Yoga with Stanja

For a long time, I thought my role was to help people find answers.

It seemed like the obvious thing to do. When someone came to me carrying a difficult decision, a painful relationship, or a question they’d been wrestling with for years, my instinct was to help them find a way through it.

But something kept challenging that idea.

The people sitting in front of me were rarely lacking intelligence or self-awareness. Many had spent years reading, reflecting, journaling, going to therapy, listening to podcasts, and trying to understand themselves better. They weren’t arriving without insight. If anything, they often had more insight than they knew what to do with.

What they were missing wasn’t another explanation.
It was an opportunity to step outside the story they’d been telling themselves for so long that it had started to feel like the only possible version of events.

That quietly changed the way I facilitate.
These days, I feel far less pressure to help someone arrive at an answer by the end of a conversation.

I’ve learned to trust what happens when people have enough space to look at their lives from a different perspective. Very often, what once felt confusing begins to make a little more sense.

And from there, people usually know what they need to do next. ✨

Over the past few weeks, I’ve written about the stories we tell ourselves, the patterns we find ourselves repeating, and the reasons we often assume are keeping us stuck.

Reading your messages and seeing your responses has reminded me how many of these questions are shared, even when our lives look completely different.

If you’ve recognised parts of your own story along the way, perhaps it’s time to explore those questions in a different way.

Systemic Constellations can help us recognise patterns that have been difficult to see on our own, understand why certain situations keep repeating, and discover new possibilities for moving forward where we’ve felt stuck.

I’ll be facilitating the next workshop on Sunday 26 July in Marrickville.
Early Bird bookings close next week.

If it feels like the right time, I’d love to welcome you. ✨

Some decisions seem as though they should be straightforward.

We know what would probably be good for us. We tell ourselves we’ll do it next week, next month, or when life settles down a little.

And yet, somehow, we keep going around in circles.

It’s tempting to assume we simply need more confidence, more motivation, or better timing. Sometimes that’s true.

But over the years, one of the things I’ve come to appreciate about Systemic Constellations is that they invite us to consider another possibility. That perhaps what keeps us stuck isn’t always the decision itself. Sometimes our choices are quietly shaped by our early experiences, beliefs we’ve carried for years, or ways of responding that once helped us but no longer do.

Looking through that lens doesn’t necessarily give us immediate answers.
It often helps us begin asking different questions.
Rather than asking, “Why can’t I just do this?” we begin asking, “What else might be influencing me?”

And more often than not, that’s where things begin to shift.

If you’d like to explore these questions through the lens of Systemic Constellations, Early Bird bookings for the 26 July workshop are still open.
Link in bio. ✨

Sometimes we tell ourselves we should have moved on by now.

The relationship that ended years ago. The conversation that still plays on a loop, late at night, uninvited. The disappointment that quietly rewired the way we trust people, so slowly we barely noticed it happening.

We like to believe time does the healing on its own. Sometimes it does. More often, we just learn to build our lives around the shape of what happened, the way a tree grows around a fence post.

We call that moving on. Often it’s something closer to adapting.

Systemic and Family Constellations works differently.
It doesn’t ask you to relive the story or explain it better this time. It offers a way to see the experience from outside your usual vantage point, where you’re not standing so close to it anymore.

The past doesn’t change. What changes is the grip it has on your present.

Has there been a moment in your life you thought you’d made peace with, that turned out to still be quietly steering you? ✨

A surprising amount of life gets postponed....

We still go to work, keep appointments, reply to messages, cook dinner and get on with life.

However, it’s the conversation we’ve been avoiding, the decision we’ve been putting off, the question we keep hoping time will answer for us.

Weeks become months. Sometimes months become years.
Then one day we realise very little has changed.

Time has passed. We have too.

Without noticing, we’ve become used to living around the things we once hoped would be different. They stop demanding our attention and quietly become part of everyday life.

Perhaps that’s the greatest cost of postponing something for too long. Not that life stands still, but that we slowly adjust to a version of life that was never really what we wanted.

If you’ve reached the point where you’re ready to give those questions your attention, I’d love to welcome you to my Systemic Constellations Workshop on 26 July in Sydney.

Early Bird finishes next week, and the group is slowly coming together. ✨

Few of us look at a room full of strangers and think,
“That’s exactly where I want to spend my Sunday.”

And yet, every workshop begins that way.

Each person walks through the door carrying a lifetime nobody else can fully see, the mix of experiences that shaped them and brought them to that particular Sunday.

Funnily enough, it rarely takes long before someone describes an experience another person instantly recognises in their own life, and familiar questions begin to surface.

Why does this keep happening? Why do I always seem to end up here? Why does this relationship feel so complicated? Why do I know what needs to change, yet still find myself repeating the same patterns?

Perhaps that’s one of the strengths of Systemic Constellations. Every life is unique, yet many of the questions we wrestle with are deeply human. Exploring them alongside others doesn’t change a situation overnight, but it often changes the way we relate to it.

And that’s one of the reasons people have gathered in circles, communities, and workshops for generations. Life doesn’t suddenly become simpler, yet it often makes a little more sense when we have the opportunity to explore it alongside others.

If you’ve been curious about joining us on 26 July, I’d love to welcome you.
Link is in bio. ✨

We often form opinions based on what we can see.

Yet behind every decision, reaction, success, setback, or relationship is a story we know very little about.

We see the moment, but not the years that shaped it.
We see the response, but not the experiences that shaped the nervous system.
We see the choice, but not the loyalties, losses, fears, family roles, expectations, or survival strategies that sit beneath it.

This doesn’t mean every behaviour is okay.
It doesn’t mean we remove boundaries or excuse what causes harm.
It reminds us that there is usually far more to a person than we can see at first glance.

Context doesn’t always change what happened, but it can change how we understand it.
This is one of the reasons I value systemic thinking. It invites us to consider the broader context before drawing conclusions.

We may never know another person’s full story, but remembering that there is one can soften our certainty, encourage curiosity, and leave room for a deeper understanding of ourselves and those around us.

Has there ever been a time when learning more about someone’s story changed the way you saw them?✨

For years, I told myself I wasn’t ready to start my business and what I know wasn’t enough.

I was signing up for one more training, I was reading more books, and I got another mentor. And thought maybe then I’d know enough to actually show up.

But the goalposts kept moving because the real issue had nothing to do with knowledge but to do with visibility. Showing up as the face of something meant being seen.

And being seen meant risking criticism, misunderstanding, failure, or simply not being everyone’s cup of tea.

Growing up, I learned that you don’t draw attention to yourself. That you work hard, study hard, stay humble and don’t make a fuss.
So even though part of me wanted to step forward, another part was quietly pulling in the opposite direction.

The shift happened when I realised that who I was mattered more than who I thought I needed to become.
Because everything I’d learned, experienced, struggled with, and worked through had value. Not one day in the future.
Now.

And once I could see that, staying hidden started to feel more uncomfortable than being visible.

More often than not, the thing holding us back isn’t a lack of ability.
It’s a story we’ve inherited and lived with for so long that it feels like the truth.

What story are you still living as though it’s true? ✨

People come to Systemic Constellations for all sorts of reasons.

A relationship ends, but something about it continues to linger.
A career that once felt meaningful no longer fits.
A conflict keeps repeating, despite every effort to resolve it.
A loss changes the shape of life in ways that are difficult to put into words.

Sometimes there is a clear problem and sometimes there isn’t.
Just a sense that something feels stuck, unfinished, or ready to change.

What fascinates me is that people often arrive believing they’re bringing one issue and yet, as the day unfolds, a much wider picture begins to emerge with a different way of understanding what has been happening.

This is one of the reasons I value Systemic Constellations.
It doesn’t provides quick answers but it helps you move forward when you’ve been going around in circles.
And from there, something new often becomes possible.

Systemic Constellations Workshop.
Sun 26 July, Marrickville.

Early Bird registrations are open. Link in bio. ✨