Loving All Our Parts
Life seeks to create life. From amoeba to dolphins, from apes to humans, all of life is aimed at safety so that life may perpetuate. Humans are one of the few animals on the planet that require our caretakers to survive. If our parents were not attentive on the day we were born, this would be the end of us. Thus, our lives are aimed at finding safety from the moment we are born.
The mechanisms by which we seek safety are developed at an early age. Until about 8 months of age, babies are fully egocentric. This means that they believe their experience of the world is totally a result of their behavior. If you have ever played peek-a-boo with a baby, they can feel sad when you cover their eyes and thrilled when they see you again. This is because, to the undeveloped mind, the baby believes that they have made you disappear and reappear by virtue of their actions.
As our minds mature into childhood, they retain some egocentrism. If one’s mother or father gets angry or cries, a child might begin to construct a belief that something they have done has led to this response. We might begin to believe that we did something bad or, if the action-reaction is unclear, that we are bad ourselves. We might begin to carry the burdens that we are not good enough, not smart enough, not pretty enough, or not lovable enough. These burdens can manifest as limiting beliefs and govern so much of our actions or inaction.
Our parents didn’t know any better. They were just trying their best, stumbling in the dark. They left imprints on us that have manifested as protective parts to keep us safe. In Internal Family Systems (IFS)–one of the most celebrated psychotherapeutic frameworks and the foundational framework of the Ceremonia Level 2: Heal journey–Dr. Richard Schwartz espoused that we are made up of “parts” that are sub-personalities designed to keep us safe. It is a profound shift to realize that the burdens and limiting beliefs we carry were ultimately formed to keep us safe.
There are two kinds of safety: outer safety and inner safety. Outer safety is setting, which is our environment. Do we feel warm, nourished, sheltered, and safe in the community we are surrounded by? Inner safety is mindset, which is within our psyche: do we feel safe to be with the content that arises? Do we feel safe with our emotions, beliefs, memories, and stories or do we engage our protectors to suppress, avoid, project, or dissociate from them?
There might be guilty parts that suppress behavior that has led us to feel hurt before. We might have “fixer” parts that make checklists to solve a problem rather than fully feel a feeling. We might also have avoidant, numbing, or addictive parts that keep us from being with the wounded parts of us that carry burdens like “I’m not good enough”. Each individual has a unique constellation of parts, each of them with a role that matured out of an imagined need to keep us safe. IFS suggests that every ailment, from depression to anxiety, from bipolarism to schizophrenia, are a result of parts that developed and have varying levels of power over our experience of reality.
The key to a healthy way of being is to be aware of our parts, create relationships with rather than suppress or reject them, and allow our Self–the radiant, buoyant, peaceful core that lies within each of us–to provide us safety rather than rely on our parts. In IFS, this is called “Self-led leadership”, which feels like 8 C’s: Curiosity, Calm, Clarity, Connectedness, Confidence, Courage, Creativity, Compassion. When we are in this state, our Self can love our parts–we can pursue wholeness by reconstituting the parts of us that we have dejected by acknowledging that they have been doing their best to keep us safe.
This framework of psychological behavior agrees with spiritual teachings. When we meditate, when we are present with what is, our parts naturally relax. Entering the observer mindset to view our thoughts, feelings, and sensations in our body is a fundamental part of the IFS practice–it is our Self that becomes aware. When our protective parts relax, when we can be our Self in its highest, we feel great peace and Oneness with the Self of others. Thus, the journey of consciousness is to allow our safety mechanisms to relax. We get to love the entire constellation of our parts–from those that depress, rage, or shame to those that feel tenderness, pleasure, and love–because they are all part of who we are.
