Parts Therapy
This being human is a guest house…. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor…. Welcome and entertain them all. Treat each guest honorably. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. —Rumi
Parts therapy, or parts-work therapy, comes from the idea that your personality is comprised of multiple parts. Treatments based on parts therapy (such as Internal Family Systems, or IFS) help you learn about, communicate with, and integrate your various parts to manage mental health struggles like depression, anxiety, and complex traumas.
The goal of parts therapy is integration and healing—learning to befriend your parts and come together as a complete individual. The process is meant to help you cultivate a healthier relationship with yourself, learn to accept yourself and your feelings, and begin to feel more comfortable and whole in your own skin.
What are “parts?”
Parts are not just feelings but distinct ways of being, with their own beliefs, agendas, and roles in the overall ecology of our lives. —Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score
We all have parts. Part of me feels motivated to write more articles for the blog, but another part wants to take a nap. Part of me still feels embarrassed about a little improv mishap from years ago and wants to hide in a hole. Part of me wants to fly away and be all alone by a lake, while another part of me wants to vacation with my friends.
When we feel an emotion, think a certain way, or even take an action, we can assume that one part of us is trying to communicate with us.
How are parts related to mental health?
The healthy human being, whether they realize it or not, gets along with their parts. The individual serves as a listener, arbitrator, and decision-maker for all the voices in their head. Each parts’ needs get met to some extent, and no one part is overwhelming or self-sabotaging.
Mental health struggles and issues occur when we:
- Lose access to our parts.
- Identify too much with one part or another.
- Have a crucial part of ourselves whose needs aren’t adequately met.
When we struggle, our parts sabotage us, and we often surrender control of our lives to one part or another. For instance, someone might identify with the part of themselves that relentlessly criticizes each little mistake they make but completely disown the parts of themselves that can feel proud or strong. Their inner critic relentlessly sends the message that the person “isn’t enough,” and no matter what the person accomplishes, they feel inadequate and timid.
It’s crucial to note that no part is an enemy; some parts have simply learned maladaptive behavioral patterns or coping strategies that they continually impose on the individual.
How does parts therapy work?
In therapy, parts are a way to conceptualize our responses to complex traumas, stressors, and mental health struggles. Parts therapy views mental health issues like depression not as illnesses, but as adaptations we make to cope. The process is meant to help you build a healthier relationship with yourself to make your struggles more manageable.
The IFS model divides an individual’s parts into three groups:
1. Exiles
Definition
Exiles are parts of us that have experienced extreme stressors or been touched by traumas. These are parts we disown—often subconsciously and instinctually—to protect ourselves from feelings of pain, terror, hurt, panic, confusion, and so on, much like our body automatically numbs itself in the moment of physical injury.
But as with numbing and physical injuries, wounds don’t go away. While we might no longer feel or remember them directly, traumatic feelings and memories live on in the parts and body. They insidiously affect our behaviors and habits, and they inhibit our ability to be fully alive and connected.
Exiles are the parts of wounded individuals that give rise to feelings such as the need to tell a story or the desire to be held and taken care of. These parts have often been deeply hurt, failed, or betrayed. When they communicate with us, they often give rise to feelings of anxiety, fragility, vulnerability, or even desperation. When ignored or invalidated for long enough, they can also give rise to feelings of shame, helplessness, and depression.
Example
The hurt “inner child” is a famous example of an exile. An individual might have been raised in a family where all their physical needs were met, but their emotional needs were all but invisible. Perhaps their parents were emotionally stunted or neglectful and continually missed signals from the child or even dismissed their needs. Continual invalidation leads to an inner child that feels disappointed, betrayed, and perhaps even abandoned, and the unbearable pain causes the mind to split off—or exile—the inner child.
2. Managers
Definition
Managers run our day-to-day lives and control how much we can access our own emotions as a way to prevent us from feeling overwhelmed. They are responsible for the desire to be in control, for better or worse, and help us function in everyday situations by suppressing certain feelings, warding off stimuli, and exiling parts of ourselves.
Example
The hostile “inner critic” is a famous example of a manager. A particularly harsh inner critic might continually say to the individual, “I’m not good looking enough” or “I’m not smart enough.” On a fundamental level, despite the misery it creates, the inner critic exists to protect the individual. Perhaps a part of the individual was harmed by a past rejection; the inner critic exists in this case to simulate rejection on a level so deep that it preempts all possible rejection from the external world. This is an unhealthy cycle, but in many cases the inner critic knows nothing better than this “protective” behavior.
3. Firefighters
Definition
Like managers, firefighters react to feelings. Unlike managers, firefighters aren’t about keeping the system under control; they’re about venting and, as their name implies, putting out emotional “fires.” Our minds resort to firefighters to react to exiles when managers no longer can. Firefighters are responsible for impulsive caretaking and self-soothing reactions, whether that be a sudden run or binge eating.
Many maladaptive behavioral, self-destructive habits, and even addictions come from firefighters’ impulsive reactions. While these parts’ reactions lead to temporary relief in the moment, firefighters build automatic behavioral habits for self-soothing and stop us from pausing to consider alternative, healthier ways to respond to discomfort.
Example
A somewhat innocuous firefighter might lead an individual to bite their nails every time they feel anxious. A more noticeable firefighter might have an individual shut down emotionally every time they feel triggered by a certain event or feeling. Like managers, firefighters exist to protect and soothe the individual from overwhelming feelings that might come from an exile. However, their responses sometimes involve unhealthy behaviors and cycles.
Managers and firefighters are both all about dealing with feelings that are uncomfortable and potentially overwhelming. IFS considers managers and firefighters “protectors” of exiles.
Building a relationship with yourself
Parts therapy is all about reclaiming yourself and building a strong, healthy relationship with your parts. The process of building a relationship with a part involves:
- Discovering and identifying the part.
- Building rapport with the part.
- Asking about the part’s purpose.
- Challenging—but not enabling—the part.
- Thanking the part.
- Negotiating between related parts.
- Integrating the part.
This process makes it easier to know which part is attempting to communicate with you when you feel, think, or act a certain way. This process also makes it easier to stop yourself from repeating self-destructive patterns and find alternative, healthier patterns to meet the same needs.
Some important rules to keep in mind when working with parts:
Your parts are not your enemies.
All of your parts are on your side. Whether they lead you on self-destructive paths or not, they are simply doing what they know best to help you survive and navigate the world:
"It is much more productive to see aggression or depression, arrogance or passivity as learned behaviors: Somewhere along the line, the patient came to believe that he or she could survive only if he or she was tough, invisible, or absent, or that it was safer to give up. Like traumatic memories that keep intruding until they are laid to rest, traumatic adaptations continue until the human organism feels safe and integrates all the parts of itself that are stuck in fighting or warding off the trauma.” —Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score
Just because a part is on your side doesn’t mean the part is always right. The trick is to understand when a part is serving you well versus when a part is enabling unhealthy coping strategies.
For instance, a part of you might always nag you about how you never “do enough” or “always make mistakes.” This critical voice in your head isn’t here to destroy you; deep down it’s likely there to protect you—it’s there to find all of your faults before anyone else can so you can protect yourself from the pain of letting someone else down or being rejected. It comes from a place where you feel you aren’t “good enough.” Instead of succumbing to this critic, observe its vitriol without acting on it and have a conversation with it.
Don’t pathologize your experience.
“Mental illness” is often used as an umbrella term for a wide range of mental health struggles, but the term often creates stigma against perfectly normal experiences. Nothing is “wrong” with you for experiencing a mental health struggle such as depression or anxiety. You are not “ill” for feeling stressed out or numb; according to parts therapy, you are simply stuck in a state where you aren’t integrated or connected with your parts.
Learn to befriend your demons. Practice listening to your parts and try to understand where they’re coming from. You don’t have to give them power or give into their wants, but understanding the needs they try to address or the harms they try to protect you from is a crucial step to deconstructing unhealthy mental habits and reconfiguring your mind.
You have the power to reparent and manage your parts.
Parts therapy is meant to teach you that you have power and agency within yourself:
“Beneath the surface of the protective parts of trauma survivors there exists an undamaged essence, a Self that is confident, curious, and calm, a Self that has been sheltered from destruction by the various protectors that have emerged in their efforts to ensure survival. Once those protectors trust that it is safe to separate, the Self will spontaneously emerge, and the parts can be enlisted in the healing process.” —Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score
It’s important to disidentify from any one part of yourself when learning to manage your experience. You are not your anxiety; anxiety is just a part of you. You are not your anger; anger is just a part of you. You are not your inner critic; your inner critic is just a part of you.
Each part serves a purpose, and you have the power and wisdom within you to discover each parts’ purpose and reconfigure how you go about managing each part’s needs.
Have a conversation with yourself
How you talk to yourself, understand yourself, and relate to yourself affects everything in your life from how you feel on a daily basis to how you connect with the world around you. Take charge of your mental health by having conversations with yourself and the parts you discover.