Healing the Parts and Understanding the Whole
“As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.”—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Have you ever had an internal dialogue with yourself? “There’s something wrong with me.” “Why can’t I just stop myself from doing that?” “I don’t even know who I am anymore.” Or, “Whatever you do, don’t cry.” You may relate to these inner dialogues. I invite you to consider that part of being human is relating within ourselves. Like how an athlete prepares for a competition or a student studies for an exam, part of life is learning to lead ourselves through caring and communicating within. Then, we will ultimately understand, “Who am I, and what is my purpose?” Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy helps explore and answer this fundamental question.
When I first heard of “parts” therapy, I felt confused, intrigued, and guarded as I thought, “Are they saying I have a multiple personality disorder?” That is not what IFS therapy implies. Instead, think about all of your lived and learned experiences that influence you in specific and unique ways. IFS helps you to understand better and approach your protective instincts and behavioral and emotional triggers. It helps you hear and guides the part of you that may be reacting rather than responding.
If you feel uncomfortable with “parts” language, consider that the word” parts” can be interchangeable with “emotions,” “thoughts,” or “aspects.” In other words, the mind is made of multiple “parts,” and underneath is the person’s core or true Self. The more I learned about IFS, the more I identified with the principles that inevitably helped liberate me from the burdens of my past. As a result, I was able to discover and respect neglected parts within myself.
What is the Difference Between Being Parts-led and Self-led?
Parts-Led
In IFS, there are Protector parts and Exile parts. “Protector” parts have two different strategies to try to prevent us from feeling our Exile’s pain.
- One is proactive: parts that use these strategies are called Managers.
- The other is reactive: parts that use these strategies are called Firefighters.”[1]
For conceptualization, it may be helpful to think of constant, small, or intense “fight, flight, or freeze” instincts that we experience daily. IFS takes a different, more in-depth look into the motivating or learned experiences that drive the parts of ourselves. “Parts use the body for their own purposes, which tend to be different for Exiles than for Protectors. Exiles use it to signal their need for help; Managers use it to exert control, and Firefighters use the body to either distract from the emotional pain or from over inhibition.”[2]
Exile parts are child-like parts of us that are especially vulnerable. Their qualities are naturally sensitive, lively, spontaneous, creative, joyful, intimacy-seeking parts; yet, they have become exiled either through protector parts, exiling themselves to keep their hurts hidden, or from peoples’ parts. They are the parts that “have experienced trauma, attachment injuries, or devaluing experiences, and from these experiences have become burdened.”[3]
The burdens they commonly carry are loneliness, despair, hopelessness, shame, sorrow, worthlessness, and fear, along with beliefs such as “I’m on my own,” “My feelings and needs don’t matter,” or “Something is wrong with me.”[4] These feelings can sometimes be extreme and scary, depending on the intensity of the burdens they carry. This is why some protector parts have to do their job extremely well to protect us from the emotionally charged energy exiles give off.
Culturally, we use words like “weight,” “hurts,” “wounds,” “hurt feelings,” “secrets,” or “baggage” to describe our exiles. Most of us do not want to get close to our exiles. This is usually because of fear or that we don’t see the purpose. We because “the past is in the past.” Or, we may have forgotten them because we have shoved them so far back into our consciousness.
Manager parts are naturally helpful and responsible for daily safety, both outwardly and inwardly. They are often the parts we interact with the most. They are comparable to the vice president of a system and have qualities that we rely upon. We respect their opinions, judgments, and tactics. These are the parts that analyze how we are interacting with ourselves and the world. They try to interpret reality yet often skew our perception to keep us safe. They abide by the “never again” policy out of fear of activating exiles’ pain, so they protect us from any “vulnerability, pain, or instability.”[5]
The manager parts carry common burdens such as exhaustion, worry, anger, anxiety, guilt, and perfectionism. These burdens can lead manager parts to strategically seek approval and people-please, mind-read, be overly optimistic/pessimistic, over-spiritualize, criticize, become self-absorbed, fight to be right, become the victim, analyze and rationalize, strive to be the “nice guy/girl,” and constantly worry about appearance, to name a few.
Also, it is important to note that manager parts create a love/hate relationship inside of you. Some manager parts are loved by many parts but hated by others. Since early in our lives, most managers have been doing their jobs to the point that we accept some as our “Self,” which are called Self-like parts. At some point in life, we surrendered and accepted these Self-like parts as our “Self.” However, they actually reflect the energy of our Self, similar to the moon reflecting the sun.
Firefighting parts respond when threatened. They move into immediate action to put out the fire, whatever threat that is. Whether it is the danger of feeling the manager and exiled parts within you or other people’s parts, our firefighters revert to whatever worked in the past to deal with the perceived threat.
“Many of us, in a compromise with our managers, binge on something socially acceptable—work, food, exercise, television, shopping, dining, flirting, sleeping, prescription drugs, cigarettes, coffee, daydreams and fantasies, gambling, meditating, or thrill-seeking activities—in an effort to distract from the flames until they burn themselves out or are doused. When our effort doesn’t work, our firefighters will resort to more drastic and less acceptable means such as illegal drugs, alcohol, suicidal thoughts or behavior, rage and acts of domination, self-mutilation, compulsive sexual activity, secret affairs, stealing, or getting into punitive relationships. Many. . . resort to the second list immediately because their firefighters have found over the years that the first list doesn’t do how much to snuff the flames of emotion. Firefighters will use virtually any thought, activity, or substance if it works” out of desperation.”[6]
Some firefighters use the body and sudden pains like migraines or chronic illnesses. These can be effective distractions for your parents not to yell at each other. Other firefighter parts use jolted reactions, sleepiness, confusion, vertigo, or dissociate (numbing, blanking out, or fantasizing/daydreaming). They have dreadful jobs and are often hated and attacked by their managers as well as by other people’s parts”. . . because they end up burning us and others around them.[7]
People who struggle with addictions experience their fighters daily, if not every minute of every hour. In Christian circles, we can over-spiritualize our firefighters by thinking they are actually Satan himself. This is not to diminish the fact that Satan always attempts to influence and trigger our system. “It’s important to remember, however, that no matter how compassionately you treat your firefighters, they won’t be able to change as long as there’s a fire to be fought.”[8] In other words, until the exiles that they protect or distract you are healed, your firefighters will still have a fire to fight.
You may think that all the parts of you are bad. Or you may think if one or more parts weren’t in your life, things would be good. However, we can’t get rid of parts of us. And honestly, we don’t want to because we would inevitably be getting rid of who we are.
Some of you may think, “I will do anything to get rid of this part of me.” But, as 1 Corinthians 12 says, each member of the body has a certain function. Like every system, certain rules, laws, and goals govern the system to maintain functioning and ultimately balance. Systems constantly need to adjust. For example, different families have different rules of relationship to achieve homeostasis. IFS therapy has certain rules that, at their core, show the true way to live life in a relationship with yourself and the world.
The goals within our internal systems are to:
- achieve balance, harmony, and wholeness
- liberate parts from their extreme roles
- restore trust and leadership within yourself through yourself
- bring healing to others and the world by bringing “more self-energy to external systems
The rules within our internal systems are:
- We cannot, and do not want to, get rid of parts. Instead, we want to help them unburden so they can return to their non-extreme roles —“Often, when these wounded parts unburden (‘find rest for their souls’), they bring joy, playfulness, tenderness, or spontaneity to our lives. They can also increase our capacity for genuine friendships, for experiencing and creating art, for soulfulness. . . . That explains why many of us who have wounded and still burdened exiles struggle to play, to be carefree, or to let people in to see who we really are”.[10]
- All parts can carry burdens.
- There are no bad parts; they are good parts stuck in bad roles. In other words, not all behaviors are good, but all parts are. Your pain, your fear, your anxiety are all good. They do not feel good, but they communicate what is currently wrong or where you may be misinterpreting and stuck in the past. That being said, IFS encourages you to welcome your parts all the time.
- Our personhood is multi-faceted, just like the reflection of God is triune.
- Everyone naturally has a Self.
Self-Led
“Emerson said,’ and what is a weed? A plant whose virtues have not been discovered.’ When our parts seem like weeds to be pulled, it’s because we haven’t taken the time to learn other beauty. Throughout our childhood, we experience varying degrees of rejection, abandonment, betrayal, and humiliation. All these influences lead us to lose trust in our natural, internal leadership—our Self.[11]
Different spiritual and religious groups have different names to describe when we are Self-led. Our Self is innate and at the core of every one of us. For Christians, the Self is our Imago Dei or God-Image; Hindus call it Atman; Taoists call it Toa or Chi; Sufis the Beloved; Buddhists call it Buddha Nature.
When our parts are working against each other, and on two sides of the canoe, Self is the captain in the middle that helps parts work as a team and prevents the ship from sinking. It is the glue for our broken parts. It is the unifying leader that may not initially have the respect and trust with parts. Yet, it is inherently worthy of trust due to the intrinsic integrity of Self.
“The Self will not lie or be sneaky or evasive. . . . The Self can be firm without being punitive or righteous. . . . it is not critical.”[12] For people whose burdens are intense, parts may be gridlocked and not let you willingly access yourself. Your burdened parts may be doing their jobs so intensely and for so long that they have never trusted you or others. This is why many of us grow up in life not knowing who we are. As William Wallace exclaims, “Every man dies, not every man truly lives.” Most of us do not live out of who we are but out of glimpses of who we are. It is like light coming into a dark room or heavy storms dissipating, allowing the sun to shine.
The Eight Cs
“When we are in our Self, we naturally and fluidly experience, what Dr. Schwartz calls the Eight “C’s”:
- calmness like the “I” of the storm,
- clarity, confidence similar to knowing we are ocean and not a wave,
- non-judgmental curiosity,
- clarity,
- compassion,
- courage,
- creativity, and
- connectedness within yourself and with others.
Every person has a Self or a God-Image at their core. In a perfect world, it is surrounded by many unhindered parts that make up our unique personalities. One person might be created with a musical part, while another might have a humorous part, and yet another might have a studious part. We all have lots of these unburdened parts.
When our internal experience is perfectly functioning, these parts are unhindered and fluid. By fluid, I mean they move into our immediate awareness when needed and move back out again when not.”[13] Therefore, when a part does take over, it receives permission from the Self, rather than being automatic. At certain times, I can be almost always in Self. At other times I am severely triggered where my protectors flood me, and it feels as if there is no “I” in the center of the storm surge.
In conclusion, while this may be overwhelming, I ask you to think about and write down what you have learned from our American culture as well as from your immediate family and genealogy about rules for dealing with vulnerability, intimacy, and pain even if it’s a pain that feels like the size of a splinter. What parts of yourself did you compartmentalize to be successful, accepted, and loved?
Written by:
micah@restorationcounselingatl.com, ext. 158
Micah comes from a Christian background and enjoys working with adolescents and families, as well as couples. His focus is coming alongside families, adolescents, and teenagers who desire to find help and resolution. His other focus is helping couples who want to understand better and love their partner to enhance their marriage. He also helps couples who are in conflictual relationships that are struggling with disconnection and isolation.
References
Goulding, R. A., & Schwartz, R. C. (2002). The mosaic mind: Empowering the tormented selves of child abuse survivors. Oak Park, Illinois: Trailheads Publication.
Pastor, M., & Gauvain, J. (2020). Internal Family Systems: Level 1 Training Manual. Oak Park, IL: Trailhead Publications.
Riemersma, J. (2020). Altogether You: Experiencing personal and spiritual transformation with Internal Family Systems therapy. Marietta, GA: Pivotal Press.
Schwartz, R. C. (2001). Introduction to the Internal Family Systems Model. Oak Park, Illinois: Trailhead Publications.
Schwartz, R. C., & Sweezy, M. (2020). Internal family systems therapy. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.
Resources
“No Bad Parts: Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model”—Dr. Schwartz
“Self-Therapy: A Step-By-Step Guide to Creating Wholeness and Healing Your Inner Child Using IFS, a New, Cutting-Edge Psychotherapy”—Jay Early
“You Are the One You’ve Been Waiting For: Bringing Courageous Love to Intimate Relationships”—Dr. Schwartz
IFS Live Demonstration with Founder of IFS with another therapist around COVID (1 hour long)
[1] Riemersma, J. (2020), pg. 20.
[2] Schwartz, R. C., & Sweezy, M. (2020), pg. 68.
[3] Pastor, M., & Gauvain, J. (2020), pg. 77.
[4] Riemersma, J. (2020), pg. 20.
[5] Pastor, M., & Gauvain, J. (2020), pg. 27.
[6] Schwartz, R. C. (2001), pg. 115.
[7] Schwartz, R. C. (2001), pg. 116.
[8] Schwartz, R. C. (2001), pg. 118.
[9] Pastor, M., & Gauvain, J. (2020), pg. 18.
[10] Riemersma, J. (2020), pg. 51.
[11] Schwartz, R. C. (2001), pg. 113.
[12] Goulding, R. A., & Schwartz, R. C. (2002), pp. 91-93.
[13] Riemersma, J. (2020), pg. 18.