WHAT IS IFS
INTERNAL FAMILY SYSTEMS
Bridging Psychotherapy & Spirituality
IFS COACHING MAY BE FORE YOU IF
-
You get easily overwhelmed or over consumed by emotions
-
You find yourself stuck in repetitive negative/harmful patterns
-
Have negative self talk and beliefs
-
Often experience, worry, stress and over thinking
-
Find yourself overly affected by (re)actions of others
-
You are ready to do the inner work and live a more authentic, calm & fulfilling life
-
You want to develop skills that continue moving you along in your healing process
The Internal Family Systems therapy is an evidence-based approach to psychotherapy, bridging spirituality with psychotherapy, first developed in the 1980’s and built upon from there.
IFS is a transformative tool that conceives of every human being as a system of protective and wounded inner parts led by a core Self (true self, higher self, soul etc). Together they make up your internal family system. IFS believes that the mind is naturally formed of different sub personalities (in a good way, more to that later) viewing the intrapsychic process as a dynamic system and recognizing the core essence of Self. IFS helps people access and heal their protective (destructive, repetitive patterns, and traits) and wounded inner parts (traumas) by first helping to reconnect to the Self and then, from the core, come to understand and heal their parts.
​
While IFS is not inherently a somatic practice, it contains aspects of somatic work and how our emotions etc. interact with and speak through the body. Additionally it incorporates “shadow work”, “inner child work” and concepts of shamanic practices comparable to soul retrieval and working with the 5 elements (Air, Water, Earth, Fire and Ether) and can also contain other spiritual aspects as well as address generational/ancestral trauma.
​
It is designed to focus inwards into our internal world where we identify our blockages, patterns, conditionings, limiting believes etc. at the very root and bring them to light and create a spacious supportive environment within ourselves to heal and let go of what is no longer serving us.
IFS is for those who are looking for a coaching/therapeutic model effectively helping to release trauma and old wounds while honoring our energetic nature together with building life skills for continued self work.
WHAT IS THE CONCEPT/BELIEF OF IFS?
IFS believes that we all are born with a core Self, or higher self/true essence/open heart space and from this place, we feel the 8 C’s: calmness, compassion, curiosity, confidence, courage, creativity, clarity and connectedness. Of course, traits such as love, kindness, etc. are also parts of our Self. And together with our Self, we are born with different parts/traits that make up our own personality. Our own individuality.
When we are first born these parts function harmoniously with the guidance of our Self and they are expressing themselves authentically. As we grow up in society and are influenced by different outside sources such as family dynamics, societal structures, passed down genetics and traumas, epi-genetics etc. some of our parts may be forced into extreme roles they don’t like due to trauma and attachment injuries to protect us. In that way, we may start to develop “survival strategies” to keep us emotionally and physically safe, since as children we depend on the adults around us to provide us with our basic needs. Our parts now carry burdens and are prevented from expressing themselves authentically.
​
These survival strategies can look different in everybody, which you can read more about in the Parts section. Often times these strategies prevent us from living a fulfilling life, keeping us stuck in negative and destructive patterns of all sorts.
IFS is really for anyone looking to actively heal but may specifically speak to those that resonate with terms such as Shadow Work, Inner Child Healing, Authentic Self, Soul Retrieval etc.
WHAT IS THE GOAL OF IFS?
​The goal of IFS is to liberate our parts from their extreme roles so they can shift into their authentic way of functioning, helping them to regain trust in our Self-Leadership and to achieve balance, harmony and wholeness of the whole system so we can engage with our inner and outer world from a heart centered place.
WHAT ARE PARTS?
A core concept of IFS is learning about, understanding and creating a relationship from your Self to your different “parts”.
Have you ever heard someone say: “A part of me feels like XYZ”? Some people may say “an aspect of me” or “a side of me”. Or, have you ever wonder where some of your thoughts come from? That inner voice and/or sensations that communicate with you?
These are likely your “parts” coming through and they can be very contradictive at times because there may be more than one at play. IFS has the understanding that we naturally have a core Self (our higher self, true self, soul), and multiplicity of the mind expressing itself as different parts.
Even though over some time some parts may become burdened and have to take over undesired roles and some parts are starting to express themselves in extreme/destructive ways, all parts are good and act with an effort to protect us. Whether it is to protect us from emotional or physical harm, feeling negative emotions that could be overwhelming or from their perspective be unsafe, or to control certain outcomes.
The main parts to recognize and explore are Exiles (traumatized parts), Managers (a protector) and Fire Fighters (a protector) as well as learning to reconnect to Self and re establish a relationship from Self to our parts (our individuality) so they all can together function in a harmonious and balanced way in the way it benefits us.
DIRECT PRACTICAL BENEFITS OF IFS
Aside from working towards releasing child hood traumas that keep us stuck, some of the direct benefits of IFS can be:
​
-
INCREASED SELF AWARENESS
A better understanding of your internal world, where your patterns may stem from and why they are there. Basically understanding the root cause of why you do what you do as well as navigating your emotions and triggers much better.
-
INCREASED SELF COMPASSION
Through this understanding we can increase our self compassion.
-
INCREASE IN CONNECTION TO & ACTING FROM YOUR AUTHENTIC SELF
It will give you more insight into who you really are and help re discover your true self, outside of conditions put on you by society over time and therefore help reconnect to your heart space and start creating a more fulfilling life
​
-
REDUCED EMOTIONAL OVERWHELM
Over time it will help you be less over whelmed/consumed by your emotions so which will improve your ability to navigate stressful situations, naturally provides a calmer nervous system and helps you in the ability to process your emotional triggers and changing your patterns over time
-
IMPROVE INTERPERSONAL SKILLS AND RELATIONSHIPS
When you learn how to recognize your own parts, not only can you change how you interact with others, but you will also be able to recognize parts in other people helping you in having more empathy and compassion towards them while simultaneously being less affected by their actions and expressions.
-
HEALING OF INNER CHILD WOUNDS & TRAUMAS
Through either active “Healing Sessions” taking place within your IFS coaching and/or learning to not only attend to your inner child but also by learning to “re-parent” your inner child and changing your patterns, you will be able to heal your inner child wounds and triggers so they no longer control your adult life.
IFS is supposed to be self empowering. Over some time you can develop the tools to be a “self-led therapist” for yourself. You’ll be able to recognize when your parts are present and instead of feeling overwhelmed by them, if you chose to, you can start engaging yourself with them and applying the simple principles of IFS and processing your feelings actively without external support.
COACHING TESTIMONIALS
DOWNLOAD A FREE MEDITATION (Meet SELF) & SHADOW EXPLORATION WORKBOOK
By entering your information you'll automatically be subscribed to our newsletter and agree to receive to receive more free resources, updates and offers of our services. You may unsubscribe anytime