IFS is a non-pathologizing way of examining the ways we learned to deal with stess, attach in relationships, and protect ourselves from fear or rejection.

When you are stuck in the same patterns, you need a loving-witness to unburden your pain. There are no bad parts, they just get put into extreme roles; they do what they do for a reason.

There are three types of parts:

• Exiles are injured, young, and tender parts that have experienced trauma, extreme stress, or been shunned. Exiles have often become isolated from the rest of the system in an effort to protect the individual from feeling the pain, fear, or shame of these parts.

• Managers attempt to keep the individual in control of every situation and relationship in an effort to protect parts from feeling any hurt or rejection. This includes striving, controlling, analyzing, problem solving, people pleasing, caretaking, and defending.

• Firefighters are the system’s emergency responders. They are reactive parts that engage when exiles are activated in an effort to control and extinguish their pain. They can do this in any number of ways, including drug or alcohol use, self harm, binge eating, or excessive shopping.

Understand the way you are trying to survive, and learn to thrive!

• Find calm in the midst of stress eating, addictive behaviors, procrastination.

• Pinpoint parts causing difficulties and help them unburden their pain and inherited beliefs.

• Feel in control of your life, and not victim to mood swings.

• Re-pattern the way you relate to yourself and others.

• Transform your inner critic into an encouraging coach.