🔼: ##### The IFS Session - [[🔑 Protectors often doubt that things can get better]] - It’s also normal for our parts to end up trusting our therapist’s [[💡 Presence]] more than ours for a while because this may be the first time they experience [[💡 Presence|Presence]]. - [[🔑 It can be dangerous to approach Exiles unassisted]]. ###### Early Stages The first thing an [[💡 The IFS Practitioner|IFS Practitioner]] will do is get to know us a bit to make sure they're a good enough fit for us. They’ll let us explain our situation thoroughly enough that they understand our problems and needs and they're likely to start tracking our [[💡 Parts|Parts]]. What's most important is deciding whether we feel safe with this person. They don't have to be perfect, we just have to feel safe enough that we can be open and honest with them or at least be open to the possibility of it. Eventually they'll ask a few questions to help us detect some of our [[💡 Parts|Parts]] and start to point them out to us: "Ah, so a part of you feels this way and another part feels that way?" Generally [[🔑 Go at your pace]]. If there aren't any scrambling for attention, we get to choose which [[💡 Parts|Part]] we're interested in getting to know better, *we* choose what to explore. ###### In Session Sessions typically last somewhere between 50 and 70 minutes. They might begin with a [[💡 Parts|Part]] of us explaining a problem we're having or something that got an unexpected emotional reaction since our previous visit, or we might just drop in and see which [[💡 Parts|Parts]] are up and wanting some attention. We tell our [[💡 The IFS Practitioner|IFS Practitioner]] what happens as we see it in our mind's eye, through [[💡 In-sight|In-Sight]], or they might speak to our parts through [[💡 Direct Access|Direct Access]]. We might have our eyes closed, but your eyes don't have to be closed, and [[🔑 We don't have to reveal anything to our practitioner]] that we don't want to. They offer suggestions for how to interact with our [[💡 Parts|Parts]], helping us get to know our own internal family and work through [[💡 The IFS Process|the IFS process]]. > [!example] IFS Session Demonstrations > <iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/UNtussFaYC0?feature=oembed" height="113" width="200" style="aspect-ratio: 1.76991 / 1; width: 100%; height: 100%;"></iframe> > > <iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ebLMeNiuoEo?start=2402&amp;feature=oembed" height="113" width="200" style="aspect-ratio: 1.76991 / 1; width: 100%; height: 100%;"></iframe> [^1]: