After almost a decade of working in this field, nothing – and I mean nothing – has come close to offering the raw therapeutic power of Internal Family Systems (IFS). If you have ever struggled with chronic feelings of insecurity, feel like you’re “not enough,” or have other emotional wounds you’ve struggled to overcome, this is the article for you.

As previously mentioned, I specialize in working with people who feel like they’re chronically “not enough” regardless of how much they achieve. These individuals come multiple different forms. Some are perfectionists who refuse to tolerate anything less than excellence. Others put so much pressure on themselves they can’t get started. Most simply live in an exhaustive state of self-conflict and misery. They heavily criticize themselves often live in a constant state of frustration with their apparently endless flaws. Since the relationship we have with ourself defines how engage with others, these same individuals often struggle socially: they might lack confidence, feel nervous around others, and/or struggle to date and find healthy romantic relationships.

Thanks to Internal Family Systems, this cycle doesn’t have to remain. By healing the child and releasing its pain, the Firefighter and Manager can relax. Such parts often transform after such events. Your Firefighter may now want to help you stay motivated and excited instead of angry. Likewise, your Manager may decide to dedicate itself to helping you plan the best possible strategy toward achieving goals so you can stay on task. As previously stated, these parts want to help. Once the central pain has been released, they’re free to transform.

Growing in Popularity

I still can’t believe I’m able to offer this powerful model to my clients. At the time I received my IFS training, we were told over 4,000 therapists and coaches were on waiting lists trying to get in. The number has only grown since then.

Internal Family Systems is powerful because it allows us to directly engage with our deepest shame and pain from a grounded place of love, compassion, and understanding. These qualities exist in all of us – we just need help bringing them forward.

After almost a decade of working with people who feel like they’re chronically not enough, I have found the best strategy focuses on relationships – especially on the relationship we have with ourselves. Since self-rejection is at the heart of insecurity, learning how to embrace ourselves removes the fire insecurity requires. This is why Internal Family Systems is so powerful. It gives us a way to engage with every single part of ourselves in a healthy, holistic fashion. What more could we ask for?

Of course, this isn’t a magic bullet. Succeeding at IFS requires us to take time to be present with ourselves and our parts in deep, meaningful ways. But if we’re willing to walk the journey, the benefits are plentiful.

Internal Family Systems: How It Works

Internal Family Systems asserts we are made up of different parts. As Carl Jung stated, “The so-called unity of consciousness is an illusion… we like to think that we are one but we are not.” Most of us already know this anyway. Any time you’ve said, “One part of me wants to do XYZ while another part of me wants to do ABC,” you’ve subconsciously recognized parts.

Let’s explore this by example. Let’s say that one night you’re scrolling through social media when you see a post by someone that hits you hard. Someone else is living your dream. Maybe they wrote a book, started a business, traveled somewhere, moved somewhere, or found what seems like love. What it is doesn’t matter. All that matters is that this is your dream too, but you’re nowhere near it. A deep sense of insecurity and shame rises up from within as your heart begins to pound. You are not ok.

Within seconds, shame is replaced by anger. A voice rises up from within that screams “Enough!!! I am so fucking tired of feeling this way. I’m tired of playing small, following the rules, and putting up with this shit. I don’t give a shit what I need to do in order to make it. Fuck everyone else. I’m getting what I want, and I’m going after it now.” This anger may feel motivating and inspired, filling you with a brief euphoria like you can take on the world. Then the ice bath comes.

A cold self-critical voice rises from within. “You seriously think you can have this? Please. Look at you. You’re pathetic. You’re so undisciplined you’d probably give up half way through anyway like you always do. Don’t make an embarrassment out of yourself. This is a stupid dream anyway.” This voice keeps speaking until any desire to take action has been extinguished.

As it takes over, exhaustion and frustration set in. You just went on a massive emotional roller coaster ride that got you absolutely nowhere. As you pull your phone out to distract yourself, a familiar question rises up: “What the hell is wrong with me?”

A Symphony of Parts

Everything in this story has been the result of what IFS calls “parts.” There are three types of parts: Exiles, Firefighters, and Managers.

Exiles hold our emotional pain. Exiles are our “inner children” to a degree, though they can easily be formed by traumatic events in adulthood too.

These are the parts of ourselves that are stuck in the past and hold huge amounts of panic and fear. From an IFS standpoint, those who are labeled with anxiety often have powerful Exiles close to the surface. In order to keep ourselves stable, we often try to bury these feelings in – effective “exiling” them. Unfortunately, this strategy rarely works. In our story, the Exile was the initial part of ourselves that felt ashamed when we took stock of our life.

Firefighters try to put out the emotional fires caused by triggered Exiles. In our story, the voice that said “Fuck this!” was a Firefighter. It didn’t care about long term consequences, nor did it care about how anyone else would view us. It wanted to do what felt good right now. While our story focused on a self-encouraging Firefighter, their short-term focus can introduce other problems. Those who abuse alcohol, drugs, sex, porn, work, exercise, eating, etc. often have overactive Firefighters. Yet the lack of inhibition often makes Firefighters defenders of the truth. In my work, Firefighters are often the parts that want us to be free.

Managers have the opposite attitude. They want structure and order, rules and stability. In our example, the self-critical voice was a Manager. Managers operate under the motto “never again” and do everything possible to avoid us experiencing pain. If we have a choice between happiness and safety, Managers pick safety. These parts focus on long-term consequences and keep our lives in order. In my work, Managers often show up as self-critics. While they may seen as damaging, they’re actually trying to help. They witnessed us go through extreme pain in our past and don’t want us to experience it again. Holding us back and keeping our mouths shut may make us miserable, but at least we’re safe. From an IFS perspective, those who battle depression have overactive Managers. These parts control so much they sap the joy out of life.

If nothing changes, these parts will perpetually exist in conflict. Wounds will get triggered, we’ll try to put that fire out through some sort of impulse, and then we’ll calm down and try to get things back in order. Huge amounts of energy are spent without any forward progress being made.

How can we break out of this cycle?

Introducing Self

While you and I all have parts, breaking this cycle requires something else: accessing Self.

Self is who you and I are at our fundamental level. It’s not a part but who we are as humans at our core. One of my clients compares Self to a canvas we’re all painted upon. You and I may have different parts like different colors that make us all unique and different, but if we’d peel those all away, the canvas would remain. We’re all united together by this common fabric of Self.

Self is an ancient concept. As Richard Schwartz, the therapist who discovered IFS wrote in Internal Family Systems, “the Self has been called various names in the past: ‘Quakers call it the Inner Light; Buddhists call it Rigpa, Hindus call it Atman or the Self; 13-century German theologian … Meister Eckhart called it the Godseed; and Sufis call it the Beloved or the God within. In IFS terms, the key to mental balance and harmony is to access our seat of consciousness, which we call the Self (p. 43).’

The most amazing thing about this – which also happens to be the thing that hooked me on IFS – is the exact same Self seems to come up in every single person around the world. After almost 40 years of implementing this model, IFS practitioners have brought forward the same state of Self forward in clients regardless of their age, culture, background, race, religion, or belief system. While the philosophical implications for this can be massive, we’ll focus on the therapeutic aspect.

Healing in IFS

Let’s continue with the example and say you started to work with an IFS practitioner. You’ve been working for some time now and have learned how to make space from your parts and access a state of Self on a regular basis. Once you’re ready, it’s time for healing.

With guidance from your practitioner – and acceptance from your other parts – you start to move towards the deepest place of shame and pain inside you. Tears start to form as you do – and you welcome them. You’re not scared of the tears, nor do you think they need to stop. If anything, you’re curious about what’s here and want to learn more.

That’s when you hit your deepest shame. You make contact with an image of yourself as a child, huddled alone in the corner. This is your Exile, the part of you holding onto this pain. As you work with them from a state of Self, information flows forward. You dive into this pain and learn where it came from, how it started, and what it’s been like to feel this way for so many years. Little by little, bit by bit, the pressure inside you lessens as you accept your pain at its core and let it pour out.

Up until this point, the pain inside you has felt isolated, alone, and ashamed of its presence. No more. You’re now showing up to yourself from a place of grounded compassion and love. Over time, with the help of your IFS practitioner, you walk through the steps needed to heal and release this pain. By the end – often after a significant amount of tears – it feels like a burden has been released from within.

Learning About Our Pain

If you’re like most people, this process will have taught you a lot. Let’s say, for example, that you discovered that this pain was caused in part by growing up in a psychologically controlling household where you were always told who to be, how to feel, and how to act. This caused you to adopt the belief if you are honest about who you are and what you want, you will be punished. You’re always wrong.

You also see how your other parts reacted to this experience. Your Firefighter hated the pressure this and external judgment, and it wanted to lash out at everyone who ever put you in a box. It wants to rebel. In contrast, your Manager was terrified of you being rejected by those you loved most. If you need to stay in line, it will help you do that by adopting the same critical voice they used. It may not like its job, but it’s doing whatever is necessary for you to feel safe.

Thanks to Internal Family Systems, this cycle doesn’t have to remain. By healing the child and releasing its pain, the Firefighter and Manager can relax. Such parts often transform after such events. Your Firefighter may now want to help you stay motivated and excited instead of angry. Likewise, your Manager may decide to dedicate itself to helping you plan the best possible strategy toward achieving goals so you can stay on task. As previously stated, these parts want to help. Once the central pain has been released, they’re free to transform.

Internal Family Systems: An Evidence-Based Practice

If reading the above made you wonder if this really works, the answer is yes – and it’s backed by data.

As stated by the IFS Institute, “IFS is recognized as an evidence based practice by the National Registry for Evidence-based Programs and Practices, a national repository that is maintained by the U.S. government’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). Interventions listed in NREPP, now including IFS, have been subject to independent, rigorous scrutiny and are deemed to show significant impact on individual outcomes relating to mental health.” (The relevant study can be found here.)

IFS has also shown evidence in treating trauma and depressive episodes connected with trauma. A research study is currently underway at a Harvard-affiliated mental health center to explore this at a deeper level.

What Is Waiting For You?

Are you curious about how IFS could be of service to you? I work remotely with people from across the world and would be happy to explore this with you. If you a) speak English, b) we can make the time zones work, and c) there are openings in my schedule, we can make it happen.