[SPEAKER_00]: Hello and welcome to another episode of the Mark Rose podcast.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I've shared with you the listener that I wasn't really having many guests on again, but when you get the opportunity to have this guest, you say yes.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so, so excited to have you on Dr.

Richard Schwartz.

[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, Mark.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm excited to be on and it's good to talk with you again.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you know, when I saw the opportunity, I was just like, Dan, this is a dream guest and the spectrum of your work and where it is leading to and what you're talking about.

[SPEAKER_00]: So more specifically today, talking about releasing our burdens, a guy to healing individual ancestral and collective trauma, I think we're in a time where we can all desire to aspire to something so great as that.

[SPEAKER_01]: I agree and I, as I got more acquainted with what we call burdens and the parts that carry them and the power of those burdens to organize people's thinking, but also their behavior.

[SPEAKER_01]: It dawn on me that it's the unburdening that can actually change a lot of things in the world.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that's been my focus for the last probably 25 years.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, for people listening or watching, maybe we could start with the framework through which you see this.

[SPEAKER_00]: And what led you to that framework?

[SPEAKER_00]: Did you start with more of a traditional psychotherapy background and then merge and move through?

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I was one of these people who, back in the 70s, got turned on to systems thinking in Gregory Basin and all of that, and the place where that took root in psychotherapy was in family therapy, because you were thinking about [SPEAKER_01]: kids symptoms, not because the kid is disturbed, but because the the contacts in which the kid has a symptoms is disturbed and you need to change that and release him from his role.

[SPEAKER_01]: That had a lot of appeal to me.

[SPEAKER_01]: I, like many family therapists in the day saw ourselves as these rebels who were trying to bring a very different perspective and it was a great Heady time and then I made the mistake of trying to prove what I was saying I'll bring an outcome study and found that this was with the symptom of bulimia that we could reorganize the family's just right and still a bunch of the kids I was I was working with kept binge and purging [SPEAKER_01]: After I got over my depression about my prophecies failed I started just getting curious and asking these kids [SPEAKER_01]: why they kept doing it.

[SPEAKER_01]: And they basically started to teach this model to me because they started talking this language of parts.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I just got ultimately loud story short, got very curious about what they were saying because they were talking about these parts as if they had a lot of autonomy and power to take over their lives.

[SPEAKER_01]: relationships with each other.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it just seemed like an internal system that was very similar to the external systems I was studying.

[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I just devoted my life to studying these internal systems since then.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so when you started to construct that model, [SPEAKER_00]: how did you break it down like through the many conversations that you have with these individuals, these young people, which is so cool to think that they're very framework of language and they're openness, like you were saying that they were basically speaking the model to you, that's so fascinating.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, I was lucky in that I hadn't studied interest circuit process, so I didn't come with a lot of preconceptions about what these were.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I was forced [SPEAKER_01]: have my clients teach me what they were experiencing.

[SPEAKER_01]: And they would say some version of, I've got this critic in here that calls me Danes all the time.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then that one goes to the heart of a part that feels worthless and emptied alone.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that part is so distressing to experience that the binge comes in to give me away from it.

[SPEAKER_01]: But then the moment, it was the critic back, [SPEAKER_01]: And then that goes to the heart of that empty, worthless part.

[SPEAKER_01]: So the binge comes back.

[SPEAKER_01]: So they recorded in this vicious cycle, which again seemed similar to what I was studying in families.

[SPEAKER_01]: These family members would be caught up in these patterns, just endlessly.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so I got more intrigued, and again, was just a chart of shocked at how articulate these clients were about the phenomena, but stayed with all in and learned relatively quickly, a took a while, because I was making a lot of mistakes in the beginning, but I learned that if you just listen to these parts, even the ones that seem destructive, if you get your client to listen to them, they'll share [SPEAKER_01]: how they got forced into the role there and that they aren't that role but they got forced into it by traumas or what are called attachment injuries, bad parenting and and so on and that they're also stuck in the past that they kind of live as if you're still five years old [SPEAKER_01]: You're still in the kind of danger that you were in then and and that they carry what they But I came to call burdens, which are these extreme beliefs and emotions that came into you during the trauma and Then attach to these parts.

[SPEAKER_01]: I was like a virus [SPEAKER_01]: and then drive the way they operate there after.

[SPEAKER_01]: So so that's that all that was shocking to me.

[SPEAKER_01]: I had no clue and I just stayed curious and was lucky that I had a few clients who were extremely articulate about it and taught it to me.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then as I would check out those observations with other clients, amazed to find that yes, even parts that had done horrible things, if you [SPEAKER_01]: get curious and don't threaten them.

[SPEAKER_01]: We'll share their secret histories of how they got forced into these roles and how much they don't like doing it, but they can't stop themselves.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think they need to protect you.

[SPEAKER_01]: So.

[SPEAKER_01]: That was all a very eye-opening, and so as I was learning all that, like you were asking, being a systems therapist, think you're, I was very interested in how this operated [SPEAKER_01]: and the big distinction that leaped out which has held up as a big distinction, all these 42 years is between parts that you might call these precious inner children before they get hurt, because they give us so much playfulness and love and openness and creativity and so on, but they're also the most sensitive parts of us, so they're the ones that do get hurt the most, or [SPEAKER_01]: get terrified the most, or feel the most shame and worthlessness from these things that happen.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when they get burdened with those extremely recent emotions and frozen in those scenes in the past, we don't want anything to do with them because they have the power to overwhelm us and make it hard to function.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so we have a tendency to try and lock them away and our culture tells [SPEAKER_01]: because we're this rugged individualist culture that says just move on from trauma.

[SPEAKER_01]: Don't look back.

[SPEAKER_01]: You can't change what happened.

[SPEAKER_01]: Just let it go.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not realizing that in doing that.

[SPEAKER_01]: You're not just moving on from the memories and emotions.

[SPEAKER_01]: You're leaving in the dust.

[SPEAKER_01]: these precious parts of you just because they are hurt.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so we call those exiles.

[SPEAKER_01]: So the big distinction was between these vulnerable exile parts and then the parts that are forced to become protectors because when you have a lot of exiles, you feel more delicate in the world seeing more dangerous.

[SPEAKER_01]: So you need parts to manage the outside world.

[SPEAKER_01]: So you don't get triggered again.

[SPEAKER_01]: your exiled don't get triggered and you need so they're a bunch of different what we call manager roles of parts that are [SPEAKER_01]: either trying to make you look perfect or perform an eye level or take care of everybody so they don't ban in you, but don't let you take care of yourself or keep people at a certain distance so you don't get hurt again.

[SPEAKER_01]: So these are all common manager, protector roles, all of which have in common the desire to control the outside world and the inner world.

[SPEAKER_01]: So some of them keep you a little bit disconnected [SPEAKER_01]: And so, please people in general, and so those are the magic protectors.

[SPEAKER_01]: Doesn't always work.

[SPEAKER_01]: The world has a way of breaking through those defenses, triggering those eggsiles, big emergency because flames of raw motion could explode out of your gut, overtake you, and it's a big problem.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, there's another set of parts like that these [SPEAKER_01]: The mish, whose job it has to take you away, get you higher than the flames, or doubt them on some substance.

[SPEAKER_01]: or distract you till they burn themselves out.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we'll do so impulsively and reactively, they don't care about the collateral damage to your body or your relationships.

[SPEAKER_01]: They think they just gotta get you out of the way from those feelings, or you're gonna die.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that's the map is pretty simple.

[SPEAKER_01]: Those we call firefighters, they're fighting the flames of emotion.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so there are two categories of protectors, managers, firefighters, both trying to contain and protect these exile parts.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so that map has held up really well over the last 40 some years and should I keep going or do you want to say something?

[SPEAKER_00]: Not, keep going.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's great.

[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so, but the big discovery for lack of a better word about IFS, [SPEAKER_01]: is that as I was doing all that and as a family therapist, once I get hip to the fact that these parts deserve to be listened to rather than fought or ignored, and I was trying to say no, okay, maybe just like in working with families if you have them face each other and talk to each other rather than [SPEAKER_01]: not knowing each other and being polarized.

[SPEAKER_01]: They'll get, they'll work together.

[SPEAKER_01]: So maybe Mark, I'm having you try to get to know your credit, for example.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it's going pretty well.

[SPEAKER_01]: You're asking what it wants you to know about itself and it's telling you it's softening and then suddenly you hate the critic and it reminded me of sessions and families where I'm having two family members who'd been polarized talk to each other and it's going okay and then a third member jumps in and sides with when I get the other and it goes south.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I think you may be the same thing's happening in this air system.

[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe as I'm here, you try to get to know your critic.

[SPEAKER_01]: Part of it's the critic is jumped in and it's doing the talking.

[SPEAKER_01]: So I began asking, what ask you, could you get the one who's angry at the critic to just give us a little space to get to know it and maybe help it?

[SPEAKER_01]: And to my amazement, you might say, okay, you did.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then I would say, now how do you feel toward it?

[SPEAKER_01]: And it would be like totally different person with speaking, because you seconds earlier hated it or afraid of it, we get that to separate.

[SPEAKER_01]: Suddenly, you know, you're calm relative to it, you're confident, you have curiosity still, and you also out of the blue have compassion for it.

[SPEAKER_01]: This is part of you that's been beating you up for years.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when in that state, the critic would really relax, [SPEAKER_01]: and could share its secret history of how it got into this role and how much it's just trying to get you to BA.

[SPEAKER_01]: So you don't get hurt again.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when I try that same procedure with other clients, of simply getting some of these parts they were blended with to open space, [SPEAKER_01]: It was like the same person would pop out with those same-seward qualities of calm, confidence, curiosity and compassion, and then for others, courage, clarity, creativity and connectedness.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when I would ask clients, what part of you is that?

[SPEAKER_01]: Let's keep that around.

[SPEAKER_01]: They'd say, you know, that's not a part like these others.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's me.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's myself.

[SPEAKER_01]: And now, thousands of people using this all over the world, we can safely say that that self is in everybody.

[SPEAKER_01]: can't be damaged, knows how to heal, and it just beneath the surface of these parts, such that when they open space, it pops out spontaneously and can take over sessions actually.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that flies in the face of traditional thinking about psychology and psychiatry, and I ultimately had to look more towards spirituality and try and ground it, but [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I was, you know, I was working with clients who, if you believe traditional psychology had no business having any of those qualities, because they'd had horrible, horrible childhoods.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like to be able to access that would, would have been a foreign thought.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and even traditional psychology and attachment theory says, to have any of that, you had to get it in a relationship, because it's not inherent to us.

[SPEAKER_01]: You have to have this good enough parent that instills it in you in a sense.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I was finding it in people that had horrible chocolates tortured on a daily basis.

[SPEAKER_01]: So I had some students who said, well, maybe this isn't like the ego.

[SPEAKER_01]: but in nature, or Christ's consciousness, or op-modern Hinduism, or on and on.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it turns out that every spiritual tradition has a word for it, and almost no other psychologists have anything like it.

[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, the model has shifted in a much more spiritual direction because of that.

[SPEAKER_01]: So for me now, what I'm calling self, isn't necessarily an individual thing.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's a drop of a much bigger ocean and that's why it can't be damaged and that's why it knows how to heal and that's why it comes out in almost the same way in people.

[SPEAKER_00]: that they can access this.

[SPEAKER_00]: It makes me think of when I did parts work, I remember in a session having the experience, first off, parts work was the most profound experience I had in terms of all of the therapeutic in modalities I've experienced.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was the fastest transformation, too.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think when I accessed the self, it really felt like soul.

[SPEAKER_00]: And at the same time, I also felt really regulated.

[SPEAKER_00]: And because through that work, I could, you know, talk to the protectors and the manager was just so exhausted.

[SPEAKER_00]: Anyways, that was like in the young part that was making decisions and trying to make everyone happy.

[SPEAKER_00]: when that all finally got organized through the guidance, it was really like you were saying this park came online that was very directional and clear and caused calm in all the other parts.

[SPEAKER_00]: They were like, oh, thank you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like you're here and I thought about it in the same way that I was really accessing like a divine knowing.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I agree with you that it feels like, for me, at least, this is my personal view, that psychology has skated around spirituality without touching spirituality.

[SPEAKER_00]: But yet, it is such a sacred act to even go into the exploration of the self.

[SPEAKER_00]: Even the, even the act that is technically supposed to be going on between [SPEAKER_00]: person doing the intervention and the client.

[SPEAKER_00]: I forget I think it's James Hillman who said that you don't go to therapy to have what's broken fixed, you go to have what's broken blessed.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that this is very much has been my experience.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I really love the language that you use with IFS because I relate to, wow, there's this feeling of regulation that feels so much more like a guidance or a connection to something greater.

[SPEAKER_00]: And now that I've heard and brought a [SPEAKER_00]: access to it.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's totally a, yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: But that's so interesting.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sorry.

[SPEAKER_00]: I just like to what's so interesting is where my traditional pathway of learning through attachment first as well was like without the installation of a self from the mother, then that why should that exist.

[SPEAKER_00]: I've never thought about that, so I appreciate you like bringing that forward.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, I love attachment theory and IFS is considered attachment theory taken inside in this sense that self becomes the good attachment figure rather than the therapist.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right.

[SPEAKER_01]: But they got that one thing wrong, which was that these qualities aren't inherent because they are.

[SPEAKER_01]: And, and I mean, I love how much you already get about this whole thing, because what you were saying earlier about, once self appears, all your parts calm down, they've been running everything.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're like, can family therapy, we called them perennified children.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're too young to run your life, you know, they're trying their best.

[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know, you don't know, there's a grown-up inside that can do it.

[SPEAKER_01]: and they all relax.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm curious when you think about the the rescuing of or the maybe that's wrong word.

[SPEAKER_00]: You think about all these protective mechanisms, the firefighters, and the the protectors, what is the way in which we can put them at ease, [SPEAKER_00]: So that we can bring this exal part out like because what you said we the parts that are most sensitive get wounded by the trauma, but yet the most we need the most sensitive parts of us because of course They're also the better barometer to future trauma.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think they're also really intuition or guidance or or maybe the better listeners.

[SPEAKER_01]: Totally and they also [SPEAKER_01]: the issue is when you lock them away, not only is it hard on them and they're in pain alive, which you sense, and you sense how delicate you are, but you're cutting off all these wonderful qualities that you just mentioned.

[SPEAKER_01]: in addition to lots of others and so a lot of the issues in our world is because so many people leaders, for example, are cut off from their sensitivity and their vulnerability and and um and are dominated by these protectors that are trying to keep you safe by making you tough in chaos.

[SPEAKER_01]: and so that's a lot of my project is to try and get people hip to that and try and help them bring those eggs out back.

[SPEAKER_01]: Now that's a big project because so many protectors are terrified open that door and there's a series of common fears they have about [SPEAKER_01]: letting you go anywhere near those young parts and over the years because we don't go there without their permission.

[SPEAKER_01]: So we start with the protectors.

[SPEAKER_01]: We honor them for their service.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we learn about what they're protecting, which are usually these exos.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then we negotiate permission to go to these exos.

[SPEAKER_01]: And to do so, we have to address their fear of opening the door [SPEAKER_01]: or opening the door and being judged by people or by me for being weak or there's a variety of these common fears.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so we've gotten good at being, you know, it's like sales, you're selling hope to hopeless systems.

[SPEAKER_01]: Because if I can be in self, myself is present, [SPEAKER_01]: They sense the safety of that, too, and they sense the lack of judgment and the acceptance.

[SPEAKER_01]: So they're much more apt to open that door.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then once we do, and we get close to the little boy inside of you, you get close to him, and you've got a trusting relationship with him.

[SPEAKER_01]: There are another four or five steps toward Helium, which involves witnessing what happened to him, but he got hurt, because most of us try to minimize it or even forget about it.

[SPEAKER_01]: So these parts, just like exiled people and countries, they want [SPEAKER_01]: to be witness.

[SPEAKER_01]: They want you to get what happened and how bad it was.

[SPEAKER_01]: So we do that until the part says, yeah, now you get it.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then I would have you mark go into that scene or into that time period and be with that boy in the way he needed somebody.

[SPEAKER_01]: And you would tell me you're there, okay, and I might have you listen to what he needs done back there and have you do that for him.

[SPEAKER_01]: So you can live here with you or in your home.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that's what we call a retrieval.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then once the part is safe and feels connected to you, then we ask about the extreme beliefs and emotions he carries still.

[SPEAKER_01]: And amazingly these parts can tell you exactly what it is and where they carry it in their bodies.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then we invite them to unload it to just send it out to the light or send it to the wind or just let it out of their bodies.

[SPEAKER_01]: let it go.

[SPEAKER_01]: When they do, which most of the time they do, if they believe it's their say, they'll immediately transform into happy little kids.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then we can bring in all the protectors to see they don't have to protect them anymore.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then they can unburden and relax.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that's the way it usually goes.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm curious, if you have someone who has a protected part that's more of a people pleaser, and in order for that exile part to reveal itself, we actually need to develop a protective part that is more bound-grade.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: How do you do that without, because I would imagine there's probably some unconscious relationship to like rage or anger.

[SPEAKER_00]: our aggression that we can't go towards that for, for obvious reasons due to the trauma probably being perpetuated through something like that.

[SPEAKER_00]: That we develop, do we have to then develop the protector, have them experience their voice, things like boxing, you know what I mean?

[SPEAKER_00]: Like there's a somatic experience of that so that they can.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not necessarily.

[SPEAKER_01]: So if you had a part like that and I had you ask it, [SPEAKER_01]: what it's afraid would happen if it did let you set boundaries.

[SPEAKER_01]: Usually the answer is, I would be hurting people or I would be too tough.

[SPEAKER_01]: I would be too mean or something like that.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so I would say, okay Mark, if we could go to the part who might take over.

[SPEAKER_01]: and would do that and make it so it didn't do that, but it just could advise you about being discerning with people and when the set boundaries are when not to, would this one have to be so open and boundaryless and usually they say no, because it's been polarized with that angry part for long time.

[SPEAKER_01]: So we do that and we go to the angry part and we help it, maybe involves unburdening.

[SPEAKER_01]: and then we bring them together and see that they, they're both trying to protect you.

[SPEAKER_01]: They just have opposite strategies and can they work together, maybe, and can they trust you because some of those sea words are courage, clarity, and confidence.

[SPEAKER_01]: Can they trust you to set boundaries and protect the system in a way that isn't going to polarize people and scare them away?

[SPEAKER_01]: Generally, when they really see that you can do that, they're happy to become advisors rather than dominators.

[SPEAKER_00]: Have you noticed a massive overlap in like if you have you measured outcomes like heart rate variability and like nervous system health after parts work and then I would imagine.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm curious if there's research on this that there would be a massive correlation to even the healing of autoimmune diseases, things like that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we haven't done that research.

[SPEAKER_01]: I would love to.

[SPEAKER_01]: We are lining up some brains can before and after research.

[SPEAKER_01]: But yes, we've had a lot of luck with psychosomatic kinds of issues, medical issues in general.

[SPEAKER_01]: Our big outcome study was with rheumatoid arthritis, for example, and it was about 10 some years ago in Boston, with all these, what are called, South, the Irish Catholic mothers, basically, and when we went to the pain and had them get curious about the pain, [SPEAKER_01]: They heard from the parts that hated the big care taking part.

[SPEAKER_01]: It was dominating the person, wouldn't let them take care of themselves.

[SPEAKER_01]: And as we worked out a kind of time share so that that part gave them some time to take care of themselves.

[SPEAKER_01]: The arthritis got much better.

[SPEAKER_01]: In some cases, it went away completely.

[SPEAKER_01]: So yes, the answer is yes, our parts, particularly if you won't listen to them otherwise, they don't have a lot of options.

[SPEAKER_01]: and they'll use whatever physical, medical, but vulnerabilities you have to try and get you to listen to them.

[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, we deal a lot with that kind of stuff.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you have any interesting theories on that?

[SPEAKER_00]: Like on parts work and it's relationship to illness, inflammation, all that kind of stuff?

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, [SPEAKER_01]: like I have a predisposition for asthma and that's some of what you're hearing.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_01]: Because I picked up a bug and then I always have this as medic thing going and also to my ran headaches.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I used to get my ran headaches all the time and then I started getting curious about it and I found a part that if it wanted to take me out, it would push the migraine button like, you know, like, couldn't do some activity and as I worked all that out, I never [SPEAKER_01]: Wow.

[SPEAKER_01]: The idea is that we're all born with these physiological genetic predispositions that are parts know about them.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we'll use them for their purposes if they need to.

[SPEAKER_01]: And also, a lot of these predispositions don't have anything to do with your parts.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, if I'm in a dusty room, I'll have a bit of an asthma attack and I'll look around.

[SPEAKER_01]: There's no parts involved.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's just because I was in this dusty room.

[SPEAKER_01]: So it's not always parts, but it never hurts to check.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like it's, it will take advantage of what is maybe a more sensitive part of, like, skin, things like that, interesting.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I've got, like, a lot of gut stuff.

[SPEAKER_00]: I definitely noticed that when I used to work with years ago as a pharmaceutical rep and I sold a product for irritable bowel syndrome and my gosh, there was such, I remember when the gastroenterologist would present on the products and [SPEAKER_00]: IBS, they would talk about very rarely because it was so frowned upon, but there were studies that looked as sexual abuse and GI issues.

[SPEAKER_00]: And when I started to study relationships and emotion, I just thought, well, of course that makes sense.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like, why isn't that at the forefront that these people are actually just stuck in a nervous system state and digestion is not the priority in those states?

[SPEAKER_01]: Totally, totally right.

[SPEAKER_01]: So it isn't just that parts are using a symptom for your attention.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's also that when these parts get stuck in these scenes in the past, like you're saying, like the girl who got sexually abused is living back there and all that terror.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's going to have a physiological impact on you as well.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's going to give you got symptoms.

[SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot of ways that your parts can affect your body.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's one of my big goals is to try and bring that awareness to the culture.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm curious when terms of ancestral and inherited, do we, is it your view that we inherit some parts that are already in exile or maybe that occurs even in utero that there's the environment in utero or [SPEAKER_00]: or and are we born maybe more open with the self and then we just observe the exiled parts, we observe the protectors, so do we inherit basically the same theater or the same roles as our as our parents.

[SPEAKER_01]: There are a lot of different transmission processes for these what we call legacy burdens.

[SPEAKER_01]: These extreme beliefs and emotions and energies that come down through the generations, maybe from a trauma that happened centuries earlier.

[SPEAKER_01]: and every generation picks that up.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so that's become a big interest of my and, you know, there's a book with Thomas Oobles about that topic.

[SPEAKER_01]: And what we find is that sometimes the transmission does happen very, very early.

[SPEAKER_01]: There's a field called epigenetics where even you take it in genetically, but often it also comes from let's say you were desperate to get your father to feel better.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so you took you and some of his depression.

[SPEAKER_01]: to try and release him from it, and then you get stuck with that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Or back in the day, when I wanted to prove that at least check to see who was true, there were no bad parts.

[SPEAKER_01]: I worked with a treatment center for sex offenders for a couple of years, and we would go to the part that did the offending, and it would show scenes from the kids past when he was [SPEAKER_01]: being abused by his father.

[SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't always sexual abuse, but just abused.

[SPEAKER_01]: This part looked around and said, who has power in this room?

[SPEAKER_01]: It's this guy earning me.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to take in his energy to protect me from him.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then it gets stuck with this desire to hurt vulnerability.

[SPEAKER_01]: So there's a lot of different ways that these legacy burdens get transferred.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're very [SPEAKER_01]: They did come in early and they they just seem like our family does it so it's just part of what we do and unburdening them produces a huge amount of healing so that's the target for us these days.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's amazing what that does then for a family system when one person, it's like when one person gets sober in a system that uses alcohol.

[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's profound and it like brings forward the elephant in the room.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm curious when you work, have you worked with people who are [SPEAKER_00]: sociopathic or psychopathic like actual diagnosis, not social media diagnosis.

[SPEAKER_00]: And is it that their protective parts are just so strong?

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm curious.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's been my experience.

[SPEAKER_01]: I haven't worked with every sociopath or psychopath.

[SPEAKER_01]: But yes, they because of their trauma, a protector took over who says, I'm not going to care about anybody, [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just going to look out for myself and do whatever I want.

[SPEAKER_01]: And if you can, they often don't come to therapy, unless there's been some kind of tip bottom or if somebody forced them to.

[SPEAKER_01]: Some of those sex offenders would fall into that category.

[SPEAKER_01]: But if you can go to that part of that protector and get your client in yourself, because a lot of times they'd done bad things, you got to get all your judgmental parts to open space, so that you can at least listen from a place of openness.

[SPEAKER_01]: They'll share a secret history, too, how they got forced to take on this protective role.

[SPEAKER_01]: And like I said, they have this never again philosophy.

[SPEAKER_01]: Never again am I going to be vulnerable or trust anybody or care about anybody.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just going to look after myself and they dominated the person for decades and there are no different from any other protector.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you can take a while to earn their trust, they don't trust me as a therapist.

[SPEAKER_01]: But once I have, then we can go and heal the ex-als they protect and they transform [SPEAKER_00]: who are just wondering if they have like layers of protectors.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, we're out of time, Joe.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, we're like, yeah, you speak to one, but then there's another one who is performatively compassionate and performatively charismatic.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then you've got probably like even two, I mean, it's like genius in terms of its constructs of, because I even find like when I, [SPEAKER_00]: have experience someone who is probably border like actually in the diagnosis of sociopathic.

[SPEAKER_00]: Even intuitively, I had a hard time picking up on the lack of genuine nature that their performance of authenticity was so academy award worthy that my brain and I know in having worked with [SPEAKER_00]: been in relationships with highly deceptive people, your version of reality is so rocked.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, a lot of gas��.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and then you are like, which ways up, and because they're so good that even it feels like, even on the level of the matrix, they're playing the numbers correctly so that people are not alerted.

[SPEAKER_00]: Does that make sense?

[SPEAKER_00]: They're almost like code writers.

[SPEAKER_01]: Totally, yeah.

[SPEAKER_01]: We have a, [SPEAKER_01]: Protector manager, we call a self-like part.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's a part that imitates self and can come across very compassionately, just the way you're describing it.

[SPEAKER_01]: But it's got a big agenda, and it's really just trying to get something for the person, doesn't really care.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so we've gotten, it's subtle, like you said, it's hard to detect sometimes.

[SPEAKER_01]: But we've gotten pretty good detector for these kinds of self-life parts, too.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, once that happens, I'm sure you activate another level of, like once you've been abused, once you've been hurt, once you've been gas lit.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, it's hard to trust anybody, of course, that protector part comes on.

[SPEAKER_00]: But if you can access the wisdom of that part, you now have a greater barometer, I guess, for these behaviors.

[SPEAKER_01]: Our culture is set up to punish these parts and punish the people who are dominated by them.

[SPEAKER_01]: But when I work with them, if I can just say, it makes sense that you don't trust anybody, it makes sense that you don't care about anybody more.

[SPEAKER_01]: Carrying about people really got you hurt in a big way.

[SPEAKER_01]: And led to doing some bad things, but I get that you're not bad inherently, you're just trying to protect.

[SPEAKER_01]: These parts love that level of understanding and acceptance.

[SPEAKER_01]: because they've been vilified you know they've been pathologized by everybody.

[SPEAKER_00]: that almost like alchemizes the shame and then allows you access to the ex-alparts because they're not being judged, like it actually.

[SPEAKER_00]: I always think that's what's so interesting in the context of your work is when you hear someone say, well, that makes perfect sense that you do what other people have called dysfunction.

[SPEAKER_00]: It might not be healthy, but it's actually perfectly functional.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and that's almost always the case when you write, when you hear the secret [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like, how could you not?

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_01]: And especially when you get that they're really living back in the past during these traumas, they still think the world is that dangerous.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, in the context, you were saying if we live in a culture that very much, let's say from a politician or corporate perspective, we have to present this type of part.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then access.

[SPEAKER_00]: to the other parts, like if we were to make it mandatory for you to provide, it mandatory for people to take IFS type of stuff within Congress or within media or within like name the thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: I would imagine the very system though is created by protective parts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like is that am I understand, like I think about politics and if you were to bring forward this deeper level of compassion, a deeper level of whatever it is, that the system itself will be like [SPEAKER_00]: Now, like that person's not going to get voted in, that person's not even going to become the leader of the party.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's really true.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's totally true.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I've worked with CEOs who started out very hard to ask and driven and got them to become more self-lad and they wouldn't do the things that they were doing before.

[SPEAKER_01]: They would make their companies a very profitable.

[SPEAKER_01]: And so they got fired or they quit, because it takes a certain level of sociopathy to be so focused, just on profit, regardless of the devastation to the planet or to the people that they're getting a profit from.

[SPEAKER_01]: So you're right, the system is set up to reward these kinds of protectors.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it's hard to know how to change that.

[SPEAKER_01]: My goal has been to bring this new paradigm for understanding the mind and how to work with and try to help people from an early time, not exo parts, bring them home when they get hurt.

[SPEAKER_01]: and then not become, help these protectors trust self.

[SPEAKER_01]: And the vision is that if everybody knew how to do that, it would be very different.

[SPEAKER_01]: But we would have to construct different incentives, different social systems that don't reward that kind of sociopathy.

[SPEAKER_00]: and what a perfect world that would be, okay, so when you think about the healing of collective, like the individual, the ancestral and the collective, what is the pathway that you guys see for being able to do that, for us to bring that, that the concepts that you're presenting into are collective experience.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, one of my visions, and this is partly why I hooked up with Thomas Uble because he's done some of this, is to gather large groups and he's done it with like 1,000 people and have everybody find and then to gather, let go of, he's legacy burdens and my vision is to to set up a protocol by which I've as therapists all around the world can bring those kinds of gatherings [SPEAKER_01]: and help collectively people on burden.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I've done it with smaller groups, you know, I've done it with groups of a couple hundred.

[SPEAKER_01]: And find that I'd say about a quarter of the group actually does the full on burdening.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then the rest get a good start on it, so that they can follow up and keep working on it.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I've got some video where you just see the huge shift and a person's not only, [SPEAKER_01]: There's symptoms, but also just their perspective.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, once I've got video of working with a woman who has a Holocaust legacy burden, Jewish, and once she unloads it, she can't other Palestinians anymore.

[SPEAKER_01]: She can't, you know, either humanity, but these legacy burdens are just blinders.

[SPEAKER_01]: They just, [SPEAKER_01]: keep you siloed, so I've done the same with other ethnic groups and their legacy burdens.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that's one of the, and we have trainings in all the hotspots around the world.

[SPEAKER_00]: So that's one of my visions and it's going to take quite a long time to manifest, but yeah, yeah, it's interesting how we all, all the things that politics leverages are all these just continuously these legacy burdens [SPEAKER_00]: Without them, how do we, we are divided if we have them and without them are united?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's such an interesting thing that, you know, a hard thing for me to have a reconcile.

[SPEAKER_00]: is that my experiences that political systems don't want you healed, or even that medical interventions don't want you healed.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like that's a hard, as someone who was a pharmaceutical revenue.

[SPEAKER_00]: And despite the excellent programming I got in training, I started to really see like, wow, it's hard for me to understand, but again, understanding that, what did you call it, the leg self?

[SPEAKER_00]: Self-like part.

[SPEAKER_00]: self-like.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sorry, self-like.

[SPEAKER_00]: So it almost feels like those systems themselves are self-like.

[SPEAKER_00]: As in they're presenting as wanting resolution and unification and healing and actually I think the greatest tricks are the ones that present and present it all under safety and morality and yet you're seeing violation of morality and that safety could be a great leverage point to move [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I don't be grudge some of their motives.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think they actually believe that they're bringing help.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know, there is a role for traditional medicine and of course.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and and I come from a big medical family.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I have to make sure I say, say, yeah, yeah, I mean to you.

[SPEAKER_01]: And too often, from my point of view, by just treating the symptom, you're missing all this other stuff.

[SPEAKER_01]: that's so rich and could, if they got curious about the symptom and found that would lead to all this very powerful healing for people, and the reduction of the symptom.

[SPEAKER_01]: So it's just that Western medicine hasn't gone there.

[SPEAKER_01]: It just hasn't thought about this as a possibility.

[SPEAKER_01]: And you're right, there's huge amounts of money, these pharmaceutical companies are [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it just wouldn't make sense that you'd want to get rid of all your customers, you know, just just like division based on everything.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's like if all of a sudden we're not fighting over stuff, then we're able to heal.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you find that there's also an unconscious loyalty to the system that actually letting go of the legacy burden is somehow a betrayal to the system?

[SPEAKER_01]: very much, particularly with certain kinds of legacy birds like the Holocaust one, because I'm, you know, I have Jewish heritage, and so I know, and I had to unload a Holocaust legacy birds too, and there is the sense that you're betraying your people if you don't suffer, and you don't remember, and you don't live without level of, [SPEAKER_01]: I provision it's all the time, it'll happen again, and all of that.

[SPEAKER_01]: So it's a stretch in the beginning to let that go, and sometimes, and this sounds a little woo-woo, but it actually happens all the time, I would invite the ancestors to come, and I would have the person ask if they want [SPEAKER_01]: them to carry this anymore.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I won't always say no, you don't have to carry this for us.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then that gives them permission to let it go.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's so powerful for people who are listening, watching other than buying the book, which everyone go to that.

[SPEAKER_00]: What are some ways that we as individuals can then start now and contribute to what you're talking about?

[SPEAKER_01]: We have a website, which is IFS-Institute.com, and there are various resources and ways to contribute on that, and in terms of popular books to read, in addition to the one I did with Thomas, the most popular book is called No Bad Parts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Neville gets so red.

[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, thank you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Everybody, run, don't walk.

[SPEAKER_00]: Go get both of them.

[SPEAKER_01]: And the other one people like is called, you're the one you've been waiting for, which is about applying this to working with couples and relationships.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that's what those are the ones I'd recommend, but yeah, and I'm very proud of the work with Thomas.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it feels like a deepening of, and a directing of your work just to another facet, which is really amazing.

[SPEAKER_00]: Much like the couple's work.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, that we're seeking in our partnership, essentially, what we seek in ourselves, which is so beautiful.

[SPEAKER_00]: And through all of the things that you're saying this unburdening, you liberate yourself from the pattern, you liberate the parts that need to be present, that we need the wisdom from, and the guidance from, and accessing that self, because then all this talk that we're doing also about nervous system.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you bring in that self, that is the experience of not just regulation, but also the experience of managing healthy dysregulation that you need, you know, there's a tiger coming, you need to access some activation.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, one of my pet peeves is the sort of hyperfocus on regulation and dysregulation because a lot of times what you're trying to regulate is a part of what needs to be listened to.

[SPEAKER_01]: It just needs some compromise, you know, if you get very agitated in this state and you try to do the tapping or whatever you try to do, you're trying, you're trying not to listen to the part it needs you.

[SPEAKER_01]: you're trying to get it to calm down, and that can work temporarily, but it doesn't really ultimately help the part.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, that's fascinating that in the desire to regulate your actually against sort of gaslighting or bypassing the part, you're doing it with soothing techniques instead of telling it to shut up, you're doing it on subtapping, but it rest work.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's a little more gentle than, [SPEAKER_01]: the giant to exile it, but yeah, that's right.

[SPEAKER_01]: So, and I'm not saying that some of that kind of stuff isn't useful times, but too often, it is a way to try and avoid having to listen.

[SPEAKER_00]: But then you're not going to the place where you're healing what creates the agitation.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it's a healthy normal agitation based on the framework of the scenario that triggers it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so instead of bypassing me, you're getting to the core.

[SPEAKER_00]: And once you get to the core and retrieve that part, then yeah, now the park could be present alongside you.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, now you don't worry about regulation so much because it's not agile.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's so interesting, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, you could have all the breath work in the world, but if you don't actually do the deeper work within yourself, none of it will be enough.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just like, green juice won't fix everything.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[SPEAKER_00]: So it tastes bad enough just that you think it might.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks so much for coming on today and sharing your wisdom.

[SPEAKER_00]: I really appreciate it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, make sure we put all the links to all your stuff in the show notes, but really appreciate you in your time.

[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I really enjoyed it, Mark.

[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't know what to expect, but I really, really enjoyed it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, thanks so much.

[SPEAKER_01]: You're welcome.