IFS
IFS stands for Internal Family Systems. It is lesser known as “parts” work.
Does it ever feel like there’s an entire village of inner thoughts and voices that live inside of you? Have you every felt like you were watching yourself outside of your body? Have you ever felt like a bundle of dilemmas? IFS describes that we are all actually made up parts - thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations that interact with each other like a family internally - each member doing their best to protect us and help us survive.
In combination with its unique effectiveness on treating mental health as a whole, IFS is a form of evidence-based therapy known to effectively treat DID (dissociative identity disorder). Read on to learn more.
We are all made up of parts and there are no bad parts.
In the 1980s, during his early work with clients who were struggling with eating disorders, Dr. Richard Schwartz noticed the way his clients would use the word “part” to describe their inner experiences like “the part of me that restricts” or “the part of me that eats”. He then learned that when clients were able to unblend from their parts, they would start to feel less stuck.
As clients began to understand their parts rather than resist, judge, or reject them, clients were able to experience a sense of agency and leadership in their lives.
FAQs
What is IFS? What are parts?
In IFS, the word parts is used to refer to thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations. Parts take on important roles in our lives to protect us from our deepest fears and shame. Our parts have served an important function in our survival at some point in our lives. For example, after a car accident, a person’s anxiety peaks and they feel like they can never drive again. With IFS, we view the anxiety as a part of the person but not all of the person. When the person tunes in closely, they might hear anxiety say, “If I don’t overwhelm this person and stop them from driving, I’m concerned that they might get into another accident.” The anxiety is a part (or protector) that has taken on the role of protecting that person from getting into another car accident.
We can begin to understand that anxiety is an important emotion that protects us from danger. Anxiety causes us to think about the future and can motivate us to avoid risky behaviour. We need an optimal amount of anxiety to survive. However, extreme anxiety can be debilitating and self-sabotaging - and that’s when we also start to develop other parts that reject, resist, or judge anxiety. Frustration can show up as another part that wants to get rid of anxiety. Frustration might say, “Anxiety is getting in the way of allowing the person to live a full life!” Once we identify the two parts, we start to gain clarity about the dilemma inside. This is the beginning of IFS work.
As we deepen our work in IFS therapy, we learn that parts interact with one another like family members. If we take the example of frustration and anxiety, we might learn that the anxiety is like a little child (a younger self) who has been with the client since they were five years old. Perhaps the client developed an anxious part in order to cope with authoritative parents who belittled them. Throughout their life, the client’s anxiety caused them to fear rejection and learned that pleasing others and putting the needs of others before themselves helped them feel worthy and valued. As the client matured, they began to recognize that people pleasing their way through life was exhausting. In response to the anxiety, another part - frustration - began to take on a role in the client’s system to shut out the anxiety. Perhaps, frustration motivated the client to repress or push away the anxiety. Frustration might say, “It’s time to exercise every day or have a drink to push anxiety out” . Through therapy, the client might learn that the frustration acts like a concerned older sibling trying their best to silence or discipline the anxiety. The client might be able to cope for a while. Then when a negative life incident happens (like a car accident), frustration is no longer able to keep anxiety at bay, and the anxious part breaks through to overwhelm the whole system.
IFS sessions focus on identifying and tackling the root of the problem rather than symptom management. As clients identify the parts of their inner world, understanding and connection leads to a process called unburdening, where parts begin to release fear and shame. IFS clients often walk away from sessions feeling lighter and having increased clarity and self-compassion.
The goal of IFS therapy is to experience increased curiosity and compassion as well as to lead with the Self.
What is the Self?
IFS describes that within every person exists the Self. The Self embodies the 8 Cs: calmness, curiosity, courage, clarity, creativity, connectedness, confidence and compassion. This is also accompanied by the 5 Ps: patience, persistence, presence, perspective, and playfulness. When we embody these traits, we are free of judgement and we feel a sense of safety and leadership in ourselves.
Think of the Self as the blue sky and our parts as the clouds in the sky. People experience Self energy in different ways. It is unique to each individual. Some people have described it as being in a flow state. Some refer to the Self as their spirit - a higher self. People of faith might describe the self as “God in me”. Think of a musician or athlete or a parent. Musicians might experience Self when they’re playing music or engaged in something creative. Athletes are “in the zone” when they’re engaged in their sport and parents might experience Self when they’re playing with the children. Hikers might describe Self as the state they’re in when they’re in nature or in the mountains. Self energy is when we feel unburdened and at home in our own bodies.
It is impossible to be in a constant state of Self. We flow in and out of that blue sky. Some days are cloudier than others and that’s okay. Through IFS therapy, we learn to work with our parts, not against them. We learn Self-leadership with our parts, not without them. We put ourselves back in the driver’s seat with necessary parts in the passenger’s seat or back seats.
What does it mean that there are “no bad parts”?
IFS tells us that there are no bad parts - just parts in extreme roles that intend to protect us from pain and suffering. By moving away from judgement of our parts, we are better able to access the Self and instead become curious. In IFS therapy, your therapist might ask you if you’re able to meet your parts with curiosity or compassion. In other words, are you willing to put judgement down and ask the part some important questions: What do you do for me? What role / job do you have in protecting me? What would happen if you let go of this job? When did you take on this job in my life? What was happening? When we are able to ask our parts these questions, we start to embody the Self and create connectedness with the part and gain clarity .
Through IFS therapy, we can start to notice our parts soften. Once parts know that we are there and that they can trust us to take leadership, parts will be willing to let go of their extreme roles when they’re ready. Therefore, the mental health journey becomes an ongoing process of understanding our parts and leading with our parts when life gets difficult.
What does IFS treat?
IFS is supportive for every client in therapy. IFS is available to treat all presenting concerns in mental health. It is best coupled with EMDR and integrated into couple’s therapy. Everyone can benefit from the practice of unblending from parts and helping parts unburden themselves.
Specifically, the most unique and promising feature of IFS is that it is an evidence-based therapeutic modality that has a very high potential to effectively treat dissociative identity disorder (DID). This is because IFS acknowledges that every person experiences varying levels of dissociation as a natural way to cope with stressors in daily life. Dissociation exists on a spectrum - from the mildest forms of behaviours like daydreaming or driving to a place and not remembering how you got there to the most extreme form of when parts / personalities within a person have amnesia and are fully disconnected from each other.
In film and media, having multiple or split personalities is mystified or stigmatized. However, today we understand that dissociation is an extreme form of coping when a person has been through an intense negative life event. People who have experienced prolonged sexual abuse in childhood over the course of many years might learn to dissociate internally in order to move on from the abuse. Externally, they may be perceived as strong or brave, but internally a disorganized world of parts and personalities work together to keep the painful memories repressed in order for the person to function daily. IFS recognizes that humans are resilient and that we have creative ways to manage adverse experiences even though at times the ways of coping may be extreme or sometimes harmful.
How is IFS different from other therapies?
IFS seeks to target the root of a person’s presenting concerns (symptoms). Akin to other forms of trauma therapy, IFS is able to effectively treat the root of the pain. When used in combination with approaches that are more solutions-focused, IFS can help a person create more lasting and permanent change in their life.
IFS teaches a person to learn Patience and Perseverance (one of the therapy’s 5 Ps) as part of their healing journey. IFS forces clients to sit and tolerate just enough distress per session in order to grow. IFS challenges what we are used to in the digital world of instant gratification. The brain is like a muscle - and as it is with building muscles, we need to add the right amount of distress and resistance in order for muscles to grow. In IFS therapy, we work to get closer to the pain we work hard to avoid in order for the brain to develop the neural pathways it needs to be strengthened. Your therapist will guide the system to titrate just enough distress for you to reprocess.
