Parts: Part 2!
Yay! We get to talk about parts again! Have I told you how much I love talking about parts?
In part 1, you read about what we mean when we say “parts work” in counselling therapy. We covered how you might notice that parts are influencing your daily life. Now we move on to the next steps.
My clients will often say things at this point like, “How do we get rid of it?” or “What do we do with it?” Western culture has taught us that we need to “get rid of” our problems, including our emotions, our habits, anything that seems to be getting in the way of the lovely, smooth, fully controlled life we think we want to live. That appears to work for some of the people some of the time. It might even seem to work for a small, select few people a lot of the time. However, it doesn’t actually lead to a life worth living. Not for anyone. That’s because attempting to get rid of our parts just leads to more disconnection. More disconnection can make it look like the symptom is gone; but it’s not gone. If we want to truly feel better, we will need to connect.
I know, some of you really don’t like where this is going. And yet, my clients typically seem to intuitively know that this is what they need. That’s why I’m here. It’s easier when we do this together.
The first step is really just to say, “Hi,” to your parts. You could say a big hello to all of them. You could also say hi to just one part that seems to be noisy at the moment. Just a simple, “Hello Anxiety. I see you there.” People are often concerned that if they acknowledge parts of themselves, like anxiety, that it’s just going to get bigger and louder. That’s not usually what happens. If it does, then yes, go back to distracting yourself and come on in for a session.
Imagine that your 5-year-old niece is hanging out at your house for the day. It turns out that she doesn’t like dogs, and you have a dog. She starts to cry, and you ignore her. She cries louder and you put her in a room by herself and shut the door. You wouldn’t do that! And it wouldn’t calm her down to ignore her and then shut her away, either. When you ignore your anxiety (or your habit, or your overwhelm) you are ignoring a part of yourself that is in distress.
What would you actually do when your 5-year-old niece starts to get nervous about your dog? You would sit down beside her and tell her that yes, it’s pretty normal to be concerned about a dog if she’s not used to dogs. And yes, it’s true that some dogs aren’t very safe. It’s smart for her to be careful around dogs she doesn’t know. You could teach her how to stay safe around dogs. Would she like you to teach her?
How do you think that might work out? Do you think your niece would be nice and calm at that point? More than that, do you think she’d feel connected to you? I’ll bet she would.
This is very much how I teach my clients to talk to parts. Let’s notice a few things that I included in this little chat with your (imaginary) niece.
1. Connect. Sit down together. Say hi. Acknowledge the part.
2. Name the emotion and the cause of the emotion (if you know what it is). Validate it. I sometimes call this agreeing creatively. (more on that in part 3)
3. Never lie to the parts. They know when you’re lying. It doesn’t help build trust. Don’t tell the parts that things are going to be okay. We usually don’t actually know that.
4. I am constantly telling parts that they are smart. Just because a part doesn’t agree with the adult part of your brain doesn’t mean that it’s dumb. From the perspective of that part, whatever they are doing or feeling makes perfect sense to them.
5. If there is more information to be had, ask the part if she would like more information. Then provide it. Don’t try to convince the part that she’s wrong. Don’t bother trying to rationalize or reason with the part. Instead, we trust parts to come to the best conclusion when they are ready to do so. Your parts are you, after all. They are smart--just disconnected from more updated information.
As we work together in session, we slowly work our way toward helping you get through each of these steps on your own. There is tons more to say about each one, but no worries. We fine tune it as we go.
Now, let’s back up a bit and take a look at your adult self. This is the part of your brain that takes the lead. I intentionally did not say, “takes control.” I know, control is popular. The thing is, humans don’t like to BE controlled. The same is true for the parts. There is no part of you that really wants to give up control to anyone, including you. So, that’s not our goal. At all times, we have tons of respect for the autonomy of all of the parts.
We can look to Richard Schwartz for a good description of the adult self. He has a list of 8 c’s and 5 p’s that describe the adult self. (Richard Schwartz uses the term “Self” with a capital “S”.) The Self has
· Compassion
· Calm
· Creativity
· Courage
· Connectedness
· Curiosity
· Clarity
· Confidence
· Playfulness
· Patience
· Prescence
· Persistence
· Perspective
When you see that you have some of these traits in yourself, you are seeing your adult self. And when none of these are really showing up, the parts have taken center stage and aren’t leaving room for your adult self to be seen. Take a moment and look through the list. Which of these traits do you typically see most often in yourself? What are you usually doing when that trait shows up? Do you tend to see your creativity show up when you are gardening, cooking, or planning an event? Do you feel confident and clear when you are doing a particular work task? Do you feel connected when you are with a specific person?
When we are connecting with the parts, we are connecting the adult self with the younger part. That’s the goal. Internal connection. When the younger parts know that the adult self is there and is a reasonably decent human being who is attentive to them, they can start to relax. If there’s no adult in charge, then they will keep on trying to drive the bus, which looks like anxiety, depression, overwhelm, difficulty making decisions, loneliness, and so on.
A lot of times, when clients try to connect with their parts, they feel only frustration, intolerance, a desire to control, and they can’t hear the parts at all. When that happens, it’s not likely that the adult self is actually in the lead. It’s likely another part who thinks he’s the adult self. Richard Schwartz calls this part The Manager. I think of the manager as being like a 15-year-old who’s been left to run the family restaurant for the day. He can pull it off, but he’ll be awfully tired, and I wouldn’t want to be the one opening up the restaurant in the morning!
Our manager parts work awfully hard to keep the emotional parts in check. The only thing they really know how to do is lock them away or criticize them. Managers simply don’t have the mental resources to lead the parts by compassionately connecting with them. Most managers are very reluctant to let the adult self take the lead. They have learned not to trust anyone else and would rather take care of things on their own. It can be tricky to build trust with a manager part so that he will take a step back and let the adult self connect with the other parts. It’s okay if you need help with that. We can do that work together.
Thinking about ourselves in terms of parts can help us to actually become more connected. It’s a very different way of seeing ourselves, so it’s just fine if it takes a while to start to notice it in yourself and if it takes even longer to make any use of it. Humans aren’t designed to be alone. We are designed for connection both internally and externally. It’s okay to reach out for help with this. We’re here to help.