"Part of me wants to quit. Part of me says I'm crazy. And there's a part that just wants to sleep."
Have you noticed that "I" is never just one voice? Wanting to go and being afraid to go. Knowing you shouldn't and not being able to stop. Being gentle with everyone and harsh with yourself. Internal Family Systems (IFS) begins with this very ordinary observation: the mind is naturally multiple. Inside it live many "parts," each with its own view and its own worries, like a family. And a concern, very often, is a relationship problem inside that family.
IFS was developed by American family therapist Richard Schwartz in the 1980s. He was doing family therapy when he noticed his clients describing themselves in the language of family members: "part of me is furious with him," "another part feels I've let him down." He decided to take those parts seriously, and a complete approach grew from it. This page covers what it is, how it actually works, who it suits, and where its limits are.
IFS has one sentence at its centre: there are no bad parts. The voice that never stops criticizing you, the part that makes you procrastinate, the urge to binge or shop the moment you feel bad. IFS holds that every one of them is doing a job, and the job is protecting you. It is just that the job was taken on a long time ago, the method is out of date, and the parts themselves are exhausted.
IFS sorts parts roughly into three kinds:
Then comes the most distinctive idea in IFS: beneath all the parts there is a "Self" that is not a part. It is naturally calm, curious, compassionate and confident. It has never been wounded and does not need fixing. The concern is not that the Self is missing, but that frightened parts have pushed it aside and taken the driver's seat.
The work of IFS is to help your Self step forward again and get to know every part: understand what each is protecting, hear its story, and then help it set down the burdens that were never its own. The counsellor does not do this for you. They show the way; you do the work.
IFS does not ask you to silence any voice inside you. It helps you become the one who can hear them all, and lead them.
IFS sessions have an unusual rhythm; much of the time you will find yourself in conversation with a part of your own mind. Here is what actually happens:
Beyond understanding your situation, the counsellor will usually introduce the language of parts and try, with you, to notice one or two that are already obvious: the tension that shows up whenever you mention work, or the critical voice in how you describe yourself. The first session does not usually go deep. It is a chance to try seeing yourself this way and notice how it feels. Some people recognize it instantly; some find it strange. Both reactions are normal.
IFS has a few classic questions. "As you say that, which part do you notice?" "Where is it in your body?" "How do you feel toward it?" (This one matters: if you feel annoyed by it or afraid of it, another part is speaking, and the counsellor will work with that one first.) "How old is it?" "What is it afraid would happen if it stopped doing this job?" You will gradually discover that the parts really do answer.
Light. Usually just noticing: which moments this week a part stepped forward, and what your attitude toward it was. Some people write it down; some spend a few minutes a day saying hello to one part. There are no worksheets and no required exercises.
IFS has a clear sequence, but not an agenda. The sequence is: get to know the protective parts first, earn their trust and permission, only then approach the exiled wounded part, witness its story, help it set down its burden, and finally return so the protectors know they can relax. This order matters; the counsellor will not skip past the protectors and go straight for the wound. But how far each session goes is decided by your parts.
They will teach you the language of parts and Self, and how to talk with a part. But the core of IFS is not a technique; it is a stance: staying curious and compassionate toward every part of yourself. The counsellor will often say "ask it" rather than "let me tell you." The answers come from inside you, not from them.
Here is a common path. Many sessions only reach the third step, and that is already useful work:
IFS has no set number of sessions, usually weekly or every other week. One specific pattern may take a dozen or so sessions; with deeper trauma underneath, the protectors need longer to trust you, and it may take a year or more. The pace is set by your parts, and the counsellor will not force it.
Raymond Li
Marriage and Family Therapist · Counsellor
MCMFT
你好，我叫 Raymond，我係一位家庭治療師。如果你正面對緊一啲人際關係上嘅困擾，或者唔知道自己喺原生家庭嘅成長經歷，係咪影響緊而家同其他人嘅相處嘅話，我哋可以一齊探索下。 有時候，我哋想擺脫原生家庭嘅溝通模式，但又會好無奈地跌返入同一個互動模式上。我想同你可以一齊尋找出路，了解自己嘅原生家庭係點樣影響到此時此刻，選擇適合自己嘅路向。
Linda Ng
Counselling Psychologist
MSocSc Psy, MSSCP
輔導不一定要等到情緒崩潰、生活出現嚴重困難才尋求協助。當你感到迷惘、關係糾結，其實已是內在在提醒你：是時候停下來，聆聽自己了。
The language of IFS is vivid. Some people hear it and think "that's exactly it"; others find it too abstract. A rough guide:
The language of IFS has been borrowed by counsellors of many other orientations. You may well meet the question "which part of you is that?" in counselling that is mainly person-centred or psychodynamic.
IFS is most often used for self-criticism and self-image, the effects of trauma and childhood experience, anxiety and depression, and those patterns of behaviour you know are bad but cannot stop. It is also common for relationship difficulties, because many relationship conflicts are really two people's protective parts colliding. What they share: several voices are pulling inside you, and you have been standing with one of them to fight the others. These are some of the concerns IFS is most often paired with:
How you see yourself, your sense of worth, and the voice that keeps criticising you.
When the past keeps shaping the present, and body and mind feel stuck in that moment.
Worry that will not switch off, a body that stays tense, and difficulty relaxing.
Tension, communication and boundaries with parents, children or siblings.
Persistent low mood, loss of interest and motivation, and a sense that nothing matters.
The idea of "parts" is easily misread. Some common misconceptions:
"Having many parts inside means a split personality."
"Part of me wants to go, part of me is scared" is an everyday experience everyone has, not an illness. IFS simply takes that language seriously. Dissociative identity disorder is a different matter, involving memory gaps and identity switches, on a different level from the "parts" meant here.
"The goal is to get rid of the inner critic."
IFS never gets rid of any part. The inner critic is an exhausted protector that believes if you are strict enough you will never be hurt again. IFS gets to know it, thanks it, and lets it know it can set the job down. Trying to drive it out only makes it louder.
"The counsellor will hypnotize me into some state."
You are awake throughout, eyes open or closed as you like, and can stop at any time. The counsellor only asks questions; the answers come from inside you. IFS places particular weight on you being in charge: if a part does not want to continue, you stop, and the counsellor respects it.
"IFS is just a recent self-help trend."
IFS has become popular in recent years through a few bestselling books, but it is a therapy model with forty years of history and a formal training and supervision system. A self-help book can help you get to know your parts; working with the trauma underneath still needs a trained person beside you.
IFS is widely used in practice, but its research base is relatively young. The main evidence so far includes a randomized controlled trial finding that IFS improved depression, self-compassion and pain-related function in people with rheumatoid arthritis (Shadick et al., 2013), and a small study of adults with multiple childhood traumas showing a significant drop in post-traumatic stress symptoms after sixteen sessions of IFS (Hodgdon et al., 2022). The IFS Institute's research page keeps an updated list.
To be plain about it: these studies are few, small, and mostly carried out within the IFS community itself. IFS is not on the NICE guidelines or the American Psychological Association's list of research-supported treatments. Its theory overlaps with attachment research, the view of the mind as multiple, and research on self-compassion, all of which have stronger evidence, but that is indirect support. If you want an approach backed by many randomized controlled trials, IFS is not there yet.
For the right person IFS can be powerful, but it has clear limits:
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