[MUSIC]
All right, y'all. So welcome. Really, what we're talking about today is that IFS informed approach for self-regulation. We've been teaching parts well before I even knew what IFS was. And I do think that IFS is such a beautiful modality. And mostly, we're teaching it-- I love teaching parts work. And I basically decided to do, because being fully transparent, IFS informed because there's so much interest in the topic. But guess what? It's the same nervous system.
So whether it's internal family systems or gestalt or functional coaching or polyvagal theory, however you're learning about your parts, OK? There are many-- all practitioners are dealing with the same nervous system. Does that make sense? It's not like there's an internal family systems nervous system and a polyvagal nervous system and a sensory motor nervous system and a trauma in form or not trauma in form. It's all the same nervous system. It's really our approach. It really matters.
The first thing I want to say about this training, super important to delineate this for you, is that I am not in any way affiliated with the IFS Institute. I'm not formally trained in internal family systems. This program is not endorsed by Dick Schwartz, or the IFS Institute. Just so really clear about that. I am extremely learned in the topic and have had multiple lengthy hours, hours, hours, long conversations with experts in the field.
And I have 20,000 coaching hours looking at multiplicity through my own lens. And so this is really a conceptual understanding. So this is not an IFS training in any type of like, like official capacity in terms of the IFS Institute and IFS was created by Dr. Richard Swartz in the 90s. So what is multiplicity? Let's talk about that for a second because I fast really frames in a really good way and has really started to normalize the idea of multiplicity.
I think for a long time when someone said, "Oh my God, you have multiple personalities" or something, that was like a scary thing, I think it's really less scary these days. So if we look at the research, what is the definition of multiplicity? Okay, so I like to align on definitions instead of just like having everyone think they understand what it means.
So personality psychology, which is research relies on this idea that humans are a single So we look at like a personality like I don't know if you look at personality disorders and the DSM or what is your personality traits?
Right most personality research thinks of the human being as a single self Personality that's the result of thoughts feelings and behaviors right so affects them addicts and cognitions And those expressed three traits Keep identify themselves as multiple have a system of multiple alternative selves that share the same physical body And so we want to understand that we all have multiplicity on a spectrum and
multiplicity is on a continuum. So it's not like oh my god I have multiple personalities and I need to go to a medic, you know
So the mental health hospital or something that's wrong with me. It's like no you have multiple feelings throughout the day Sometimes throughout the hours and times throughout the minute Okay, and so I wanted to tell you normalize this idea that multiplicity is so normal We all have different parts of ourselves And when you understand that, it really changes the idea of when you say something like, well, I'm overwhelmed. I'm confused. I want to make $10,000 a month.
Every time you say, "I," you're probably speaking from a different "I" in there. There's different "I's." And one of the things that's really sneaky that I've noticed over the years is that one part will ask a question, and then the other part shows up for coaching. Right? And it's like, okay, like, let's highlight that, right? So we want to start to think about multiplicity differently, okay? We want to start to really think of multiplicity as internal physics, okay?
And Newton's Sir Law of Motion says for every action is an equal opposite reaction. So as we go through life and have experiences, especially hurtful experiences, there's an action. So there's a trauma or wound that's created and then there's a reaction and a park gets created. Does that make sense? So we have neglect and then a part gets created or abuse and a parts gets created. And then the protective part does something different.
And then in response to that reaction, another part is formed in response to that part. And now all of a sudden you have this like fractal self internally. And it's really interesting. We started doing parts work because as you start to access or get in touch with different parts, there's like parts that like to protect those parts. as parts that like to pretend you don't have the parts that they're trying to protect, as parts that get confused, as parts that, it's like a parts party in there.
And like when you really go looking for parts, there's so many fucking parts. There's so many fucking parts. Okay. And there's like this one part in most smart people that needs to classify all of them, right? And it's like, I don't really do that because what we're trying to do here is make it applicable to your day-to-day life, right? We don't need an up-periodic table of elements all your parts necessarily. Though that could be helpful. We want to make it applicable.
And also, as I said earlier, there are many parts approaches. These are just some of them. Okay. So we have Gestalt Therapy, right? Fritz Purl's Transactional Analysis is a wonderful parts-based therapy. Neurolinguistic Programming, which is a coaching modality formed in the '70s. Neurolinguistic Programming came from, has roots in transactiostal therapy and family therapy.
Like they studied Virginia Satyr, who created family therapy, And they studied Gestalt and they kind of put it together into NLP, which is something that Richard Swartz also did, feeling very similar to that for IFS. Ego State Therapy, there's a re-decision therapy, which is not that well known anymore, but a very powerful approach. There's a young Ian psychology talks about all these different aspects, the automa, automas, all these things.
Meridian psychology with the ego and the id and all that type of stuff. Of course, internal family systems, functional life coaching, narrative therapy, schema therapy, psychoanalytic therapy, object relations theory. Um, and also polybagulotiform structures because polybaguloteary says we have different states and states are parts. Does that make sense?
Right. So there's lots of things. And even if you look back to one of the originals gestalt, the word gestalt itself means something that is made of many parts and yet is somehow more or different than the combination of its parts, right? So that's what gestalt means. So Schwartz got his, you know, Virginia sat here, uh, was one of his teachers, right? who taught family therapy. So we have internal family systems. There is a Virginia Satyr
perspective, right? Gestalt from Fritz Purls, which Schwartz studied. Okay, now we have Hart's work. So we have kind of Gestalt coming in and we have family systems kind of coming in. And we have Dick Schwartz as a young student coming in going, huh, I wonder if like what's happening outside also happens inside. Does that make sense? Does that make sense, y'all? And so what he noted was there's a thing called intracic conflict, which most therapists will tell you about.
The definition of intracic conflict is the clash of opposing forces in the psyche with conflicting drives or wishes or different agencies or desires. We all have intracic conflict. If you have internal conflict, you have intracic conflict. Now, intracic conflict sounds like spiritual warfare or something, but it's happening inside you, inside your mind, inside your system. Another way to think of it is ambivalence.
Right. So it's a simultaneous existence of contradictory feelings and attitudes, right? About something. So you could want to be with someone and want to leave them. You could want to start a business, but procrastinate, right? That's ambivalence. Some people think ambivalence is not caring. That's not what ambivalence means. Okay. So ambivalence is also like you can think of it as uncertainty or indecisiveness about a specific course of action.
And guess what? As you started to move forward in your life, whether or not you're doing travel work, you're going to meet ambivalence. Now, when we look at the lens of internal family systems, internal family systems looks at ambivalence because of the past and helps you free up the past ambivalence in the present. IFS, it bless you, Sam. IFS is not necessarily a coaching modality that helps you move forward. IFS does not look into the future that much, right?
I've talked to lots of IFS practitioners about this and where IFS fall short is in the future. And really, if you think about coaching, like we're going to spend most of your time trying to move you forward. And if we don't address ambivalence, right, then we're and ambivalence is not just thoughts, y'all. It's somatic ambivalence, emotional ambivalence, right? Like body ambivalence, nervous system ambivalence, hearts ambivalence. And that's inner conflict, right?
And what that really is are different parts of you with different agendas. There's a part of you that wants to move forward. And as a part of you is like, fuck that. I don't want to feel grief. That's a part that's mad at the part doesn't want to feel grief. Right. And all of a sudden it's like, ah, who's in charge? Right. So IFS says, oh, you have a feeling that's a part. Oh, you have a thought. That's a part. Oh, you have a physical sensation. That's a part.
Now, IFS was conceptualized in the 80s. And the first serious study about IFS was published in 2013. There's a PMID, if you want to read it. Um, and then shortly thereafter, that study, which is a study on IFS and rheumatoid arthritis was then presented at a trauma conference at Besselrand and then the rest is history. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)