How to Achieve Inner Peace & Healing

00:00:00.000 | - Welcome to the Huberman Lab Podcast,

00:00:02.240 | where we discuss science

00:00:03.660 | and science-based tools for everyday life.

00:00:05.840 | I'm Andrew Huberman,

00:00:10.400 | and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology

00:00:13.640 | at Stanford School of Medicine.

00:00:15.560 | My guest today is Dr. Richard Schwartz.

00:00:18.080 | Dr. Richard Schwartz is the founder

00:00:19.640 | of Internal Family Systems Therapy,

00:00:22.000 | which is a unique form of therapy

00:00:23.860 | that's less centered on your relationship to other people,

00:00:26.660 | but instead focuses mainly on identifying

00:00:28.880 | the parts of yourself and your personality

00:00:31.120 | that tend to emerge in different situations,

00:00:33.280 | and that tend to create anxiety, resent, or depression.

00:00:36.440 | Another key feature of Internal Family Systems Therapy

00:00:39.480 | is that it's not just focused

00:00:40.760 | on fixing challenges within us,

00:00:42.640 | it also teaches you how to grow your confidence,

00:00:45.060 | openness, and compassion.

00:00:46.640 | Now, today's episode is different

00:00:47.960 | than any other episode of the podcast

00:00:49.840 | that we've done before, and that's for two reasons.

00:00:52.620 | First, Dr. Schwartz takes me through

00:00:54.440 | a brief session of IFS therapy,

00:00:56.440 | so you can see exactly what it looks like in practice,

00:00:59.120 | and then he takes you, the listener, through it as well.

00:01:02.340 | So as you'll soon observe and experience,

00:01:04.560 | Internal Family Systems Therapy

00:01:06.240 | allows you to work through challenging sticking points,

00:01:08.760 | basically the parts or feelings within you

00:01:10.480 | that you don't like to have,

00:01:11.760 | and then it shows you how to convert those feelings

00:01:14.200 | into more functional aspects of yourself.

00:01:16.320 | So as you'll soon see,

00:01:17.480 | Internal Family Systems Therapy is both super interesting

00:01:20.480 | and it's an incredibly empowering practice.

00:01:23.180 | It's also a form of therapy that's now been studied

00:01:25.800 | and for which there's a lot of peer-reviewed science

00:01:27.780 | to support its efficacy.

00:01:29.140 | By the end of today's episode,

00:01:30.800 | Dr. Dick Schwartz will have shown you

00:01:32.560 | that a lot of the negative reactions

00:01:34.200 | that we tend to have with different people and things

00:01:36.720 | tend to originate from a few basic patterns

00:01:39.080 | that once we understand,

00:01:40.560 | we can really transmute into more positive responses.

00:01:43.720 | It's a really interesting practice.

00:01:45.480 | It's one that you can apply today during the episode

00:01:47.840 | and that you can return to

00:01:49.480 | in order to apply going forward in your life.

00:01:52.040 | Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize

00:01:53.960 | that this podcast is separate from my teaching

00:01:55.940 | and research roles at Stanford.

00:01:57.520 | It is, however, part of my desire and effort

00:01:59.680 | to bring zero cost to consumer information

00:02:01.680 | about science and science-related tools

00:02:03.440 | to the general public.

00:02:04.800 | In keeping with that theme,

00:02:06.080 | this episode does include sponsors.

00:02:08.400 | And now for my discussion with Dr. Richard Schwartz.

00:02:12.160 | Dr. Dick Schwartz, welcome.

00:02:14.340 | - Thank you, Andrew.

00:02:15.600 | It's delightful to be with you.

00:02:17.240 | - Yeah, I've heard so much about you and your work

00:02:21.080 | and internal family systems models.

00:02:23.580 | I've had the opportunity to do a little bit of that work.

00:02:28.280 | To be honest, I don't know whether or not

00:02:29.480 | the person I did that work with was formally trained in it.

00:02:32.900 | So I'd like to start off by just asking you,

00:02:35.640 | what is internal family systems

00:02:38.420 | and what are the different components?

00:02:42.200 | And as we do that, I'm sure people are going to be thinking

00:02:44.480 | about these various components for their own life

00:02:47.700 | and the people in their lives.

00:02:49.120 | - Great. - Yeah.

00:02:50.900 | Well, originally I developed it as a form of psychotherapy,

00:02:54.300 | which is probably the way it's used most now,

00:02:56.760 | but it's also become a kind of life practice

00:03:00.120 | and just a paradigm for understanding the human mind

00:03:04.800 | and as an alternative to the culture's paradigm.

00:03:09.000 | So that's saying a lot

00:03:12.760 | and it's been quite a journey.

00:03:16.460 | - I know of Freudian psychoanalysis.

00:03:20.000 | I know of any number of different branches of psychology

00:03:23.920 | that have a clinical slant to them.

00:03:25.800 | There's cognitive behavioral therapy.

00:03:27.640 | What are the core components of internal family systems?

00:03:31.580 | - Yeah, so one basic assumption

00:03:34.400 | is that the mind isn't unitary,

00:03:36.300 | that actually we're all multiple personalities,

00:03:40.220 | not in the diagnostic sense,

00:03:43.200 | but we all have these, what I call parts,

00:03:47.400 | other systems call sub-personalities,

00:03:50.400 | ego states, things like that,

00:03:52.140 | and that it's the natural state of the mind to be that way,

00:03:56.440 | that we're born with them because they're all very valuable

00:04:01.240 | and have qualities and resources

00:04:04.480 | to help us survive and thrive,

00:04:07.620 | but trauma and what's called attachment injuries

00:04:14.320 | and the slings and arrows we suffer

00:04:17.920 | force these little naturally valuable parts

00:04:21.560 | into roles that can be destructive.

00:04:25.200 | Often they don't like it all,

00:04:27.000 | but because they're frozen often in time

00:04:30.320 | during the trauma and they live as if it's still happening,

00:04:34.560 | they're in these protective roles

00:04:36.600 | that can be quite extreme and interfere in your life.

00:04:41.200 | And, yeah, so I just stumbled onto the phenomena

00:04:46.080 | 40, now I think it's 41 years ago,

00:04:49.560 | and it's been an amazing ride.

00:04:52.520 | - So at the time,

00:04:53.360 | were you already practicing as a clinical psychologist?

00:04:56.500 | - Actually, I have a PhD in marital and family therapy,

00:04:58.880 | so I was part of the movement in family therapy

00:05:02.520 | away from intrapsychic work.

00:05:04.640 | There was a polarization and we thought

00:05:08.640 | we could reorganize families

00:05:10.160 | and heal all these symptoms just by doing that.

00:05:13.120 | We didn't have to muck around in the inner world.

00:05:15.760 | And I went to prove that, and this was about 1983,

00:05:20.200 | by getting a group of bulimic kids together

00:05:22.320 | and their families and tried to reorganize the families

00:05:27.320 | just the way the book said to and failed.

00:05:30.840 | Kids didn't realize they'd been cured

00:05:33.720 | and they kept binging and purging.

00:05:36.320 | So out of frustration, I began asking why,

00:05:39.160 | and they started talking this language of parts,

00:05:41.600 | and they would say some version of,

00:05:43.600 | when something bad happens in my life,

00:05:46.440 | it triggers this critic

00:05:47.960 | who's calling me all kinds of names inside,

00:05:51.040 | and that goes right to the heart of a part

00:05:52.740 | that feels empty and alone and worthless.

00:05:56.400 | And that's so distressing to feel

00:05:58.000 | that the binge part comes in and takes me out,

00:06:01.000 | takes me away from all that pain.

00:06:03.440 | But the critic comes in and attacks me for the binge,

00:06:06.760 | and then the criticism goes right to the heart

00:06:10.560 | of that worthless part.

00:06:13.320 | So to me, as a family therapist,

00:06:15.120 | this sounded like what I'd been studying

00:06:17.400 | in external families,

00:06:19.040 | these circular sequences of interaction.

00:06:21.760 | And so I just got curious and just started to explore.

00:06:26.080 | - Are these different parts that exist

00:06:27.760 | within each and all of us,

00:06:30.280 | are they represented by a clear and distinct voice

00:06:33.600 | from the other, or do people typically experience them

00:06:37.400 | as just the self, like my inner critic?

00:06:40.420 | You'll give us the other names and titles.

00:06:44.080 | Or is this happening typically

00:06:47.240 | below people's conscious awareness?

00:06:49.840 | - Some of both.

00:06:50.680 | So most people are aware they're a critic,

00:06:54.080 | but other times you're not aware of these parts

00:06:59.560 | we call exiles that you've locked away

00:07:01.400 | because you didn't want to feel their feelings.

00:07:04.600 | They're stuck in these bad trauma scenes.

00:07:07.840 | And to survive in your life, you had to push them away.

00:07:12.040 | And so with those parts,

00:07:13.360 | a lot of people aren't really consciously aware of them

00:07:17.040 | until these protected parts give space

00:07:20.280 | and open the door to the exiles.

00:07:22.620 | - I'd like to take a quick break

00:07:24.860 | and acknowledge our sponsor, BetterHelp.

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00:07:32.520 | Now, I personally have been doing therapy weekly

00:07:34.360 | for well over 30 years.

00:07:35.880 | In fact, I consider doing regular therapy

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00:09:44.080 | - I definitely want to go into

00:09:46.800 | what the various protector roles or titles are,

00:09:50.720 | labels, excuse me, and the exiles.

00:09:52.840 | Before we do that,

00:09:54.360 | since you brought up the topic of trauma,

00:09:56.560 | this is a topic that I think

00:09:58.040 | many, many people are interested in.

00:10:00.520 | I'm just curious, how do you define a trauma?

00:10:03.460 | And why do you think it is that traumas tend to lock us

00:10:09.960 | into a state that was representative of an earlier time?

00:10:14.960 | Why is it that it's so linked

00:10:17.600 | to this thing of time perception?

00:10:20.760 | - Yeah, the why question I can't totally answer,

00:10:23.640 | but it definitely is.

00:10:25.160 | And for me, traumas aren't necessarily traumatizing.

00:10:28.080 | So something bad happens to you,

00:10:31.540 | and if you can access what you and Martha Beck

00:10:35.720 | were calling the self, to capitalize,

00:10:39.160 | and you go to the part of you

00:10:40.520 | that got hurt by what happened,

00:10:42.940 | instead of pushing it away and locking it up,

00:10:45.240 | and you embrace it and you bring it closer to you,

00:10:49.440 | which means going to your suffering,

00:10:51.760 | which is counter to what most of us try to do.

00:10:55.640 | But if you were to do that,

00:10:57.960 | and you could help it unload the feelings

00:11:00.120 | it got from the trauma,

00:11:02.160 | then you're not traumatized.

00:11:03.980 | What's traumatizing is something bad happens,

00:11:08.920 | these more vulnerable parts of us,

00:11:11.120 | the most sensitive parts of us,

00:11:12.440 | get hurt or feel worthless because of what happened,

00:11:16.080 | or get terrified, and then we lock 'em away

00:11:19.480 | because we don't wanna feel that feeling anymore,

00:11:23.600 | and everybody around us tells us to just let it go,

00:11:26.880 | just move on, don't look back.

00:11:29.480 | And so we wind up exiling our most sensitive parts

00:11:33.860 | simply because they got hurt.

00:11:35.540 | And then when you have a lot of exiles,

00:11:39.360 | you feel more delicate, the world seems more dangerous,

00:11:43.840 | 'cause anything could trigger that.

00:11:45.320 | And when they get triggered, they'll blow up,

00:11:47.880 | they'll take over.

00:11:49.440 | So it's like these flames of raw emotion come popping out.

00:11:53.040 | So other parts are forced into these manager roles

00:11:58.240 | or these protective roles.

00:12:00.340 | And some of them are trying to manage your life

00:12:03.300 | so that you don't get triggered anymore,

00:12:04.960 | so that, for example, nobody gets close enough to you

00:12:08.960 | to trigger any of that,

00:12:11.200 | or so you look really good, so you don't get rejected,

00:12:15.600 | or perform at a really high level

00:12:17.800 | to counter the worthlessness.

00:12:20.120 | Many of those become the critics,

00:12:21.920 | because in their effort to try to get you to look good,

00:12:25.120 | they're yelling at you to try and behave

00:12:26.920 | and do what they want so you look better.

00:12:29.560 | And then there are other, what we call manager protectors,

00:12:34.680 | that are, for some people, particularly women,

00:12:38.680 | have these massive caretaking parts

00:12:41.040 | that don't let them take care of themselves

00:12:42.760 | and take care of everybody else.

00:12:44.800 | So I could go on and on.

00:12:45.680 | There's a lot of common manager roles.

00:12:49.520 | And I want to make clear as I'm talking about this

00:12:51.840 | that these are not the essence of the parts,

00:12:53.720 | and that's a big mistake that most of the field has made,

00:12:56.920 | is to assume the critic is just

00:12:59.520 | an internalized, critical, apparent voice

00:13:02.560 | instead of listening to it and hearing

00:13:05.880 | that it's desperately trying to protect you.

00:13:08.000 | So none of these are what they seem.

00:13:09.820 | It's the role they've been forced into.

00:13:11.800 | And the analogy, again, is to an external family,

00:13:14.760 | like kids in dysfunctional families

00:13:19.360 | are forced into these extreme roles

00:13:22.120 | that aren't who they are.

00:13:23.280 | It's the role they got forced into

00:13:24.680 | by the dynamics of the family.

00:13:26.920 | So the same is true with this internal family.

00:13:29.220 | So most of us have a lot of what we call managers.

00:13:34.960 | They got us here, they help us in our careers,

00:13:39.240 | and they, other systems would call them

00:13:41.420 | the defenses or the ego.

00:13:42.920 | And, you know, in spirituality, they get vilified too.

00:13:48.460 | But their whole MO is keep everything under control,

00:13:54.380 | please everybody, and you'll survive.

00:13:58.940 | The world has a way of breaking through those defenses,

00:14:01.260 | triggering an exile.

00:14:03.280 | When that happens, it's a big emergency.

00:14:05.540 | 'Cause again, these flames of raw emotion

00:14:08.020 | are gonna overwhelm you and make you

00:14:10.500 | have trouble functioning or even getting out of bed.

00:14:14.980 | So there are other parts that immediately go into action

00:14:17.860 | to deal with that emergency.

00:14:19.380 | And in contrast to these managers,

00:14:23.340 | they're impulsive, reactive, damn the torpedoes.

00:14:27.380 | I don't care about the collateral damage to your body,

00:14:30.740 | to your relationships.

00:14:32.460 | I just got to get you higher than those flames

00:14:34.580 | or douse them with some substance

00:14:36.820 | or distract you till they burn themselves out.

00:14:40.100 | So we call those firefighters.

00:14:42.680 | And again, these are just the roles.

00:14:44.980 | When released from these roles,

00:14:46.180 | they'll transform into being something very valuable.

00:14:49.640 | - So the firefighter, the inner firefighter role

00:14:54.580 | is one of the exiles that surfaces

00:14:57.100 | under conditions of a lot of emotion.

00:15:00.140 | Maybe we could, this is a beautiful description

00:15:03.140 | and I'm completely on board this idea

00:15:05.380 | that we have multiple aspects of self or selves inside.

00:15:08.980 | Jung said that too, I think, right?

00:15:10.600 | - Yeah, Jung had all this a long time ago.

00:15:13.300 | - Yeah, and what I like about this protectors/managers

00:15:18.300 | versus, again, not versus because they're combated,

00:15:21.380 | but as a distinct category, the exiles is,

00:15:24.100 | just feels very true to me.

00:15:26.840 | And I like the directness of the language.

00:15:31.300 | So maybe we could just like create a mental grid for people.

00:15:36.300 | Like if, let's say I came to you as a patient

00:15:39.460 | and I said, listen, I'll just be direct.

00:15:42.460 | I'll be honest.

00:15:43.300 | Why not do it?

00:15:44.120 | - Let's do it. - Let's do it.

00:15:45.580 | Secretly, I brought you here to get therapy.

00:15:47.820 | No, but okay.

00:15:50.260 | So I'm somebody who for a very long time

00:15:52.900 | has been able to organize his life.

00:15:54.800 | I tend to have smooth interactions with my coworkers,

00:16:00.080 | great friendships.

00:16:02.100 | I now have a very good relationship

00:16:04.060 | with my immediate family, very good in fact.

00:16:07.860 | I'm still working on a few things with a few people,

00:16:09.960 | but I'm living in a mode of great joy

00:16:14.340 | and appreciation these days.

00:16:16.260 | However, I'm not gonna give the details of this

00:16:19.580 | for sake of privacy, but the other day I was in a discussion

00:16:23.180 | with a family member and they had a grievance with me

00:16:26.100 | that I felt we had already addressed

00:16:27.740 | and it became a very high friction conversation

00:16:31.840 | very quickly to the point where we tabled as an idea

00:16:35.920 | that maybe we just take some serious space,

00:16:38.060 | which was not reflective of how deeply I love this person

00:16:43.320 | or they love me.

00:16:44.160 | It was just a feeling of both of us

00:16:45.320 | just being in this high tension place like, ugh.

00:16:48.480 | And fortunately, the conversation ended well

00:16:53.920 | with a path forward that involved more contact, not less,

00:16:58.920 | that both of us feel really good about.

00:17:01.660 | But in that moment where I'm feeling overwhelmed

00:17:04.960 | and they're feeling overwhelmed, what's going on there?

00:17:10.120 | We're both adults.

00:17:11.580 | - So overwhelmed with anger at each other or--

00:17:13.660 | - Frustration. - Frustration, yeah.

00:17:15.660 | - Frustration, like that previous conversations

00:17:19.460 | I felt I hadn't, I was saying things,

00:17:24.460 | they were saying things, but I feel like there was

00:17:29.400 | so much underlying tension based on a history

00:17:32.120 | of poor communication nested on top of a,

00:17:37.120 | of the kind of an intensity of emotion

00:17:40.400 | that we both tend to carry.

00:17:41.760 | And somehow we just like couldn't parse things

00:17:46.800 | from that state.

00:17:48.320 | And so I sat in my chair and I just told myself,

00:17:50.620 | okay, I'm gonna not say anything for five minutes

00:17:53.860 | because I know myself.

00:17:55.500 | It's not that I thought I would say something

00:17:56.940 | really barbed wire, but I just thought,

00:18:00.300 | this is not gonna work.

00:18:01.340 | Like I'm slamming my head against a wall.

00:18:04.520 | They're not hearing me.

00:18:05.880 | I'm clearly not hearing them.

00:18:08.020 | And the thing that helped me through that was just,

00:18:12.340 | 'cause it was what was taught to me,

00:18:13.320 | I just decided to surrender.

00:18:16.140 | And the word surrender used to mean to me,

00:18:18.160 | letting go of truth.

00:18:20.040 | And it felt really scary because when you say surrender,

00:18:22.620 | it's almost like saying one context is surrender means

00:18:26.080 | you're right no matter, and you're right.

00:18:27.720 | - I was just gonna say, that's right.

00:18:28.760 | - But I've come to realize that surrender to me

00:18:30.880 | is just a surrender in the moment

00:18:33.620 | so that I can get better optics,

00:18:37.480 | internal and external optics.

00:18:40.420 | So to me, the thing of embracing surrender

00:18:43.600 | in those types of moments, very uncomfortable.

00:18:46.200 | But I now have learned it's a great way to get perspective.

00:18:53.240 | But even as I describe it, the whole situation was so heavy.

00:18:59.280 | I came out of that call, even though it ended well

00:19:01.160 | and was like, ugh.

00:19:03.000 | - Yeah. - Like, ugh.

00:19:05.000 | That was like, I'd never run a marathon,

00:19:08.460 | but I'd rather run a marathon than do two of those a week.

00:19:11.240 | - Totally agree.

00:19:12.080 | - Yeah, I had one of those with my wife a few days ago.

00:19:14.880 | - Okay, all right, well.

00:19:16.880 | - And yeah, very similar.

00:19:18.240 | Just caught that part and said,

00:19:21.600 | okay, let's just let it go for now and we'll talk later.

00:19:25.840 | So I could give you my take on what happened,

00:19:28.900 | but if you wanted to,

00:19:30.200 | we could just go in and do a little exploring.

00:19:33.120 | - Sure. - Yeah?

00:19:34.320 | - Yeah, sure.

00:19:35.760 | - Okay, should we start with the frustrated, angry part?

00:19:39.660 | - Sure.

00:19:40.500 | - All right, you ready?

00:19:41.660 | - I believe so, yeah.

00:19:43.380 | - Okay. (laughing)

00:19:45.300 | So remember that feeling,

00:19:47.660 | and then focus on it and find it in your body

00:19:52.020 | or around your body.

00:19:53.140 | Okay, where do you find it?

00:19:58.940 | - Somewhere between the middle of my midsection

00:20:01.740 | and up, like, right behind my forehead.

00:20:04.540 | Like, there's pressure.

00:20:05.980 | - It's great in both places.

00:20:07.180 | It's great you have such clarity about it.

00:20:08.680 | So as you focus there,

00:20:12.180 | how do you feel toward this part of you?

00:20:14.800 | - Oh, no, it's very unpleasant.

00:20:19.180 | - So you don't like it?

00:20:20.380 | - No, I don't like it.

00:20:22.600 | - Yeah, which makes sense,

00:20:25.100 | 'cause it does sometimes escalate things with your friend

00:20:29.460 | and doesn't leave you feeling good.

00:20:32.660 | So I understand why you don't like it,

00:20:36.100 | but we're gonna ask the parts that don't like it

00:20:38.460 | to give us the space to just get curious about it

00:20:41.740 | and see if that's possible.

00:20:43.900 | - Okay.

00:20:44.740 | Okay.

00:20:48.340 | - So how do you feel toward it now?

00:20:50.000 | - A little bit of relaxation in the head part of it.

00:20:55.440 | Yeah, it's funny how when you asked me to localize it,

00:21:02.140 | it's so clear.

00:21:02.980 | It's like this thing inside me.

00:21:04.020 | It's like this about the size of like a teddy bear

00:21:06.040 | that's just like, oh,

00:21:06.880 | but it's not a good thing.

00:21:08.520 | It's like pushed up there.

00:21:09.880 | But then when you said to get curious about it,

00:21:12.940 | it feels like it kind of drops down a little bit

00:21:14.740 | and kind of moves in a little,

00:21:16.240 | maybe softens a little bit.

00:21:17.520 | - So you do feel curious toward it?

00:21:19.280 | - Yeah.

00:21:21.140 | - All right, so go ahead and ask it

00:21:23.340 | what it wants you to know about itself.

00:21:25.560 | - Silently.

00:21:26.680 | - Up to you, either way, whichever is more comfortable.

00:21:29.680 | - Well, since this is a podcast

00:21:31.440 | and none of this is comfortable anyway

00:21:33.380 | for me to do in public, if I'm quite honest.

00:21:37.100 | - Yeah, just ask inside.

00:21:37.940 | - Sure.

00:21:38.780 | No, I'll do it out loud.

00:21:40.300 | Okay, so what do you want me to know about you?

00:21:45.720 | - Yeah, and just wait for the answer.

00:21:47.660 | Don't think.

00:21:48.500 | I know you've got a big cognitive part,

00:21:51.120 | so we're gonna ask that one to relax.

00:21:53.820 | And just whatever comes in terms of the answer,

00:21:56.060 | just wait for it.

00:21:57.020 | - Well, my answer is based on the feeling

00:22:02.020 | that occurred immediately after asking it,

00:22:04.300 | which was, the answer was, I can dissipate.

00:22:09.300 | And then I kind of felt it dissipate.

00:22:12.220 | - Okay.

00:22:13.060 | - So it feels like an energy that when condensed, sucks.

00:22:16.020 | But when I look at it, softened a little bit,

00:22:20.300 | and then asked the question you asked,

00:22:22.140 | and then it feels like it just kind of

00:22:23.740 | went into the rest of my body,

00:22:24.940 | but not poisoning the rest of my body,

00:22:26.940 | just kind of mixing in with,

00:22:30.500 | you know, of course we're speaking in completely,

00:22:32.420 | you know, in mystical terms here, but.

00:22:34.700 | - So it relaxed.

00:22:36.900 | It may not have dissipated in the way we think about that.

00:22:40.220 | It might've just relaxed more.

00:22:42.040 | But just keep asking it, what's it afraid would happen

00:22:46.620 | if in that context, it didn't try to take over

00:22:49.900 | in the way that it did?

00:22:50.900 | Just ask that question.

00:22:52.540 | - That if it didn't try to take over?

00:22:54.860 | - Yeah, what's it afraid would happen

00:22:56.260 | if it hadn't tried to take over?

00:22:58.300 | - Oh.

00:22:59.140 | - Just wait for the answer.

00:23:00.460 | - Yeah, that's a good question.

00:23:02.380 | Okay, so what would happen if you didn't

00:23:05.820 | take over my system that way?

00:23:07.680 | Condensed from my stomach up to my head

00:23:11.300 | when I'm feeling that way?

00:23:12.460 | - Yeah.

00:23:13.280 | Don't think, yeah.

00:23:16.340 | - Oh, the answers are coming really quick.

00:23:19.220 | That I wouldn't be able to discern the truth.

00:23:22.100 | - Okay, so the truth is really important

00:23:24.740 | to this part of you.

00:23:25.740 | - Yeah, yeah, because it tends to surface

00:23:29.500 | when I'm hearing something that I--

00:23:31.400 | - That you know is wrong.

00:23:32.240 | - That I believe to be fundamentally untrue,

00:23:35.400 | typically about my thoughts or feelings, right?

00:23:39.060 | I've come, maybe with age, I've come to the conclusion

00:23:42.500 | that two people can look at the same interaction

00:23:46.020 | or same thing and have two very different versions of it.

00:23:49.380 | I'm okay with that.

00:23:51.020 | The part that I'm very, very sensitive to,

00:23:53.820 | people in my life know this,

00:23:55.220 | is when someone else tells me how I feel.

00:23:57.340 | - Right.

00:23:58.180 | - And what my motives are, or how I feel.

00:24:00.700 | That, to me, is like, (mimics explosion)

00:24:03.580 | that's kind of a hard, fast way to engage this thing.

00:24:08.580 | - Okay, so just stay with this thing, just stay with it.

00:24:11.620 | - Okay.

00:24:12.940 | - And let it know you get that,

00:24:14.500 | that having people misinterpret your motives

00:24:17.780 | is really, really hard for it.

00:24:19.840 | And ask it more about that.

00:24:23.180 | Just, again, don't think, but ask why that's so hard,

00:24:27.700 | why does that bother it so much,

00:24:29.780 | and what's it afraid would happen if it let that go?

00:24:34.420 | - Yeah, so what, why are you afraid to,

00:24:37.640 | or why do you have to step in when that happens?

00:24:41.220 | My answer is not going to be very satisfying

00:24:44.820 | for the listeners, but, or for me.

00:24:46.920 | But it, it's saying,

00:24:51.100 | because if you can't hold on to your truth,

00:24:57.100 | then nothing will make sense.

00:24:59.740 | - So there's something about making sense,

00:25:03.380 | or not, nothing making sense, that it's really scared of.

00:25:07.300 | Is that right?

00:25:08.140 | - Yeah, I mean, I decided to become a biologist,

00:25:12.100 | and to try and understand the meat inside our heads

00:25:17.340 | and body that is the nervous system,

00:25:18.780 | because I felt, and I still feel,

00:25:20.860 | that it can reveal some fundamental facts or truths.

00:25:25.460 | It's, you know, understanding reality, as it were,

00:25:29.940 | is really important to me,

00:25:31.260 | because I feel like humans, including myself, of course,

00:25:36.260 | are so prone to misinterpretation.

00:25:41.940 | So like the truth as a thing out there,

00:25:47.780 | I'm willing to let go of completely, like completely.

00:25:51.620 | The truth as it exists for knowing for certain

00:25:56.100 | what my motivations were, or what did or didn't happen,

00:26:00.220 | but typically it's about motivation.

00:26:01.860 | What did or didn't happen,

00:26:02.700 | you usually can parse with somebody.

00:26:04.220 | - Yeah.

00:26:05.060 | - That's something I feel I need to protect at all costs.

00:26:09.900 | - Yeah, so speaking of protect,

00:26:11.940 | and so this is a protector part, right?

00:26:14.240 | Ask it if it's protecting other parts of you

00:26:17.700 | that are vulnerable and get hurt

00:26:20.300 | when someone misattunes to what your motive is.

00:26:25.300 | Just ask that question, don't think.

00:26:27.180 | - That's an easy, that's a fast one.

00:26:30.020 | Not easy, but it's a fast one.

00:26:31.900 | Yeah, the part of me that feels injured by that

00:26:36.340 | is the fact that I believe that I,

00:26:41.340 | at least at the beginning

00:26:45.820 | and throughout most of a relationship,

00:26:47.980 | and even if a relationship ends for whatever reason,

00:26:50.900 | that I know it's my nature to try and imagine

00:26:55.900 | as much goodness in the intent

00:26:59.700 | of the other person as possible.

00:27:01.740 | So if I were to let go of this response,

00:27:05.420 | keep going, in my mind I'm calling it like this,

00:27:09.220 | it's like a titanium teddy bear shaped thing,

00:27:12.060 | but it doesn't, it's not even feel like a,

00:27:13.340 | it's like a titanium block there.

00:27:16.400 | I would potentially move into a mode of judgment of them.

00:27:23.660 | It's interesting because I,

00:27:29.180 | there are many people from my past

00:27:31.300 | and maybe even a few from my present

00:27:32.820 | that people close to me who are pretty well-qualified

00:27:36.540 | tell me like I should dislike them

00:27:39.980 | or cut them out of my life.

00:27:42.340 | And I don't, there are a few,

00:27:46.620 | maybe one or two instances of people

00:27:48.380 | I've cut out of my life,

00:27:49.360 | but it's my inclination always to just try and see

00:27:51.580 | what can exist.

00:27:54.500 | So that, and that part feels important to me.

00:27:56.780 | I don't know why it's important

00:27:57.740 | now that I've come to think about it.

00:27:59.540 | Like-

00:28:00.380 | - Well, we can ask, but-

00:28:01.660 | - Yeah.

00:28:02.500 | - So what I'm hearing is this guy,

00:28:04.060 | this titanium guy is keeping at bay another part

00:28:09.060 | that can be very judgmental of the other person.

00:28:12.460 | - Yeah, I don't like feeling that.

00:28:13.740 | - Yeah.

00:28:14.580 | - It feels energetically wasteful.

00:28:16.420 | - Yeah.

00:28:17.260 | - And it feels, more than that, it feels incredibly sad.

00:28:19.860 | - Yeah.

00:28:20.700 | - It's sort of like, I think to accept that part of myself

00:28:25.060 | is to kind of give up on some fantasy,

00:28:28.620 | which is probably an unrealistic fantasy,

00:28:31.620 | which is why I'm calling it a fantasy, I realize.

00:28:33.620 | - Yeah.

00:28:34.460 | - Yeah, like this, because I look at,

00:28:38.580 | and I always have since I was a kid,

00:28:40.020 | I look at people as we are among the animals.

00:28:43.940 | We're the curators of the earth

00:28:45.300 | 'cause we're good at technology development,

00:28:47.020 | but aside from that, and our, just like you wouldn't,

00:28:50.420 | I can't imagine that a raccoon looks at another raccoon

00:28:54.740 | and it's like, that's a bad raccoon.

00:28:56.780 | - Right.

00:28:57.620 | - It's just a rabid raccoon.

00:28:58.540 | - Right.

00:28:59.460 | - And they just, I sort of yearn for the same-

00:29:04.460 | - Yeah.

00:29:05.780 | - The same sensitivity to our own species.

00:29:09.500 | - I get that.

00:29:10.340 | - Yeah, like, I don't hate anybody.

00:29:12.460 | - Well, there might be parts of you that do, but-

00:29:15.700 | - I hate behaviors.

00:29:17.020 | - Okay.

00:29:17.860 | - I hate things that people have said or done,

00:29:20.140 | not, certainly, mostly to other people, not to me,

00:29:23.140 | but yeah, being, like, really being angry at someone

00:29:28.140 | in a pervasive way, not just in the moment-

00:29:31.620 | - Yeah.

00:29:32.460 | - Is something that's very difficult for me.

00:29:34.980 | - But what I'm hearing, what we heard from this part,

00:29:38.220 | it's afraid, if it doesn't do this,

00:29:40.540 | a part that judges the other,

00:29:44.420 | probably in a not-so-nice way, would be released.

00:29:49.420 | Does that sound right?

00:29:51.020 | - Yeah.

00:29:51.860 | - So there is that part in there.

00:29:52.780 | It's just that you've been able to kind of exile it.

00:29:55.460 | - Yes.

00:29:58.260 | - Okay.

00:29:59.100 | - Yeah, I'm comfortable with the idea

00:30:00.820 | that you take the appropriate amount of distance,

00:30:04.020 | could be zero or could be near infinite,

00:30:07.740 | but that I should take the appropriate amount of distance

00:30:10.420 | from things and people

00:30:11.660 | so that I can be in the most loving stance

00:30:15.020 | toward them for that.

00:30:16.580 | - Yeah, yeah.

00:30:17.420 | - I'm not trying to sound technical here

00:30:18.300 | with all the parallel constructions,

00:30:19.660 | but I've thought this through a lot.

00:30:21.020 | Like, there's some people that I,

00:30:23.180 | that there's no limit to the extent

00:30:27.540 | to which I want to interact with them.

00:30:29.220 | You know, we have other things to do

00:30:31.220 | and I can spend all our time together.

00:30:32.780 | And then there are other people that I love them,

00:30:35.020 | but I know that I have to keep a certain amount of distance

00:30:38.140 | in order to continue to love them.

00:30:39.860 | This is the same thing.

00:30:41.220 | So in that moment, it's almost like,

00:30:44.180 | but it's coming up without my conscious thing.

00:30:46.940 | It's not like saying, listen,

00:30:47.820 | that's the kind of person I can, you know,

00:30:50.180 | talk to like once a month or something.

00:30:53.460 | And I'll just add, you know, in professional settings,

00:30:56.380 | not now, but in the distant past,

00:30:59.220 | when I was in a very hierarchical structure of,

00:31:02.220 | I'm still in academia, I still teach,

00:31:03.580 | but not running research anymore formally.

00:31:08.260 | You know, like I had a couple senior colleagues

00:31:10.940 | that I really loved and respected,

00:31:13.980 | but that they would say or do things

00:31:17.540 | that I thought were frankly unethical to other people.

00:31:20.300 | And to me, I felt them as kind of abrasive.

00:31:23.180 | So I might, like the physical manifestation of this is,

00:31:26.780 | I would make it a point to like walk past their office door

00:31:30.420 | quickly so that they didn't say,

00:31:31.660 | hey, 'cause I don't want to interact.

00:31:33.620 | But I don't, I'm not familiar

00:31:35.580 | with cutting people out of my life.

00:31:37.780 | I'm just not familiar with doing that.

00:31:39.500 | I don't, I sort of don't believe in it as a value.

00:31:42.020 | - Let's pause for a second.

00:31:43.180 | I'll give you a little overview of where we are.

00:31:46.020 | So we started with this guy who came up with your friend

00:31:49.060 | and is trying to protect that relationship

00:31:52.660 | because if you continue to be misunderstood

00:31:58.280 | in terms of your motives, it would have an impact.

00:32:00.460 | Does that sound right?

00:32:01.300 | - Yeah, the only thing I'll add is a family member.

00:32:04.500 | Yeah, not that matters, but close family member, yeah.

00:32:07.540 | - And in exploring this part,

00:32:11.420 | asking what it's afraid would happen if it didn't do that.

00:32:16.160 | So there's this other part that might come out

00:32:19.980 | that would be very judgmental of that family member

00:32:24.460 | and really might have a bad influence

00:32:27.860 | on your relationship with that person.

00:32:29.540 | Does that sound right?

00:32:30.500 | - That's correct.

00:32:31.460 | - Okay, so we have these two,

00:32:33.380 | well, we have you who's noticing all this,

00:32:36.780 | which we should talk more about.

00:32:39.380 | And then we have these two parts that are sort of polarized,

00:32:42.580 | but one, the judgmental one, you really don't like.

00:32:47.580 | And so you really go to lengths to keep it bay.

00:32:52.080 | And you kind of admire this guy,

00:32:59.060 | but you also know that he can get in the way at times too.

00:33:02.740 | Does all that sound right?

00:33:03.700 | - Yeah, that's right,

00:33:04.540 | because I'm describing a recent situation

00:33:07.380 | where the presence of this like titanium teddy bear,

00:33:10.700 | sorry, I don't know why that's amusing to me to say that.

00:33:13.700 | The shape of a teddy bear,

00:33:16.500 | I'm not seeing a teddy bear in there,

00:33:17.660 | but roughly that size and shape.

00:33:19.540 | It creates a protection, but a pressure internally

00:33:23.420 | that's super uncomfortable.

00:33:25.020 | It's actually taken me a couple of days to dissipate this.

00:33:28.760 | And I do think somewhat counter to the way I'm describing it,

00:33:33.760 | it doesn't prevent me from saying something.

00:33:41.040 | It actually, if it's too much,

00:33:43.400 | it's almost like that's when words start coming out

00:33:46.620 | and they're not kind.

00:33:49.360 | So it's not a real protector in the sense

00:33:52.320 | like it's preventing me from a course of action

00:33:55.800 | I don't wanna take.

00:33:57.040 | It's more, it feels like it's kind of extruding

00:33:59.840 | all this stuff.

00:34:00.680 | And obviously I'm responsible for my words and actions.

00:34:03.360 | I know that, but it does feel like it creates kind of a--

00:34:06.640 | - It kind of takes over.

00:34:07.480 | - It takes over, yeah, that's the way to put it.

00:34:10.420 | - So let's go through that again.

00:34:13.200 | So first of all, I'm so grateful

00:34:17.580 | that you're willing to be this vulnerable

00:34:19.560 | and expose these parts.

00:34:23.580 | So this guy, actually they're both probably

00:34:27.940 | what we call firefighters and very reactive.

00:34:31.820 | There's maybe some other very vulnerable part

00:34:34.540 | that is involved here we haven't heard about.

00:34:37.620 | But if I were to be, if we continue to work together,

00:34:42.180 | I would work to get permission

00:34:44.780 | to go to the judgmental guy too.

00:34:46.740 | And what you would find is he's a protector too.

00:34:52.400 | He's not just a bunch of negative thoughts about people.

00:34:55.400 | And as I was hearing earlier,

00:34:59.120 | you've spent a lot of time in your life

00:35:02.740 | trying to be fair to people and to not judge them

00:35:07.100 | and to see them, what they do is just their behaviors

00:35:10.620 | and not who they are, which is great.

00:35:14.460 | But in the process of doing that sometimes

00:35:17.540 | we wind up having to push away the parts

00:35:19.420 | that wanna judge and wanna hate and so on.

00:35:23.160 | And what I find is if we can go there

00:35:27.960 | and get to know them, they're just protectors too

00:35:32.780 | and they're young and when they are able

00:35:37.780 | to unload the hate they might carry,

00:35:41.180 | the judgment, they'll transform.

00:35:45.020 | So this is a model of transformation in that sense.

00:35:48.740 | And there are no bad parts, you go to everybody in there,

00:35:53.140 | regardless of how you think, how bad they are.

00:35:57.600 | And you get curious about them

00:36:00.140 | and you learn how they're trying to protect.

00:36:03.180 | And then we help them out of their protective roles

00:36:06.340 | and help them trust.

00:36:08.380 | There's a you, who you talked about with Martha,

00:36:11.280 | who can run things, but they don't have to do it

00:36:14.420 | 'cause most of them are young.

00:36:16.900 | And get them to trust this you to handle your family member

00:36:21.900 | rather than they have to take over

00:36:25.580 | or try to take over in the way they did.

00:36:28.020 | Does this make any sense?

00:36:29.060 | - Yeah, it makes total sense.

00:36:30.660 | You know, what you said at the beginning,

00:36:32.460 | permission to go to the judgmental part.

00:36:35.260 | I was just, my mind flits when I hear that, flits too.

00:36:44.460 | You know, two possibilities, one's a novel possibility,

00:36:47.500 | one's a familiar possibility.

00:36:48.900 | The familiar possibility is if I were to really feel

00:36:52.420 | the disappointment that I'm feeling

00:36:56.340 | when this pattern in the other person shows up again,

00:37:01.340 | 'cause at least it seems to,

00:37:03.140 | I'm very familiar with the pattern,

00:37:05.140 | then it would fundamentally like change

00:37:10.140 | the way that I feel about them.

00:37:12.140 | - That's right.

00:37:12.960 | - I'm just trying to hold on to the goodness in it.

00:37:14.860 | - That's right.

00:37:15.700 | - But of course, I wanna be very clear,

00:37:18.820 | not just for anyone listening, but for myself too,

00:37:20.900 | that clearly that the protecting role

00:37:25.900 | of this titanium teddy bear has created something

00:37:30.860 | where what the times when things have broken through

00:37:34.140 | from my side, they're not kind.

00:37:36.100 | - Right.

00:37:37.020 | - And or they're spoken in a way

00:37:39.740 | that just is not constructive.

00:37:42.020 | - Right.

00:37:42.860 | - Right, so yeah.

00:37:47.860 | And then the second possibility is that,

00:37:50.340 | I hadn't considered this possibility,

00:37:53.100 | but the second possibility is that were I to

00:37:58.100 | let myself feel that disappointment,

00:38:01.800 | that maybe the relationship could persist.

00:38:03.900 | Like I've been looking at those things as mutually-

00:38:08.440 | - Exclusive.

00:38:09.280 | - Exclusive.

00:38:10.100 | - Yeah.

00:38:11.180 | - And as I say all this, I also realized that,

00:38:15.880 | well, the honest disclaimer is like,

00:38:20.180 | I don't wanna give the impression

00:38:21.200 | that I don't judge people.

00:38:23.100 | I'm human and I certainly do.

00:38:24.940 | I'm just saying that when there's a relationship

00:38:26.620 | that I wish to maintain, I'll go to great lengths

00:38:30.180 | to push aside knowledge of my own experience

00:38:34.140 | and or just judgment.

00:38:35.400 | I've made this, I've engaged in this pattern

00:38:39.660 | in ways that ended up being extremely destructive to me

00:38:42.900 | by completely like putting the blinders

00:38:46.780 | onto things that were right in front of me.

00:38:48.160 | - And that's what I'm talking about.

00:38:49.000 | - Consciously.

00:38:49.820 | - That's what I'm talking about.

00:38:50.660 | - Because I adored the person so much in other dimensions,

00:38:54.420 | like that, and it's not a, for lack of a better word,

00:38:58.660 | a holistic way to approach things.

00:39:00.440 | But I also will say that in contrast

00:39:04.220 | to those types of relationships,

00:39:05.820 | the relationships where the titanium tenor

00:39:09.900 | where it's not required feel to me.

00:39:13.060 | So like by comparison,

00:39:14.300 | but also in the absolute scale feel to me,

00:39:16.540 | like the best possible relationships one could have.

00:39:19.820 | They're like pinch me type of relationships,

00:39:21.620 | like our friendship, some of my relationships to family,

00:39:24.500 | like my coworkers and there are others too.

00:39:27.540 | Certainly I had romantic relationships like that,

00:39:30.260 | relationships, my relationship to my dog.

00:39:33.060 | It's trivial as people might think that seems

00:39:34.820 | to the contrast of that,

00:39:37.060 | like where there's no need for this protector part.

00:39:40.680 | It's like the best thing

00:39:43.860 | because it feels completely safe and uninhibited.

00:39:48.140 | I never have to worry

00:39:48.980 | that I'm gonna be taken over from the inside.

00:39:52.540 | Nor do I ever worry that I'm gonna like really screw up.

00:39:56.980 | And I hope that if I do screw up, they'll tell me,

00:39:58.780 | but like it's the complete absence of fear.

00:40:04.740 | - So let me check in and just see how this has been

00:40:07.060 | to discuss and focus and so on.

00:40:11.260 | What's it been like to do this process?

00:40:13.500 | - It's a lot in the sense that I don't like feeling

00:40:21.580 | that titanium thing, teddy bear.

00:40:24.820 | It's been very informative.

00:40:28.620 | So it's balanced by that.

00:40:30.260 | And maybe that's why I went into a little riff

00:40:33.580 | about the pleasant relationships

00:40:36.460 | and how outsized positive they are for me.

00:40:39.980 | They're like a salve and an elixir for me

00:40:44.420 | that maybe I gave myself a little like wash over with that

00:40:48.780 | 'cause it's pretty uncomfortable,

00:40:50.740 | but it's really informative.

00:40:54.420 | And it also tells me that the internal family systems work

00:40:57.280 | that I did with someone else was an attempt at this,

00:40:59.660 | but so very different, which makes sense

00:41:01.180 | because this is your art and science.

00:41:04.240 | So I'm grateful.

00:41:05.820 | Yeah, it feels good.

00:41:07.380 | - What I was saying earlier is if we were to pursue it,

00:41:10.780 | we could get to the point where the teddy bear guy

00:41:15.460 | could unload the feelings he carries

00:41:18.020 | that makes it so uncomfortable and he would transform.

00:41:21.820 | - How would we go about doing that?

00:41:25.140 | - You would focus on him again.

00:41:27.900 | You would explore more of what he's protecting.

00:41:30.460 | Either we would go to the guy he's trying to keep at bay

00:41:33.820 | that would ruin a relationship,

00:41:35.960 | or often these parts are protecting

00:41:38.060 | something much more vulnerable from your past.

00:41:41.260 | Some young part that's stuck somewhere in the past

00:41:45.180 | that has a big issue about being misunderstood

00:41:47.860 | in terms of motives or something.

00:41:49.500 | - Yeah, not that I need clarity on this right now,

00:41:54.340 | but it's more that it protects the possibility

00:41:59.260 | of a relationship at all.

00:42:01.220 | I think the fear is like,

00:42:02.380 | if I were to look through my lens of truth

00:42:05.100 | at what's happened or is happening in the moment,

00:42:08.040 | if I were a "better boundaried person,"

00:42:11.020 | it'd be done yesterday.

00:42:12.460 | So it's sort of like a desire to live out a fantasy.

00:42:17.380 | - Got it.

00:42:19.340 | - I mean, if I'm honest.

00:42:20.820 | - So that would be the part that we would go to

00:42:24.200 | that it protects, that has this fantasy

00:42:27.020 | of what a relationship should be or could be,

00:42:30.120 | who might be stuck somewhere in the past,

00:42:33.500 | and we would witness,

00:42:36.820 | you know, you talked with Martha about compassionate witness,

00:42:39.740 | we would witness where he's stuck

00:42:41.920 | and what was happening back then,

00:42:44.420 | and then I would have you go in

00:42:45.900 | and get him out of that time period.

00:42:47.700 | Then we'd have him unload the desire for that fantasy

00:42:54.480 | that keeps you getting hurt,

00:42:57.200 | and then I would have the teddy bear see

00:43:00.680 | it doesn't have to protect him anymore,

00:43:02.760 | and then we would help the teddy bear

00:43:04.520 | unload the feelings he carries,

00:43:07.620 | and then he could relax,

00:43:10.200 | and they would all start to trust you,

00:43:11.960 | which we should talk about a little bit now.

00:43:14.240 | Who is you?

00:43:15.760 | Who's separate from these others?

00:43:17.480 | - For the record, I never owned a teddy bear as a kid.

00:43:21.200 | I had a stuffed frog.

00:43:22.560 | - I had a teddy bear.

00:43:23.400 | - I had a, well, I'm not embarrassed to tell you,

00:43:24.920 | I had a stuffed frog that I loved,

00:43:26.300 | it was an Afraidy the Frog,

00:43:27.640 | and so I don't know where the teddy bear thing came up,

00:43:31.920 | but it was, the shape was so very clear.

00:43:34.640 | - But let me just elaborate on what I was just saying,

00:43:37.800 | 'cause when you separated from him and you found him here,

00:43:42.800 | and I asked you how you felt toward him,

00:43:46.720 | and you had an attitude about him at first, remember?

00:43:49.960 | We got that to relax and got curious about him.

00:43:53.400 | Then you started to access more of what I call yourself

00:43:56.560 | with a capital S.

00:43:57.800 | - So it comes through curiosity.

00:44:00.720 | - Well, often starts with curiosity.

00:44:03.380 | And just to backtrack a little bit,

00:44:07.620 | so when I would have these clients in the early days

00:44:12.160 | starting to work with these parts,

00:44:14.320 | like the critic and so on,

00:44:15.980 | and once I got hip to the fact they weren't what they seemed,

00:44:19.960 | that they deserved to be listened to

00:44:21.280 | rather than fought with,

00:44:22.720 | so I would help the parts that hated them step out,

00:44:28.560 | and clients could do that pretty readily.

00:44:30.600 | And then I would say,

00:44:32.960 | now how do you feel toward this critic?

00:44:35.600 | And spontaneously people would say,

00:44:36.760 | I'm just curious about why he calls me names all the time.

00:44:40.000 | Or even would say, I feel sorry for it

00:44:41.960 | that it has to do this, I'm gonna help it.

00:44:44.320 | And when they were in that state,

00:44:49.620 | and I would ask, what part of you is that?

00:44:53.100 | That's great, let's keep that around.

00:44:54.540 | They'd say, that's not a part like these others, that's me.

00:44:57.140 | That's my essence, or that's my self.

00:45:00.780 | So I came to call that the self with a capital S.

00:45:03.220 | 40 years later, thousands of people

00:45:05.660 | doing this all over the world.

00:45:07.860 | Turns out that that self is in everybody

00:45:10.620 | just beneath the surface of these parts

00:45:14.380 | so that when they open space, you can access it quickly,

00:45:18.100 | and has all these great qualities,

00:45:19.700 | what I call the eight Cs.

00:45:21.620 | So curious, but also calm, confident,

00:45:26.420 | compassionate, courageous, clear,

00:45:31.420 | creative, and connected.

00:45:33.720 | And that person knows how to heal these parts.

00:45:39.300 | So once I get somebody in a lot of what we call self,

00:45:43.580 | I'll just say, okay, what do you wanna say to this part?

00:45:45.900 | And how does it react?

00:45:47.820 | And now what do you wanna do with the part?

00:45:49.860 | I can kind of get out of the way.

00:45:52.100 | And one of the hallmarks of IFS,

00:45:53.740 | as opposed to a lot of other therapies,

00:45:55.780 | is that it's not so much about me becoming

00:45:59.580 | that good attachment figure to these hurting parts of you,

00:46:04.420 | these inner children.

00:46:06.140 | You become that.

00:46:07.300 | You become the good attachment figure yourself,

00:46:10.660 | or the good inner parent,

00:46:11.900 | or the good internal leader for these parts.

00:46:16.260 | And they come to trust you as a leader.

00:46:19.060 | And then you get into it with your family member,

00:46:22.340 | and you just remind the part, no, I can handle this.

00:46:24.460 | Just let me stay.

00:46:26.940 | And now when that happens with my wife,

00:46:29.460 | sometimes, not on a good day,

00:46:32.820 | I can stay in the C-word qualities

00:46:35.660 | and have a totally different conversation with her

00:46:38.380 | than if that protector took over.

00:46:40.260 | - I'd like to take a quick break

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00:49:25.500 | I'm struck by a couple of things

00:49:27.860 | that I think people will be, if I may, wise to think about.

00:49:33.460 | One is, yeah, in the classic psychodynamic

00:49:37.180 | or CBT model of therapy,

00:49:39.380 | it's clear that the client or patient,

00:49:44.260 | sometimes it's called, right?

00:49:45.940 | Patient-therapist relationship is one

00:49:48.460 | where it takes on certain components

00:49:52.300 | that exist in the outside world with other people.

00:49:55.220 | And it's always slightly bothered me

00:50:00.180 | slash concerned me that that's the structure.

00:50:04.740 | And as you said, in IFS, internal family systems,

00:50:09.180 | you become your own kind of therapist,

00:50:11.820 | if you will, for lack of a better way to put it.

00:50:14.540 | I like that because there's so much discussion nowadays

00:50:19.540 | about parenting yourself and this kind of thing

00:50:23.620 | and learning to mother yourself and father yourself.

00:50:26.900 | And I actually think there's great value in that.

00:50:28.520 | I mean, I learned by living alone,

00:50:30.700 | how to cook for myself and clean for myself.

00:50:32.600 | These are, I'm mapping to stereotypes here,

00:50:34.780 | but also to protect myself and to organize myself

00:50:38.900 | and be very, very disciplined.

00:50:40.500 | And actually running a laboratory

00:50:43.020 | was a great teaching there

00:50:44.660 | 'cause you're basically a single academic parent

00:50:47.620 | to all these people.

00:50:49.020 | So you have to, you quickly realize

00:50:50.820 | where you lack maternal instincts

00:50:52.700 | and where you may lack or overemphasize

00:50:56.580 | or have hypertrophied paternal instincts.

00:50:59.140 | So that was a good forum to see my weaknesses

00:51:02.640 | and hopefully some strengths too.

00:51:04.440 | So I like this idea

00:51:05.360 | that one can play those roles for oneself.

00:51:08.380 | How is IFS typically done

00:51:13.280 | if somebody doesn't have access to a therapist

00:51:15.700 | who's expert in it,

00:51:16.920 | or is that really the only proper gateway into it?

00:51:20.280 | - No, so-

00:51:21.640 | - 'Cause I'm sitting here with the master,

00:51:24.720 | the founder, and I'm very grateful, by the way,

00:51:28.460 | for the work we just did.

00:51:29.780 | So thank you, it feels good.

00:51:32.220 | - It was a privilege.

00:51:33.060 | - Yeah, thank you.

00:51:33.900 | Yeah, likewise.

00:51:34.820 | But most people won't have direct one-on-one access to you.

00:51:39.020 | So it's very experiential.

00:51:44.020 | I imagine in books and courses,

00:51:49.640 | people can learn how to do this.

00:51:50.800 | And by the way, this was not preconceived

00:51:53.300 | as a pitch for books and courses,

00:51:55.060 | but I'm wondering,

00:51:56.500 | can somebody do this on their own the very first time?

00:51:59.740 | That's what I wanna know.

00:52:00.580 | - Yeah, yeah.

00:52:01.400 | So for a long time,

00:52:03.740 | I resisted trying to take this directly to the public

00:52:06.900 | because I learned the hard way that some systems,

00:52:11.420 | particularly people with huge amounts of trauma,

00:52:13.940 | are quite delicate.

00:52:15.420 | And if you start going to the part we talked about

00:52:19.960 | that's vulnerable inside,

00:52:21.380 | that has this view of relationships,

00:52:23.820 | this kind of idealized view of relationships of yours,

00:52:28.240 | would be what I call an exile,

00:52:32.200 | that if we were to go to it,

00:52:35.700 | and we won't today

00:52:38.900 | 'cause it requires a lot of vulnerability,

00:52:41.140 | but if we were to,

00:52:42.980 | a lot of extreme protectors might come out

00:52:46.260 | and then people start to get scared.

00:52:49.220 | So it took a long time to figure out

00:52:54.220 | how we might bring it to the public in a safer way.

00:52:57.300 | And so we just put out a workbook for people

00:53:01.900 | and it doesn't involve necessarily going to those places,

00:53:05.700 | but there's a huge amount you can do

00:53:07.380 | just by working the way we started to

00:53:10.660 | with these protectors and getting to know them

00:53:12.740 | and know that they're not you.

00:53:14.140 | They're just a part trying their best.

00:53:15.980 | And no, it's not anything negative.

00:53:18.080 | That judgmental part you've got such an attitude about

00:53:21.780 | or fear of,

00:53:22.780 | if you were just to begin getting curious about it

00:53:27.260 | and getting to know it a bit,

00:53:28.360 | you'd find out that it's a very valuable part

00:53:31.660 | that has a lot of discernment, like you said,

00:53:34.680 | you know, and wants desperately to keep you

00:53:37.300 | from getting in these relationships where you get hurt

00:53:40.300 | and gets so judgmental because you don't listen to it.

00:53:45.220 | Do you follow what I'm saying?

00:53:47.140 | - I do.

00:53:48.180 | I do.

00:53:49.020 | In fact, something pops to mind,

00:53:50.180 | maybe I could just ask you about it.

00:53:51.980 | My mind's right on what you're saying,

00:53:55.780 | but you know, something occurred to me as you said it,

00:53:58.420 | which is if I were to, for instance,

00:54:03.040 | really feel the feeling of like,

00:54:05.140 | hey, that's really screwed up or like that's not,

00:54:07.560 | like actually feel the disappointment or judgment

00:54:10.300 | that this titanium teddy bear is trying to protect against,

00:54:15.980 | I realize it leads to a lot of role confusion

00:54:18.940 | and identity confusion.

00:54:20.360 | - That's right.

00:54:21.200 | - And I'll just be very blunt.

00:54:22.740 | It's probably not the best thing to do on a podcast,

00:54:25.100 | but I'm going to do it anyway, which is, you know,

00:54:27.220 | this is how I feel about modern politics.

00:54:29.740 | I see things on the left that make sense to me

00:54:33.660 | and things that are to me, just absolutely ludicrous,

00:54:36.660 | inappropriate and offensive and like just badly wrong.

00:54:41.660 | I see things on the right that make a ton of sense to me

00:54:44.960 | and also things that are inappropriate, offensive and wrong.

00:54:49.020 | And as a consequence, I'm trying to see the best,

00:54:51.140 | the goodness in both sides and just kind of create

00:54:54.200 | this kind of a Swiss cheese model of the world,

00:54:57.540 | talking about politics, 'cause it's just simpler to do

00:54:59.660 | and people at least know what the groups

00:55:01.540 | we're talking about.

00:55:02.500 | And, but then it leads me in a place of no affiliation.

00:55:07.380 | And I'm then between one of two stances,

00:55:10.580 | one of just kind of standing there being like, yeah,

00:55:13.960 | well, there's no real position in the middle

00:55:16.180 | that is an official position in the middle,

00:55:18.640 | but it also makes me just want to put up the middle finger

00:55:23.020 | to both and say, I'm a double hater, but of course,

00:55:25.980 | I'm an adult and a citizen who cares about people

00:55:29.180 | in the country.

00:55:30.020 | And so I feel like to be an adult, I can't opt out,

00:55:33.720 | but there's like, I feel unaffiliated.

00:55:36.140 | I feel like there's no option for me.

00:55:38.060 | And this maps pretty well to, I think,

00:55:42.140 | the identity and role confusion that I feel

00:55:44.640 | when I place my, again, understanding the truth

00:55:49.320 | is a complicated thing, but my judgment on things

00:55:54.060 | and people is like, well, then what is my role as a son?

00:55:56.680 | What is my role as a partner?

00:55:58.960 | What is my role if this thing is true?

00:56:01.680 | And so it's a way I'm realizing of protecting

00:56:05.200 | the simplicity of a role.

00:56:07.640 | And I did grow up in a home where like the roles were like,

00:56:10.040 | you know, you're a son, you do certain things,

00:56:11.680 | like, you know, you do, you know, and so,

00:56:16.680 | but I also have a rebellious side to me.

00:56:18.420 | So the role confusion is something that I imagine

00:56:23.420 | a lot of people are familiar with.

00:56:26.640 | - Yeah.

00:56:28.200 | - And when one, and I also believe that when you just really

00:56:32.420 | say, well, they did something bad, therefore all bad,

00:56:35.880 | therefore I'm part of the opposite team.

00:56:37.680 | - Right.

00:56:38.520 | - Which to me is an unlived life.

00:56:40.840 | - Yeah.

00:56:41.680 | - It's like, but I see a lot of people do it.

00:56:43.680 | And actually sometimes I'm envious of people

00:56:46.020 | that have that ability because they seem so unconflicted.

00:56:50.220 | - Right.

00:56:51.240 | - So it's a tough thing to be a thinking, feeling person

00:56:53.960 | at the level of nuance.

00:56:55.120 | - Yeah.

00:56:55.960 | - It kind of sucks sometimes.

00:56:57.440 | - Yeah.

00:56:58.280 | - I'd rather do that than be a double hater

00:57:02.400 | or just cleanly opt in.

00:57:06.880 | - Yeah.

00:57:07.720 | - Does that make sense?

00:57:08.560 | - Totally makes sense.

00:57:09.380 | - Okay.

00:57:10.220 | - And what I'm hearing is that when you're looking

00:57:13.600 | at a person or a political party or issue in the world,

00:57:18.120 | you'll hear from these conflicted parts.

00:57:20.360 | They each have perspective, just like our country now,

00:57:24.320 | hears from these conflicted parts.

00:57:26.220 | But you don't have a lot of access to what I'm calling self

00:57:30.400 | in those contexts.

00:57:31.800 | 'Cause one of the C words is clarity.

00:57:35.720 | So again, as I was listening to you and Martha,

00:57:39.480 | you were talking about how there are times

00:57:41.360 | where you just have this sense in your body

00:57:43.680 | of what's right or what's true.

00:57:45.380 | That's what I'm calling self.

00:57:47.600 | Self has that clarity.

00:57:49.300 | And self sees injustice and self,

00:57:54.320 | some of those C words are courage, confidence and clarity.

00:58:02.160 | So there's an impulse also to act to correct imbalance,

00:58:06.100 | to correct injustice too.

00:58:09.200 | So self isn't a kind of passive witness

00:58:11.280 | as it is in a lot of spiritual traditions in IFS.

00:58:14.960 | It's an active inner leader, it's an active external leader.

00:58:18.120 | And too often, our actions are driven

00:58:23.640 | by these protective parts.

00:58:25.860 | And that's true in our politics now too.

00:58:29.580 | So one of my goals is to try to bring more self leadership

00:58:33.220 | to the world, to all these conflicts.

00:58:36.760 | But to do that, people have to unburden,

00:58:42.340 | they have to release these extreme beliefs and emotions

00:58:44.620 | they got from their traumas in the past.

00:58:46.620 | We have a concept we call legacy burdens.

00:58:51.100 | So many people have inherited these extreme beliefs

00:58:55.940 | and emotions that came down through their ancestors.

00:58:59.780 | And drive their parts, drive their extremes.

00:59:03.980 | And many conflicts in the world

00:59:06.700 | are driven by these legacy burdens.

00:59:08.800 | And we've gotten good at helping people unload these things.

00:59:13.760 | - Yeah, we've seen this in the Middle East recently.

00:59:15.540 | - Totally, and we're doing a lot of work

00:59:18.420 | in the Middle East.

00:59:19.260 | So we have training programs there,

00:59:21.780 | we have, and one of my visions

00:59:24.300 | is to have large scale legacy unburdenings

00:59:28.300 | where large groups of people come together

00:59:30.100 | and we help them unload the Holocaust legacy burdens

00:59:33.660 | on the one side and the 1941 legacy burdens

00:59:38.100 | on the Palestinian side.

00:59:39.820 | And have more self accessible to each side.

00:59:44.820 | And when, like when we do couples therapy

00:59:47.180 | or we do other kinds of negotiated conflict,

00:59:51.260 | if people's parts start getting into it,

00:59:53.580 | we'll just say time out.

00:59:55.700 | You sort of did this on your own with your family member.

00:59:58.940 | Just say time out, want both of you to go inside,

01:00:02.500 | find the parts that have been doing the speaking.

01:00:05.340 | Don't come back until you can speak for them

01:00:08.180 | but not from them.

01:00:09.340 | And come back in these C word qualities,

01:00:13.300 | in that state of self.

01:00:15.100 | We can hold people in that,

01:00:17.420 | it's really easy to get out of the conflict.

01:00:20.320 | If their protectors are going at it all the time,

01:00:23.580 | conflicts never change, so.

01:00:25.800 | - Do you think that people who have the reflex

01:00:32.220 | or the ability to kind of somaticize a bit,

01:00:38.180 | like I obviously, I don't think of myself as somebody

01:00:40.640 | who's like psychosomatic.

01:00:42.220 | I don't have stomach aches and headaches and stuff

01:00:45.180 | unless I caught a virus, you know.

01:00:47.320 | But I can feel where certain things are in my body

01:00:51.140 | pretty quickly and always have.

01:00:53.920 | Do you think that IFS lends itself better

01:00:58.800 | to people who, you know, feel things somatically

01:01:03.800 | versus people that are like really cognitive

01:01:06.520 | and in their head?

01:01:07.360 | 'Cause I have that component too.

01:01:08.800 | I can actually feel the switch.

01:01:10.280 | - Yeah.

01:01:11.120 | - Like I do it through, I'll go into like a narrative

01:01:12.820 | and then I start to see the structure like up here.

01:01:15.440 | - Yeah.

01:01:16.360 | - And--

01:01:17.360 | - Yeah, that happened several times

01:01:18.680 | when we were working together.

01:01:21.000 | Like I would have you stay with something

01:01:22.760 | and then the narrator part would kick in.

01:01:25.280 | - Yeah.

01:01:26.120 | - And then I would try to refocus you.

01:01:28.940 | But, you know, I've lived in Boston for 10 years,

01:01:32.480 | so I worked with lots of cognitive people

01:01:36.200 | who didn't know their bodies, who had, you know,

01:01:38.440 | just were in that rat race to try and get tenure and so on.

01:01:43.440 | - Been there.

01:01:44.680 | - Yes, me too.

01:01:45.520 | - Yeah.

01:01:46.520 | Tenure's nice, but one should tend to their emotional cells

01:01:50.080 | while they're pursuing it.

01:01:51.920 | But just to answer your question, they can do it,

01:01:55.840 | but we first have to start with that thinking part

01:01:59.400 | and get it on board and get it to step out

01:02:02.160 | and to stay out long enough that they can feel their bodies.

01:02:06.520 | So, yeah, you know, it lends itself to anybody,

01:02:11.320 | but with people like that,

01:02:12.960 | it takes a while for that thinking part to trust

01:02:15.920 | that it's safe to let them into their bodies.

01:02:20.180 | - So if we were to just step back for a moment

01:02:22.520 | and do sort of a top contour summary of the process,

01:02:26.680 | someone brings forward a memory,

01:02:33.760 | a recent or distant memory of something

01:02:37.120 | that made them feel not good,

01:02:38.560 | and you try and localize some sensation in the body,

01:02:43.880 | get a sense of its location.

01:02:44.720 | - Let me pause there, I'll tell you why.

01:02:46.260 | - Yeah.

01:02:47.080 | - Because if they find it in their body,

01:02:50.140 | and they direct the question there

01:02:51.580 | and they wait for the answer to come from there,

01:02:54.100 | they're less likely to be in their head.

01:02:56.300 | So it sort of short-circuits that thinking part.

01:02:59.820 | So many people come to therapy,

01:03:02.380 | and that thinking part thinks

01:03:03.620 | it's supposed to do the therapy.

01:03:05.300 | It's, you know, CBT or whatever.

01:03:08.180 | Even a lot of the more, not experiential,

01:03:11.520 | but a lot of the more psychodynamic therapies,

01:03:14.360 | the thinking part is really trying to explain

01:03:17.640 | why they feel stuff.

01:03:18.940 | - Right.

01:03:19.780 | - So this is getting them out of that

01:03:21.540 | and getting them to actually listen inside

01:03:25.020 | into what they think is their body,

01:03:27.220 | but it's really these parts that live down there

01:03:30.100 | that they haven't had access to

01:03:32.060 | 'cause the thinking part is running things so much.

01:03:35.340 | - Got it.

01:03:36.260 | And then one places some attention

01:03:39.420 | from the stance of curiosity.

01:03:41.540 | They're like, what's there, what's it trying to say?

01:03:44.460 | - Exactly, so.

01:03:45.300 | - And then you start to reveal the underlying layers

01:03:48.420 | of what's it protecting,

01:03:50.020 | what are those things that are protective trying to say?

01:03:53.460 | - Yeah, it's not even you're trying to reveal.

01:03:55.820 | It's just that you're asking these questions

01:03:58.340 | and the answers start coming.

01:03:59.900 | - I see.

01:04:00.740 | Oh, I love this 'cause I'm a big believer

01:04:02.380 | in seeding the unconscious mind

01:04:03.900 | and then letting things surface,

01:04:05.340 | either in sleep or in meditative states.

01:04:08.740 | Has internal family systems been combined

01:04:15.220 | with some of the therapies that are now getting tested

01:04:18.820 | still in clinical trial stage around psychedelics?

01:04:24.860 | - Yeah, in fact, two days ago,

01:04:27.860 | we just completed a IFS and ketamine retreat.

01:04:32.580 | - Oh, wow.

01:04:33.420 | - So we had, and we're doing it more and more.

01:04:35.220 | Like I said, I'm trying to bring this more

01:04:36.940 | out of the psychotherapy world.

01:04:39.020 | So we invited 32 leaders to come of various kinds

01:04:44.180 | and had three days where they do ketamine

01:04:48.020 | and then do IFS.

01:04:49.500 | The nice thing about psychedelics

01:04:52.100 | is it puts those manager parts to sleep somehow

01:04:55.220 | a lot of the time.

01:04:56.500 | - Yeah, I've been open about the fact

01:04:58.420 | and I always have to provide the disclaimer.

01:05:00.980 | I don't just say this to protect me.

01:05:02.620 | I say this to protect listeners

01:05:03.900 | that I do think young people should avoid psychedelics.

01:05:08.900 | The brain is already in a psychedelic state.

01:05:11.020 | - I do too, yeah.

01:05:12.780 | - The amount of plasticity, and this is really tremendous.

01:05:16.060 | And this is coming from somebody who regrets it,

01:05:18.780 | but I did psychedelics recreationally as a kid.

01:05:21.940 | - Me too.

01:05:22.780 | - And I regret it.

01:05:24.220 | I returned to them later in a clinical setting

01:05:27.580 | and derived a lot of benefit, I think, from them,

01:05:31.820 | namely high-dose psilocybin and MDMA,

01:05:35.660 | but both of those are still very much illegal.

01:05:39.180 | You can get into a lot of trouble for taking them

01:05:41.340 | and/or certainly for selling them.

01:05:43.300 | So that's the cautionary note there.

01:05:46.260 | And the clinical trials are really impressive,

01:05:48.500 | in my opinion, spectacularly impressive,

01:05:50.540 | especially for MDMA and for the treatment of PTSD.

01:05:54.260 | But the FDA, this last year, did not approve MDMA

01:05:59.260 | as a treatment for PTSD.

01:06:01.180 | I think going forward in the new administration,

01:06:04.300 | it's likely that it will get approved, but who knows?

01:06:08.220 | So anyway, that's a bunch of pseudo-legalese jargon,

01:06:12.340 | but it's sincere.

01:06:14.220 | If I were an 18 or 19-year-old person

01:06:18.100 | or 30-year-old person listening to a conversation

01:06:20.220 | about psychedelics and how they can be helpful,

01:06:22.980 | I would want to also know that there are instances

01:06:25.700 | where people take them

01:06:26.540 | and they don't have the appropriate guidance

01:06:28.100 | in and through it and out of it,

01:06:29.900 | and it leads to serious problems.

01:06:32.100 | So this is a real, real thing that we're talking about.

01:06:35.900 | And that's why these ketamine clinics

01:06:38.300 | where they just hand 'em the drugs and the medicine

01:06:41.460 | and just leave 'em on their own are scary to me.

01:06:43.860 | I'm proud to say that IFS has been adopted

01:06:48.100 | as one of the primary models for psychedelics now,

01:06:52.140 | 'cause it's a really nice fit.

01:06:54.140 | And as I was saying earlier,

01:06:56.180 | what I see happening often, not always,

01:06:59.340 | is these manager parts go offline,

01:07:02.860 | and that releases a lot of self.

01:07:05.060 | So you start to just feel those C-word qualities emerging.

01:07:10.060 | And that's a big invitation to all these exiled parts

01:07:16.100 | to come and get attention.

01:07:18.260 | And so as people come out of the ketamine experience,

01:07:22.780 | I can work with 'em for 15 minutes

01:07:24.620 | and do something that would take maybe five sessions,

01:07:27.780 | because they can get access to parts

01:07:30.860 | that they couldn't get,

01:07:32.260 | or it would take a long time to convince their protectors

01:07:35.180 | to let us go to.

01:07:36.980 | And we can unburden those exiles

01:07:38.740 | and then bring back their protectors.

01:07:41.660 | And so I love it.

01:07:43.980 | You know, and ketamine's the legal one,

01:07:45.500 | so that's why we do it.

01:07:47.500 | And the other nice thing, and I don't know,

01:07:50.660 | as a scientist, how much you would go with this,

01:07:53.500 | but ketamine, again, because it opens the door

01:08:00.300 | with these protectors,

01:08:02.500 | you can also taste what I call the big self.

01:08:05.940 | You taste this, what they call non-dual state

01:08:09.540 | that can be quite blissful.

01:08:11.660 | And some people go, "God."

01:08:14.980 | And then as you come back, you have this sense

01:08:19.780 | of I'm much more than this little body and this little ego,

01:08:24.260 | that there is something much bigger.

01:08:27.020 | And that's why they're using it with "End of Life"

01:08:29.060 | and why it did, and psilocybin has such a big impact

01:08:33.340 | on depression and because it sort of lifts you

01:08:36.980 | out of this little box your protectors have you in,

01:08:40.660 | to know that there's something much more, so.

01:08:43.220 | - Interesting.

01:08:44.060 | I've never tried ketamine.

01:08:45.180 | A few years ago, and I've talked about this publicly

01:08:49.780 | as well, I started developing a pretty deep relationship

01:08:56.060 | to spirituality and God, and mostly through the path

01:08:59.740 | of giving up control.

01:09:02.540 | I mean, there's a certain, breaking news, folks,

01:09:05.620 | you can't control everything, you know?

01:09:07.220 | And you can control certain things, but most things no.

01:09:12.220 | And the way you describe, ketamine's very interesting

01:09:16.020 | because as a dissociative anesthetic,

01:09:19.060 | it works in such a fundamentally different way

01:09:23.340 | than say MDMA, which is an empathogen,

01:09:27.420 | which makes people feel so much more.

01:09:30.740 | I mean, I sort of half joke that the,

01:09:34.780 | aside from the safety legality stuff,

01:09:36.820 | the concern I have about MDMA is that if one is not

01:09:41.380 | in the eye mask, if you don't have somebody guiding you

01:09:45.300 | through it and taking some notes, you know,

01:09:47.700 | if you listen to a piece of jazz or classical music

01:09:50.860 | or your favorite rock and roll album,

01:09:53.700 | or you're there with your dog or cat or plants,

01:09:56.620 | I mean, you can spend the entire four hours bonding

01:09:59.340 | with the plant.

01:10:00.660 | You're not gonna run off and get married to a plant.

01:10:03.860 | You're not gonna try and fornicate with a plant,

01:10:06.380 | but one hopes, but it's a very precious,

01:10:11.380 | but very labile situation.

01:10:16.940 | - Totally agree.

01:10:17.780 | - Because it's such a strong empathogen

01:10:20.420 | that whatever you direct your attention to,

01:10:22.420 | internal or external, is going to hypertrophy.

01:10:26.540 | So just have to be really careful.

01:10:29.540 | - Totally agree.

01:10:30.420 | - You know, and given that the neurotoxicity issues

01:10:33.780 | seem worked out in that if it's actually MDMA

01:10:36.660 | and isn't other things, by the way,

01:10:38.660 | that the big study that showed neurotoxicity of MDMA

01:10:41.140 | in non-human primates,

01:10:42.940 | turned out they were injecting methamphetamine.

01:10:44.940 | - What?

01:10:45.780 | - Yeah, that paper was retracted.

01:10:47.060 | It was published in Science.

01:10:48.020 | We'll provide a link to the paper and the retraction.

01:10:50.380 | That, the retraction was not as publicized.

01:10:52.620 | - Wow.

01:10:53.460 | - Methylene dioxy, methamphetamine, MDMA

01:10:55.900 | has not been shown to be neurotoxic,

01:10:58.580 | provided that's what people are taking.

01:11:00.660 | - Wow.

01:11:02.140 | - And not taking some combination of other things.

01:11:04.340 | Yeah, it's a real tragedy the way that retractions

01:11:08.620 | don't get nearly the kind of popular press coverage

01:11:11.780 | that initial studies do,

01:11:14.380 | regardless of whether or not the initial study

01:11:15.900 | was positive or negative.

01:11:18.060 | In any case, I do believe there are other routes

01:11:20.420 | to calming down the forebrain

01:11:22.980 | in the context of doing this kind of work

01:11:24.660 | that I'd just like your thoughts on.

01:11:26.500 | - Sure.

01:11:27.340 | - When I first wake up in the morning,

01:11:29.180 | I'm in kind of a liminal state,

01:11:30.940 | but the thing that I don't want to think about

01:11:35.940 | comes to my brain.

01:11:37.380 | I can't avoid it.

01:11:38.220 | It's just like the protectors are not available.

01:11:41.380 | They're still asleep.

01:11:42.540 | So that seems valuable.

01:11:44.140 | I've tried recently to keep my eyes closed.

01:11:46.060 | Sometimes I'll get up and use the bathroom,

01:11:47.500 | but keep my eyes closed,

01:11:48.380 | stay in that still state,

01:11:49.540 | and explore the contours of that thing,

01:11:53.340 | provided it's done safely and not anywhere near water.

01:12:00.340 | Cyclic hyperventilation breath work,

01:12:02.660 | done for a few minutes or cycles, you know.

01:12:06.260 | We think can change the brain activity.

01:12:12.180 | So the forebrain kind of comes off of line a bit.

01:12:14.700 | - So all these things just put managers

01:12:17.260 | to sleep.

01:12:18.100 | - Put managers to sleep.

01:12:19.060 | - Like when you go to sleep,

01:12:20.860 | your managers go to sleep,

01:12:21.900 | and then you have these weird dreams,

01:12:23.460 | and that's 'cause your exiles have access to your mind now,

01:12:26.940 | and they're trying to give you signals

01:12:29.340 | about what they want.

01:12:30.380 | The other thing I'll say about psychedelics

01:12:33.140 | and the breathing too,

01:12:34.780 | is that as your managers go to sleep,

01:12:39.260 | and your exiles start coming in,

01:12:42.300 | it can seem really terrifying,

01:12:45.980 | 'cause these parts are stuck in horrible places often,

01:12:50.500 | with a lot of terror.

01:12:51.860 | And so what's called bad trips,

01:12:54.620 | is them trying to get attention.

01:12:56.580 | So they'll come in and they'll totally take over,

01:12:58.820 | and you'll look like you're having a panic attack.

01:13:01.420 | But what we've learned,

01:13:02.260 | and this happened a few times last week,

01:13:05.300 | is instead of thinking of it as a panic attack,

01:13:09.700 | or a bad trip,

01:13:11.740 | to welcome it.

01:13:13.500 | Here's a part that needs a lot of attention,

01:13:16.660 | it's taken over entirely.

01:13:19.300 | But if I were to say,

01:13:21.220 | "Okay, Andrew, I see you're really scared,

01:13:24.620 | "but how do you feel

01:13:25.460 | "toward this really scared part that's here now?"

01:13:28.740 | And I could get you to say,

01:13:30.180 | "I feel sorry for it."

01:13:31.540 | Then I would have you start to get to know it,

01:13:34.620 | and work with it, and comfort it,

01:13:36.460 | rather than have a panic attack.

01:13:38.700 | You would access calm and those C words,

01:13:43.460 | and then it becomes a hugely useful healing

01:13:48.180 | of something that's in you,

01:13:50.620 | that's stuck in a terrified place.

01:13:53.780 | - I'd like to take a quick break

01:13:55.020 | and acknowledge one of our sponsors, Function.

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01:15:41.260 | - What is so striking to me is that,

01:15:43.260 | and Martha taught me this practice of,

01:15:46.660 | when we think about the things

01:15:48.180 | that create shame for ourselves,

01:15:53.180 | if we're able to go up and really look at those

01:15:55.360 | and own them not from the perspective of I'm proud of them,

01:15:58.900 | but own them as in us and not of us,

01:16:03.480 | that it's incredibly freeing.

01:16:08.260 | And indeed it is so freeing, right?

01:16:10.180 | It's like the, if there were like a secret to life,

01:16:13.920 | it would at least include that.

01:16:17.900 | - Yeah.

01:16:19.380 | - Because--

01:16:20.220 | - Let me wrap up on that for a second.

01:16:22.020 | - Yeah, please.

01:16:22.860 | - 'Cause just as an example,

01:16:24.740 | like I do, I've done workshops

01:16:29.740 | where I have people work with their racism.

01:16:32.540 | You're speaking of something very shameful.

01:16:35.100 | And a lot of people say, "I don't, I'm not a racist.

01:16:38.980 | "I don't have any racism."

01:16:40.420 | But if I really convince them to look inside and check,

01:16:45.420 | they'll find there's a little part in there

01:16:46.940 | that does spout racist things

01:16:48.520 | when they meet somebody of a different skin color,

01:16:51.420 | has these white supremacy beliefs,

01:16:54.000 | and they're really ashamed of it.

01:16:57.500 | So if I were to have you focus

01:16:59.020 | on that racist voice in there,

01:17:00.940 | you would have to get a lot of the parts

01:17:03.260 | that are ashamed of it to step out.

01:17:05.220 | And then I would have you get curious about it

01:17:07.660 | rather than ashamed of it,

01:17:09.740 | and ask it about where it picked up these beliefs.

01:17:14.420 | And it could tell you.

01:17:15.580 | And then I would ask,

01:17:18.700 | "Do you like having to carry this racist stuff?"

01:17:21.860 | Usually they'll say no.

01:17:23.020 | If it's ready to unload it, we can just unload it.

01:17:26.980 | So one of the key things to know is

01:17:30.660 | these parts are not the burdens they carry.

01:17:33.120 | They're all good.

01:17:35.580 | The little guy who's got the racist rant

01:17:38.140 | is a part that got stuck with his beliefs.

01:17:42.820 | But when he releases those beliefs,

01:17:44.760 | he transforms into being a good.

01:17:47.300 | And the mistake our culture makes,

01:17:50.000 | the mistake that most psychotherapists make,

01:17:54.240 | is to assume that he is that racist rant,

01:17:58.340 | and to try to exile him.

01:18:00.780 | But it's a different way of understanding

01:18:03.580 | even very seemingly evil people,

01:18:06.700 | that they're dominated by these protectors,

01:18:09.580 | and they're so afraid of their exiles.

01:18:12.100 | And they relate inside

01:18:14.540 | in the same way they relate outside.

01:18:17.040 | So if they hate parts of themselves,

01:18:19.540 | they'll hate people who resemble those parts of them.

01:18:22.500 | They'll try to dominate those people.

01:18:25.220 | Do you follow what I'm saying?

01:18:26.180 | - Yeah, and I'd like to really go into this a bit,

01:18:28.740 | because we hear all the time

01:18:31.860 | that when we're upset about something,

01:18:33.580 | it's something in ourselves that we're really upset about.

01:18:36.920 | - And for me, that isn't always true,

01:18:40.880 | but that's sometimes true, yeah.

01:18:43.020 | - So if I'm upset about the intolerance

01:18:45.880 | of good ideas from people in opposite groups

01:18:50.620 | of each other's good ideas,

01:18:52.240 | this logic would say that I'm really just disapproving

01:19:00.300 | of that aspect of myself

01:19:01.940 | that is like black and white judgmental.

01:19:05.780 | - Which we already established.

01:19:08.180 | - Got me.

01:19:09.100 | Then again, you're the therapist, so.

01:19:10.980 | Right, so is this always true?

01:19:16.620 | - Not always, but a lot of the time.

01:19:18.840 | So if you can come to have compassion

01:19:23.300 | for that judgmental part of you,

01:19:24.700 | and not be embattled with it,

01:19:26.960 | and actually see it as desperately trying to help you,

01:19:29.900 | be more discerning, and help it unburden

01:19:33.060 | and get out of this role that it's in.

01:19:35.180 | 'Cause in the role that it's in, it can be destructive.

01:19:38.100 | We're not trying to minimize that or say,

01:19:40.060 | you know, when I say all parts, there are no bad parts,

01:19:43.760 | there are no bad parts,

01:19:44.600 | but they can get into very destructive roles,

01:19:47.380 | and they can carry these burdens from the past

01:19:50.140 | that can drive them to be harmful.

01:19:53.100 | But part of my work is to help all that change,

01:19:58.540 | and so if you were to start a new relationship

01:20:03.140 | with that judgmental part of you,

01:20:04.960 | then you would see past the judgmental parts

01:20:08.500 | of other people, and you could see the exiles

01:20:12.340 | that drive those protectors,

01:20:14.780 | and you would have compassion for them.

01:20:16.980 | It wouldn't mean you wouldn't stop them

01:20:19.740 | or stand up to them, but you would do it with compassion,

01:20:24.620 | rather than from these hateful protectors.

01:20:28.640 | - Ah.

01:20:29.960 | - I think it's important that people hear that.

01:20:32.320 | Namely, that if we get in touch with these parts

01:20:37.240 | of ourselves that are protectors,

01:20:39.180 | that it makes us less vulnerable, not more vulnerable,

01:20:45.560 | both to, quote-unquote, attack,

01:20:47.480 | but that also, I guess, put simply,

01:20:50.940 | that in understanding of ourselves

01:20:54.540 | and compassion for ourselves,

01:20:56.120 | one develops understanding and compassion for others,

01:20:58.260 | but that doesn't mean that you're opening yourself up

01:21:02.160 | for harm.

01:21:03.000 | - That's right.

01:21:03.840 | - And the opposite is actually true.

01:21:05.240 | - The opposite is actually true,

01:21:06.920 | 'cause these protectors will generate often what they fear.

01:21:10.880 | So by being so protective, they'll create protectors

01:21:15.880 | in the other that will attack,

01:21:18.280 | whereas if they could stay in self,

01:21:21.080 | self can be very protective with those C-word qualities.

01:21:26.080 | Very forceful, sometimes fierce.

01:21:28.860 | - This idea of, I'm definitely following,

01:21:33.120 | that we will sometimes create in others what we fear,

01:21:38.120 | because it allows us to engage in this unhealthy dynamic.

01:21:44.160 | It seems so counterintuitive, right?

01:21:47.000 | Maybe we take a kind of classic set of examples

01:21:50.360 | that I think are pretty common.

01:21:52.560 | A person who's codependent with somebody

01:21:54.360 | who's a substance abuse addict,

01:21:56.400 | or somebody who's very timid and always wants to pacify,

01:22:02.440 | and somebody who's very dominant.

01:22:04.400 | When I zoom out from the second case,

01:22:05.620 | it actually makes me chuckle how crazy that is,

01:22:09.840 | because if you think about it,

01:22:10.920 | a person who is very dominant

01:22:14.680 | doesn't need somebody very timid

01:22:18.840 | in order to feel dominant, right?

01:22:20.600 | They could probably feel whatever power it is

01:22:24.520 | they need to feel with somebody who is less timid,

01:22:26.440 | and maybe the relationship would be healthier,

01:22:27.880 | but that's not how people tend to other select.

01:22:31.240 | It's kind of interesting.

01:22:32.280 | So it raises perhaps a bigger question.

01:22:35.280 | Why do people select people

01:22:36.840 | that are fundamentally bad for them?

01:22:41.280 | - Okay, so I did a book called

01:22:44.440 | "You're the One You've Been Waiting For,"

01:22:46.960 | and in it, I talked about this whole issue,

01:22:49.840 | and so for a lot of people,

01:22:53.660 | you get hurt by your parent,

01:22:56.620 | and there are parts that wanna protect you from your parent,

01:23:02.200 | but there are other parts who are desperate,

01:23:04.160 | who took on the worthlessness

01:23:05.520 | from being rejected by your parent,

01:23:08.080 | and are desperate for redemption.

01:23:10.280 | Do you follow this?

01:23:11.200 | And so as you leave and you're looking for a partner,

01:23:19.200 | that part from a subconscious place

01:23:21.960 | can influence your decision

01:23:23.520 | to find somebody who resembles that parent

01:23:26.880 | in their effort to be redeemed again.

01:23:29.480 | - Yeah, is this anything like

01:23:30.920 | the sort of repetition compulsion?

01:23:33.120 | - Yeah, yeah, exactly.

01:23:34.160 | - That we tend to repeat a pattern over and over again

01:23:37.200 | as an attempt to resolve,

01:23:39.040 | not just a manifestation of dysfunction?

01:23:42.800 | - That's a version of what I'm talking about.

01:23:45.320 | And so you find somebody who does resemble that person,

01:23:48.240 | that parent, and unfortunately,

01:23:50.600 | they do resemble that parent,

01:23:52.600 | and so they'll hurt you in the same way,

01:23:55.180 | and then your protectors go into one of four modes.

01:23:59.160 | They'll say, "I've gotta change that person back

01:24:02.760 | "into who they're supposed to be,"

01:24:04.000 | so they'll try to change the person's behavior,

01:24:08.360 | or they'll say, "I've gotta change myself

01:24:11.100 | "so they'll be who they're supposed to be,"

01:24:14.240 | or they'll say, "Oh, this wasn't the redeemer after all,"

01:24:18.360 | and they'll go looking

01:24:19.240 | for the real redeemer who's still out there.

01:24:21.440 | - And it's always inside.

01:24:24.040 | - And yeah, that's what I try to do,

01:24:25.760 | is to help them see that that redeemer

01:24:28.080 | is inside of them itself.

01:24:30.440 | And if we can go to that exile

01:24:33.720 | who's got this thing for this parent-like person

01:24:37.440 | and help it connect to self and help it unburden,

01:24:42.480 | that whole repetition compulsion disappears,

01:24:46.320 | 'cause now they can take care of themselves.

01:24:48.720 | They trust self to do it.

01:24:51.440 | They don't need that from some other person like that.

01:24:54.520 | And so, when we're working with couples,

01:24:58.240 | and you always find some version of that in couples,

01:25:02.240 | if we can get each of them to become

01:25:03.840 | their own good attachment figure, good caretaker inside,

01:25:08.340 | that frees up the partner,

01:25:11.320 | because when this exile is leading the relationship,

01:25:16.200 | your partner feels a lot of sort of demands,

01:25:20.160 | or feels a lot like your partner

01:25:22.200 | has to take care of that young part of you,

01:25:24.880 | and can't, can't fully do it.

01:25:26.520 | So there's always this sense of, oh, a burden.

01:25:31.240 | You know what I'm saying?

01:25:32.240 | - Yeah, yeah.

01:25:33.880 | It's so interesting how romantic relationships

01:25:36.600 | are where these patterns get repeated.

01:25:39.600 | And at the same time, numerous examples in my life

01:25:42.560 | of healthy relationships,

01:25:45.360 | is that usually the case

01:25:46.360 | because people have done the work before,

01:25:49.440 | or because they had a minimum of trauma in their upbringing?

01:25:52.880 | - Both, yeah.

01:25:53.720 | - Yeah.

01:25:54.540 | What percentage of kids, adults as well,

01:25:59.440 | do you think had a minimum of trauma,

01:26:01.960 | are just because of the way they're wired,

01:26:05.060 | and the way the stuff is organized within them,

01:26:07.000 | that they naturally attach to a good partner,

01:26:11.000 | and are pretty healthy?

01:26:12.480 | Is it like 25%, 30%?

01:26:15.080 | Does it?

01:26:16.040 | - I really can't say, 'cause I, my sample is very skewed.

01:26:19.680 | I'm working with psychotherapy patients

01:26:22.760 | who always have a lot of trauma.

01:26:25.320 | So I really can't say.

01:26:27.440 | I mean, I'm very biased.

01:26:30.480 | - Well, half of marriages in this country end in divorce.

01:26:35.480 | And presumably of the ones that don't,

01:26:39.080 | I'm guessing somewhere between a half

01:26:42.000 | and a quarter of those,

01:26:45.080 | people are really unhappy.

01:26:50.360 | Sounds so pessimistic.

01:26:51.400 | But if you just look at the numbers,

01:26:53.120 | and I'm an optimist,

01:26:54.240 | I already acknowledge

01:26:55.200 | that I don't like to think about bad stuff,

01:26:56.840 | and I, you know, so.

01:26:58.420 | Yeah, I'm guessing that a lot of people

01:27:04.560 | repeat these patterns,

01:27:05.640 | but it seemed as if maybe 20, 30 years ago,

01:27:09.920 | because these ideas weren't discussed really,

01:27:12.800 | so many fewer people were in any kind of analysis

01:27:17.320 | or personal exploration work,

01:27:20.340 | that as a society,

01:27:23.040 | we defaulted to just sort of role execution.

01:27:26.540 | You're a father and a husband,

01:27:29.680 | so you do certain things,

01:27:30.960 | and you don't do certain things.

01:27:32.360 | You're a wife and a mother,

01:27:33.760 | so you do certain things,

01:27:34.600 | and you don't do certain, and so on.

01:27:36.360 | And I think nowadays there's a lot of discussion about,

01:27:40.600 | you know, is there a resurgence of organized religion

01:27:45.280 | because we've drifted so far

01:27:47.160 | from these kind of core structures?

01:27:49.020 | I mean, love your thoughts on that.

01:27:52.400 | And also what you think,

01:27:54.280 | doing this kind of internal work on oneself

01:27:57.000 | without requiring any input or participation from another,

01:28:00.860 | what the value of that is.

01:28:02.320 | It sounds like there's tremendous value

01:28:04.620 | to just doing this work for oneself,

01:28:07.080 | maybe with someone trained in IFS.

01:28:09.600 | - Yeah, I mean, like I was saying,

01:28:13.000 | there's a lot you can do with working with your protectors

01:28:15.880 | and helping them get to know self.

01:28:18.920 | Like, we didn't do it,

01:28:20.000 | but had you asked that titanium teddy bear

01:28:25.000 | how old it thought you were

01:28:28.880 | and just really waited for the answer,

01:28:31.760 | most people will get a single digit.

01:28:34.760 | It still thinks you're very young,

01:28:36.920 | and it still thinks it has to protect you

01:28:39.440 | the way it did when you were very young.

01:28:42.100 | And just even updating it

01:28:43.640 | creates a huge amount of relief with these protectors.

01:28:48.920 | So there's a lot that can be done

01:28:50.400 | just by working with protectors,

01:28:52.400 | introducing them to self,

01:28:54.320 | helping them see they don't have to keep doing this

01:28:56.600 | all the time.

01:28:57.440 | Some protectors, it's very hard for them

01:29:00.360 | to totally drop their weapons

01:29:02.800 | until what they protect has been healed.

01:29:06.000 | So that's where the therapist comes in.

01:29:09.560 | So, you know, there are coaches doing this work, for example.

01:29:14.560 | They'll work with some executive and they'll do great,

01:29:20.280 | and then they'll get to an exile.

01:29:22.760 | And then they'll have the person see an IFS therapist

01:29:26.280 | for a couple of sessions to heal the exile

01:29:28.560 | and then come back.

01:29:30.460 | 'Cause, you know, coaches aren't trained as therapists.

01:29:33.640 | - Right.

01:29:34.740 | - So yeah, there's still need for therapists,

01:29:38.980 | but yeah, but you can do a lot on your own.

01:29:43.980 | - I'm struck by how experiential it is

01:29:47.260 | as opposed to just conceptual.

01:29:50.300 | I mean, obviously the concepts are important,

01:29:52.100 | but I think internal family systems

01:29:55.220 | was described for me previously,

01:29:58.260 | kind of mapped out for me on paper.

01:30:00.020 | I got a sense of it actually with some objects placed out

01:30:03.180 | and it was helpful,

01:30:05.500 | but I think just having done a little bit of it today,

01:30:10.500 | the only by actually feeling the sensations in the body

01:30:15.180 | associated with it does actually really make sense to me.

01:30:18.060 | I mean, it made sense cognitively,

01:30:19.340 | but that's so very different.

01:30:21.220 | - It's very removed.

01:30:22.060 | - Yeah, it's like me telling people, you know,

01:30:23.380 | get out and get sunlight in your eyes in the morning

01:30:25.060 | or set your circadian rhythm.

01:30:26.180 | Like you can know that,

01:30:27.100 | you can know the underlying mechanisms,

01:30:28.620 | the neurons, the pathways, the hormones, et cetera,

01:30:30.860 | but at some level until you experience what that's like

01:30:34.700 | for two or three days in a row,

01:30:37.100 | you might as well be reading about, I don't know,

01:30:41.780 | titanium teddy bears, you know, yeah.

01:30:44.460 | - Exactly, and that's why I'm so grateful to you

01:30:46.260 | that you were willing to try it.

01:30:48.340 | And because it's true, as I describe it to people,

01:30:51.420 | they don't really get it until they actually feel it,

01:30:54.860 | experience it, and it is very different

01:30:57.580 | from many other therapies,

01:30:58.820 | which are much more cognitively based,

01:31:02.700 | 'cause we're trying to bypass that

01:31:04.740 | and actually get to this raw stuff in here.

01:31:08.300 | - In order to be deliberately repetitive,

01:31:10.180 | I wonder if it would be useful to the listeners to,

01:31:15.140 | would it be possible to just pose the questions to them

01:31:19.900 | as an exercise that they could do in real time?

01:31:22.140 | - Totally, yeah.

01:31:23.140 | - Thank you so much.

01:31:24.460 | - I think that would be tremendously valuable.

01:31:26.300 | So I'm gonna have to erase myself here.

01:31:29.100 | For once, I'm gonna be quiet for a little while, folks,

01:31:31.540 | and you are the lucky patient

01:31:35.180 | that gets to talk to Dr. Schwartz here,

01:31:40.260 | and he's gonna pose a series of questions,

01:31:43.020 | and we'll allow some moments of break or silence

01:31:46.980 | for you to be able to tap into the answers

01:31:48.980 | to these in real time.

01:31:50.420 | That way, you don't have to create

01:31:52.940 | a parallel construction of what we did earlier.

01:31:56.180 | - Yeah, and let me lead by saying,

01:31:59.220 | please don't do this if you have fear about doing it.

01:32:02.060 | But if you're interested in some inner exploration,

01:32:08.780 | then I'll lead you through some of the steps.

01:32:13.220 | So as you've been listening to our conversation,

01:32:18.220 | I'm speaking to listeners,

01:32:20.700 | you may be thinking about some of your own parts,

01:32:23.460 | particularly your own protectors.

01:32:25.900 | And if you can't think of any,

01:32:28.500 | most people have a kind of critic inside

01:32:30.820 | or part that makes them work too hard

01:32:33.580 | or a part that takes care of too many people.

01:32:38.100 | So I'm gonna invite you to pick a protective part

01:32:44.260 | to try to get to know for a few minutes.

01:32:47.820 | And just notice that inner voice

01:32:52.820 | or that emotion, that thought pattern,

01:32:58.740 | that sensation, just focus on it exclusively for a second.

01:33:03.740 | And as you do that,

01:33:06.900 | notice where it seems to be located

01:33:11.020 | in your body or around your body.

01:33:12.980 | And just take a second with that.

01:33:16.380 | And some people don't find a location,

01:33:19.700 | some people they still sense it,

01:33:21.420 | but it's not clear where it seems to be located.

01:33:24.580 | But if you do find it in or around your body,

01:33:29.020 | just focus on it there.

01:33:32.340 | And as you focus on it,

01:33:45.460 | notice how you feel toward it.

01:33:47.900 | And by that I mean,

01:33:50.580 | do you dislike it and wanna get rid of it?

01:33:54.860 | Are you afraid of it?

01:33:58.700 | Do you resent how it dominates?

01:34:05.180 | Do you depend on it?

01:34:09.020 | So you have a relationship with this part of you.

01:34:15.140 | (silence)

01:34:17.300 | And if you feel anything except a kind of openness

01:34:26.100 | or curiosity or willingness to get to know it,

01:34:28.700 | then that's coming from other parts

01:34:32.780 | that have been trying to deal with it.

01:34:35.820 | And we're just gonna ask those other parts of you

01:34:41.340 | to relax back for just a few minutes

01:34:44.260 | so you can get to know it.

01:34:47.580 | We're not gonna have it take over more.

01:34:50.420 | We're just gonna get to know it better.

01:34:53.580 | So see if they're willing to let you open your mind to it.

01:34:59.180 | And if they're not, then we're not gonna pursue this.

01:35:05.260 | And you can just get to know their fear

01:35:08.140 | about letting you get to know this target part.

01:35:11.460 | (silence)

01:35:13.620 | But if you do get to that point

01:35:17.740 | of just being curious about it without an agenda,

01:35:22.380 | then ask it what it wants you to know about itself.

01:35:27.100 | Just a kind of nice open-ended question.

01:35:31.340 | And don't think of the answer,

01:35:33.940 | just wait and see what comes from that place in your body.

01:35:39.180 | And don't judge what comes, just whatever comes,

01:35:42.580 | we'll go with it.

01:35:43.540 | What does it want you to know about itself?

01:35:48.620 | And what's it afraid would happen

01:35:53.140 | if it didn't do this inside of you?

01:35:55.120 | And if you got an answer to that question about the fear,

01:36:09.620 | then it was telling you something

01:36:11.660 | about how it's been trying to protect you.

01:36:13.760 | And if that's true, then extend some appreciation to it

01:36:21.820 | for at least trying to keep you safe,

01:36:25.380 | even if it backfires or it doesn't work.

01:36:27.700 | Let it know you appreciate that it's trying to protect you.

01:36:32.620 | And see how it reacts to your appreciation.

01:36:37.620 | (mouse clicking)

01:36:40.380 | And then ask if you could go to what it protects

01:36:48.740 | and heal or change that

01:36:52.540 | so it didn't need to protect you so much.

01:36:56.500 | What might it like to do instead inside of you

01:37:00.420 | if it was released from this role?

01:37:02.200 | And I'll repeat that.

01:37:05.940 | If you could go to what it protects

01:37:08.900 | and heal or change that

01:37:10.500 | so it was liberated from this protective role,

01:37:14.060 | what might it like to do instead inside of you?

01:37:17.700 | And then ask it this kind of odd question.

01:37:33.140 | How old does this part think you are?

01:37:36.640 | Not how old is it, but how old does it think you are?

01:37:40.160 | And again, don't think, just wait and see what comes.

01:37:44.340 | And if it got your age wrong,

01:38:01.880 | then go ahead and update it and see how it reacts.

01:38:06.480 | And the last question for this part is

01:38:28.120 | what does it need from you going forward?

01:38:32.200 | What does it need from you?

01:38:34.440 | And again, just wait for the answer.

01:38:39.200 | And when the time feels right,

01:38:56.920 | thank your parts for whatever they let you do in this

01:39:00.600 | and then begin to shift your focus back outside

01:39:03.500 | and maybe take some deep breaths as you do that.

01:39:06.800 | - Thank you for that.

01:39:15.580 | That was awesome.

01:39:16.800 | I also was able to get some, I think, good work done in that.

01:39:20.520 | - Is that true? - Yeah, yeah.

01:39:22.280 | Totally different location,

01:39:25.160 | totally different set of dynamics.

01:39:27.920 | So, even though what you just took us through

01:39:32.920 | is very experiential,

01:39:35.480 | what, if any, value do you think there is to writing down

01:39:39.820 | sort of key takeaways? - A lot of value, yeah.

01:39:42.120 | Yeah, so it's great to do the work session

01:39:46.440 | or this exercise,

01:39:48.920 | but ideally it's the beginning

01:39:52.080 | of a new relationship with this part.

01:39:54.640 | So, and that takes work on your own.

01:39:58.240 | So, what I advise people is,

01:40:00.600 | as you get that ball rolling in that good direction,

01:40:03.760 | it'll reverse if you don't stay with it for a while.

01:40:07.880 | So, every day, like you were saying,

01:40:10.760 | you wake up, rather than what am I gonna do today

01:40:14.160 | or what problems do I have in my life,

01:40:17.320 | how's that part of me doing

01:40:18.520 | that I've been starting to work with?

01:40:20.360 | What does it need from me today?

01:40:23.400 | What does it want me to know?

01:40:24.520 | Is it still feeling better?

01:40:26.180 | Do I still have compassion for it or appreciation for it?

01:40:32.560 | So, like I said earlier,

01:40:36.160 | this kind of becomes a life practice.

01:40:38.280 | So, I do that every morning. - Every morning?

01:40:42.240 | - Not every, not every.

01:40:43.720 | - Well, you're very familiar with these parts.

01:40:46.000 | And to clarify for people,

01:40:47.920 | when Dr. Schwartz is saying parts,

01:40:51.360 | he's saying these personalities within us,

01:40:55.440 | not necessarily the body part where it manifests,

01:40:58.440 | but maybe that provides a physical anchor to look to.

01:41:01.680 | - Exactly right.

01:41:03.360 | So, yeah, I'll check in,

01:41:06.420 | not with all my parts, 'cause I've met many, many,

01:41:10.160 | but the ones I've been working with,

01:41:11.800 | just to see how they're doing.

01:41:14.840 | And as I go through the day,

01:41:16.340 | I'll notice, am I in those C-word qualities?

01:41:20.720 | Is my heart open?

01:41:22.240 | Is my mind curious?

01:41:25.200 | Do I have a big agenda?

01:41:26.520 | Anything, any departures from that is a protector, usually.

01:41:33.080 | And I'll just have a little internal board meeting.

01:41:35.800 | I get, you feel like,

01:41:37.640 | like in preparing to come and be on this podcast,

01:41:41.280 | I had to work with the parts that were nervous,

01:41:43.600 | and I have, my father was a big scientist,

01:41:47.720 | big endocrinology researcher.

01:41:50.920 | - Oh, cool, great field.

01:41:52.680 | - Great field.

01:41:53.640 | My brother is a big shot endocrinology researcher.

01:41:56.860 | So I have some issues, put it that way.

01:42:02.680 | - I hope I didn't reinforce the negative ones.

01:42:04.840 | - Well, that was my parts' worries coming in,

01:42:07.800 | and so I worked on it and said,

01:42:11.440 | "Okay, but just, I get it, I get you're scared."

01:42:13.920 | I could feel them in my hands

01:42:15.520 | when I was taking a drink earlier.

01:42:17.560 | - Interesting.

01:42:18.640 | - But I just kept, "Okay, I get that.

01:42:21.400 | "I get you're scared, but just trust me.

01:42:22.920 | "Just step back, just relax."

01:42:25.840 | And then I feel this shift, a literal shift,

01:42:28.700 | and then I feel those C words flooding,

01:42:32.760 | and then we have a much different kind of conversation.

01:42:35.500 | So it's a life practice in that sense.

01:42:40.200 | - I love that, thanks for sharing that.

01:42:41.640 | I didn't detect any anxiety whatsoever,

01:42:45.840 | neither pre-recording nor during this discussion.

01:42:50.520 | If you don't mind, could you describe

01:42:54.000 | or maybe even just list off some of the other labels

01:42:57.440 | of parts that people might encounter

01:43:01.760 | if they do this kind of work?

01:43:02.980 | So you described them as protectors that manage,

01:43:07.520 | and then the exiles, which are the parts of us

01:43:10.400 | that the protectors and managers are protecting, correct?

01:43:13.780 | Okay, those are two different things, right?

01:43:15.800 | - Yes, so yeah, the big distinction is between parts

01:43:19.240 | that by dint of simply being hurt or terrified

01:43:24.240 | or made to feel shamed and worthless,

01:43:26.940 | and usually those are our most sensitive parts.

01:43:31.680 | They're the young inner children.

01:43:33.360 | They get stuck with those burdens of worthlessness,

01:43:38.060 | terror, and emotional pain,

01:43:40.400 | and then we don't want anything to do with them

01:43:43.140 | because they can overwhelm us,

01:43:45.060 | and so we lock them away,

01:43:46.140 | and everybody tells us to do that.

01:43:47.920 | So those are the exiles,

01:43:49.360 | and when you have a lot of exiles,

01:43:53.280 | these other parts are forced to become protectors.

01:43:57.800 | So there are two classes of protectors.

01:44:00.520 | One are the managers we've been talking about,

01:44:03.420 | and the other are the firefighters.

01:44:06.160 | So we mentioned a number of manager common roles,

01:44:13.160 | but there's just lots and lots of them.

01:44:15.460 | Firefighter common roles include addictions,

01:44:20.900 | excuse me, dissociating,

01:44:26.820 | the kind of judgmental, rageful parts.

01:44:33.080 | I could go on, but anything that is reactive, impulsive,

01:44:43.060 | and is designed to protect those vulnerable parts,

01:44:48.060 | but in an impulsive way,

01:44:51.600 | as opposed to the managers

01:44:53.600 | who are all about control and pleasing.

01:44:58.120 | These firefighters are all about,

01:44:59.980 | if I don't get you away from these feelings right now,

01:45:03.620 | you're gonna die.

01:45:04.920 | A lot of them believe that,

01:45:06.260 | and some of them, it's true.

01:45:11.460 | So there's often a kind of hierarchy

01:45:14.780 | of firefighter activities.

01:45:16.940 | The first one doesn't work, you go to the next one.

01:45:18.820 | If that doesn't work, the top of the hierarchy

01:45:22.260 | for most people is suicide.

01:45:25.120 | If things get painful enough,

01:45:29.600 | there's this exit strategy.

01:45:32.740 | It's actually very comforting to lots of people,

01:45:35.140 | and here we come along and get really scared

01:45:39.380 | of these suicidal parts.

01:45:41.500 | So this is, again, it's one of the hallmarks

01:45:43.740 | of the difference with IFS.

01:45:46.020 | If you were to say you've got a suicidal part,

01:45:48.300 | say, "Let's go get to know it."

01:45:50.420 | I would have you find it and all the steps,

01:45:54.340 | and I would have you, "What are you afraid would happen

01:45:55.820 | "if you didn't kill Andrew?"

01:45:57.260 | What do you think the answer to that is most of the time?

01:46:01.000 | - That it would just feel like too much to bear.

01:46:03.500 | - Yeah.

01:46:04.820 | - Like they just couldn't take it anymore.

01:46:06.660 | - Exactly.

01:46:07.500 | - Which, of course, is a crazy statement,

01:46:08.340 | 'cause it's not like my brain would explode.

01:46:10.660 | But these parts believe it.

01:46:12.180 | - Yeah, yeah, they're not grounded in logic.

01:46:15.180 | - So my, well, my response to that part

01:46:17.940 | is if we could unload the pain

01:46:21.460 | that you're so afraid would overwhelm,

01:46:24.020 | would you have to kill him?

01:46:26.780 | - No.

01:46:28.140 | - And would you let us do that?

01:46:30.340 | - Well, fortunately, I don't feel suicidal,

01:46:33.580 | but the answer would be yes.

01:46:37.100 | - Okay, so, 'cause we can prove to you

01:46:39.060 | that we can unload that pain,

01:46:42.140 | and if we could do that, what would you like to do

01:46:45.300 | instead of being the suicidal part?

01:46:47.060 | - I mean, I have to imagine that if somebody,

01:46:53.900 | forgive me for going into my head about this,

01:46:55.380 | but if I have to imagine, 'cause it's just hard for me

01:46:57.540 | to imagine being suicidal.

01:46:59.020 | - No, that's okay.

01:46:59.860 | - Yeah, but if I have to imagine

01:47:01.100 | that if somebody is feeling suicidal

01:47:03.100 | in order to protect themselves

01:47:05.020 | against the enormity of the feelings

01:47:08.580 | that they would otherwise feel,

01:47:10.420 | and then they are offered the opportunity

01:47:13.260 | to work through, to be released from those feelings,

01:47:15.820 | I think the scary part would be like the first,

01:47:20.100 | it's like wading into really cold water.

01:47:22.280 | You know, I always feel that way about negative feelings.

01:47:25.180 | Once you get past your kind of waist or so,

01:47:28.180 | you get your shoulders under.

01:47:30.340 | - That's a good analogy.

01:47:31.180 | - It's a heck of a lot easier.

01:47:32.700 | - It's a really nice analogy, yeah.

01:47:34.060 | - Because you realize there's an upper limit to this stuff,

01:47:37.200 | and you passed it a little while ago, yeah.

01:47:41.260 | - Yeah, so that suicidal part often transforms

01:47:46.260 | into part that wants to help you live, actually.

01:47:50.740 | They're often in the role that's opposite

01:47:52.420 | of who they really are.

01:47:53.580 | So as you can hear, this is a totally different approach

01:47:57.260 | to suicide, for example.

01:47:59.460 | And we do the same with addictive firefighters.

01:48:01.860 | Find that part that makes you so high.

01:48:05.380 | How do you feel toward, I hate it.

01:48:07.840 | I want to, you know, I want to be in recovery.

01:48:11.040 | I want to just lock it up.

01:48:12.980 | Let's get all that to step out and just get curious about

01:48:16.680 | and ask it what it's afraid would happen

01:48:19.440 | if it didn't get you high all the time.

01:48:22.280 | Same answer.

01:48:23.120 | If we could heal all that pain or that shame,

01:48:28.080 | would you have to get them high all the time?

01:48:29.440 | No, but I don't think you can do that.

01:48:31.440 | Would you give us a chance to prove we can?

01:48:34.440 | Totally different approach to all these problems.

01:48:37.080 | - Something comes to mind, for a number of years,

01:48:41.200 | not now, fortunately, I mean, I still work a lot,

01:48:46.100 | but I work like, you know, I don't want to,

01:48:49.060 | well, I'll share the numbers, but it's not a goal

01:48:52.740 | that no one should try and exceed this.

01:48:54.140 | I mean, there were times in graduate school

01:48:55.820 | where I, no joke, worked 80, 85 hours a week,

01:48:58.700 | slept under my desk.

01:49:00.220 | I lived in my office as a junior professor.

01:49:02.940 | My students can attest to that, I brushed my teeth.

01:49:04.880 | Not every night, but you know, if I had deadlines,

01:49:07.600 | it was just all in with mind, body, heart, everything.

01:49:10.880 | It's not healthy, right?

01:49:12.600 | And at some point I had to take a look at it

01:49:14.520 | because it's not conducive to a lot of things.

01:49:17.520 | It brings a lot, you can get a lot done.

01:49:20.120 | I won't lie, you can get a lot done.

01:49:21.720 | You can get a lot of degrees.

01:49:23.660 | You can get a lot of knowledge and you can accomplish a lot.

01:49:26.740 | But I decided to take a look at it, you know,

01:49:30.760 | like what would happen if I, I don't know,

01:49:33.940 | published five awesome papers in a year instead of 10

01:49:37.580 | or something like, you know, I just started looking at it

01:49:39.420 | and it just, it seems crazy now.

01:49:42.560 | But I remember the genuine fear of backing off.

01:49:46.360 | And I started to realize that I loved what I did,

01:49:50.060 | but that some of the work came from a desire

01:49:53.420 | to compete out other feelings.

01:49:57.900 | It's a form of dissociation.

01:49:59.380 | - Totally.

01:50:00.580 | - And then what happened was I was able to adjust my hours,

01:50:03.440 | really pick the projects that held the most meaning for me

01:50:06.560 | and then really savor them and enjoy them.

01:50:08.160 | And that's how I approached the podcast

01:50:10.040 | and other things I'm doing.

01:50:11.080 | So it was a tremendously useful exploration,

01:50:15.040 | but it was terrifying.

01:50:17.140 | I didn't have to go to 12 Step for work addiction

01:50:19.800 | or anything.

01:50:20.640 | I mean, it wasn't at that level, but-

01:50:22.340 | - But you're giving an example of exactly what we do.

01:50:25.840 | We go to that workaholic part.

01:50:28.240 | What are you afraid would happen

01:50:29.340 | if you didn't do this to them?

01:50:31.420 | - Yeah, so what I came to, it's interesting,

01:50:33.180 | was the, it was literally a fear of annihilation,

01:50:37.420 | of disappearing.

01:50:38.540 | And then I thought, well,

01:50:39.380 | then you parsed it a little bit further,

01:50:40.980 | disappearing to who?

01:50:42.380 | It's not like there was an absence of positive feedback.

01:50:45.300 | So it wasn't actually to avoid disappearing

01:50:48.380 | from the outside world.

01:50:49.740 | 'Cause I'll tell you when you're working 80, 85 hours a week,

01:50:52.700 | you're already gone, you know, you just don't realize it.

01:50:58.700 | It was actually some way of avoiding this thing

01:51:03.700 | that I've now come to really love.

01:51:05.840 | I learned it from my bulldog.

01:51:07.280 | I used to have this assumption that slow is low,

01:51:12.200 | like to slow down is depressive.

01:51:15.240 | I mean, now I love slowing down.

01:51:16.880 | And I did learn that from my bulldog.

01:51:19.360 | And a few people came into my life and their dogs as well.

01:51:22.000 | And I learned like to really savor slow

01:51:26.920 | and not just so that I can bounce back into work,

01:51:29.700 | that too, admittedly, but also to just,

01:51:34.700 | and it came through.

01:51:36.000 | I just would like your thoughts on this.

01:51:37.840 | I realized right as I would go into

01:51:41.480 | or come out of a meditation

01:51:43.440 | or what I call non-sleep deep rest,

01:51:45.120 | this kind of yoga nidra like deep relaxation thing

01:51:47.240 | that listeners of this podcast

01:51:48.560 | will be familiar with hearing about,

01:51:50.620 | that there's this really terrifying moment

01:51:54.720 | where I realized someday,

01:51:57.720 | assuming I'm awake when it happens,

01:51:59.400 | or it's not an accident,

01:52:01.300 | or I don't get involved in an accident,

01:52:03.300 | I'm gonna take my last breath.

01:52:06.500 | And it's absolutely terrifying, that concept.

01:52:09.400 | And I realized that the fear of disappearing

01:52:11.360 | is actually a fear of death.

01:52:12.640 | And what I was really afraid of was death.

01:52:16.080 | And I was using work.

01:52:17.580 | So it's a long way from like working 60 hours

01:52:20.760 | or 40 hours a week instead, or 30, whatever,

01:52:23.080 | but people choose as opposed to 85.

01:52:24.680 | But what I realized,

01:52:25.520 | what I was running from was the fear of my own mortality.

01:52:28.160 | - That's right.

01:52:29.000 | - And I didn't have to use any substances to realize this.

01:52:31.440 | I just had to keep peeling back the layers of like,

01:52:33.800 | what are you really afraid of?

01:52:35.120 | And now I come to the conclusion that most addiction,

01:52:38.320 | having talked to a lot of addicts with process addictions

01:52:40.760 | and substance addictions, et cetera,

01:52:43.180 | that deep down everyone, addict or no,

01:52:46.000 | is terrified of death.

01:52:47.280 | It's just that some people are in touch with that terror

01:52:50.200 | and have worked through it.

01:52:52.520 | - Well, you remember what I was saying earlier

01:52:55.560 | when we talked to these addict parts,

01:52:58.640 | what are you afraid would happen

01:52:59.520 | if you didn't make them high?

01:53:01.280 | He would die.

01:53:02.120 | So that's a really common answer.

01:53:05.360 | And basically what you just described

01:53:07.760 | is you were doing IFS without knowing it.

01:53:10.160 | Asking those questions, what are you really afraid of?

01:53:14.440 | What are you really afraid of?

01:53:15.360 | Till you get to the key answer.

01:53:19.080 | And then I don't know how you help that part

01:53:21.800 | that feared death, but somehow you helped it relax more.

01:53:25.780 | - Yeah, I think if I, for better or worse,

01:53:30.080 | if I see or experience something that scares me a lot,

01:53:33.920 | I have to explore the contours of it.

01:53:40.840 | That's been a dangerous part of my life

01:53:43.160 | and it's been a helpful part of my life too.

01:53:47.440 | You know, the ability to suppress one's reflex

01:53:50.800 | to avoid fear is such a complicated thing

01:53:53.600 | because on the one hand, it's necessary to navigate life.

01:53:57.040 | On the other hand, people always say,

01:53:59.320 | "What would you tell your younger self

01:54:00.960 | if you could tell your younger self anything?"

01:54:03.080 | And I would have said, "Psst, hey, dude, listen.

01:54:07.120 | You know, if something makes you anxious, get out of there."

01:54:09.840 | Because my reflex has always been

01:54:11.800 | that if something gives me anxiety,

01:54:13.880 | it's like, okay, here's a test of myself.

01:54:15.760 | - I see, yeah. - I need to overcome it.

01:54:17.240 | - Okay, so that's another part of protecting.

01:54:19.480 | So in any case, some people are the opposite, you know.

01:54:22.760 | Yeah, I've tended to touch the hot stove three times

01:54:27.540 | when it should have been one trial learning

01:54:29.400 | and it hurt, excuse me, the first time.

01:54:31.960 | So, but that's just me.

01:54:32.800 | I mean, everyone's got these things,

01:54:34.080 | but what I'm discovering,

01:54:36.320 | certainly through what you're telling us today,

01:54:39.080 | but also the exploration of these things

01:54:42.400 | is that so much of life is structured,

01:54:46.520 | especially nowadays with the phone.

01:54:48.880 | Love the phone, love social media,

01:54:50.400 | but so much of life is structured

01:54:53.640 | to fill all the space between activities.

01:54:56.760 | And I do want your thoughts on what you see

01:55:01.760 | in terms of things that are active impediments

01:55:06.560 | to doing good work of the sorts of work

01:55:09.900 | that you're describing today, self-work.

01:55:12.400 | I would never ask, I guess, to be disparaging of the world

01:55:15.840 | just for its own sake,

01:55:16.880 | but I think people are now starting to develop an awareness

01:55:20.420 | of how certain technologies and lifestyle habits

01:55:24.680 | that are unique to the last five or 10 years

01:55:27.920 | are really exacerbating our problems

01:55:31.160 | as they relate to ourselves,

01:55:33.600 | not just interpersonal dynamics.

01:55:35.200 | - Very much, yeah.

01:55:36.040 | - And you seem to be thinking about the big picture a lot.

01:55:38.320 | So I'm curious what your thoughts are.

01:55:39.920 | - Yeah, so, you know, all these little machines we have

01:55:43.100 | and all the ways we have of never spending any time

01:55:47.160 | by ourselves or alone or thinking,

01:55:49.100 | just feed these protective parts, these distractors,

01:55:54.100 | and leave in the dust more and more these exiled parts.

01:56:00.000 | So a lot of people's fear of not having something to do

01:56:05.680 | is because when they don't,

01:56:08.840 | or if they're not working in your case,

01:56:11.520 | then these exiled parts start to come forward.

01:56:15.920 | They're not being distracted from.

01:56:18.400 | In my case, I mentioned my father.

01:56:22.320 | I'm the oldest of six boys.

01:56:24.000 | - Oh, wow.

01:56:24.840 | - I was supposed to be a physician like him

01:56:27.840 | and a researcher, and I was spared that fate

01:56:31.940 | because I had undiagnosed ADD and wasn't a good student.

01:56:36.320 | And three of my brothers were physician research types.

01:56:40.840 | But I was the oldest, so he was really hard on me

01:56:46.320 | in terms of lazy and worthless and so on.

01:56:50.520 | So I came out of my family with a lot of worthlessness.

01:56:54.960 | And actually the model wouldn't exist

01:56:59.960 | if I didn't have that because I had this part

01:57:03.200 | that had to prove him wrong

01:57:04.400 | and drive me not to the extent you're talking about

01:57:09.020 | or sleeping in the office or anything,

01:57:10.440 | but it would drive me to find this model

01:57:15.120 | and then take it in the face of a lot of attack

01:57:18.560 | to where it is now.

01:57:20.740 | And if I wasn't working on it,

01:57:24.120 | if I wasn't getting the accolades,

01:57:26.100 | then that worthlessness would crop up.

01:57:29.160 | And then I'd have other firefighters

01:57:31.960 | to try and deal with that.

01:57:33.960 | And I had not only the workaholic part,

01:57:40.320 | but I had a part that could close my heart

01:57:43.120 | and make me not care what people think

01:57:45.080 | because I was attacked by traditional psychiatry and so on.

01:57:50.600 | - For developing internal family systems?

01:57:52.700 | - Yeah.

01:57:53.540 | I was humiliated at Grand Rounds a couple of times.

01:57:57.480 | I was in a department of psychiatry.

01:57:59.840 | - What is with the field of psychiatry?

01:58:01.800 | - That's a good question.

01:58:02.640 | So, point being that I was dominated

01:58:07.160 | as I developed this by these protectors

01:58:09.480 | and it got me through all that,

01:58:13.000 | but it didn't serve me as a leader of a community.

01:58:15.780 | And I was lucky to have some students

01:58:19.000 | who would confront my parts

01:58:21.160 | and would just say, "You can't keep going on like this

01:58:24.480 | "if you're gonna be any use to us."

01:58:27.760 | And I listened and I went and worked

01:58:29.640 | with that worthlessness and now I don't have it.

01:58:33.520 | I don't have to work, it's just I feel free

01:58:37.080 | 'cause I'm not so afraid of that bubbling up

01:58:39.520 | if I'm not distracted.

01:58:40.940 | And now we have more distractions than ever as we're saying.

01:58:46.800 | - Right, the pain point can potentially

01:58:49.760 | become the source of tremendous growth

01:58:52.080 | and value to the world based on what you've developed.

01:58:57.960 | Keep in mind, I learned about your work,

01:59:00.920 | not just through Martha Beck, although Martha as well,

01:59:03.480 | but several incredibly talented psychologists,

01:59:08.040 | scholars in the field of research psychology

01:59:10.720 | and actually a psychiatrist as well.

01:59:14.640 | - Yeah, there are some good psychiatrists.

01:59:16.800 | - Maybe I'll just share the,

01:59:18.200 | so a psychiatrist that I think the world of said to me,

01:59:23.360 | I won't reveal who it is, but they said,

01:59:25.120 | "Do you know why there's so many lousy psychiatrists?"

01:59:28.320 | This isn't a joke actually,

01:59:29.780 | even though it sounds like the setup for a joke.

01:59:32.440 | I said, "No, why?"

01:59:33.640 | And they said, "Well, because if you're

01:59:36.600 | a cardiothoracic surgeon and like 30% of your patients die,

01:59:41.600 | you're considered a pretty terrible cardiothoracic surgeon.

01:59:46.400 | If you're a psychiatrist,

01:59:48.160 | unless your patients kill themselves on a frequent basis,

01:59:52.040 | you can have a pretty "successful career."

01:59:55.820 | - That's interesting.

01:59:56.660 | - And no one ever questions whether or not

01:59:59.460 | you're good at your job or not.

02:00:02.040 | Because the field, A, has a dearth of tools,

02:00:06.120 | B, the kind of assumption is that

02:00:08.280 | a lot of things don't get better and on and on.

02:00:11.640 | And they listed off all these reasons

02:00:13.120 | why the field of psychiatry is so replete

02:00:15.000 | with what they described as lousy psychiatrists.

02:00:19.960 | So I do believe there are some excellent psychiatrists

02:00:24.080 | out there, research and clinical and both.

02:00:26.320 | I don't know if that does anything.

02:00:28.960 | It sounds like you worked through your relationship

02:00:30.440 | to psychiatrists on your own.

02:00:31.880 | You don't need my statements.

02:00:33.880 | - I agree with you entirely, yeah.

02:00:35.860 | And I tried to stay in psychiatry

02:00:40.200 | and just kept hitting the brick wall.

02:00:42.400 | And so I went grassroots for 30 years

02:00:45.740 | and now it's starting to come around into psychiatry.

02:00:48.800 | So it feels good that way.

02:00:51.080 | - It's interesting how timing in a field is so important

02:00:54.560 | and not just an academic field,

02:00:55.840 | but a clinical field and the ethos.

02:00:58.800 | If anyone is interested in understanding

02:01:03.400 | where we are in the arc of medicine and culture,

02:01:07.280 | I highly recommend reading Oliver Sacks' book, "On the Move."

02:01:12.280 | He was an obviously neurologist and writer,

02:01:15.120 | but he describes coming up through medicine

02:01:18.560 | and being in these various fields.

02:01:20.320 | He worked on headache for a while.

02:01:22.960 | It's pretty interesting.

02:01:24.280 | He wrote a book about migraine.

02:01:25.920 | He worked with kids on the autism spectrum

02:01:30.920 | and a bunch of different fields.

02:01:32.700 | And in every single one of those fields

02:01:35.560 | was vehemently attacked by some individual

02:01:40.160 | for whatever reason, usually a superior,

02:01:42.600 | kicked out of universities, moved to another one.

02:01:44.760 | Now he did have his own issues.

02:01:45.960 | He was, you know, at the time he was a methamphetamine addict

02:01:48.840 | and things like that, but he got over that

02:01:50.120 | and became the great Oliver Sacks that he was.

02:01:53.560 | But, you know, he describes these fields

02:01:55.720 | as having a culture at the time

02:01:57.720 | of really trying to suppress new ideas

02:02:00.020 | and holding people down.

02:02:01.280 | And then toward the end of his career,

02:02:03.320 | several of the universities

02:02:04.940 | that essentially had fired him earlier,

02:02:07.320 | hospitals and universities,

02:02:08.760 | were trying to recruit him back with multiple appointments

02:02:13.200 | because now he was this famous guy

02:02:15.040 | who had written a movie or worked on the movie "Awakenings"

02:02:17.640 | and like, you know, and of course,

02:02:19.080 | it revealed the hypocrisy of these big institutions.

02:02:23.280 | And so it made me chuckle and also realize

02:02:25.400 | that for those of us who are doing public health education

02:02:28.000 | at any level, and certainly on the,

02:02:30.160 | these more non-traditional things, approaches,

02:02:35.160 | that the time is right for sharing them.

02:02:37.880 | And the good news is nobody lives forever.

02:02:41.280 | So, you know, the old guard dies or retires, you know.

02:02:44.680 | - That's true.

02:02:45.520 | And I'm not going to hold my breath

02:02:47.040 | waiting for that Department of Psychiatry to invite me back.

02:02:50.040 | - I won't ask which one it was.

02:02:53.600 | We can have an offline discussion about that.

02:02:55.440 | They just might.

02:02:56.320 | A couple of more questions.

02:03:00.180 | First of all, going back to this thing

02:03:05.000 | about the larger context of culture,

02:03:07.780 | I love the optimism that's threaded through your view

02:03:13.000 | that we could get, God willing,

02:03:16.760 | Democrats and Republicans to come to some sort

02:03:19.840 | of common ground around the most important issues,

02:03:24.100 | that we potentially could eradicate destructive racism,

02:03:30.640 | racism of all kinds.

02:03:32.060 | But given the way you described it,

02:03:34.840 | certainly it's implementation in the world

02:03:37.840 | is the first thing that needs to be dealt with, right?

02:03:42.320 | Certainly, if people can see those parts of themselves

02:03:45.080 | and work with them, that we stand a chance to do that.

02:03:49.720 | And given that trauma is near ubiquitous, right?

02:03:54.520 | That people could start to address their own traumas

02:03:57.760 | so that they can induce fewer in other people.

02:04:00.640 | I guess that's basically the ultimate goal of humanity.

02:04:05.000 | - Totally.

02:04:05.840 | - And I, like so many people,

02:04:12.120 | lately, not just, by the way,

02:04:14.520 | not just in the last year or so,

02:04:15.860 | but like for the last 10 years,

02:04:17.700 | have just been developing the sense like, goodness,

02:04:20.160 | like it just seems like the number of problems

02:04:22.440 | is just seems to be expanding exponentially.

02:04:25.220 | How do we get our heads around this?

02:04:27.280 | And, you know, there's so much blame game going on,

02:04:29.600 | of, well, it's because of this, and it's because of that.

02:04:31.680 | And like, that's not a solution at all.

02:04:34.280 | So I love your sense of optimism that it's possible.

02:04:39.240 | And then my question is,

02:04:41.200 | how do we get that going to be direct?

02:04:47.240 | - Yeah, well, that's what I've been working on

02:04:49.920 | the last several years.

02:04:52.200 | And what I can say is, for example, I spent 20 years,

02:04:57.200 | like, you know, I worked with bulimia, like I said,

02:05:00.480 | and I thought, okay, this really works with that population.

02:05:05.040 | - You got people who were bulimic

02:05:07.280 | to essentially not be bulimic any longer.

02:05:09.200 | - Yeah. - Wow.

02:05:10.720 | - And then I thought, okay,

02:05:14.640 | well, let's see if no bad parts is really true.

02:05:18.100 | And so I went to the toughest populations I could find.

02:05:22.280 | So for 20 years, I worked with DID and I worked with-

02:05:25.120 | - DID, sorry.

02:05:27.120 | - Dissociative identity disorder,

02:05:29.480 | like multiple personality disorder.

02:05:32.120 | And I worked with

02:05:33.840 | what's called borderline personality clients.

02:05:36.840 | - Yeah, very common, right?

02:05:38.040 | - Yeah.

02:05:38.880 | - Before, when you talked about bulimia,

02:05:39.840 | bulimia is notoriously difficult to treat, let alone cure.

02:05:44.560 | - It's because people fight with the symptoms.

02:05:46.720 | They try to get rid of the symptoms

02:05:48.060 | instead of listening to the part that's making them binge

02:05:51.640 | about what that's about.

02:05:53.480 | - Moving from the one-on-one therapy model

02:05:56.120 | to a model where people can do this work on their own

02:05:59.000 | as well as in groups.

02:06:00.840 | But if I'm correct in thinking this,

02:06:04.900 | it seems like getting the work done with oneself

02:06:08.240 | is the first real step.

02:06:09.960 | - Yeah.

02:06:10.800 | - That there's no replacement for that.

02:06:12.480 | - Yeah.

02:06:13.320 | - Yeah.

02:06:14.160 | - And there's, in the activist world,

02:06:16.500 | there's always been a kind of,

02:06:18.000 | you're wasting, I'm wasting your time,

02:06:21.920 | but there's been a polarization

02:06:25.760 | between being in the activist mindset

02:06:30.760 | of really trying to change things in the outside world,

02:06:34.640 | versus sitting around and just focusing inside

02:06:39.360 | and not being an activist.

02:06:40.640 | But I'm working with a lot of the peoples

02:06:44.960 | you would recognize in terms of activists.

02:06:48.160 | And when they came to me, they were doing their activism

02:06:52.160 | from this sort of righteous, judgmental part.

02:06:54.800 | And if we can get that one to step back

02:06:59.060 | and have them do their activism from self,

02:07:03.180 | they have a totally different impact.

02:07:05.520 | People are willing to listen to them,

02:07:08.200 | whereas when they're in that righteous place,

02:07:10.080 | nobody wants to listen to the shaming that does.

02:07:13.660 | It needs to be both.

02:07:15.400 | People need to do their work, access self,

02:07:20.240 | and then start to try to change the outside world,

02:07:22.640 | or not one before the other, but at least simultaneously.

02:07:26.740 | - Fantastic.

02:07:29.420 | No, really fantastic.

02:07:31.860 | I don't think we've ever done a podcast like this

02:07:36.360 | where the audience had a chance

02:07:40.540 | to do self-work in real time.

02:07:43.100 | - Really appreciate you giving me the opportunity.

02:07:46.740 | - Yeah, I don't know that I've ever heard a discussion

02:07:49.380 | like it, to be honest,

02:07:52.420 | which is just a testament to you and your bravery.

02:07:58.020 | It's very clear that your decision

02:08:02.280 | not to go into endocrinology

02:08:03.680 | was one that we all are grateful for.

02:08:06.400 | - It wasn't a decision.

02:08:07.400 | - Well, my endocrinologist friends

02:08:09.560 | will have to just accept that, you know,

02:08:12.640 | we've got a lot of good endocrinologists.

02:08:14.360 | We needed you, Dr. Dick Schwartz,

02:08:16.840 | to find yourself in this business of discovering

02:08:25.000 | and creating a truly novel approach to therapy

02:08:30.000 | and self-work that goes all the way up

02:08:34.260 | to the potential to change culture, change the world.

02:08:37.820 | - That's the goal.

02:08:38.780 | - Yeah, those aren't just words.

02:08:41.140 | Those are real aspirational possible things

02:08:46.140 | that could be accomplished if people do this work.

02:08:50.300 | And in coming here today and sharing with us

02:08:53.580 | the structure of internal family systems

02:08:56.540 | and a demonstration of how it can work

02:09:00.960 | and offering people the opportunity

02:09:03.360 | to do it themselves in real time

02:09:05.520 | and giving us your perspective

02:09:07.420 | about the things that are around it,

02:09:10.600 | as well as in it with incredible clarity

02:09:13.800 | and just a real beautiful sense of care

02:09:18.800 | for people that comes through.

02:09:22.320 | But also the, I like the concreteness of it so very much.

02:09:25.800 | - It's very concrete.

02:09:26.640 | - Right, it's not abstract.

02:09:28.960 | - Right.

02:09:29.920 | - And I really appreciate that.

02:09:31.720 | And I'm certain that everyone else does as well.

02:09:34.440 | So I wanna thank you for coming here today,

02:09:37.480 | for sharing this.

02:09:38.680 | We will provide links to places where people can learn more

02:09:42.060 | through books and courses and other resources

02:09:46.000 | that you've created.

02:09:47.880 | And also just for the work that you've done

02:09:49.680 | and for being you, it's been a real pleasure.

02:09:51.800 | And I'm so very glad we did it.

02:09:54.920 | - Me too.

02:09:55.760 | Oh my God, I know my little nervous parts

02:09:58.880 | were giving me a lot of trouble.

02:10:01.080 | But once we got going, I just felt connected

02:10:03.980 | and I felt your appreciation and interest.

02:10:07.520 | And so we could have this kind of self-to-self exchange,

02:10:12.240 | which I love.

02:10:14.000 | I just love spending time in that energy.

02:10:16.760 | - Yeah, likewise.

02:10:17.600 | - And you're a great interviewer too.

02:10:20.400 | So yeah. - Thank you.

02:10:21.680 | Well, this whole thing is a labor of love

02:10:24.440 | and a free fall through just curiosity.

02:10:29.440 | - Yeah, yeah, it's clear.

02:10:32.480 | - Yeah, I hope to continue the conversation.

02:10:35.000 | - Would love to.

02:10:35.940 | - Wonderful, thanks so much.

02:10:37.760 | - Thank you so much.

02:10:39.240 | - Thank you for joining me for today's discussion

02:10:41.040 | with Dr. Richard Schwartz.

02:10:42.620 | To learn more about his work

02:10:43.840 | and to find links to his many excellent books,

02:10:46.080 | please see the show note captions.

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How to Achieve Inner Peace & Healing | Dr. Richard Schwartz

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