Internal Family Systems
What is IFS?
Richard Schwartz practised for many years as a systemic family psychotherapist, working alongside couples, families and individuals. Through his practice he recognised that all clients possessed a rich internal system of multiple and often conflicting parts, that interacted with the external systems in their lives. He identified that these different parts, had developed within us, to protect us from some of the vulnerable, hurtful, fearful and painful feelings that dated from an earlier time in our life.
How it works
He highlighted how our protector parts work hard as a defensive system. For example if one part of us fears failure, we may develop a perfectionist protector to ensure that we do not experience the painful sense of not getting it right or failing.
Other parts might wrestle with each other during certain decision-making processes and these can range from, “Should I go out and have fun or should I stay in and study” to “Why do I always end up bingeing or drinking too much when another part of me, knows how bad this is for me, it makes me feel so bad and ashamed of myself”.
If these kinds of internal dilemmas and conversations sound familiar, then IFS will provide a helpful way of allowing these conflicting parts to step aside and enable you to regain a clearer sense of who you are, and it will help you to stop feeling so bad about yourself.
Many of us have experienced a range of negative events in our early lives, such as chronic criticism, abuse, abandonment, neglect or bullying, to name but a few of the many traumatic experiences that each and every one of us will have been through at one time or another.
These experiences can cause us to feel hurt, sadness, fear, distress, shame, guilt etc. and to survive in the everyday, we try to hide these painful feelings within us.
The IFS approach:
It helps people to acknowledge that all of their different parts are working hard to keep them from feeling those long held, painful feelings.
It provides a way of reaching those feelings and allows the individual to release and separate them from the traumatic events of the past.
The IFS therapist achieves this from a position of compassion and uses their curiosity with that of the individual to explore the dynamic of their inner parts together.
IFS can be applied to a wider range of mental health issues including anxiety, panic, depression, eating disorders and others.