Download - Saturday, September 28

16 CO N F E R E N C E S E S S I O N S : S AT U R D AY

SATURDAY @ a glance . . .Registration 7:00 a.m., North/South Convention LobbyContinental Breakfast 7:00 – 8:00 a.m., Grand BallroomIFS 2019 Plenary: #IFSwithoutBorders 7:55 – 9:45 a.m., Grand BallroomMorning Workshops: (#301–314) 10:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.Lunch Buffet 1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m., Grand BallroomAfternoon Workshops (#401–414) 2:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.Book-Signing Event featuring Richard Schwartz 5:45 – 6:30 p.m., North Convention LobbyEvening Workshops (#501–502)*Please refer to each workshop for scheduling details.IFS Sangha 6:15 – 7:15 p.m., Location TBDUpliftment, Songs, and Stories with Anna 7:00 – 8:00 p.m., Grand Ballroom Closing Ceremony Dance Party 8:30 – 10:30 p.m., Grand Ballroom

IFS Conference Bookstore Hours9:30 a.m. – 6:30 p.m. Tower Court A in the I.M. Pei Tower

Finding Om: Mindful Vinyasa Yoga

Debby Patz, PsyD, CAC III, E-RYT How do you respond to challenge? Which parts of you show up, and which parts of you resist? Engage all your parts, including the physical, in this moderately strenuous vinyasa yoga flow. This practice invites you to tune into your own experiences in an honest, nonjudgmental way and be witness to areas of acceptance and reactivity. The more we engage with and learn about our own “stuff,” the beter equipped we are to show up for our clients from a place of Self energy.

6:15 – 7:30 a.m., Location: TBDAdvance registration recommended but not required

Self Energy Activation:A Kundalini Yoga

and Meditation ExperienceNatalia Rosenbaum, LMHC

Kundalini Yoga and meditation offer tools to access and stimulate the conscious mind, giving us the ability to connect with more Self energy. Join us for 90 minutes of both energizing and calming practice—movement, breathwork, mantra, and meditation.

Kundalini Yoga experience not required!6:30 – 8:00 p.m., Location: TBD

Advance registration recommended but not required

An Evening of Upliftment, Songs, and Stories with Anna Huckabee Tull

At the special request of Dick Schwartz, we are honored to welcome back to the IFS Conference award-winning author and singer-songwriter Anna Huckabee Tull, who offers up a rare and special evening—a collection of powerful stories of healing and inner spaciousness brought to life through words and song. Anna will be performing songs from her new album, The Days of Your Opening, and sharing insights from the wild ride of her new IFS-friendly book, Living the Deeper YES, which Dick has called, “poetically evocative,” “skillful” and “highly recommended.” Come finish out your day in a restorative, uplifting, and centering environment with music that soothes and inspires, and stories that invite you to remember that more is possible and all is well.

7:00 – 8:00 p.m., Grand Ballroom

Saturday, September 28— The IFS Conference will be held in the I. M. Pei Tower Building —

Plenary Session8:00 a.m. – 9:45 a.m.Opening RemarksJon Schwartz, PhDExecutive Director, The Center for Self Leadership

#IFSwithoutBorders Deran Young, LICSW, Caitlin Capistran, DPT and Sarah Houy, MA, LPC, RYT, BCNAs the use of IFS expands and evolves, we’re excited to welcome three innovative practitioners who are extending the reach of IFS beyond the traditional application of the Model. Deran, Caitlin, and Sarah are all breaking down borders to bring IFS to new places. During this plenary session, you’re invited to hear how these IFS innovators are using IFS in new ways and to consider how you are expanding the use of IFS in your own community.

IFS & Diversity: As the founder of Black Therapists Rock, Deran has been dedicated to making mental health and emotional well-being culturally relevant for marginalized communities. During this session, she will explain how she utilizes IFS to foster passion for diversity and dedication to unity. Deran will also share how she has personally removed the painful, though once necessary, borders around her own heart to create more space for community and collective healing.

IFS & the Body: Dr. Caitlin Capistran is taking IFS inside the body to dissolve the border between body and mind. She’ll share what our bodies can reveal about our parts and how IFS can be used to transform our physiology and support physical health. Caitlin will discuss how our bodies reflect our internal systems, the direct impact parts can have on our physiology, and how to support your clients’ physical health through the use of IFS.

IFS & Technology: Sarah is passionate about breaking down borders through the integration of technology and mental health. She will share scenarios from her own experience and how she sees the utilization of IFS and technology together to expand and enhance the healing capacity of IFS.

Ketamine-Assisted IFS Therapy Dr Robert M Grant, MD, MPHKetamine is a legal and FDA approved psychedelic medication for treatment of depression. Integrating psychotherapy with ketamine treatment prolongs the benefit from single ketamine treatments. IFS is well suited for use with psychedelic therapies because it embraces the multiplicity of the mind, seeks full consent continuously, enables reprocessing of traumatic memories, leverages the ketamine induced neuroplasticity in shifting neural networks involved in mood, memory and self perception. Dr Grant has clinical experience over 2 years with integrating ketamine assisted psychotherapy with IFS; the process and outcomes will be presented.

Morning Workshops10:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

IFS CORE CONCEPT

301 Direct Access: An Essential IFS SkillFran Booth, LICSW Additional teachers for this workshop: Jory Agate, Karby Allington-Goldfain, Kathy Cox, Ann Drouilhet, Karen Earnest, Joanne Gaffney, Michelle Glass, Sue Seiler, Jeni TysonHaving mastered the basic protocol, the maturing IFS therapist often seeks proficiency at direct access. Embodied ease with direct access increases your competence as an IFS therapist. This workshop offers the unique and rich experience of having a team of highly skilled IFS therapists coach attendees in supervised practice. Teaching methods include didactic, video, experiential, and practice. You will leave with more confidence about using direct access.

Track: Trauma Level: Intermediate to Advanced

IFS CORE CONCEPT

302 You-Turn to Return: From Reactivity to Self LeadershipCathy Curtis, LCSW and Toni Crossen, LMFTRichard Schwartz coined the phrase “You-Turn.” This quite literally means learning to turn your attention toward yourself and away from the external environment for validation. This workshop is designed to help people understand the multilayered reasons for their reactivity, name the protectors whose job it is to blame other people for feelings of anger and shame, and identify exiles whose pain motivates these protectors. Participants will learn what it truly means to make a You-Turn and what it sounds like to make a Self-led return. Through didactic, experiential, and group discussion, we will help you learn how to do this work with yourself and with your clients. We will explore common protectors that work hard to prevent this process, incorporating material from the Intimacy from the Inside Out couple therapy training program. We believe this work is life-changing and will benefit you and your clients immensely.

Track: Couples, Family, Parenting & Children Level: All Levels Welcome

CO N F E R E N C E S E S S I O N S : S AT U R D AY 17

Book-Signing Event!Stop by the Bookstore for more information

Saturday, 5:45 – 6:30 p.m.IFS Conference Bookstore, Tower Court A


Continuing EducationCE credit from boards may vary for some workshops.

For more information, visit:selfleadership.org/2019-annual-conference-edu-credits.html

for the most up-to-date details.

303 SoulFreedom™ for Healers: Embodied Spirituality, Relational Expressive Arts, & IFS to Heal You and Your ClientsAdrienne Glasser, LCSW, RDMT, IFS CoachFocusing on the healer’s journey and access to Self are of utmost importance. For clients, co-regulation happens through IFS when they are able to sense Self being present in a group and in the Self leadership of the therapist. Through group exploration of Self, guides, trance states, and embodiment with IFS, participants can simultaneously learn experiential methods and movement techniques for their own personal growth and to use with clients. This workshop will explore quick and effective ways for clients to access Self that can be used both individually and with groups. Participants will learn how to connect with spirituality, or Highest Self, to both protectors and exiles. When this connection is made, deep karmic clearing, the lifting of burdens, and playing with the gifts of our legacy heirlooms all become possible. We’ll seek a better understanding of our embodied sense of purpose as a healer on a somatic level through the exploration of parts, exiles, and the felt sense of Self in the body. Participants will be guided through group healing where the collective consciousness (Highest Self ) of the group sees, mirrors, and heals all parts relationally. Experientials such as: SoulFreedom™ Maps (sculpting), SoulFreedom™ movement, breathwork, guided visualization, sociometry, group ritual, and relational mindfulness will be explored.We will learn ways to work with groups that make the IFS Model, spirituality, and embodiment accessible to anyone. A brief overview of how the group collective Self can heal attachment wounds through expressive arts, guide work, trance states, and embodiment will be discussed. Participants will leave with a renewed sense of purpose, many tools to point toward Self with clients, and ways to easily access Self during sessions to give our healer parts much-needed support and love.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: Advanced

304 Our Voices, Our SelvesNaaz Hosseini, LPVoice is an integral part of the therapeutic process. When we, as therapists, are not aware of our own voices, we can undermine our intention. When we are not aware of our clients’ voices, we can miss important cues. Through lecture, practice, and experimentation, we will explore how our voices carry Self energy and parts energy and ways to attune to voice as it reveals, informs, and helps guide our work with our clients and ourselves.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: All Levels Welcome

305 Heart Lessons of the Journey: An IFS Lens on the Unique Life Passages of TherapistsCece Sykes, LCSWThe lives of therapists are unique—we spend thousands of hours in relationships with people who are suffering deeply. We offer our emotional support and our emotional intelligence and actively facilitate their internal relationships and healing. Over and over, we assume the role of welcoming other people’s emotional pain and guiding them to a better place. All the while, our own worries and distress remain (rightly) in the background. Yet we have a complex history that got us into this position. Our journey is rich with its own challenges, losses, and triumphs, and we are evolving, too.This workshop will guide therapists to more deeply explore and build relationship with the protectors who learned how to focus and attune externally as well as to our vulnerable exiles who absorbed early messages about responsibility, sacrifice, and striving. Through lecture and experiential exercises, we can rediscover our appreciation of the “heart lessons” of our individual journeys, resource our inner worlds, and reinvigorate our connections to Self energy and our own unique wisdom.


306 Utilizing IFS with Individuals and Families Affected by Autism Spectrum DisorderHelena Huckabee, PhDChildren with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) often speak for their parts with their actions. Parents need healthy and effective approaches to witness their child’s parts and unburden their child’s trauma even when the child has little or no language and his or her actions may be dangerous. Essential information and approaches will be given for working with individuals of all ages with ASD, including adolescents or adults wanting intimate relationships, frustrated or grieving parents, and polarized or fighting couples. Knowledge will be shared on the core self in individuals with ASD and how unblending, unburdening, clarity, and connection can be facilitated. Approaches will be provided for parents, siblings, or caregivers to acknowledge the parts of their ASD family member while still maintaining healthy family boundaries as well as unburdening their own anger, fear, rejection, and isolation.

Track: Couples, Family, Parenting and Children Level: All Levels Welcome

307 Graduate Students’ Stories: How We Learned From and Used IFS in Our Graduate Practicum Training ProgramNancy Morgan, PhDSince 2015, IFS has been incorporated into a forty-six-week trauma-focused/mindfulness-based graduate psychology training site at LifeMoves, Northern California’s largest agency dedicated to breaking the cycle of homelessness. Each year, twelve to sixteen psychology practicum students are introduced to IFS through didactics, individual supervision sessions, and weekly group supervision.


Graduate psychology students join their past practicum training site director, Nancy Morgan, an IFS therapist, to share their experiences of being introduced to and using IFS during their practicum training years. Discover how IFS informed students’ views, perspectives, case presentations, and sessions with homeless children, families, individuals, veterans, and elders, all of whom had significant trauma histories. Students will also share their experiences using IFS with monolingual Spanish-speaking clients, in conjunction with art therapy, and much more.

Track: IFS Beyond Psychotherapy Level: All Levels Welcome

308 IFS Through the Lens of Shamanism: Expanding Self’s Connection to the Energetic WorldJennifer Farley, MA, LPCC (2700), BC-DMTIn this workshop, attendees will be invited to view Internal Family Systems beyond the framework of psychotherapy and through the lens of shamanism. Specifically, attendees will learn foundational teachings of the South American Waskar and Inkari lineages and how IFS is in alignment with these teachings. Utilizing IFS, people are empowered to be their own shaman by learning to navigate and heal their internal world in order to enhance the experience of their external world. Embracing shamanism as a lens, IFS can be even further expanded in its capacity to connect to the experience of existential connection/spirituality. Acknowledging this alignment with shamanism, other embodied shamanic rituals can be utilized in synchrony to support healing and experience expansive energetic connection/spiritual connection. This workshop will explore these ideas both didactically and experientially.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: Advanced

309 Exploring Shame within the Culture, Ourselves, and Clients: Using IFS to Build Shame ResilienceIrina Diyankova, PhD and Norma Stevens, LCPC, NCCShame is a universal condition and one of the most exiled and protected experiences of all the negative emotions, as it is so destructive to our sense of personhood. In this workshop, we will present the latest research on shame, including perspectives from neuroscience as well the IFS perspective on shame and its self-perpetuating cycle. We will explore sources of shame, its role in mental health, its common protectors, and challenges in working with clients. Using a combination of didactic and experiential exercises, participants will gain a deeper understanding of their clients’ parts around shame as well as their own. Participants will enhance their practice of IFS in working with shame and in building shame resiliency.

Track: Trauma Level: Intermediate to Advanced

310 IFS Is a Relational Model of Therapy: Exploring Various Aspects of the Relational Field in IFS TherapyDavid Stern, PsyDIn the moment when a part meets Self and Self meets a part, something wonderful reliably occurs. A relational circuit is completed and, with the closing of this circuit, there is a quiet and delicious explosion of love. IFS has, as its primary goal, fostering a relationship between the client’s Self and parts. Healing arises most swiftly when clients’ parts are met with clients’ Self. As a consequence of this focus, the larger relational dimension of IFS work is often misunderstood, underexplored, or underdeveloped. This workshop explores different ways to deepen the relational dimension of IFS practice.As with any therapeutic process, there are many relational circuits at play, and these form the rich matrix of any relational field. The circuits of therapist Self to client Self, therapist Self to client parts, client Self to therapist Self, and client Self to therapist parts are each a distinctive dimension of the relationship. These cross-fertilize in a matrix of relationships which, when properly honored and explored, can multiply, quicken, and deepen the possibilities for healing. Connection is essential for healing all manner of attachment wounds. It is also essential to healing all manner of trauma and an important part of healing addictions. In revealing the almost magical power of the Self-to-part connection, IFS shows us a path through which love will reliably travel and all manner of healing can be achieved. By attending to all dimensions of the relational field, we assure ourselves that the relational matrix will be suffused with love and that healing and wholeness will obtain.


311 In Living Color: Your System, IFS, & SoulCollage®Katherine L. Ziegler, PhDSoulCollage® uses recycled images, imagination, and intuition in a fun yet profound, relaxing, inspiring, and healing art-collage-plus-inner-dialogue process, enabling deep self-exploration, emotional development, and creative pleasure with full and compassionate self-awareness. You keep your 5" x 8" collages to view, consult, and add to over time—your psyche manifest, a presence you can see, touch, and relate to. The overall process strengthens your connection with Self in the IFS sense, helping bring more of your core wisdom into your life and work.Hands-on, we will combine SoulCollage® with IFS to begin getting to know some inner parts and perhaps shed new light on an inner conflict, identify a part’s burden, or find wise inner guidance and support around life questions. Unique among expressive-arts approaches, the SoulCollage® form of inner dialogue is specifically structured to give expression to (normal) inner and outer “voices” or viewpoints of which the collager may not be aware—or present them in new configurations that can give a fresh slant on an issue.No art talent or training is required. All materials will be provided.



312 Client Suicide Happens: A Therapist’s Journey toward Healing from the Grief and Trauma of a Client Dying by SuicideBarb Torgerson, LCSW, LSCSWWhen a client dies by suicide, it is devastating. The goal of this presentation is for therapists and other helping professionals to not feel so alone in navigating the loss of a client whose suicidal part has made the decision to end the client’s life, or in grappling with the fear of losing a client in that way. When a client dies by suicide, we must explore many of our parts. We will learn to be Self-led and hold space for parts such as grief, shame, confusion, and doubts about competency through didactic teaching, experiential exercises, and demonstration/sculpting.

Track: Trauma Level: All Levels Welcome

313 When Humans Are Dangerous: Beyond Verbal Interventions with Parts That Have Relational TraumaRobyn Lending Halsten, MA, LPC, BC-DMT, DTRLThis body-centered, movement-based workshop will be largely experiential and geared toward participants who wish to explore, from their own embodied experience, how to safely work with nonverbal parts. Cultivating embodied Self presence with parts who have relational trauma allows for our clients and their parts to neurocept, a sense of safety. Parts need to know the Self is willing to get to know them on their terms and, if necessary, without the use of language. Using the principles of IFS, Polyvagal Theory, dance/movement therapy and Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, participants will learn how the interactive relationship between client and therapist as well as Self and parts can be explored, expressed, and unburdened through nonverbal interventions.


314 Harnessing the power of Vicarious Resilience Through use of IFS: Lessening the Impact of “Compassion” Fatigue and Preventing BurnoutKindra Carroll, LCSW, LICSWMost therapists and helping professionals are aware of the potential impacts of vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue, and burnout in working with individuals who have experienced trauma. However, the contrasting concept of vicarious resilience is often overlooked in these discussions. It occurs when professionals experience personal growth in their own life through witnessing the growth of their clients. IFS can encourage vicarious resilience by unblending from parts that take on the trauma and enhancing one’s capacity to experience compassion and Self energy. In this workshop, participants will experience a better understanding of both vicarious trauma and vicarious resiliency as it relates to the IFS Model. In an effort to minimize burnout, participants will learn to better differentiate between empathy and compassion and will consult with the 8 C’s to encourage a more self-led practice.


Afternoon Workshops2:30 – 5:30 p.m.

401 Revising Relationships through ResonanceSusan McConnell, MA, CHTOur intimate relationships reveal the stories of our body-based attachment experiences. These “known but not remembered” experiences from conception through infancy are brought to awareness through somatic practices. In a state of embodied Self, our resonant bodies are the vehicle for the psychobiological attunement necessary to rewire our habitual patterns of relating and to restore “right relationship” within ourselves and with those we love.


402 IFS: Highway to Hell, or a Way Back HomewardMary Steege, LMFTThe word religion is derived from a Latin root meaning “to join, or to connect”—humans and divine enter into relationship. IFS is a relational model. It connects us up in a multitude of relationships between parts, Self, and what Dick calls “the Larger Self.” IFS facilitates trusting and harmonious relationship at every level of being and has consequently become a spiritual practice for many. Followers of diverse religious traditions and spiritual paths have noted the spiritual underpinnings of IFS. At the same time, they wonder about the role of revelation, religious practices, and the teachings of their own tradition. Still others make IFS a religion and inadvertently perpetuate cycles of shame and perfection. We will explore topics that include Self from a spiritual perspective; IFS, I-Thou, and world peace; and salvation and the Idolatry of Self. The workshop is a convocation for anyone interested in the conversation. All parts are welcome: religious, atheist, anti-religious, and otherwise. Bring your burdens. Participants will learn how IFS can help bridge revelation and relationship within a tradition and help build bridges between traditions. Participants will gain insight into their own beliefs and burdens with regard to religion. Clinicians will gain skills to work with the religious systems of clients. Together we will create sacred space for this holy work within the IFS community.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: Introductory to Intermediate

403 A Journey through the 12 Steps of Recovery the IFS WayNaomi Nygaard, ADMPThis experiential workshop will present the 12 Steps through an IFS lens. We will use meditation, journaling, movement, and group discussion to journey through an IFS version of the 12 Steps. This version describes a process of discovering and unblending from our firefighters and managers, healing the polarities between them, and allowing a turn toward Self in Steps 1 through 3; discovering and unburdening exiles in Steps 4 through 7; healing relationship wounds with those in our


lives that occurred when we were blended with our protectors in Steps 8 and 9; and deepening a connection to Self in a life of ongoing spiritual growth for maintaining and deepening our recovery in Steps 10 through 12. The material is practical in nature and can be used to greater understand, appreciate, and help all our parts involved in our addictive-compulsive tendencies. It will also allow us to better understand our clients’ addictive cycles and to facilitate a process of recovery that will sustain.

Track: Addiction Level: Intermediate to Advanced

404 The Knowing Field: Drawing on the Innate Intelligence of IFS and Constellation WorkBrian Jaudon and Elmar Dornberger, LPCIFS and Constellations (Bert Hellinger) are two of the most deeply honoring and transformational models on the planet. While IFS helps us discover and navigate our inner landscape, Constellations have traditionally revealed the hidden dynamics of families and other large systems. When we marry these highly symbiotic approaches to systemic evolution, the results are pure magic. We learn where we’ve been stuck and how the system is ready to evolve. We experience expansion at all levels as the path forward begins to reveal itself.This highly experiential workshop will allow participants to apply innovative methods and approaches that draw on both the IFS and the Constellation models. Specifically, Brian and Elmar will provide exercises for you to explore multiple avenues of personal growth: • What are the gifts that are ready to be expressed in your life?• How can you move from a state of helplessness to enoughness?• What other states of being might your system be asking for?


405 Mature IFS Therapists 65 and Over: IDs Will Not Be Required at the DoorRoberta Rachel Omin, LCSWWe are mature IFS therapists. Most of us don’t fit the cultural stereotype of being old. Yet we are experiencing our aging. At times we have lots of Self energy with all the confidence, resilience, and wisdom that aging brings, and at other times we hear our critics chastising us for not quite being who we were or that our body has a mind of its own despite our best efforts. While we have more consciousness, awareness, and presence, we cannot escape the sorrow, pain, and losses of many kinds that come with growing older. How do we navigate both worlds of who we are as part of this developmental stage?How do we bring our courage, curiosity, compassion, and acceptance to this stage of our life? Through meditation, experiential exercises, and audience participation, we will discover and deepen our insight with what moves us and shakes us in this latter part of our journey.


406 A Task Analysis of Working with an Exile in IFSTim Welch, MS, Adrian Blow, PhD, Tina Timm, PhD, and Jennifer Van Boxel, MMFTThis workshop presents the results of an empirical process study that used a task-analysis framework to examine the steps associated with a successful exile retrieval. The presenters (who include two IFS trained clinicians) contacted Dr. Richard Schwartz to obtain videotapes that contained successful examples of him using the intervention for analysis. This workshop describes the results of this study, which provides empirical evidence of the steps associated with successfully working with an exiled part in IFS. Our workshop will consist of a didactic component which describes the research methods used and the selected intervention, a discussion that solicits participants’ views and experiences with this technique, and the opportunity to observe and analyze video clips of a successful exile retrieval.

NEW! Pilot Track: Research-Based Level: Introductory

407 How Sexual Trauma Impacts Couples’ Ability to Be Safely Intimate: Using IFIO Couple TherapyNancy Wonder, PhD When working with couples regarding their sexual intimacy, therapists need to be aware of how sexual trauma has impacted their clients’ parts. Many of the parts effected by childhood sexual trauma or adult sexual exploitation and harassment need compassion and attention in the consulting room. Internal Family Systems and Intimacy From the Inside Out offer protocols to work with these parts in a safe and effective way. Participants will learn how to track sequences of protective parts in regard to sexual intimacy and to identify more vulnerable parts that have been hurt by others. Finally, participants will learn how to use the IFIO protocol Courageous Communication to help clients share sexual hurts from the past.

Track: Couples, Family, Parenting and Children Level: Intermediate to Advanced

IFS CORE CONCEPT

408 The Art and Science of Unblending PartsElizabeth Taeubert, LCSWIt is essential to the healing process that the protectors and Self-like parts unblend and allow the Self of the client to go to the exile so that it can be fully witnessed, understood, retrieved, and unburdened. In this workshop, we will briefly review the neuroscience of parts. We will discuss how to identify signs of when a part is blended, what to do when there is rapid sequential blending, and how to detect Self-like parts. We will describe various approaches to facilitate unblending with a focus on direct access.Participants will have the opportunity to practice as well as observe a live demo.


409 Michi’s “Drop” Techniques Michi Rose, PhD, MAT, LMSWWhat if we view parts as energy rather than “units” or “entities”? Are there implications for new techniques? Michi suggests that we can think of parts as holograms. This means that a tiny piece of any part (even one drop) will contain all of the informational energy of that part.Based on this concept, Michi presents a “DROP Technique” that she developed. She will teach how to work with only “ONE DROP” of a target part (rather than the part itself ). This DROP technique is helpful when working with extreme target parts and/or highly defended internal systems. Michi will also present her “DROP Mini-Healing Cycle” for clients with fragile systems.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: Intermediate to Advanced

410 Using IFS to Heal Ancient WoundsGuthrie Sayen, PhD and Lena Plamondon, PhD, CPCAn IFS practitioner and his client will share a story of using the IFS process to heal parts that seem to be caught in the deep past. The practitioner and the client have been working together weekly for nearly five years, and they have discovered numerous parts that seem to have associations with periods before the present. They will discuss the carrying of burdens from one historical period into later periods, the ability of these parts to live out new healing destinies, the transformation of protectors into healers in their own right, and the parts of other people showing up as members of the client’s inner family. We will also discuss the appearance of guides and the various ways unburdenings can occur. This workshop will include a live demo, group discussion, and an experiential process. Finally, we will propose and invite sharing around profound spiritual truths that have been revealed and how we can participate in healing our planet.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: Intermediate to Advanced

411 IFS Healing with Expressive and Creative Arts: Embodying Self and Externalizing Parts in Group TherapyMarybeth Weinstock, PhD, BC-DMT and Jeanne Willis, LMFT This experiential workshop is focused on applying IFS through creative and expressive arts in group settings. You will be guided through practicing creative arts techniques for unblending and embodying Self. You will be invited to engage in expressive arts techniques that externalize parts and support the unburdening process. You will learn how to set up and conduct psychodramas that externalize parts in ways that provide powerful healing. You will develop skills for engaging all group members in IFS healing, even hesitant clients. We will explore this expanded possibility of treatment as a shared experience that leads to a Self-led healing process of recovery. We will summarize our exploration via felt sense of Self and how this can be a gift for both the client and the therapist, as we process the pains and joys of the healing journey.


412 Using Sandtray Therapy to Connect Self to PartsLauren Spaulding, MA, LMFT, LPC InternA connection of part to Self is a common goal for IFS practitioners. People are able to feel relief, understanding, and empathy for their parts when they are able to interact with these parts in Self energy. Sandtray therapy offers tactile and creative opportunities for unblending and experiencing parts in a unique way, nonverbal way. Participants are able to see how their parts relate to each other and to Self. They are able to get a glimpse into their internal world not only by seeing a visual representation of their parts but also how they are in relation to each other. This workshop will introduce the various ways in which Sandtray can be implemented with traditional IFS protocols. The workshop will be heavily experiential and could elicit strong emotions for participants, but special attention to building safe resources will precede all experiential practice.

Track: Mind, Body & Spirit Level: Introductory to Intermediate

413 Sculpting Polarized Parts in Couples with Insecure Attachment PatternsChristine Schneider, PhD, LCSW and Alexandra Solaro, MA, LPCThis presentation will focus on the use of drama therapy techniques in IFS couples therapy. Polarized protector parts in one or both partners can elicit an insecure attachment pattern that inhibits the couple’s ability to gain a sense of connection or repair. The Crittenden Model of Attachment will be explored in a didactic format, followed by an experiential demonstration of sculpting hypothetical couples with different patterns of insecure attachment. This workshop will conclude with discussion about the blocks and stuck points, as well as a discussion of ways that the “parts of the therapist” can affect the work.

Track: Couples, Family, Parenting and Children Level: All Levels Welcome



2019 IFS ConferenceThat’s a Wrap!

The SoulChild Movement Closing Ceremony

(no dancing required)

Adrienne Glasser, LCSW, RDMT, IFS CoachClose the conference by acknowledging both

Self and all parts through stillness, gesture and movement. Experience the healing that is available to parts when they are mirrored through the words, stillness and gesture of the collective Self. End the conference by allowing your protectors, your Self

and your child parts a time of acknowledgement and through an offering of playfulness. Protectors will

be acknowledged for their hard work, Self and child parts (exiles) can create, explore and play. Parts that

need acknowledgement and comfort can be held by you and the Collective Self.

Come experience a closing ceremony that allows integration, a sense of love the IFS community

embodies. This closing ceremony will also help parts integration on the path back to home. And then . . .

Join us as we celebrate the end of another great conference together.

All Parts Welcome!

8:30 – 10:30 p.m.Grand Ballroom

Evening Workshops6:00 – 9:00 p.m.501 Circling as a Path to Self-EnergyEric SjobergThe foundations of Circling and IFS Self energy are very similar. Where IFS focuses intrapersonally, Circling focuses both intra- and interpersonally through cultivation of Self energy and unblending from parts that are in reaction or distortion.This workshop is an exploration and experiment in the use of the Interpersonal Method of Circling to deepen one’s experience of Self and parts, while simultaneously connecting intimately in the moment with others. Space is limited. Register early!

Track: IFS Beyond Psychotherapy Level: Introductory to Intermediate

6:15 – 7:45 p.m.502 Tai Chi Chuan and IFS: History Living ForwardDavid Medeiros, LICSWThis workshop will integrate two seemingly unrelated models and practice: IFS and the martial art of Tai Chi Chuan. We will explore the history and practice of Tai Chi Chuan with the many ways IFS has embraced these universal concepts. Participants are encouraged to wear comfortable clothes, as we will be focusing on the experiential aspects of Tai Chi and IFS. In addition, it is important for participants to know that respectful touch between participants will be encouraged during well-defined experiential exercises and demos. While touch is encouraged, it is not required, and all participants have choice in how they interact.Tai Chi is actually a martial art, and unlike many other fighting art forms, we are focused on maintaining contact and connection with our practice partners, opponents, etc. Of special interest (to me) is how we as IFS practitioners maintain a connection with our Self/parts and others. The ability to maintain contact, embrace sensitivity and softness, and cultivate chi/energy are fundamental concepts of Tai Chi Chuan and IFS. As Dick Schwartz has said, “Chi is Self energy.” No experience is required.


Continuing EducationCE credit from boards may vary for some workshops.

For more information, visit:selfleadership.org/2019-annual-conference-edu-credits.html

for the most up-to-date details.

Download - Saturday, September 28

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