Internal Family Systems Therapy (IFS)
Created by Richard Schwartz in the 1980s, Internal Family Systems Therapy is a mental health approach significantly different from the majority of current psychotherapeutic modalities.
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Blame it on my biomedical training, but in order to explain IFS, I believe it is better to dissect the concept:
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Internal
I am sure we can agree that our human experience is largely affected by the state of our mind; our internal worlds. Despite the obvious correlation between vulnerable socioeconomic circumstances and mental health issues; working as a physician in New York City I am always reminded of how economic privilege does not equate mental wellbeing. At the end of the day we don't live in our high rise Penthouse, we live inside our minds.
The internal environment of our minds is a dynamic world wherein factors like societal, familial and cultural legacy, genetic buildup, both large and small trauma, all ripple through time to create a daily experience. We are mistaken if we think our internal worlds are not worthy of dedicated exploration, and with this knowing comes increased agency.
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Family
This concept often times confuses new-comers to IFS, since they believe it will somehow have to do with involving their nuclear families in therapy; it does not. However, the term family here is key.
Trained as a family therapist, Schwartz had the intuition and brilliance to address the polarizing aspects of the minds of his patients as distinct family members.
I don't believe it is "out there" to think that the human mind -with its 100 trillion connections- is able to organize itself into subpersonalities -commonly known as "parts" in IFS language. The reality is that sub-particles seem to happen over and over in the natural world. What Schwartz discovered was that the degree of individuality and separation between parts could often times correlate with the degree of trauma that the individual had experienced. While patients with tremendous amounts of sexual and emotional abuse were displaying vivid "multiple personalities", others with more subtle trauma might experience these subpersonalities in a less dramatic way, but very real nonetheless.
The concept of family is key here in that through the course of a person's life in the aftermath of trauma, these sub-personalities have led different fates. Some have become protagonists of the patient's mind space, others have fallen into infamy and are constantly shamed, some have been non stop at work for decades, other have been hidden in the shadows and only come up in moments of vulnerability. The progressive understanding of these parts as members of a family, the validation of their story and their work, and a heartfelt awareness of the inextricable nature of their presence in our worlds, can in turn make them less reactive, less overwhelming, and more cooperative. Through the process of IFS, a progressive compassionate understanding of each one of these parts can lead to unprecedented changes in our internal environments.
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Systems
As important as it is to understand the roster of parts that inhabit your mind, is to understand the way in which they interact with one another to become a system. Vulnerable parts might have become further scared and withdrawn in a system dominated by a strong critic, and the critic may subsequently experience a deluge of shaming from a "self-help" part monolithically concerned with erasing the critical voice. These interactions are an opportunity for inward nurture and understanding. We increase empowerment and agency, once we start to understand how our system operates; "I am about to go on a date; so I know the part concerned with how I look will be very active...". or "I am spending time with my parents so I know I will have a more reactive angry part, to which a guilt-ridden part responds with matching activation, and eventually my binge-drinking part comes to turn off the fire".
Watching the system in itself decongests the system, since it gets us out of the roadblocks, and give us an areal view; from where to start practicing some curiosity and compassion for the inner workings of our mind.
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Therapy
Here's where you come in: committing to IFS therapy and practice. I believe that a system will know what it needs. You might benefit from a monthly session -and then applying these concepts to your every day inner world- or you might need a weekly session if the system needs more time under guidance in order to relax enough to allow this exploration.
Therapy is a sacred place of discovery and acceptance. I never judge a client; no matter what they feel, think or have done. Your system has done what it has had to in order to keep you alive and safe. This system we will validate and honor, as we help it adjust to a current reality wherein some of its mechanisms may have become less useful and/or are causing pain. We will get there WITH the system, not bypassing it.
The journey of IFS therapy is made of both breakthrough moments, but more importantly of the small gains that come from slowly thinking about your mind in a new and more open way, a road to compassion for yourself that will allow you to -in the words of Carl Jung- go from the slumber of looking outside, to the wake state of looking inside.