Anne writes:
I think that your description of the Self in your book is eloquent.  However, unless I missed it, there doesn’t seem to be much about how to access that Self.  For people like myself whose Parts are so active, it can be difficult to be centered.  I’ve done lots of meditation work, which has helped, but there are still lots of times when I find myself in what I call the “spin cycle” of lots of voices, most of them not very positive.  What are the most prevalent ways that your clients access the Self?  That information would be helpful.

Here is my response:
All of Chapters 5 and 6 is about accessing Self. And I deal with the situation you are referring to in Chap. 9 on p. 171 in the section called Dealing with Overwhelm (see below). Let me know if that helps or if you have more to ask.

Dealing with Overwhelm

Your inner world can be a garden of riches, but at any moment it can also erupt in a chaotic confusion of intense feelings. Sometimes when a loaded issue gets triggered, instead of parts appearing one at a time, which would be more workable, they all become triggered at once, vying for control and attention, and fighting with each other. Suppose that, in the example above, as soon as you hear your lover threatening to leave, many parts come up at the same time. You feel terrified, defensive, self-judging, angry, ashamed, and abandoned, all in one intense moment. At first, you may not be able to distinguish these individual feelings; you may just experience inner confusion, conflict, or chaos. You might feel overwhelmed and flooded with emotion. Read the rest of this entry »

Bonnie and I recently realized that we needed to rewrite our report on the Inner Controller, which is one of the seven types of Inner Critics. It isn’t that our understanding of the Inner Controller changed. What’s new is our view of the Inner Champion needed for the Inner Controller. To understand this, we can think of there being two kinds of Inner Controllers. Here is the second half of the new Inner Controller report.

(1) Sometimes the Inner Controller has an unrealistic view of who you are and the danger of your impulses. It attacks you for having needs or taking actions that are just taking care of yourself. Or you may have some degree of impulsiveness, but your Inner Controller reacts in a way that is much too harsh, punitive, and rigid, given the reality of your behavior. Your culture may have an unreasonable ideal of thinness or prohibitions against emotional or sexual expression. This can result in your feeling that you have to control your normal impulses. In this case the Inner Controller may be working against what may be natural and healthy for you.

(2) In other cases the Inner Controller is really reacting to an out-of-control Indulger Part that does need to be attended to. When this is true, there is a polarization between these two parts and both sides need to be understood and worked with to get relief. Read the rest of this entry »

In reflecting on the New Year, there are big changes afoot in my work. I am just as dedicated as ever to helping people heal psychological wounds and grow, and I still see IFS as the best way to do that. However, my work is shifting toward groups, teaching, training, writing, and producing other products to help people’s inner work.

Bonnie and I are currently focused on working with Inner Critic parts. We have already put up an questionnaire and various articles on this, and we are planning much more— downloadable booklets, a book, a web-based system for profiling Inner Critic and Champion parts, and probably CD’s of guided meditations, animated videos of inner work, and social networking sites. This feels very exciting and creative to me. Furthermore, even though I have already written four books in my career, I now have ideas for at least five more, and I plan to get them out much more quickly than I have in the past. Read the rest of this entry »

During this difficult week, seeing the shocking images in Haiti, some people were glued to the TV and some avoided watching altogether. I am a checker. I feel the need to know and be connected with what is going on, but in small doses.

I find myself startled that now most news crews have gone home and we are back to Senator Brown, Tiger Woods’ rehab, and illegitimate children of famous men.

How can I stay connected and not go back to business as usual. And why do I want to? There is something in my Jewish roots that holds that it is important to know what is going on in the world, to not ignore other people’s suffering.

And then there is a spiritual challenge to not shy away from horror but to be a witness and keep my heart open. My years as a therapist, working with survivors of sexual abuse, have taught me the importance of being a compassionate witness in the healing process. Read the rest of this entry »

As I was working with a group of therapists who are learning couples therapy we ran into a HOT TOPIC – infidelity and how to work with it.  The room was full of energy, charge, confusion, anxiety, overwhelm and the conversation lively.  Issues of judgment, morality, health issues, how to balance interventions.  The topic was loaded with the therapists’ beliefs and past personal experience.  For them, the issue of “infidelity” loomed larger than other issues that couples bring to therapy and these therapists felt unclear and somewhat intimidated by it all. Read the rest of this entry »