so alone.
Nobody understands me, nobodyhas ever lived this kind of pain
.
You forget all of the pain andall of the lessons that your

(01:11:20):
ancestors lived.
You embody, you carry all ofthat ancient wisdom inside of
you.
That's another superpower.

Speaker 1 (01:11:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:11:32):
You just tap into it which we did through that
meditation.
It's so powerful.

Speaker 1 (01:11:37):
You can always go to Michelle Blackmon, our dear
friend.
Michelle always says that yourancestors are overstaffed and
underworked.

Speaker 4 (01:11:46):
They're ready.

Speaker 1 (01:11:46):
You have all these people standing behind you.
That you can just sit down,close your eyes, connect and be
like please show me what I needto do next, you know, please
show me what.
Or please support me.
Or I have all these people thatare that are supporting me and,
regardless of the relationship,regardless of the circumstance,
regardless of the stories,regardless of whatever that
looks like, that you can goalways back to that resource.

(01:12:07):
Yeah, absolutely, that's.
That's a very good point.

Speaker 4 (01:12:41):
Yeah, absolutely, that's truly a beautiful
experience.

Speaker 1 (01:12:46):
And you know, with all of its complexities as well.
Yes, Because we're all stillgoing through stuff, right?

Speaker 2 (01:12:54):
Oh, a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:12:55):
It's not to say that you know like we're.
You know these healed peoplegoing through life and we have
all the answers.
Like no, we're still dealingwith.

Speaker 4 (01:13:03):
A lot.

Speaker 1 (01:13:04):
You know massive amounts of shit.
You know that we're still alldealing with and we're working
through those things, but we'reworking through it.
You can dealing with and we'reworking through those things and
but we're working through it.
That's you can, you don't, youcan't give us much, but you can
give us that, we're working onit.
Right, it's like I'm a work inprogress and I think all three
of us are, and we're you knoweverybody in our family systems
are, but that's the beauty of itand we're all just walking each

(01:13:25):
other home yes, that's a verygood.
Not my phrase, but I love it.
That's a very good one.
That's a very good one.
Not my phrase, but I love it.
That's a very good one.
That's a very good one.

Speaker 5 (01:13:33):
That's a very good one.
Who's he from?
You know that His name is RamDas.

Speaker 1 (01:13:37):
Ram Das, ram Das.

Speaker 5 (01:13:38):
Ram Das.
Sorry, ram Das.
He was a psychologist, a writer, an author, a yoga instructor.
He was a visionary.

Speaker 1 (01:13:50):
Yeah, yeah.
So I think on that note, thankyou guys very much for
completing the first Zulu Onepodcast, the home team, the
family of origin, One of these.
We're going to get dad in hereto see if he can.

Speaker 4 (01:14:05):
That'll be you know the OG4.
That's all that matters.

Speaker 1 (01:14:10):
More than one, More than one, yeah which is very
powerful, which I'm verygrateful for Me too.
Thank you, guys, for first ofall convincing mom starting this
journey.
We have to honor you in thisprocess that, even as painful as
that was, that all these yearslater, that we're here and that

(01:14:30):
all of this pain has has purposeright and it's such a beautiful
thing, yeah they're all justlessons.
Life lessons yeah yeah, and I'lljust thank you or alicia,
alicia thank you um thank youfor for being um my partner in
healing throughout this processas well you know us doing this

(01:14:53):
work is hard.
There's a lot of resistance,but it's worth it and I wouldn't
pick another bunch of people todo this with to be in the
trenches with doing this work.
So thank you guys.

Speaker 4 (01:15:04):
Thank you, love you, love you.

Speaker 1 (01:15:08):
Love you Bye.
Thanks for tuning in to theZulu One podcast.
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