Regulate & Rewire: An Anxiety & Depression Podcast

How to Unblend & Unburden (Parts Work Series, Pt. 2)

• Amanda Armstrong • Season 1 • Episode 78

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Episode 78

Ever feel at war with yourself? Ever find yourself frustrated that you overreacted or that you've again turned to a less than ideal way of coping? In IFS this is called being "blended" - this is when a particular part (usually a younger wounded or protective part) of you has taken over, influencing your thoughts, emotions, and actions, so much so that it feels as if you are that part. 

Today we're talking about how to "unblend" to put your regulated self back in the driver seat of your mind, body and life. Today's conversation builds on last week's part 1 of our Parts Work conversation. Hit play to learn more!

Here's the 3 takeaways:

  1. Our parts are often the coping strategies we’ve developed in response to difficult experiences. They are a welcomed part of our internal system, we just don’t want them running the show.
  2. Unblending is the process of separating our authentic self from these reactive parts, allowing you to respond to situations with more clarity and compassion. Unburdening involves helping these parts release the heavy emotions or beliefs they carry, creating more harmony and flexibility in your internal system.
  3. Successful healing requires an integrated approach, mind and body, psychology and physiology. If you’re looking for this kind of support, I’d love to hear from you.

Want to learn more about parts work/IFS? Here's some other introductory resources:

Looking for more personalized support?

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Email: amanda@riseaswe.com

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0:00  
Welcome to regulate and rewire an anxiety and depression podcast where we discuss the things I wish someone would have taught me earlier in my healing journey. I'm your host, Amanda Armstrong, and I'll be sharing my steps, my missteps, client experiences and tangible research based tools to help you regulate your nervous system, rewire your mind and reclaim your life. Thanks for being here now. Let's dive in. 

0:27  
There's no denying that being a human can be tough. We have all been through a lot. My assumption is, especially if you're coming to a podcast like this, especially for me, somebody who's ended up doing the work that I do in the world, recording a podcast like this. And with each thing that we've all been through, we develop different coping strategies. All of these coping strategies are helpful in the moment, or we wouldn't have engaged with them. And sometimes once those helpful coping strategies become habits, and you're still engaging in them, months, years or decades after the situation in which we first turn to those coping strategies, you might find that they are getting in the way of the life or the relationships that you want and in parts work or ifs we refer to These different coping strategies or beliefs that we form as quote, parts. 

1:25  
Now last week, I answered the question, what is parts work with a brief overview. So that is part one of this conversation. So if you missed that, you might want to start with last week's episode and then come back here today, because today I'm going to expand on two aspects of this modality called unblending and unburdening, and then weaving them into reiterating and summarizing and hopefully providing some more clarity around what we talked about last week. 

1:56  
We all have an authentic self. This is a wise, curious, compassionate self that's full of inner knowing, and in today's conversation, I will likely refer to this as self, authentic, self regulated self. So we all have this authentic self, regardless of our lived experiences. We all have this inside. For some of us, it just may be easier to access and source for than others, and every single one of us is also made up of many parts. Originally, these parts had helpful qualities, but they're sometimes forced to take on these extreme characteristics, especially during difficult experiences in life, either to carry our wounding or to work to protect us from re experiencing those wounds, and I shared some examples of this in last week's conversation. 

2:48  
And what you need to know is that your authentic, regulated self has the ability to get back in the driver's seat when your protective parts have taken over, and this is what happens through unblending. Your authentic self also has the ability and the capacity to heal the wounded parts through the process of unburdening. And the goal of this work, this work being this modality, ifs internal family systems or parts, work is all about restoring trust in this sense of self leadership that you do, in fact, have an authentic self, it is able to lead your system, all of these wounded or protective parts of you can learn to trust that a that self is, in fact, there, and that it Can Lead, it can take care of and guide the whole system through difficulties, through being triggered, through a variety of things that we experience in life. So it's about teaching you to trust and hold and heal you. 

3:54  
And I want to reiterate, similar to last week, that if what I've said or what I'm about to share in the next handful of minutes feels a little bit hard to grasp. Please stick with me through the end of this conversation, because as you get these little isolated pieces, it will like a puzzle. They will start to come together, hopefully, if I am explaining this well enough that it clicks. 

4:19  
So let's start by talking about what is unblending in ifs This is where you separate your core self, this authentic self, from the parts of you that are being reactive to a particular situation when you are, quote, blended a particular part, like your anxious part and angry part, and I'm not enough, part takes over and starts running the show. It starts driving the bus. It is influencing your thoughts and actions in that moment. So unblending allows you to step back to observe that part without. Being overwhelmed by it to say, oh, I can see that that my part is in the driver's seat and is taking these actions, is thinking these thoughts in these moments. And when we unblend, we get access to that self energy, to that sense of self, to respond from a place of calm, clarity, compassion and the separation is key to putting your authentic self back in the driver's seat, and also to being able to build a relationship with that part of you, that protective or that wounded part of you, to understand their needs, their fears, their struggles, just like you would with a friend that you're learning to care for and build a relationship with. 

5:42  
Now, to put this in terms that you might be more familiar with, especially for those who are a regular listener to my podcast, this is when you might turn to some of your reactive regulation skills. So in a moment you notice you're dysregulated. You can sit here and say, Ooh, I'm in the yellow zone. You pause, you regulate, and you feel your system settle. This is the same process just accessed through a different lens. So unblending is I am blended with my anxious part. I might use some tools practices. Maybe it's thought work tools top down. Maybe it's bottom up. It's a deep breath. You shake it out to step back, move yourself up that nervous system ladder a little bit. You've noticed you're dysregulated. Maybe you're able to have that thought, ooh, I'm in the yellow zone. I'm feeling really activated right now. That is synonymous with recognizing that you're blended. Oh, this is my anxious part. Same thing's just different language. And this is beautiful, because different people's brains work differently. And for some people, and for many of our clients, that nervous system ladder is the access point to, oh yes, I'm in the yellow zone, I'm in the red zone. And then to add a layer deeper to that, or just a different access point could be, ooh, this is the part of me that's anxious. 

7:06  
What I love about this is that the immediate understanding is this isn't all of me. It's not all of me all the time that is this way. This is a part of me, or this is a moment in which I'm in that yellow zone. It's the same process just accessed through a different lens. You notice that you're blended. You pause and you unblend. Now, to unblend, you might use more of those top down tools. You might be able to use more thinking based tools, or you might use those reactive nervous system regulation practices, a deep breath, shaking it out, a vision therapy drill to help settle your nervous system to bring that authentic regulated self back to the surface. So unblending is simply put, the process of regaining access to this authentic regulated self, what is sometimes referred to as your self energy. Again, same thing, different terminology. I want to resource. I want to regulate in an ifs language, it's I need to source for self I need more self energy, and this is what allows you to create enough distance between that regulate itself and your part, or your dysregulated symptom, to better understand it, to better serve and work with it. So that is unblending, it's noticing you're blended in the first place, and then taking a step back, noticing you're dysregulated, and then taking a step back towards more regulation. 

8:42  
Then we have this concept or this process of unburdening. This is the process of helping a part of you release the heavy emotions burdens or memories that they've been carrying, often as a result of past trauma or difficult experiences. And when we can unburden by unburdening this part of you can let go of these negative influences and adopt a healthier, more balanced role in this internal system. So this is that deeper work that we often talk about. If you remember our stress bucket analogy, in the stress bucket, you have your baseline stressors and your daily stressors. Your daily stressors are more your lifestyle, your your relationships, your environments, your work stressors, but those baseline stressors, and then those boulders that sometimes get dropped in those part of what exists there are your burdens. Is this past trauma? Are these deeply wounded parts of ourselves, and through ifs, we can unburden these wounded parts of ourselves, bringing that baseline stress level down so that your whole system has a little bit more capacity, so that your daily stressors don't feel as overwhelming. You don't get as close to the top of that bucket as often. 

9:59  
So, I have found in my own learning process around parts work as well as the way that we help our clients conceptualize this, it can sometimes be easier to understand this process if we externalize it a little bit. So I want you to imagine that there's this room. You're in a room and there are three people. Person Number one is you as your most regulated, loving, curious and compassionate self. Person number two is a younger kid, a younger kid feeling unseen, unsupported, uncared for hurt, burdened, wounded. And person number three is someone there standing between you and that kid. This person is there to protect this kid from experiencing any more hurt, any more wounding this per this protector may also be there to numb or minimize the pain that that kid is experiencing. So if in this room, the ultimate goal here is for you as your regulated, most loving, curious and compassionate self, to turn to that child to help them feel more taken care of, more seen, to lighten their burdens. The first step to this is getting that protector to quit lashing out, to settle down and to step aside so that you can even get access to attempt to build a relationship with that wounded younger kid. And I hope that it's obvious, but in case it's not, these three people represent parts of your internal system. Person Number one, that's your authentic self. Then you have your protector parts. These are different coping strategies, different ways of reacting to the world beliefs. And then you have your wounded or burdened parts. The process of unblending is realizing that you this capital, you this self. You are not those protectors, because some of us, maybe you have been living in survival mode for so long on either the offense or defense, that sometimes we don't know any different. We have forgotten that there is even a calm, curious, confident, creative, compassionate or courageous self inside of us. We have lost this sense of self leadership. We've lost any trust in or access to this inner knowing or sense of a regulated self because we have spent so so long in this protector role, because there have been so many wounds accrued that more and more and more protectors have had to step in and step up and stay in the driver's seat of our life. 

9:59  
And sometimes we don't have trust in our access to this inner knowing, because maybe when we were young, when we didn't yet have a defined authentic self, we experienced overwhelming situations where we didn't get the support that we needed, mentally, physically, emotionally. When we are young, our own internal leadership isn't defined yet. We are dependent on CO regulation to a calm, compassionate, attuned, other adult caretaker, and if that's not present, then our quote parts step up to protect the system, to bury our wounding as a way of just getting through. So I want to reiterate, we rely on the self energy of our caregivers, and if they are being led by their protective or wounded parts instead of their regulated selves, then we don't learn to trust that within ourselves, either. And this is why this work is so sacred if you are a caretaker, if you are a parent, because your access to your self energy creates that internal access and self trust for the tiny humans who were responsible for and if we're always leading from our protectiveness or our wounding, their systems are going to respond accordingly. 

13:53  
And so coming back to this work for you, before your parts can learn to trust this inner, regulated self, they need to learn that it's even there in the first place. Then over time, you build a relationship with it. All of your parts build a relationship with it. It leads that relationship and builds it back. So again, any of us living in survival mode can find it really tough to access this self energy or this sense of regulation, because our protective parts stand so strongly in the way of it. And this is where some somatic practices can be really helpful, things like movement, breath or touch, to release some of that intensity in your system, that protectiveness in your system, so you can feel a sense of, oh, there is something else underneath that. I may not be familiar with it, I may not have a ton of access to it, but I can see that there is something underneath this protective intensity, and these are practices that we often do in our practice with our clients in session. It's something I also have recorded practices for inside the membership library so that our clients can move through them in a self placed way to help access. This more sense of self. 

15:02  
So part of the unblending process is to work with those protector parts, to soften and eventually step aside, to let you do work with your more vulnerable, wounded parts, to step into that unburdening again, if you're listening and you're like, I'm still kind of grasping at straws here. If this feels tough to understand with your internal parts as I talk through this next thing, I want you to imagine that you are working towards getting the trust of one overprotective friend to step aside to let you mend a relationship with a different mutual friend, or maybe you're more of an animal person. This may be a better visual. Imagine that there are two dogs, and you are trying to get a protective dog to step aside, because behind it there's a wounded dog. Maybe this dog has a hurt leg, and this is the process, sometimes, of unblending or working with our protector parts. Is we've got that protective dog, protecting the wounded dog. We need to get to that wounded dog. That's the ultimate goal, is to help them heal. We've got to get this protective dog to step aside first. 

16:19  
So in ifs there are quote, six F's to working with our protective parts. And your protective parts can be more reactive or proactive, trying to put out the threat like a firefighter, or trying to prevent the threat more like a manager. And I actually have a whole module inside the membership, inside our healing course that talks about this, but these six F's are, number one, you have to find you have to identify that part of you that is active or causing distress. Then you have to number two is focus. We want to pay attention to this part, notice where it shows up in our mind and our body, and what situations. The third F is to feel towards. Can you notice how you feel towards this part, whether it's curiosity, compassion or something else? Let's say this is a drinker part or an emotional eating part. A lot of times we don't feel very curious or compassionate about that part. Sometimes we feel really judgmental, really frustrated by the fourth F is to flesh out so explore the details of the part. Can you understand the thoughts, the feelings and the behaviors? Why is this part of us showing up or acting or thinking in this way? The fifth F is fear? Can you acknowledge any fears that the part has about changing or about what might happen if it didn't engage in these behaviors. Coming back to this dog analogy, what are you afraid might happen if you step aside? Maybe that dog's afraid that I'm foe, not friend, for the wounded dog. And so this step of fear of facing and acknowledging this part's fear involves understanding the protective role that that part plays. Its concerns about what might happen if it lets go of that current way of functioning, and then when your authentic self can be in conversation with this part of you and address these fears, to help this part of you feel safer and more willing to soften, to change, to step aside, and then the sixth F is to befriend. We want to build a compassionate relationship between your authentic self and this part you let it know that you appreciate the work that it's been doing, you might ask it, would you be interested in letting go of that job or softening the intensity? What would you need from me, your authentic, regulated self, to let go of this role? You might offer it some examples of things that it could do instead, or ways that you could take over some of its responsibility of protecting this wounded part of you, asking it, do you do you trust me? What would I need to do to help build that trust? 

19:12  
So coming back to this protective dog analogy, once you've won the trust enough for that protective dog to step aside, then you can tend to the wounded, and that's an entirely new relationship that you need to build. That first dog trusted you enough to step aside, but that wounded dog doesn't know you or trust you, yet that wounded part of you need you to take that same gentle and patient approach, and I am now going to talk you through that process of unburdening. That's the work that we do with that wounded part. And as I walk you through some of the steps of unburdening, I want to do so with the caveat that I believe this part of the IFS process is best done with the support of a trained ifs therapy. Or coach. 

20:02  
And so these steps to unburdening are, number one, to access and identify the part of you that's holding the pain or the painful emotions approaching it with calm and compassion. 

20:15  
Number two is to witness the burden so externalizing, again, thinking about this as maybe you and this burden part of you sitting across a table from each other or sitting next to each other on a couch or maybe sitting outside on a picnic blanket. And so this is your authentic self aiming to witness the burden of this burdened, oftentimes a much younger version of you, can you tell me your story and they might share with you a memory or a belief or emotion that's tied to this past experience, and when we can stay unblended enough to witness the burden with compassion and understanding to allow that part of us to fully express what it's been holding on to, when we can look to that part of us and say, What did you need at that time that you didn't get? What does it look like for me to offer that to you now? And this is why this is such a beautiful process, because it's about you learning to heal you. You learning to take care of you. You learning to see and validate and be able to hold space for these parts of you to express and process and ultimately release some of their emotional wounding. 

21:33  
So after the burden has been shared, after it's been held and witnessed, you can invite that part of you can ask them, Are you ready to let that go? And how do you need to do that? Do you need to scream or cry or stomp? Is there another way of releasing? Oftentimes, practitioners will bring in elements. Can you release that burden to the light, the rain, wind, earth, fire, water, and we give that part of us as much time as they need to do this, and then once that burden has been softened, released, we reintegrate that part to our internal system. Hey, now that you're not carrying that, now that you're not stuck in that role, what would you like to do instead? More rest, play, create, connect. 

22:15  
And so here is what you need to know and have likely already guessed, this process takes time. Our parts aren't often unburdened in one shot, just like trust isn't built in one go with external relationships. It takes time our protective parts, our burden parts, will likely need a number of these interactions with our authentic, regulated self before they can really trust them to lead the system through more of your present day life. We all carry burdens. There are emotional burdens, things like shame, guilt, anger, anxiety. We have cognitive burdens, negative beliefs, beliefs of unworthiness, of helplessness, hopelessness. This need to be perfect in order to be accepted. We have these behavioral burdens, compulsive or avoidant behaviors. We've inherited burdens. Or there's legacy burdens, ancestral trauma, cultural and societal burdens. Maybe it's academic expectations, beliefs around money, body image issues, family violence, racism, the effects of capitalism, religious as you listened through me just list those burdens you might have recognized a few or many. 

23:35  
And what I want you to know is that there are ways to soften your system, not just a way, but many ways. We work with so many clients who express to us, I feel like I've tried everything. Nothing seems to work. And what we often reflect back is, we promise you haven't tried everything. We promise there is still so much hope, so much possibility for your healing. It's possible that you've tried some of the right things, but in the wrong order. What does it look like? And we often come in as a strategist. At first, where do you want to start? What have you tried? What kind of worked, what didn't? What did your system say a hard no or a hard yes to? And we help them organize their their healing in a really personalized and strategic way. But one of the things that I love about parts work, and that is, in my opinion, it so beautifully complements the nervous system approach that is foundational to healing. It is the cornerstone of the work that we do with our clients. What I love about the way that parts work complements this is, it's the psychology, the top down, support to our physiology, our bottom up, our nervous system, focus. I don't believe that you can heal fully without both. I think it's impossible to do parts work without having enough regulation in your system, in your physiology, and understanding that aspect of you and how to. Navigate. It creates capacity for the deeper healing work that can happen through parts work. 

25:06  
It's like taking a ship into a storm. Any ship can go into a storm, but not all of them will come out. We want a ship that is in good shape, one that is well resourced, that has capacity to take a few blows from the waves without splitting in two. This, I think, is where so many people's experience of the mainstream mental health model fails them. They're asked to face the storms too soon. I cannot tell you how many times we've worked with clients where by the second or third therapy session, they're asked to share the most horrible moments of their lives. They talk about how they leave those sessions feeling raw undone, often creating more anxiety or shut down for them. And this happens week after week after week where they're not given tangible tools to manage what comes up when they talk about or re experience these things. We have to help our clients first create capacity before we sail them into the storm, you must learn about the role that your nervous system plays and take steps to create more regulation and capacity on the physiological side of things before we can add more of a stress load to the system. And this is the process and model that we walk all of our clients through. 

26:20  
Like I said at the beginning, this two part series on ifs and parts work is not a complete or detailed overview of this methodology. Maybe I will do that in the future. There are also more incredible resources out there that offer that if you're interested. But what I want to do, and wanted to do with this was to introduce you to another aspect of our practice, another modality that we use, that many of our clients find immensely helpful, and that you can get access to in our one on one coaching program in the membership, and if you have ever or often feel at war with yourself, this is a modality you might want to look into. This is a process that might feel helpful and hopeful for you. One of my favorite things about teaching our clients about navigating their nervous system is that the same tools that get them from unwell to well to really anxious to baseline are the tools that can get them from baseline to optimized. It puts their healing in their hands on a physiological level. I believe the IFS does the same this parts work does the same over time and with experience. It teaches us as clients how to become our own healers. It puts us in the driver's seat of our own internal system. 

27:43  
And I want to finish today's conversation by reading an excerpt from Dr Tori olds, she's a PhD and psychologist, from her blog, and I will link it in the show notes. And it reads, quote, one thing that is amazing and very unique about internal family systems therapy is that it teaches us as clients how to become our own therapist, our own healer. It does so through putting us in contact with a somewhat hidden potential self, what you might think of as your best self, or your or your deeper self, right from the beginning, without taking years to develop, if you're thinking, quote, believe me, I'm not an enlightened person. I drink too much, I have a really hot temper, I'm really insecure. That's just who I really am. That's the only me I've ever known. It's not like an ifs we would say all those problematic behaviors are just an illusion. No, in fact, we really start with direct focus on the parts of ourselves that we struggle with. The difference is we approach those parts as just that, as parts, not the whole. I teach my students, and here she's referring to her university psych psychology students. I teach my students to think in terms of parts, even if they never use part language with their clients, I will tell them, please don't say quote, my client is a drinker. End quote, no, your client is not a drinker. They are a complex human who has a part of them that feels compelled to drink. A part of them, that part is not the totality of their selfhood or defines who they are. But what does this concept of part have to do with that enlightened version of ourselves? Well, in ifs when we can understand these aspects of our identity that we struggle with, the moment we realize they are just one facet of ourselves, it allows us to step back in a way, and to be able to finally, actually see this part more clearly, and more importantly, to approach it with compassion and curiosity. End quote.

29:47  
What I want to reflect to you who are listening, who might say, I'm an anxious person, I'm a depressed person. No, you are not an anxious person. You are a comp. Exhuman being who has a part of you that feels compelled towards anxiety. You have a part of you who feels compelled into this darkness, into this shutdown state. And when we access and understand this through a physiological lens, your physiology is exhausted and burnt out. Your symptoms of activation are shut down. Make perfect sense based on your past lived experiences in your current life, circumstances, and a nervous system that has the capacity to survive what you've been through, is a nervous system with the capacity towards healing, towards creating space enough for these wounded parts of yourself to come forward, to be witnessed, to process and to let go so that you can move through this world in a lighter way. There is so much hope.

30:46  
And there is such a variety of ways to work with your mind and body to move towards healing. There is such a variety of practitioners and methodologies and ways that those different practitioners use and engage with those methodologies. And if the way that I've presented in this conversation or in this podcast resonates with you, I would love to hear from you. I would love to answer your questions about our coaching programs. I would love to hear your story and see if our one on one program is a good fit. Please book a discovery call with me. The links are always in the show notes to do so.

31:19  
But what I want to do now is wrap up this conversation with three takeaways. 

31:25  
Number one is that our parts are often coping strategies that we develop in response to difficult life experiences. They are a welcomed part of our internal system. They have a seat on that bus. We just don't want them in the driver's seat. 

31:41  
Number two, unblending is the process of separating our authentic self from these reactive parts. This allows you to respond to situations in your life with more clarity, compassion and regulation. Then unburdening involves helping these parts release the heavy emotions or beliefs they carry, and this creates more harmony, capacity, regulation, flexibility within your internal system as a whole. And I want to caveat this with if talking through what this process looks like felt a little hard for you to grasp. This is something that our clients often grasp best through experience, in being led, through acknowledging a part unblending and unburdening with our trained practitioners. 

32:34  
And number three is that successful healing requires an integrated approach, mind and body, psychology and physiology, and if you're looking for this kind of support, this is what we do with our clients every single day. 

32:49  
Thank you for being here. Thanks for taking these brave and courageous steps towards your healing with each and every week and minute that you tune into this podcast, I see you. I am grateful for you. I am here for you, and until next week, I am sending hope and healing your way. 

33:07  
Thanks for listening to another episode of The regulate and rewire podcast. If you enjoyed what you heard today, please subscribe and leave a five star review to help us get these powerful tools out to even more people who need them. And if you yourself are looking for more personalized support and applying what you've learned today, consider joining me inside rise my monthly mental health membership and nervous system healing space, or apply for our one on one anxiety and depression coaching program, restore. I've shared a link for more information to both in the show notes, again, thanks so much for being here, and I'll see you next time you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai