For those of you who are working through Parenting from Within inside my BalancingU membership, this week's episode could not come at a better time! We are currently working through the process of uncovering our inner voices and children and starting the good (but hard) work of healing. If you're interested in this program you can learn more here. We have already started, but it's available as a self study on its own or as a part of my membership. Let me know if you have any questions!

Ok, on to the episode. One of the things that has been the hardest for me in my respectful parenting journey, is swallowing the uncomfortable truth that I can't expect to become a more respectful parent to my children when I'm still using the same old negative tactics on myself, in my own mind. If we know that change and learning and growth for our kids don't happen via shame, blame, and guilt, why would it be any different for us right? And yet it is so hard to let those old patterns go, and start treating ourselves with the same love and compassion we show our children.

And that is where "re-parenting" comes in. Without it, respectful parenting can be quite a slog, because your inner narrative and approach is not aligned with the outer one you're attempting to use with your children. However, WITH IT, in my experience, there is so much healing and grace that it allows respectful parenting to flow through you much more easily.

Re-parenting is actually pretty straight forward and simple and I'm so excited to share with you a process that has been so helpful to me personally. In this week's episode, we will explore how we use Internal Family Systems (IFS- See this previous episode for an introduction!) to help us reparent ourselves and parent our children with compassion, grace, and curiosity.

To help me in this conversation, I brought in Christine Dixon, an IFS expert who I adore learning from. With more than 20 years as an Educational Therapist, Christine's own relational, religious, and medical trauma eventually resulted in panic attacks and bodily symptoms that left her incapacitated. In a desperate effort to heal herself, Christine discovered how integrated her mind and body truly are. After training with renowned Life Coach, Martha Beck, Christine fell in love with the modality of IFS - Internal Family Systems - which she found to be the most direct, effective, holistic, and compassionate inner healing method she had ever encountered. She is committed to sharing her learnings with those who need it.

Here's a summary of our conversation:

Internal Family System (IFS): What does it mean to have an internal family?
Reparenting through an IFS lens
Why it is such good news that we are multifaceted and not mono-minded
IFS as a lifestyle and what it looks like in daily living

If you want to know more and learn how to navigate your internal family systems, visit www.theordinarysacred.com (there are courses such as IFS 101 and Self-Compassion through an IFS Lens- which I loved and is a perfect complement to Parenting from Within) and follow Christine on IG @the_ordinary_ sacred.

TRANSCRIPT

Parenting is often lived in the extremes. It's either great joy or chaotic, overwhelmed. In one moment, you're nailing it and the next you're losing your cool. I want to help you find your way to the messy middle, to a place of balance. You see balance is a verb, not a state of being. It is a thing you do. Not a thing you are. It is an action, a process, a series of micro corrections that you make each and every day to keep yourself feeling centered. We are never truly balanced. We are engaged in the process of balancing.

Hello, I'm Dr. Laura Froyen and this is The Balanced Parent Podcast where overwhelmed, stressed out and disconnected parents go to find tools, mindset shifts and practices to help them stop yelling at the people they love and start connecting on a deeper level. All delivered with heaping doses of grace and compassion. Join me in conversations that will help you get clear on your goals and values and start showing up in your parenting, your relationships, your life with openhearted authenticity and balance. Let's go!

Laura: Hello everybody! This is Dr. Laura Froyen and on this week's episode of The Balance Parent Podcast we're gonna be talking about how we can use IFS or Internal Family Systems to help us reparent ourselves. So many of us are attempting to parent our children with compassion and grace and curiosity. And I really believe one of the biggest blockers to that is that we are not able to interact with ourselves in our own bodies and minds and spirits, in that same way that we're trying to interact with our kids on the outside. And I think that Internal Family Systems, which is a modality of working with yourself and your inner parts, your inner family is one of the best ways to start engaging in that work. That inner work. And so to help me with this conversation, because I am not an IFS expert, I'm bringing someone in, I'm so pleased to introduce Christine Dixon. Christine, welcome to the show. Why don't you tell us a little bit more about yourself, who you are? What you do?

Christine: Yes. So good to be here, Laura. Yes. So I actually have a background in educational therapy. So I worked with children with learning differences for over 20 years, but then at that point past trauma from childhood from an abusive marriage from various things kind of caught up to me and once I was in a safe space, what often happens is the trauma can manifest in our bodies and it begins to then show up and want attention. And we'll learn you know an IFS that these are actually parts that are stuck back in the moments of trauma that really need to be loved and to be attended to. So at that point I was having all of these physical symptoms and began just going on this quest for healing for myself, and began to see the mind body connection.

Tried so many different things that were very helpful, mindfulness, self compassion, somatic, experiencing all these wonderful things. And then I began a coaching program with Martha Beck, some people may know her, she's one of the most famous coaches and she coached me and she said I'm going to use something called Internal Family Systems with you. And I said okay. And little did I know that my life would forever be changed from that point on. Internal Family Systems for me, what I often say is it's the most direct, effective holistic and compassionate healing method that I have experienced. And so traumas that had been affecting me for my whole life for many, many years were finally healed and it was just so incredibly hopeful and transformative for me that I changed my whole trajectory and I just, like my husband says I began to eat, sleep and breathe IFS.

And it was just my North Star by calling, you know, I was so compelled and pulled forward by it and so now I call myself an IFS educator and enthusiast. And as you know, I share every day on instagram and it really comes from a place of sincerity that this is something, that is a lifestyle to me, that I live and I just want to share with other people. Dick Schwartz, the one who developed IFS, Talks about being a hope merchant for other people and for our parts too. But just, to just sell this idea that there is healing that's possible and the source of healing is within you. And so that's kind of what I am: a hope merchant, a wounded healer. And yeah, just love to share about it.

Laura: I love that. Okay, so if we're gonna specifically talk about kind of reparenting through an IFS lens, where do you think is a good place for us to start? On that kind of, because that's what a lot of my listeners are looking to do. They know that they had childhoods that they don't want to replicate and yet at the same time they find themselves saying the same things their parents said. Doing things in their parenting that they don't want to do, unable to to make that kind of that final shift, they've read the books, they know how, you know, they know what they're supposed to do and say, but they just can't. And from my perspective, the way that I found is learning how to do that for myself is the only way that I can do that for others. Where would you start us off?

Christine: Yeah, so it's interesting. Right? So my clientele is not just parents, but I believe that every person is a parent. Is parenting because they need to parent themselves. And even if you've grown up in a relatively healthy family, you are going to have a lot of wounds because your parents cannot possibly be there for you at every moment when you have, you know, a grief or a letdown. There's going to be cultural, lots of cultural, systemic things that are, are weighing on you. So even if you haven't had trauma, there's gonna be a lot of baggage or what we call in IFS burdens that we're carrying.

So I have people like I said, who don't have children, physical children, but they have inner children. And so just like, you know, your clients who are parents, they're going to all these courses and they're learning how to lovingly consciously parent their physical outer children. I would encourage them to consider the fact that they also have inner children. And the process looks very similar. And in my experience there are times when, I mean you have to juggle the two, the outer children and the inner children. But in my experience when I really tend to my own inner children first, the parenting on the outside becomes very natural.

And I know that's hard for some parents because it's like if I tend to myself that's selfish, they have, that's one of the cold burdens for a lot of women, especially. I'm supposed to sacrifice myself for my children. I'm supposed to go against my limits and against my own needs. And obviously I'm sure they've heard that the whole, you know, put on the oxygen masks first. But again, those parts that hold those burdens, it's very hard to let go of them. So we have to go in and you know an IFS. We have this beautiful process of really meeting those parts and understanding them and validating how they got that message and helping them learn something else. So it really is like going toward a child inside of you.

And I'd like to kind of give a little analogy sometimes, like if you were at the stove and you're making dinner and your child comes up and is pulling on your pant leg, Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Mommy! Right? And you just you're like you're trying to shoo them away, no, no, no, no go away, I'm making dinner, mommy's having dinner, go away. And they're like and the more you try to shoo them away, the louder and louder they get right? And but if you turn off the stove and you get down on their level for a second, they might say look at my boo boo mommy, can you kiss it? You know, if you kiss it and then they run off or look at my drawing, oh it's so wonderful. And then they run off, right? And so the more we kind of try to push them away when they're distressed, kind of the louder they get and that's the same with our inner children that we have parts of us that will push away.

You know, some of those parts that hold maybe fear or anger or grief, you know, that feel really overwhelming and they're constantly like, no, no, no, I don't have time for this, go away. And what we learn in IFS. Is just experimenting with going toward that. And I think of like a big emotion as like a little child inside of us. And saying just moving toward it maybe for you know, 90 seconds, which is the amount of time that an emotion goes through our bodies and just say I'm here with you, what do you need? And just listening to that part that's holding that and just like our child, it will relax. And the more we learn to do that, the more the system begins to trust that we can, that we can go toward difficult things and we don't have to. I don't know how much of the IFS language you want me to…

Laura: Use it all. We'll talk about if it's a term that I feel like folks don't know, we can talk about what it is. Use it all. Good.

Christine: Yeah. So one of the first things is just understanding that we have these multiple parts inside of us, these inner families that are constantly interacting and for some people this they think, oh they thought of this as a pathology, right? But it's really not. If you begin observing your mind, people who meditate a lot right? They'll observe that there's not a monologue, there's a dialogue or discussion often going on. And it's actually really helpful to understand that because instead of thinking, if I'm angry that means that all of me is angry, right? Or if I'm sad all of me is sad. You can actually understand there's a part of me that's angry here. And if you can get a little distance from it, you'll see that it's protecting something that's more vulnerable underneath. And that angry parts are actually always very loyal to you and to your needs. They're letting you know that there's a need that's unmet or that there's a boundary that's been crossed.

Laura: They just have like sometimes maladaptive or unhelpful strategies for that protection.

Christine: Yes, exactly. And one thing I love it and IFS is this understanding of the difference between the negative impact that particularly a burdened extreme part may have. And it's a positive intention. So there's this idea in IFS that there are no bad parts. Meaning that they… it's kind of like Dr Kennedy, Dr Becky the good inside right? That every part is good inside every person is good inside, their intention is good. And as you go towards them and you get to know them, you will understand that they are protecting something underneath.

And that perhaps they learned this strategy at a time when that's what the only thing that kept you alive. You know, helped you survive? Maybe you had to fawn and please your parents in order to survive. Or maybe, you know, some people say you have an addiction. People try to get the person to stop just to get rid of that addiction. But that addiction is a is a symptom that is showing you there's something underneath and maybe the protector next in line is suicide, right? And that addictive part is like I'm gonna do this no matter what. So that the pain doesn't come up.

Yeah, so I had a situation the other day where I was driving, there was a street light and then the car across from me swerved and started coming towards me, and I thought, oh my gosh, what is this guy doing? How dare he come into my lane and then I saw that there was a child in the road and that he was swerving to get out of the way of the child. So I immediately understood the good intention, right? And this is very much what happens to our parts. Initially we look at them and we go, what the heck is this part doing in ourselves or in someone else. But then as we begin to understand the history, it begins to make sense. Oh, you were protecting this or and so those big parts that have the negative impact, they can't stop doing that until whatever they're protecting is healed. So there's no shame ever in the IFS model.

Laura: I love that experience that you shared. I'm sure it was scary but what a beautiful illustration of what's happening for a lot of us. So I'm curious to know that for someone who is just at the beginning of understanding this. Understanding that I have a complex internal system that's been with me for a long time. That there may be parts that have been pushed to the side for a long time. They've been getting louder and louder and we're ready to start taking a look. What would you recommend is like the first thing someone does if their intention is to start parenting themselves more with more compassion and curiosity? What would be the first thing that you'd have them do?

Christine: Yeah. I often will start just with awareness, right? Just a noticing. I often say noticing whatever is alive in you and you might do that in moments that are not necessarily volatile, at first. I often liken this to it's like a scuba diver who several times a day goes under the surface and looks around at the ocean. If anyone's seen my octopus teacher. You know? Like this and every time they go down it's a different world. Like things are changing and you begin just noticing, right? That there's these subtle changes. So and I often tell people you don't need to start with like 10 minutes at a time. Start with 30 seconds, start with 10 seconds if, do whatever the little amount that your system will allow you to do, that you will do that feels effortless, right?

And you could just for a moment I tell people you're gonna go inside in IFS we say you make a Y. O. U. Turn. You come inside and it's just like I call it being the non judgmental, you know compassionate witness which we'll learn as ourself for capitalist self. That you can practice it on the outside too. Just you know, you're being in this present moment, your five senses, what do I see? What do I hear? What do I smell? What do I taste? And then I'll tell people now turn it inside. And I often like to close my eyes and you're just looking. I say you're looking for your pets, you're looking for your physical sensations, emotional energy and your thoughts and there's no fixing. It's just noticing. Just, oh I notice the pressure of my tailbone on the chair. I noticed the way my hair feels on my shoulder. So you're just looking at physical sensations at first and some people have had significant trauma, have a really hard time even with that. So that's okay.

You would notice that, like I noticed an anxiety about going into my body. Like that seems scary to me. And again, there's no judgment, it's just a noticing. Or maybe there might be moments where you stop and as soon as you stop and be still, oh my goodness, there's a sadness that's just wells up, right? Or you notice, oh my goodness, I'm so tired. Right? Or it's just, it's just going to reveal to you what is true, what is alive in you. And again for those striving parts of us probably that want to try to fix it. Like, oh there's a sadness, oh no, what do I do? Again, you would notice that too. And now I see there's a part that wants to fix and so there's just, it's just a noticing and I'll often say I see you and I see you and I is the self and the you is the part.

I see you. I see you. Or I might have conflicting thoughts in my head. Man, I really, really want to do this, ah but I don't want to do it because you know and and I just listen, I see the part that wants to do that. I see that this part doesn't. So in doing that, then, as you go in, you know each day or whenever you want to, you begin to see the changing terrain inside. And that there are different active parts that come to the surface and you blend with you at different times. If you feel really overwhelmed by something, you can ask it, I like to say, can you just be nose to nose with me? Can you just come right out to the surface?

Laura: Just a second. I want to just swoop back, just, just a smidge, you said they can blend with you. Can you just like hold that to the light for just a minute and help us understand because I think what you mean there is that when we are reacting on the outside, when we're having, we're really flooded, we're angry, we maybe lose our cool and yell that, what you were alluding to there is that that's not actually us, that's the part that's blended with us. Can you talk a little bit about that piece of it?

Christine: Yeah. So in IFS, the experience that I've had, you know, with myself and all my clients and Dick Schwartz is also have all of his clients, is that every single one of us at our core has a capital s self. And that is kind of our true essence, right? And we're born with it. It's innate, it cannot be destroyed, cannot be taken away, it cannot be diminished through trauma. So, it's always there at our core and it has these, these eight C qualities, right? It's curious and compassionate. It's calm and it's clear as clarity. It's connected. It's creative, it's confident. It's courageous. So, if you think about like moments maybe when you're nature or you're with, you're in a really safe space, right? It's kind of that eventual state, you know? You feel really connected and calm, that's kind of your true nature. But just like the sun, you know, is always there but sometimes it gets covered by clouds, right? And you can have like several overcast days and you're like, does the sun even exist?

Laura: Feels like that in winter sometimes here in the midwest.

Christine: Yeah, it can be really, it can be honestly really scary and overwhelming and you know, for a lot of people to, when it's overcast for so long. And in our lives sometimes that happens where these protective parts come in because they learned to do this extreme job to protect us in the past and actually to preserve the self. And so they come like clouds and they cover over that self and they can often have if they're burdened, not all parts are burdened. But if they are burdened they will have very extreme emotion and very extreme tactics because they literally think you're going to die if you don't do this, right?

Or if you don't lash out or you know, whatever their strategy is. And so they will kind of like take the seat of consciousness, they'll kind of cover over the self and they will act as you in a sense. And so what you'll feel like is I am so angry, right? Or you'll feel like I am so worthless, you know? And you'll have a lot of like your whole identity is this thing. And so that's when you'll feel blended and you kind of feel like where’s self, where’s self? There's nowhere to be found. It can be a really overwhelming experience and you'll see other people too, who get blended with their parts.

Laura: I think that, I don't know about you, but in your, my experience, working with folks with parents, they've spent a lot of time being blended. With their parts. Especially when they're in the throes of a really hard stage and parenting.

Christine: Oh, for sure. The beautiful thing to understand is that those parts cannot stop doing what they're doing. Until what they're protecting is healed, right? So there's no shame in those parts. Those parts are faithful. It's in them being able to have a relationship with this core loving compassion itself that they will eventually be able to relax, but only then.

Laura: Because they have to feel safe. There has to be trust and connection and safety in order for them to relax and release those tactics, those strategies that they've cultivated over the years to protect us. It's just like with our kids, right? It's just like with our kids when they're having, you know, a nervous system meltdown. When they are shunted out of the rational brain and into fight or flight. There's no reasoning with them, there's no convincing them. There's only safety. There's only signaling safety to these sweet little ones who are losing their, you know, who are lost to their fear to their anxiety to the trigger that took them. And just like with those kids, all we can do is signal safety. I see you. I'm here with you. I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere.

Christine: Yeah, exactly. And I love the statement from Marshall Rosenberg who created nonviolent communication. He talks about if you cannot find it in yourself to have compassion on another person. You know, if it's your child in that moment, you must bring it to yourself first. And then you will naturally have it on that. It's not about this willpower of making ourselves. It's about understanding, Oh, if I don't have the capacity to have compassion or empathy on my child right now, there's a part of me that needs it first. So I remember first when I first understood this when my kids were younger. At first I would try to power through, right?

Laura: And I think that's what we're all doing. We’re gritting our teeth, and we’re nickling all through it. What we're supposed to say?

Christine: Yeah. Oh my God. And then and then I would lose it right. I wouldn't be able to power through yell at my child. And then, you know, and then the critic would come in and how many what terrible mom you are. And the shame. And it was just a spiral. But I remember at one point, I remember the exact moment when I made this choice of like an experiment. Because I really think it's helpful to propose to those parts and experiment at first because they don't know yet that it's effective and they might not trust it, but to say I'm just going to go into the laundry room for 90 seconds, I tell my children I'm going to go into the laundry room. I'm gonna be right back and I put my hand on my heart and I would say, oh my goodness, you're suffering. I see that you're suffering, you're so angry, you're so overwhelmed, like just naming whatever it was that was there in me and I would just begin to weep usually at those parts at being seen.

Oh my gosh, yes, it is so hard, you know, and just, you know, I'm being seen by myself and then the tears would come and I would resolve into a little place of more clarity and calm that prefrontal cortex would come back online and I would be able to emerge with so much more common clarity and say, you know, mommy was really triggered here, I might be able to apologize and repair. If I did, you know, just very naturally or I might be very clear about this is what mommy needs right now, without angst without, you know, just just kind of that direct leadership. But it took me going to be with myself first and a lot of people think I'm gonna have to do that for hours, you know, but really you can do it for a couple of minutes, 90 seconds. And my family began to learn that when Mommy had a time out, things went so much better. They’re supportive.

Laura: Yeah. And your system learns that too. So just like our kids need to trust us, so too does our system. So our system you… I love how you phrase it, proposing an experiment. Just let me try this and let's just see what happens. Because they don't, our parts don't always trust us because we've allowed other parts to blend at certain times. You know, that there can be a sense of like there's no way you've got this, you've never had it before. How can you? You know? And we have to build, spend time building trust and then we get better and better as that trust builds too. And as those parts that used to have such destructive strategies once they relax, once we start acknowledging their good intentions, they can actually start learning better strategies too and be a beautiful team for us.

Christine: Right. Yeah. It becomes like you said, I like the quote from Dick Schwartz that IFS is attachment theory on the inside where as we begin to have this secure attachment between our younger parts and ourself on the inside, we're able to parent from our adult self much more right? But if our young parts are coming out right at our kids to know that there's no shame in that, it makes sense. It's just information to us, oh my goodness, there's a part in me that needs attention here. And we can either go in that moment or we can try to make an appointment later and say, I really need to go back and meet with this part and see what its burden is. And gradually you'll begin to notice when those parts come up before they explode, right? You'll begin to notice a little agitation as it starts building. Oh, I'm you know, maybe I'm blended with a part that's pushing me beyond my limits right now. And another part is getting really agitated and before you blow up you can go inside and say, hey, I see, I see both of you. I see the part that thinks I need to, you know, why do you feel that way? And you can begin kind of having this relationship with the different parts in you.

Laura: That's self attunement, right? So, we as caregivers to our children on the outside, are always looking for attunement. Being able to be sensitively attuned to our children. And when we are, we notice the frustration as it starts to bubble as the magnet style tower keeps crashing. We notice the change, the slight change in tone between siblings as they at the very beginning of a disagreement where if we're tuned and we hear it. We can come in and just be present and just offer a little bit of support just with our presence and then lo and behold they actually like notice that they're getting that way and they use their problem solving skills, you know, if we've taught them to them. That is attunement on the outside and you're asking us to become attuned on the inside and it takes practice and time and getting to know what that feels like when it's starting to bubble up within us. Yeah. It’s beautiful.

Christine: Yeah, it really is such such a parallel experience.

Laura: It's totally is. I’m so glad to find someone else who really sees it that way. It’s the same.

Christine: It's the same side. The inside and the outside. Yeah, so yesterday in my eyes, the support we were talking about polarization and like you talk about, you know, two children who are beginning to escalate, right? We can have two parts within us that are fighting with each other and that will often feel like kind of being pulled back and forth into extreme directions or feeling stuck or confused, right? Because we have this part that, you know really, really wants to like I've been working with polarization, I was giving the example of polarization right now, like the part that just really wants to get everything out for free and just help everybody. And another part that's like, yeah, but you need security Christine and you know, and they're kind of like fighting with each other.

Laura: I think I have the same parts.

Christine: Yeah. So it's like there are these parts inside that have… That they are in their moderate form, right? They have, they both have very good intentions. So let's see, a common polarization like for a mother might be the part like I was saying it's very caretaking and wants to give everything of themselves and sacrifice everything for their family. And then often what happens is as extreme as that part is there will be an equal and opposite part that's extreme in the opposite direction. So there's a part that's… Yeah, and it's like I want to go into the woods and abandoned my family and never, you know, I mean it's very extreme. So I'll have a parent come to me and feel such guilt over that. Why do I have this part that just wants to abandon my family? And I'll say, well let's look at the opposite extreme part and this part. So the polarization is a burden systems way of trying to achieve balance.

Laura: Trying to achieve balance.

Christine: So it has this one is like this caretaking part is so extreme that I have to pull to this degree to get you to take care of yourself. Now the care taking part and its moderate form has this beautiful intention to connect to your family and to give to them to love them. And this other part that wants to escape, wants to protect you and your freedom and your expansiveness and your rest, right? So they both have really good intentions and so you become the mediator on the inside, just like you are with your children on the outside. Let's see what is your need? What is your need? Oh my gosh. You both have really good needs.

How can we come to a strategy that meets them both? You know? And if usually I'll ask people which one's older, usually the caretaking part is, is older. And so it might be meaning that it existed before the other. And so that's usually the one that's burdened. And so then you'll want to look underneath and say the big question in IFS is what are you afraid would happen if you didn't do this? What are you afraid would happen if you didn't sacrifice yourself constantly? And then just be open to receiving an answer from that part without thinking it up. Right? And it might say I would be a bad woman, I would be shamed. I would be punished. I would, you know, have no worth. Usually it's a very desperate answer which helps you understand, oh it's no wonder you're doing that to such an extreme. And you make sense. Exactly. And then you can say, you know, when did you get that message? Or when did that happen?

And it might show you again that a younger part of you that either got that message culturally was punished, was, you know, for me there's a lot of religious burden. You know, around you must put others above yourself or you know that's that's the honorable thing to do. So, it's about really getting to know how that part got to be so extreme and going and being with those young parts. And IFS we do reparenting where we actually go in, to a memory and as our current wise adult loving self, we are with that child self and we help them know they're not alone and that they are worthy as they are. And we're really creating this corrective experience. And until an adult parent has that corrective experience inside, they're going to pass on. All of, you know, those burdens inevitably to their children, not because they're a bad person, but because those parts of them genuinely believe that that's how to survive until they have a different experience.

Laura: Absolutely. And so I feel like we've kind of highlighted in this beautiful discussion. Two ways of re parenting, right? So there's this kind of active daily process of sensitive attunement and self kindness and compassion self presence, you know, under you know, just being present with yourself, recognizing those parts. And then there's this reparenting piece that is deeper where you're specifically targeting the parts of ourselves that need a different parenting experience than the one that they received. And we're using the word parent, I feel like parents get such a bad rap sometimes, but that could be an experience with the teacher.It could be a traumatic experience with someone who wasn't your parents, where they, you had unmet needs and or you, you know, you had an experience that didn't make sense and so you were left on your own to make sense of it. I mean we can offer that experience with a wise, compassionate adults to that younger part of ourselves in the here and now. I love like highlighting those kind of two different modalities of reparenting.

Christine: Yeah, once, kind of a daily practice or just a lifestyle and again it doesn't have to be for long periods of time. It can just be a check in here, there, what's alive in me. But then there's some deeper work again that as you notice and I guess we call them triggers or trailheads or tormentors like our children or other people in our lives can be our tor-mentors with a dash, you know. They are mentors because they show us some things there that needs our attention and needs healing. And so I like that you said it's not always parents, it can be anything and as those protective layers as we get to know all the protective parts, the strategies to keep pain out and to keep it down. And because they're just so afraid of the ones that hold the pain. But if we can befriend them and get their permission because they begin to trust the self because they have experience with the self.

What if I could go to that one and they begin to say, oh yes please. I didn't know you could help me, please help me. And then and then in IFS we do this thing that I called time travel. But like I said you know one of the first ones that I did was where I brought my curious compassionate self into this moment when I was 10. And my best friend of many years said you're fat and ugly and I can't be your friend anymore. And she never spoke to me again. And there were other parts of me that had diminished that all my life. Oh that wasn't a big deal that happens, you know? And so I had to ask them if they would just give me space and that's something we can do in IFS. If there are parts that block our way. Oh can I, I see why you're trying to diminish it because you don't want to focus on that.

But can you let me go to it from a space of just openness so that I can witness that. And so that process looks, again, I call it time travel. You're going back to that moment but now this 10 year old me is not alone. Now my adult self is there too. So it's not just reliving, you know, a trauma moment. It's recreating it. It's redoing it right? And really remember going back and really getting how devastating that was for my 10 year old self. And all the messages, the burdens we call them nn IFS, but the beliefs about herself that she took on that day. And then all these protective parts that were developed that day. The parts weren't developed but their role was developed, right? I'm going to be perfect, I'm going to restrict my eating. I'm going to get perfect grades so nobody can criticize me.

Laura: This is never going to happen again.

Christine: Exactly. Yes. Never again. This is the motto of the protective parts. So I began to see how my system developed and how it makes sense. But in going and being with her wit, witnessing her giving her what she needed in those moments that she didn't have, you know, and then retrieving her bringing her out of that moment because a lot of those parts are really sincerely stuck there and helping her unleash those beliefs that she got. Now my protective system doesn't constantly have to do all the work to protect her. She has this loving relationship with self and that frees up energy in my system right? So that's just an example right of what it looks like to do some of that deeper work.

Laura: Yeah. And what's beautiful about this is that we can all imagine our child on the outside having a moment like that. Coming home from school crying, telling us that a friend said something mean. And that active experience of going with and being with yourself in a painful moment, honing that skill of openhearted compassion, nonjudgmental presence, asking what's needed, not what we think is needed, but what that part actually needs. Building that skill that repertoire you can then use on the outside again with your kids. Because your kids will need something different in that moment. Than that, what you did. You know, there's a, this thing, you know, that floats around to be the parent that you needed as a child. And I, like I always say no, you need to be the parent you needed as a child to your own inner children and you need to be the parent that your actual child needs with curiosity and compassion.

Christine: I love that.

Laura: They need a different parent than what you needed. You need a quite unique parent that only you need, they need somebody else, you know.

Christine: Right. I always push back on the, you know, do unto others as you would have them do unto you. And I'm like no do unto others as they would have you do unto them.

Laura: My daughter does too. So that, the, like her school, like they talk about the golden rule and then they're like, my daughter insisted that they create a platinum rule that is do unto others as you as they would have, have you do.

Christine: Yeah, I love that.

Laura: I know she's a fabulous soul.

Christine: Oh my goodness.

Laura: Yeah. And absolutely my own partner in healing because you know, we get some of these kids, you know there are kids who for whatever reason kind of just flow with what happens and they don't push the healing, you know, in the way that some other kids do. My daughter, I think there's so much like resonance and reverberation with her. I see so much of my dad and myself in her that like, practically every day with her as an invitation for my own.

Christine: Yeah, they're holding up a mirror to us. They’re… You know what I remember when I first really understood that my triggers were gifts that they were an opportunity to, you know, it's just like a physical symptom, right? We'll have like a physical symptom and we get upset. Oh man, why am I having this pain? But it's actually alerting you, it's letting you know that something needs attention, right? Like seeing your bodily symptoms, your emotional symptoms as these benevolent messengers that are saying there's something underneath that really need attention. And if we can, that's why I love IFS, because it gives us this roadmap of what to do, how to go in and how to actually help and heal those root issues.

Laura: I love that. In one of my programs, Parenting from Within, we have a gratitude practice for triggers where we explicitly practice gratitude towards those things that alert us to where our healing needs to happen. I love that. One of the things that I do feel that I get asked of me a lot for parents who are starting some of this work like in my parenting from within program. I'm sure you get this too from your folks who are in some of your courses, which I'd love for you to tell us about. But there are some folks worry that, because they don't have very many explicit memories. Many of the people who come to work with me either say like my childhood was fine, like there was nothing like big that stands out. Or you know, it wasn't great, but I don't really remember, I don't, you know, they don't have explicit memories. And I'm kind of, you know, I have never found that to be a problem in my work with with parents, but I'm kind of curious about, because I have found in, you know, leading folks through self compassion and IFS that even if we're talking about things that happened in the past, it's all happening in the here and now for the parts…

Christine: Exactly, yeah.

Laura: I'm kind of curious, like for folks who are worried like if they don't they wouldn't have an explicit memory of being 10 and having a friend saying something harsh, what would you do that work?

Christine: Yeah, that's a good question because, so we can have memories in different ways, right? We can have explicit memories and we have implicit memories which are somatic or we feel in our body are in our nervous system? So I would encourage people that their body never lies. Right? So, I remember just having such a volatile nervous system and thinking, you know, and then the shaming piece of why am I experiencing this? Nothing really that bad happened to me. You know, I don't understand why I'm having this, but to really validate that in moments when your nervous system just becomes activated, and maybe you have no idea why. Right? What I will often do is, say there's just a a sudden terror, panic sensation or a grief and you have no idea what it's about or just an irritation or something like that, right? Discuss it.

Again, just begin noticing and knowing that that's coming up for a reason. And what I'll do, I started to say this before, I'll ask it, can you just come right in front of me, right, so that I can be with you and some people visualize their parts. Some people do not. So if you don't visualize and there's nothing wrong with you, right? You might just experience it as an energy in front of you. Sometimes I will, like kind of see myself in that state. I'll see myself in english and I immediately begin to have compassion because it's like, it's another person in front of me is feeling that. But again, if you experience something semantically or in your nervous system. Okay, can you come in front of me and I'll just ask one question. I'll just say, how old are you? And wait for a number to come.

Some people report that they can't ever get an age. They can't get a number. But I was always so surprised that a number would come and what, what that? You don't have to know any kind of detail, any kind of memory at all, just the age can help, you know how to soothe that part. So if it's, if it says I'm an infant, I'm zero, right? You can begin rocking. You can wrap yourself in a blanket. If it's a young child, you might stroke your hair and just say, oh honey, I'm here, I'm here with you. Right? So whatever age, it's a teenager, right? You, you might just have a little bit of distance and let them vent. But it can be just a really quick practice where you don't need to know any kind of detail of…

Laura: You don’t need to know. Yeah, one thing too is that I feel like it's important that I've experienced for myself when I ask that age question, cause I do IFS for my own well being. When I asked that age question, there is always a skeptical part who's right there with me being that is ready to like discount whatever age pops in. So there's always like, you know, like when I'm about to ask that question, that skeptical part is always thinking things like, you know, like you will be able to think of an age like there's no, you know, like it's always right there with me and like, lo and behold the number does usually come. And then that's part is like, how do you know, it's that age, you know, like it's…

Christine: It's like the experimenting again, right? Because I tell people, I don't ever expect you to believe this stuff unless you've experienced it, right? And so I tell people the day before I experienced this, I thought it was crazy. So I feel it with you.

Laura: I feel like every person who experiences IFS and like really has at that moment of like, yes, this is it. Like there's, they have a story about when like it just like…

Christine: Yeah. And I've done that thing with the age so many times now that my parts are, my skeptical and thinking parts are more relaxed, but initially there of course they're going to be there. And I'll just ask, can you just rest back and let me, you know, receive a number that I've learned to trust the validity of that number. The other day I had overwhelmed. I won't go into the situation with my son and I went into the closet that's my place to meet with my parts. And I said, Oh my goodness, you're so overwhelmed, how old are you? And I said 42. And I was like, another part of me was like, no, you're not. Forty-two.

Like, but as I began thinking about it, this thing that I was concerned about with my son, he had this really difficult experience when I was 42 when I went through all these physical ailments and I was hospitalized and I and that, and I couldn't be there for him in that moment. And I was like, Oh, you are 42. But it was like my rational brain hadn't put any of that together. So it's really on a subconscious level where there's a certain wisdom and as you experience it, these parts will begin to tell you things if you can just receive an answer from them and you'll be amazed at the insight. You go, oh my gosh, that makes complete sense. You'll have clarity about it that you didn't have before. So again, just encourage you to experiment with it and see what happens.

Laura: Yeah. Well, Christine, thank you so much for this beautiful conversation. I'm sure that folks are, you know, who are listening for whom this is like, oh gosh, you know, like making some curiosity, interest arise. I'm sure that they'd love to know how they could learn more from you and with you.

Christine: Yeah. So, if you follow me on Instagram, I am the underscore ordinary underscore sacred.

Laura: And I hope everybody listening, I will put all of the links to everything in the show notes. So you'll be able to go and connect.

Christine: Yeah so it's theordinarysacred.com but my entire content is about IFS Education. So I have tons of posts. You can go back and watch videos and different things there. And then on my website, theordinarysacred.com, I have some self-paced courses. There's one called IFS 101 so you can just get the basics. And then there's one self compassion through an IFS Lens. And I'm actually working on one that I hope to come out at the end of the month. That's IFS And The Body. And really just connecting how our parts show up and how they use our bodies to give us messages. So that's the third one is coming out. And then I also have some worksheets. I was like you know, I can't be one on one with everybody but I put out all these worksheets because it's almost like I'm there directing you kind of through the process through this worksheet. And then I have some meditations and some other resources on the website. I do have a support group and I have a support group that meets on Tuesdays at, from 1 to 2:30 Central Time right now. It's an open group in the future. It might be more closed. But that the cost of that is just $20 a month and the courses are $36 that might go up soon. So…

Laura: And I definitely so I have her self compassion with an IFS Lens because that's like that's what I teach and I have never found anybody else who teach really like teaches that I obviously teach it for parents specifically, but it's lovely to find other teachers we all teach in very different ways. It's so delightful to learn from other enthusiasts and another compassionate souls. So I definitely am a testimonial for your courses and listeners. If you've taken a course with me, you should know that the flow of Christine's courses is very similar. So if you liked my flow and pace, I have found hers to feel very homey to me. Okay, well Christine. I so enjoyed this conversation. Thank you so much for sharing. Not just with us but with the world. I just adored our conversation. Thank you.

Christine: Me too. I appreciate the opportunity and just had such a good time talking to you.

Okay, so thanks for listening today. Remember to subscribe to the podcast and if it was helpful, leave me a review that really helps others find the podcast and join us in this really important work of creating a parenthood that we don't have to escape from and creating a childhood for our kids that they don't have to recover from.

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All right. That's it for me today. I hope that you keep taking really good care of your kids and your family and each other and most importantly of yourself. And just to remember, balance is a verb and you're already doing it. You've got this!

Laura Froyen, PhD

Laura Froyen, PhD

Balanced Parent Podcast

Laura Froyen, PhD

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Episode 144: Re-Parenting Ourselves in the Here and Now with Christine Dixon