Internal Family Systems
Internal Family Systems (IFS) is a powerfully transformative, experiential, trauma-informed, and evidence-based model of psychotherapy. In IFS, our minds are naturally multi-faceted and made of parts. Our goal in IFS is to understand these parts. We are not here to make them go away, to eliminate them, or tell them they are bad. We are simply here to understand, listen, and build a relationship.
In working with trauma, grief, panic, or whatever event has caused pain, there is no need to go back into the experience and relive what happened in order to provide comfort and compassion. Often times, that isn’t what these parts need or want. Instead, we provide them with what they needed in the past - often safety, support, and acceptance.
Benefits of IFS
When working through trauma - instead of re-experiencing and ‘being in’ the traumatic event, like other exposure-based modalities, you are sitting with the part that holds the trauma story and are allowing it space to share whatever it needs with you. It is a gentle and compassionate process. We will always go at your, and your systems, pace.
Learn to see yourself as differentiated from your parts and behaviors - allowing for more compassion for yourself and your system.
Provides a normalizing, non-judgmental perspective on your internal world.
Learn how to access your Self energy - compassion, calmness, curiosity, courage, confidence, clarity, connectedness, and creativity.
Achieve balance, harmony, and wholeness in your life - internally and externally.
Learn to create and sustain communication between Self and parts. This allows you to ask the part to ‘unblend’ when a part is flooding or overwhelming the system. That way, you can be WITH the part instead of BE the part.
Gain more understanding of yourself and the way your system functions, which in turn allows for more compassionate understanding of those around you.
Gain better communication with your family, friends, and community through deeper understanding and compassion.
Understand your inner critic and allow your inner critic to understand you - creating more acceptance and less shame.