What is Internal Family Systems and Parts Work?

Internal Family Systems (IFS) and other types of parts work, such as Ego State Therapy, view our personality as being made up of “parts". You can think of your parts almost like sub-personalities, each you, but each with their own thoughts, feelings, sensations, beliefs, and so on. 

As we go through life, our parts develop relationships with one another, forming a complex inner system. All parts of this system have positive intentions for your wellbeing, however, experiences that cause stress, trauma, or pain can push parts into extreme roles and lead to inner conflicts. 

IFS and Ego State Therapy use techniques from family therapy to work with the relationships between parts. The aim is to de-escalate inner conflicts and help parts work together as a team. 

Specific to IFS is also the assumption that we’re more than our parts. Beyond our parts, we all have access to an energy that is assured, relaxed, and compassionate. IFS calls this the Self. The role of the Self is to lead the inner system of parts, bringing to it a sense of harmony and balance. When parts have been pushed into extreme roles, however, there may not be much space for the Self.

The goal of IFS therapy is two-fold: to create more room for the Self to lead the inner system, and to help parts in extreme roles let go of what keeps them in those roles and return to a more balanced expression. 

What does Internal Family Systems and Parts Work look like?

I practice IFS informed therapy and incorporate interventions from Ego State therapy. In session, this can look like:

• Using props or drawing to map out your inner system 

• Identifying parts of you and exploring how they show up in your mind and body

• Exploring the roles of your parts and the relationships between parts of you 

• Visualizations, meditations, and exercises to differentiate from or connect with parts, deepen your experience of Self, or help parts metabolize the impact of stressful, painful, or traumatic events 

What is Somatic Psychotherapy?

Somatic psychotherapy works directly with the body’s expression of mental and emotional concerns. Even when we can’t consciously remember an event or put an experience into words, our body holds its own story. Maybe the jaw clenches, or the shoulders move slightly, or the breath catches in the chest. Somatic psychotherapy views physical signs like this as entry points into understanding, processing, and ultimately shifting what’s going on for you. 

The aim of somatic psychotherapy is to reconnect the mind and body, and help you let go of emotional pain on a physical level.

What does Somatic Psychotherapy look like?

There are many types of somatic psychotherapy. I primarily use Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, a modality that addresses the implicit memories and neurobiological impact of traumatic events and attachment. I may also incorporate trauma informed mindfulness and movement. In session, this can look like:

• Encouragement to notice your body sensations in the moment

• Exploring how body sensations might be connected to thoughts, emotions, or memories

• Using mindfulness, movement, breath, and other physical tools to regulate emotions and the nervous system, expand your capacity to be with inner experiences, or reprocess unconscious patterns and past events

What is Embodied Anti-Oppressive Practice in Therapy?

Current consensus in the field of trauma is that the impact of significant stressors and traumatic events are not held in conscious, explicit parts of the brain, but instead in subconscious, implicit parts of the brain. Embodied anti-oppressive approaches to psychotherapy understand how individual experiences of systemic oppression and social injustice can be held in this same way. 

There are various doorways into the subconscious, implicit parts of the brain, one being our in-the-moment experience of our body. Embodied anti-oppressive practice, when applied to therapy, makes use of this doorway to explore the impact of significant stressors and traumatic events related to social identity. 

It’s less a specific method, and more a lens brought to somatic therapy. It leaves room for nuance in our understanding of mental health by taking into account how distress can come from multiple, intersecting layers of a person’s environment, rather than from within that person themself. 

For me, part of embodied anti-oppressive practice is acknowledging how harmful systems of power have shaped the field of mental health itself. I engage in ongoing reflection and learning to divest from the ways in which these systems continue to influence care. 

What does Embodied Anti-Oppressive Practice in Therapy look like?

• Using somatic psychotherapy and other experiential psychotherapy techniques to explore how systems like colonialism, white supremacy, patriarchy, cisheteronormativity, capitalism, and ableism impact your wellbeing and may shape the concerns you bring to therapy

• Exploring and processing forms of trauma that extend beyond you, such as collective trauma or intergenerational trauma