IFS for your parts
Hey IFS and IFS-interested practitioners!
You’re here for one of two reasons (or maybe both!):
1. You have taken an IFS training and now want to work on YOUR parts before you work with your client’s parts.
2. You are patiently waiting for the Level 1 trainings to open and figured you’d get a head start on your own work.
Welcome either way!
Here’s the real question:
am I the person to do your IFS work with?
Maybe this will help.
My Background with IFS
When I started parts work, as a client, it felt both comforting and electric.
I felt seen and heard as the client and beyond excited as a therapist.
IFS allowed me to finally move from
what my psychologically minded brain had tried so hard to help me understand (about my OCD, anxiety, depression, imposter syndrome and attachment wounds)
to genuinely befriending
my history, my stories and my life-long fear/anger/resentment.
IFS helped me change from a top-down approach to an inside out approach.
I finally knew myself. And it has changed how I do life.
That work started in 2010.
Okay, great story Vicki!
You’ve been a client for a while and it helped. So happy for you!
But what about your training experience?
IFS CREDITIONALS
Level 1 2012 – Two week *residential intensive – one week led by Dick Schwartz
Level 2 2014 – Two week *residential intensive – one week led by Dick Schwartz
IFS Supervision group with Dick Schwartz – 2013 – 1 year participation
IFS Peer Supervision monthly group with Atlanta practitioners – 2015 to 2021
Program Assistant Level 1 – 2015 to 2016 (Chris Burris Lead Trainer)
Client of IFS therapy with Lead Trainer – 2015 to 2021
Client of IFS therapy – 2021 continuing
~Psychedelic Assisted work using IFS – Training in 2024~
*Residential Intensive was how the IFS Institute used to do Level 1 and 2 trainings. It included staying at an onsite location for 7 days (2 different sites and times – 14 days total) with a group of 20 therapist participants and immersing yourself in the model.
My Level 1 cohort bonded so well and were very invested in having Dick train us for at least one week in our Level 2 experience. We organized our Level 2 around his schedule and came back together 2 years later.
I am grateful to have participated in this style of learning the model as well as being trained by Dick for both Level 1 and 2.
Other Takeaways
Working with a Lead Trainer for my own therapy allowed me to not only dive deeply into my system, but also take notes on how to work with clients.
Being a Program Assistant with Chris Burris for Level 1 gave me another view of the model and allowed me to refresh and deepen my understanding of IFS. I would do it again in a heartbeat if I could get into a training!
Being a member of the Atlanta Peer Group for years allowed me to do case consultation with an IFS lens, hear how other practitioners used the model and keep my skills fresh with dyad work.
That’s my IFS story!
I LOVE working with Internal Family Systems and its one of the main modalities I use in my work. I also LOVE working with therapists and their therapist part(s) as well as their system as a whole.
Remember what we say, “All parts are welcome!”
This truly is experiential work and to do your own sessions either to become more versed in IFS itself or to befriend your system personally…it is transformational.
Good to go?
Schedule an interest call below!
