Send us a text IN THE second part of our focus on what change looks like in IFS, we talk about: the pressures to change that clients and therapists face;the concept of constraint release;the importance of encouraging our clients to work on their connection with parts inbetween sessions; and how do we handle it when a dominant protector just will not step back and allow any change.Emma E Redfern MBACP (Snr Accred) initially trained in humanistic integrative psychotherapy. Emma is a certif...

Send us a text TODAY we're exploring what we mean when we talk about change in IFS therapy... what are the expectations around this and how much change is actually possible? And if there is an urgent agenda for change, a key thing to consider is: who inside our client, or ourselves, is leading this? We'll also discuss what clients self-report in terms of change. As usual, we'll give useful examples and tips; and because there's a lot to this topic there will be a part two coming soon. Emma E ...

Send us a text IN this episode, we look at the ethical aspects of working as an IFS therapist. It's a very different way of working, so the psychotherapy profession's existing, mono-minded ethical framework inevitably will not cover everything for the IFS professional. It's an important topic for those transitioning to IFS, and we cover issues around the therapeutic relationship, the therapeutic contract and IFS therapist responsibilities... as well as giving our take on the drama Adolescence...

Send us a text In today’s episode, we’re focusing on the process of asking parts to step back. It's a part of the protocol that often causes a lot of uncertainty, about when to ask parts to step back, whether this was the right decision or not, or whether the part should have become the new target part instead. We talk about many of the different aspects of the step back process, give some case examples, and focus in on the language options - with particular focus on the difference betw...

Send us a text In this episode, we're talking about just how well the IFS model equips us as therapists and supervisors. We provide plenty of useful examples and draw comparisons with traditional talk therapy. Both Gayle and Emma talk about their experience of being therapists prior to encountering IFS; and how equipped they now feel knowing there is always a part to talk to; and that there's always a way into some meaningful work. Let us know what you'd like us to tackle next! Em...

Send us a text IN part two of our focus on polarisations we look at polarisations involving more than two parts, polarisations across systems, eg, between client and therapist or parent and child; and addictive processes. We also discuss navigating conflicts in the wider world and how we can bring more Self to difficult conversations. *Details of the film we refer to: The Crisis in Gaza - Navigating difficult conversations: A Q&A with Dr Gabor Mate and Daniel Mate (available on the Scien...

Send us a text After taking a break for summer, we're back with a new episode focusing on polarisations. Being able to detect relationships between parts, particularly parts who are fighting against each other, has lots of benefits - including reducing the inner conflict that many people experience as well as easing any stuckness a client may be experiencing in their life. We discuss what exactly polarisations are, and suggest a three-stage progression for how a therapist might develop their ...

Send us a text In today's episode, we’re focusing on parts detecting - a key IFS skill to develop that is crucial to maintaining confidence and clarity in the work. We cover: - 'Universal truth' parts - The weaponising of parts - flexible thinking and not boxing parts in - examples of interesting parts detected - as well as a parts detecting test for listeners! Emma and Gayle also talk about the importance of therapist transparency, and of not claiming to offer IFS the...

Send us a text IN today's fascinating episode, the second of two on this topic, we're focusing on how parts affect our health, how our bodies affect our parts and how body sensations and illnesses can be approached as valuable trailheads. We discuss how there is no separation between mind and body; the concept of 'unwellness'; the ingenuity of dissociating parts; and the importance for some people at times of crisis in the body of having supportive body therapies alongside IFS sessions. Howev...

Send us a text IN today's fascinating episode, which is part one of two, we're focusing on how parts affect our health, how our bodies affect our parts and how body sensations and illnesses can be approached as valuable trailheads. Among several interesting case examples, Gayle describes: - helping a pregnant client talk to her baby - highlighting that we don't need to be afraid of working with so-called 'pre-verbal' parts; - working with a part that was causing frightening throat spasms; - w...

Send us a text In today's episode, we're hoping to inspire therapists to embrace the variety that IFS brings to supervision. We cover a lot, including: · Examples of individual and group IFS supervision · Differentiating the role of the IFSI Approved Clinical Consultant and IFS supervision · The importance of regular supervision, e.g. when consciously transitioning to IFS · The different f...

Send us a text IN today's episode, it's part two of our focus on the updating process and meeting Self. We look at a fairly advanced case example in detail and go through it step by step. The case - involving Hazel**, and her parts Coco (an exile) and Storeen (a protector) - highlights the importance of persistence (one of the 5Ps of the therapist Self), and of being able to differentiating between Self and a Self-like part. Other aspects we cover include: How to recognise the differe...

Send us a text Today we focus on updating parts - a process that is much more than just telling a part your present day, adult age. There are many reasons why we do the update with protectors, but it's particularly helpful in negotiating a Self-to-part relationship. We describe various scenarios you often face during updating and provide a lot of the language around this, including case material on handling protectors who dismiss the update information and a dominant figuring out protec...

Send us a text TRIGGER WARNING: We discuss how to talk to suicidal parts from around the 24-minute mark, but we don't go into any detail about a particular experience of suicide. On today's show, we discuss the vital skill of direct access, and in particular, what we call broadcast direct access. It's an aspect of direct access that doesn't get much talked about but is so valuable to learn. Essentially it's when a therapist speaks directly to the client's system as a whole or to a gr...

Send us a text In this our first episode, we talk about why we wanted to do this podcast, why we think IFS is best used without integrating other approaches and explore what is meant by saying that IFS is a complete model. We also discuss: the mixed messaging about how IFS should be used.the benefits of knowing that IFS has just about everything you would need as a therapist or IFS practitioner.what is and isn't 'pure' IFSthe need to temper expectations regarding how many of the ...