Introduction to Internal Family Systems

This book is geared to patients/clients. I bought it as a quick intro before I started the IFS workbook, and it was perfect for that. I feel much more prepared. I want to read “No Bad Parts” now while I work through the workbook. Out of all the therapy types, this one has been resonating with me the most and I find the most helpful. He has another book that is more of a manual for clinicians who want to learn how to use IFS.

Great read! Came in great condition no damage.

For anyone struggling with Complex PTSD, this book is a must read. IFS therapy has been one of the most effective and permanent treatments I've experienced.

Absolutely love

It makes me cry, because it's the truth!

I purchased this book after researching a bit on IFS and noticing that it is a required reading for the trainings offered by the IFS institute if you want to become certified or official. This book is an easy read and maintained my attention. I especially appreciated the multitude of metaphors, examples, and quotations to help the reader understand each topic in question. I believe that this book is primarily geared towards letting client's of therapists using the IFS model/intervention understand the process and purpose, and not necessarily how to use the model; which is what I was expecting in addition to some explanation of the origin and terminology. That may have been a fault of my own, but it is OK because I still found this book to be useful. I am eager to learn more about this model and how it can be applied to therapy. IFS generally reminds me a lot of Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT), but it uses different terms. I expect that I will use more ACT in my work setting and use this as an intervention to achieve distancing the "Self" from thoughts.

This book opens the door for a person to get to know themselves better, and help that person to work through unresolved issues, opening a person to a fuller life and more personal empowerment.

great reading for both psychologists and general public

Super

great book with much information

The book is definitely very very written and has many a thought provoking questions to ask our inner-selves and introspect about our inner leadership. As a Clinical Counselor and a Clinical Hypnotherapist, I have a few solid takeaways and am definitely eyeing my next copy, the handbook of IFS for practitioners.

Having stumbled across Internal Family Systems in Gabor and Daniel Maté’s The Myth of Normal and Bessel van der Kolk’s The Body Keeps the Score, I was intrigued by Schwartz’ “methodology” for exploring of what John O’Donohue in Anam Cara refers to as “the landscapes of our inner world” which “never reveals itself cheaply”. A number of aspects of Schwartz’ Introduction to Internal Family Systems struck me as profoundly and refreshingly useful. Firstly, the way in which Schwartz describes the core of the human Self as having beautiful qualities such as curiosity, compassion, calmness, confidence, courage, clarity, creativity, and connectedness, the “original blessing”, which he contrasts with the post-Augustinian doctrine of “original sin”. Secondly, his acknowledgment that “on the rocky road of life, we are all, to varying degrees, rejected, humiliated, abandoned, and traumatized. We all have pools of pain and shame and protective strategies that are reinforced by our culture”, in which we “absorbed a great deal of disdain for weakness and impatience with emotional pain”. The third deeply impactful realisation was Schwartz’s assertion that, “just as our bodies know how to heal physical injuries, it seems that we all possess an innate wisdom for healing ourselves emotionally”, that resonated with Hegel’s beautiful phrase “The wounds of the spirit heal and leave no scars”. It seems that Schwartz’s monumental work provides readers with “directions” for exploring our inner worlds of which John O’Donohue describes the advantages in Walking in Wonder: Eternal Wisdom for a Modern World: “If we can somehow bring the difficult things with us into the realm and the light of our souls, it is unbelievable the healing that will achieve itself in us”. I found the prospect that people “at war with themselves”, “knotted in dysfunctional inner relationships and … their outer relationships paralleled their inner ones” could change by “changing the way they regarded and interacted with their thoughts and emotions” so that “they felt less inner turmoil, liked themselves more, and got along better with the people in their lives” rather astonishing. I experienced the way in which Schwartz manages to integrate Western and Eastern philosophies (refer to Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now) useful in growing my own understanding, also of the role of psychedelics in the healing of trauma (even though Schwartz did not touch on this aspect). Lastly, I was deeply touched by Schwartz’ raw vulnerability and authenticity in honestly and openly describing his own internal and external challenges. While I understand that developing ideas of such deep dimensions may have required much time to refine, I cannot but wonder how different my life would have been had I read this book thirty years ago. I thank you for sharing your insights.

Excellent