This undoubtedly humane and often very adequate approach has limitations worthy to reflect. The limitations are rooted in two central aspects of the theory underlying the IFS process: the structure of the parts and the role of the Self.
In IFS the parts are defined by their function in the inner system. “All of our parts arise to help us adept to physical, psychological and social needs. This helping function is what we call the positive intention of each of our parts.”
This definition may seem very plausible at first sight and it also seems to be confirmed by the parts themselves. Each part has a special gift, a special competence that can greatly enhance our life. Looking into Tom Holmes’ ingeniously written and illustrated book ‘Parts Work’, we meet a wide array of parts that seem to support that function-oriented definition. We meet, for example, the ‘Happy Pig’ that ‘takes great joy in being employed as the monitor of hunger: it’s job is to recognize when we are hungry, to know what tastes good, to find it, eat it and enjoy it’.
Considering this statement more deeply, some doubts may arise. Can there really be one single part that is employed as the monitor of hunger, of selecting and savouring food? Is not every part of our psyche somehow connected to the body, expressing itself through it in it’s own way? What does it mean, when we feel like eating a triple burger at one time and a small plate of plain rice at another? Is that the Happy Pig unable to make a decision? Or could the different likings not come from different parts in us?

This does not mean, that there cannot be a part in someone that could be poignantly described as a ‘Happy Pig’, someone greatly interested in food and fun. But how do we know whether that interest reflects the true nature of that part or if it reflects a reactive state of mind – however persistent and stable that may be. Obviously, in a reactive state of mind we may also detect helpful intentions and competence. Once we make ‘the helping function’ the central defining factor for parts, we are apt to stop short in scrutinizing the parts more deeply. This inclination will increase with the seemingly obvious positive effect a part has on our wellbeing. We will welcome the Happy Pig as a natural and functional part of ourselves and when the pig becomes too happy we must look for the balancing factor in the system. But what if the Happy Pig, by it’s original nature, turned out to be a simple, silent and heartful man who sought refuge in food and fun because he was disappointed by all the shallow answers he received?

One can apply this question to every function-oriented definition of a part. Is the ‘Fear Part’ really one single part? Do not different parts fear different things? Is there really one ‘Anger Part’? Do not different parts get angry at just the things that contradict their reactive state or their nature? Are ‘Critical Parts’ critical by nature, by function or by reaction? If we do not ask these questions, we may be defining parts by their obvious purpose – how they help us survive, adapt or manage -  and we will find no need to search for their underlying, maybe more essential nature.

Yet another central aspect in IFS directs us away from that deeper search: the position and the role of the Self.
The Self is seen as the balancing centre of the system. It’s main quality is that of ‘mindfulness’ – an impartial, observing, impersonally loving energy. There is no doubt, that this state of being exists in most people – even if they have no idea about it – and that it’s qualities are extremely beneficial in everyday life and even more so in a therapeutic context. 

By calling it ‘different in nature from the parts’, by positioning it in the centre of the psyche, by attributing to it the qualities of wholeness, knowing and peace, we are creating a two-class psyche: the Self and the parts.
This must not be unwelcome to a client and his parts, on the contrary. Like the believe in God, the believe in a central Self can have a very reassuring and centring effect on a person and there is no reason to deny that to anyone who can draw benefit from it.
The downside of it is, that all the best, deep, eternal and essential qualities are now assigned to the Self. Thus the inclination to define parts by their function is enhanced and the need to look into them more deeply diminished.

We now have three factors supporting a limitation in the depth of inquiry of a given part: the indirect contact between the part and the therapist; the function-oriented definition of the parts and the central role assigned to the Self. Let us now see how the picture changes, when the parts are exposed to a more direct contact with the world.

7. A part is in direct yet self-determined contact with a therapist. This is the setting sometimes chosen in IFS and always in Voice Dialogue .
In this setting the part is externalized. The client is choosing a certain place in the session room by either logical reasoning – ‘that part feels scared, so I think I will want to place it safely behind that screen’ – or by intuitive perception – ‘it feels as though this part was standing right here next to me’.
Once the client sits or stands in that place, the therapist will address him as though he was only that part. The client as a whole is represented by the chair he was sitting on at the beginning of the session.
The therapist now engages the part in direct contact – either energetically or verbally or both. He may just be with it or ask questions about it’s situation in the client’s inner and outer life. The statements of the part are taken for face value. They are not questioned or doubted or provoked.

In this setting, there is a direct contact between the therapist and the part. The part’s bodily, emotional, verbal and energetic expressions become more obvious.  The focus on it is more exclusive, as no other parts can be present at the same time. 
This may bring more information to light than the indirect contact described above. Yet it may also prompt the part to be more cautious, lest it give away information it wants to remain secret.
If the therapist remains in the manner of an empathetic yet formal interviewer gathering information, he will be dependant on the part’s willingness to share information. His chances to directly encounter the unconscious and absolute resistance of a part remain unlikely and at random.

8. The next step in direct contact is the contact from ‘like to like’. This is the setting used in IndividualSystemic sessions. The part is externalized as described under point 7. The therapist now engages the part in a way very similar to the part’s own behaviour. This must not be confused with what is known as mirroring or even pacing. The major difference to these is the therapists willingness to have a real relationship with the part, not sparing his own impulses, ideas, reactions and feelings. For this to happen in a trustworthy way, some highly developed skills on the side of the therapists are required.  
As the therapist engages the part in the ‘like-to-like’-fashion, the intensity of the contact is enhanced dramatically. This almost invariably leads to a culmination-point, where both the behaviour and the contents of the part become irrelevant while the underlying attitude, as the source of both behaviour and content, is experienced with great clarity. 
Almost always this attitude proves to be a ‘reactive’ attitude – meaning a part’s unconscious, one-sided and absolute determination of how to deal with the world. If one does not stop there but continues the exploration with a similar determination one can make a fascinating discovery: underneath that first layer, more reactive attitudes of the same absolute strength but of quite different content and direction are revealed. It is as though the history of a part’s trials and errors in protecting and asserting itself is uncovered backwardly.
Finally, beneath up to five layers, the part’s original nature emerges.

This experience, repeated hundreds and hundreds of times, has led to a structural model, not only of the psyche as a whole, but also of the parts that make it up. In this model the parts are multi-dimensional entities and cannot be defined by the function they provide for the system.
To fully understand this we have to make a clear distinction between the contents of a part – everything it says, thinks, imagines and feels, the behaviour of the part – all the ways in which it expresses it’s contents, and it’s attitude. The attitude is seen as the source of both content and behaviour.
The attitudes we find in one single given part can be very different from each other. They represent the highly intelligent yet completely unconscious efforts of the part to serve two diametrically opposite needs at once: to express itself in the world and at the same time protect it’s nature from adversities.
In this struggle, every part basically uses the same strategy. At it’s deepest core it has a unique and essential nature. This nature can be defined by the part’s qualities and abilities on one side and it’s needs and expectations on the other. When facing adversities the part will withdraw certain qualities of itself and emphasize others. In this way the part itself is distorting it’s own original form to fit with outer or inner realities. After some time, that new form will freeze into a very stable and determined ‘attitude’,  a stereotype answer to all situations. This answer must not be stupid or bad. It represents the best compromise the part has found between expressing and protecting itself in a certain environment.
As situations change, that first solution may not suffice anymore as the compromise may produce new difficulties. The part will try out new solutions and a second attitude will soon cover the first. This goes on and on and with every new attitude more of the essential qualities are repressed and forgotten and at the same time pain and difficulties are reduced. One may call this process self-repression. The topmost attitude is the best solution possible. This is the point where a therapist meets a self.
The parts’ attitudes are of an astonishing yet completely unconscious intelligence. It is the same blind intelligence that allows animals to imitate rocks, lure their enemies right into their mouth or attack them from out of nowhere. Unfortunately, the topmost attitude of a part can not be taken for face value. No matter how functional and competent it may appear: as long as we do not know it’s essence, we do not know if the function it has taken on corresponds with it’s original nature.

If we do not define parts by their function, then how should we categorize and name them? IndividualSystemik suggests an answer to that question that is derived from the experience of the parts’ essences.
At it’s core, every part reveals a surprisingly clear kinship to one of the ‘Five Continents’ of the psyche: Woman, Man, Child, Animal or God. They are by nature either relation-oriented, plan-oriented, vulnerable, instinctive or transcendental.
As different as these five archetypal ways of being in the world may be, there is one thing they all have in common: the need to be recognized and acknowledged for who they are.
They do bring forth very specific abilities that are all needed in life and these abilities may well be utilized as ‘functions’. But the function they fulfil and the essence who they are must be seen separately. The essence remains even when the function is lost.
IFS assigns the qualities of being calm and compassionate, curious, clear, confident, creative, courageous and connected to the Self. These are – among others – the qualities one finds at the core of the parts, in different emphasis, depending on the Continent the part belongs to.
A person that is in touch with the essence of one or two parts, may identify that essence as the Self and may not know that more and quite different ‘selves’ are waiting to be uncovered and freed from their self created isolation.

Summing up everything stated so far, one can come to the following conclusion:
The psyche has a basic need for both safety and contact. Often, these needs are contradicting each other. More contact can subjectively and objectively lead to unsafe exposure while less contact enhances the possibilities of self-protection.
Yet, the level of contact also determines the level of information we are able to gather from the system. The less contact we have, the less detailed information we get and the less are the possibilities to verify the information offered by the system itself. This is greatly enhanced by the psyche’s inclination to unconscious resistance. 

Therefore, every therapy will have to choose the level of contact it applies in the process. A psyche that is severely intimidated and destabilized will need a much greater level of safety than a psyche that is excessively self-assertive, tricky or indifferent.
The more stable a system, the more contact it can allow and consequently the more detailed information will be revealed.
This is especially true when working with parts. The very concept of the parts is a great step towards a more detailed understanding of inner dynamics. The closer the relationship between a therapist and a part, the more he can scrutinize and understand it in detail.
In this way, IFS, Voice Dialogue and IndividualSystemik must not be seen as merely three different schools with different approaches, but rather three positions on a continuum of safety and contact, each contributing very specific insights, skills and styles of working with people.

The deeper meaning and intention of this article is to generate curiosity to further explore the implications that the different levels of contact bring to the safety and the insight of clients and therapists alike.

¹ Internal Family Systems’ according to Richard Schwartz, USA
² IndividualSystemik according to Artho and Veeta Wittemann, Germany

Artho Wittemann
Plixenried, Germany
March 8th, 2010