What Is It?

 

Internal Family Systems is an up and coming theory that is becoming popular pretty rapidly. The theory relies on using the body's internal wisdom to heal itself by engaging in open-communication with it. The assumption of this theory is that the body is connected to the brain subconsciously and all body sensations are a potential window into the subconscious if communication is conducted properly. A distressed body is the subconscious trying to relay a message that there is an emotional wound that needs to be addressed. If the subconscious is able to release the emotion, the body follows suit, thus the body is used as a gauge for subconscious healing. I've written a summary of the theory's core ideas that you can access here and/or you can watch a demonstration by its creator here.

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How Does It Work?

 

I'm not going to lie, outright this is a pretty weird concept, but it works.

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There are a few underlying assumptions of the theory. First, we all have different parts of ourselves that are sometimes at odds with one another kind of like when part of you wants to hang out with friends and part of you wants to stay home. Parts of ourself get fragmented in the mind/ body when we have pivotal negative life experiences and this fragmentation is responsible for our distress. Second, the body is always trying to help you, not hurt you. When parts of ourselves become fragmented due to strong negative emotions our subconscious instinctively tries to protect itself, but these protective measures almost always end up hurting us later in life. Understanding these fragmented parts of ourself and how they are subconscious attempts at self protection permits the fragmented parts to reintegrate resulting in emotional and physical release. Third, you can externalize your subconscious. Externalization is a therapeutic technique that's aim is to separate a person from the problem, in this case the person from their distressed body part or the person from their subconscious.

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To start, a client identifies something that distresses them and the subsequent physical reaction that occurs in the body. The client externalizes the body part by visualizing the body part taking a physical form which allows it to separate from the self and engage in communication as if it were a person. The ultimate goal is to talk to the emotionally wounded part of the self but sometimes there are other parts of oneself that inhibit the process named protector parts. All protector parts need to be understood, pacified, and brought on board with the process before the wounded part can be addressed. The wounded part must first be understood, then it's invited to release the pent up emotions and replace them with new, positive emotions. Once that is done, the client tends to feel an internal emotional release and the process is complete. This is a simplified version of how the process works and the provided links above give more in-depth explanations of how it works.

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What Does A Session Look Like?

 

A session looks very similar to the last paragraph, but a bit more intricate in terms of helping you communicate with the various players of the subconscious to effectively release stuck emotions within a session. It is more or less a dialogue between myself, you, and your subconscious and a joint effort to understand your subconscious and work past any barriers the subconscious has to releasing the emotions which can occasionally be pretty tricky.

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The session alternates between the client's dialogue with their own subconscious, relaying the information to me, me providing some guidance as to questions to ask the subconscious, rinse and repeat. Sometimes the subconscious can be talked to directly and dialogue will be had between myself and your subconscious with you acting as the mouth piece. Eventually the goal is for you to be able to have these dialogues with your subconscious by yourself so that you can release your emotions without an intermediary.

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What Results Have People Had?

Emotional release. All clients who have successfully done this method feel instantaneous emotional release. The creator of the theory says this method can be used to heal all kind of emotional wounds and even physical problems. I haven't had any clients who have wanted to try getting rid of physical sensations or maladies yet, but it would not surprise me at all if it worked. If you want to test it with me, I would happily try it with you.

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