Internal Family Systems therapy: an introduction
[cn: therapy and mental health. Abstract mention of trauma and childhood abuse, depression and anxiety, dieting]
Internal Family Systems is a therapeutic and psychological model. The name is misleading: this isn’t a form of ‘family therapy’ that you do alongside your literal family (parents, kids, partners, etc.) Instead, IFS claims that we don’t have a single, simple, unitary mind; rather, we all have an inner “family” of several different parts, each with their own personality, feelings and goals. All our parts want what’s best for us, but they often disagree on how to achieve this, which can create internal conflicts, or lead us to act in ways that we do not fully endorse.
How IFS sees the mind
According to IFS, our minds are made up of the Self and three types of parts. The Self is the voice of consciousness, the thing that can step back and consider the other parts. It is full of curiosity, calm, connectedness, clarity, compassion, courage, and creativity. It cannot be broken. It allows us to feel and experience our emotions with being submerged in or overwhelmed by them. I first learned about IFS from Self Therapy, by Jay Earley; it’s called that because IFS trains the Self to act as a therapist to your other parts — to listen to them, empathize with them, shower them with unconditional positive regard, heal their trauma, and reconcile their conflicts.
The other parts are different for everyone, but they come in three categories: Exiles, Managers and Firefighters. These parts ‘show up’ in many ways. Sometimes people ‘see’ them in their mind’s eye, or they might just hear them; other times, they are an emotional or physical feeling in the body. They are often archetypes (for example, a businessman, a rebellious teenager, or a jester) or younger versions of yourself, and they have can also be non-human (for example, a cloud, a wall, or a bird). It’s common to have parts of different genders (and of no gender) even for people with an overall binary gender identity. We all have many of these parts.
Exiles are young parts who are burdened with negative emotions — fear, anger, sadness, worthlessness. An exile is formed when a person experiences a traumatic event, usually in childhood, that they cannot properly process. This trauma might be something extremely severe, like abuse at the hands of caregivers, but it could also be a more ‘everyday’ negative experience that, nonetheless, was seriously upsetting for the person in their immature state — for example, harsh criticism from a parent or teacher, a painful injury, or being left alone as a baby. When they are triggered, exiles flood the mind with emotion. The aim of IFS is to unburden Exiles, which we do by finding them, meeting them, reliving their traumatic event, and ‘re-doing’ the event so that everything turns out ok.
Managers are the parts that organize your life. For example, you might have an ‘productivity’ part that tells you to get off social media and focus on your work, an analytical part that explains your experience to you, a care-giving part that wants to look after your friends and family, a people-pleasing part, an internal critic, or an angrily assertive part who stands up for you.
Some Managers have the task of protecting Exiles. They do this by telling us to avoid situations that are similar to the traumatic situation that created the Exile, because these situations tend to trigger the Exile’s negative emotions. This protects the psyche as a whole from being flooded with difficult feelings, but it can also lead us to act in ways that are less than ideal.
For example, let’s say Maria has an Exile who feels worthless, and is therefore extremely vulnerable to criticism from others. She therefore developed a perfectionist Manager who tries to do everything perfectly and never make mistakes. If Maria does everything perfectly (this Manager part says), no-one will ever criticize her, and her worthless-feeling Exile will be protected. This Manager part does protect the Exile, but over time Maria’s perfectionism makes her anxious and burnt-out.
The third type of part are Firefighters. Like Managers, Firefighters have the job of protecting Exiles. While Managers are proactive, trying to avoid situations that will trigger Exiles, Firefighters are reactive. When Exiles are triggered, they act fast to make the pain go away.
Let’s imagine that Maria is criticized harshly and her Exile that feels worthless is triggered and upset. This might summon an angry Firefighter who tells her to aggressively lash out at her critics, or a fun-loving Firefighter who makes her want to go out partying to forget the pain. Firefighters often use distraction tactics, urging us to escape pain by compulsively seeking pleasures such as sex, food, social media, alcohol, drugs, or sleep.
Managers and Firefighters share the same aim — to protect you — but they often end up polarized and angry at each other. Let’s imagine that Dominic has a weight-conscious Manager who wants him to diet, and a pleasure-loving Firefighter who likes to eat. The weight-conscious Manager constantly tells Dominic what to eat and when to exercise, and harshly criticizes him when he doesn’t obey. This is ok in moderation, but if the weight-conscious Manager becomes too strident, this makes Dominic exhausted and anxious, which wakes up the pleasure-loving Firefighter who is eager to avoid pain. This Firefighter tells Dominic to eat tasty but unhealthy foods or skip the gym if he’s tired. Unfortunately, this behaviour makes the weight-conscious Manager even more critical, which in turn makes the pleasure-loving Firefighter more rebellious. Many of us have experienced similar dynamics when trying change our habits, learn a difficult skill, or complete a hard project.
Where Managers and Firefighters conflict, society tends to side with our Managers: when people like Dominic listen to their Firefighters, we call this a failure in willpower, or akrasia. However, according to IFS, Managers and Firefighters are equally important and we should take their concerns equally seriously, rather than treating Managers as ‘good’ and Firefighters as ‘bad’. Both types of part have your best interests at heart: they are trying to help you survive, thrive, and avoid pain.
Because Exiles are protected by Managers and Firefighters, the Self needs to meet and negotiate with these protectors first, before it can unburden the exile. The aim of IFS is not to get rid of parts, but instead to help them transform and adopt a more positive and productive role within the psyche.
Further reading: I learnt about IFS from Self Therapy by Jay Earley. This blog theorizes about possible neurological reasons for why IFS might work.
