John Clarke is Interviewed by Mannah of Therapeutic Astrology Podcast (Part 1) | Going Inside x TAP
John Clarke is Interviewed by Mannah of Therapeutic Astrology Podcast (Part 1) | Going Inside x TAP
In this episode of Going Inside, we share a conversation from Mannah’s Therapeutic Astrology Podcast (TAP). Mannah, an Evolutionary Astrologer and Trauma Therapist, explores how astrology informs her therapeutic work, while I dive into Internal Family Systems (IFS) and parts work. Together, we share how IFS differs from traditional therapies like CBT, the power of self-energy in healing, and the paradigm shift in understanding trauma. Mannah also examines my astrological chart, showcasing how astrology and therapy can complement each other in fostering self-awareness and growth.
Differences Between Traditional Therapy and IFS
The Concept of Self and Parts in IFS:
Trauma and Unburdening in IFS
Astrology’s Role in Therapy
Navigating Neurodivergence and Therapy
Learn more about Mannah at:
https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/
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Interview Transcript:
[00:00:00] John: CBT would basically say, if you're feeling a certain way, you're thinking a certain way, and your thinking is creating your feelings, right? Creating your reality. So maybe one of the depressed thoughts is, no one likes me. From a CBT perspective, we would go in and we would refute the thought. IFS would see that a part is holding those beliefs, right?
[00:00:22] John: And probably what IFS would call an exile part, right? These often tend to be young, frozen paralyzed parts of us that are locked away and have been pushed away and pushed down, right? Our inner child. So an inner child that at some point probably had an experience, a formative experience, where that part took on this belief or this fear of no one likes me or what if no one likes me.
[00:00:51] Shaina: Hey everyone, Shaina here. I am the producer for Going Inside and today's episode is actually from Mannah's podcast. This is the Therapeutic [00:01:00] Astrology Podcast, which dives into healing and how we can reconnect to our true nature. Mannah is an evolutionary astrologist and a trauma therapist, and in this episode she interviews John, who gives us a deep dive into internal family systems, parts work, and how it differs from traditional therapies like CBT.
[00:01:20] Shaina: Meanwhile, Mannah dives into John's astrological chart and gives us her background as to how and why she integrates astrology with her therapy practice. We hope you guys enjoy and let's dive in.
[00:01:32] John: Before we dive into today's episode, I want to thank our sponsor, Jane. Jane is a clinic Mannahgement software in EMR that helps you handle your clinic's daily admin tasks So you can free up your evenings and weekends The team understands how precious your time is and recognizes that charting can often be the most time consuming part of your practice So to save you from having to chart from scratch You can check out Jane's template library Which gives you access to templates that have been [00:02:00] generously created and shared by health and wellness practitioners in the community Once you have a template you like, you can choose to customize it further with charting tools, such as range scales, text fields, check boxes, and more.
[00:02:14] John: To see how Jane can help you spend more time doing what you love, head to the link in the show notes to book a personalized demo, or if you're ready to get started, you can use the code John at the time of signup for a one month grace period applied to your new account. Let's dive in.
[00:02:31] Mannah: Welcome so much to TAP.
[00:02:33] Mannah: I'm so glad you're here with us today where we are looking into the human psyche again. I think we always are, but this time we're doing something very special. We are looking into what we can call an emerging paradigm of the human psyche. It's about the mind model. We have referred to that. A few times in this podcast we've interviewed, I've interviewed a few people who's doing IFS.[00:03:00]
[00:03:00] Mannah: And and today I'm talking to John Clark, who is a trauma therapist and host of the podcast Going Inside. So I'm very honored that you are my a colleague out there in the podcast world and also in the world of therapy and being so fascinated with What parts we can do working with parts on, in that internal space and helping clients not only relate to us in that kind of repair work, but relating to themselves and finding that connection and bonding with themselves.
[00:03:35] Mannah: That's what I find so amazing. It's a part of what I find amazing. So we'll talk about that today, how we're shifting because I believe we are. But let's, let me welcome you, John Clark, and let me hear what you think about all of this.
[00:03:48] John: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for having me. I'm just as excited about parts work and share your enthusiasm.
[00:03:55] John: And it's in part why I started my podcast and [00:04:00] once I learned about this model after, being a therapist for 15 some years, finally discovering this model and then feeling it's so life changing and so powerful that I want to do everything I can to get it out there for people and help them even start using it for themselves to start improving their lives and their healing.
[00:04:21] Mannah: 15 years. in a different modality? Was it one different modality or was it different psychology branches? That's
[00:04:31] John: a great question. So going back to the start, most graduate programs, at least in the US, I would say internationally, they tend to favor one or a handful of psychotherapy models. There are a few thousand out there, right?
[00:04:46] John: And basically what a model is a particular group's view on psychology, but also on pathology. And when we talk about pathology we talk about [00:05:00] why and how people suffer, right? So if someone is dealing with anxiety, how do we view that anxiety? Is it a result of their thinking? Is it a result of their attachment style?
[00:05:13] John: Is it a result of A lack of mindfulness or awareness of the body and can we just start there? Is that the therapy in the IFS world? Is there a part that is anxious or a part that's holding the anxiety or communicating the anxiety and rather than turning away from it or trying to control the anxiety, which is what a lot of therapy is about, reducing the anxiety.
[00:05:36] John: IFS says What if we were to turn toward it and see it as a part and get to know it and ask the part what's going on? Hey, tell me what the problem is. Tell me what's going on. Tell me about this anxiety and self can go in and help that part. I'm already not answering your question. So
[00:05:54] Mannah: It's just because now we're so fascinated with IFS and path work.
[00:05:58] Mannah: So we're going straight to that. [00:06:00] But yeah, you were speaking about what favor the traditional therapy schools.
[00:06:04] John: Yeah, so the model that I was trained in was the psychodynamic model. Psychodynamic and what's called interpersonal process. Psychodynamic is a branch out of psychoanalytic theory, which in my world and in my, where I'm sitting right now, feels so far away and so antiquated and out of date.
[00:06:25] John: And yet there's a lot of psychoanalysis, psychoanalysts still out there doing psychoanalysis. And some people getting great results from that. But I think it's a model that a lot of therapists have moved on from. Every model seems to build on the last model. And I think IFS is no different in some ways.
[00:06:42] John: So in psychodynamic work, basically the idea is The pathology comes from faulty relational templates that we have during childhood, basically, right? So an example would be, I had a client who for nine months, her therapy with me was about her fear of crying. [00:07:00] Now, Where did that fear come from? When she was a kid, anytime she would cry or start to cry, her dad would mock her and make fun of her and laugh at her.
[00:07:10] John: So she developed what we call an internal working model of, if I cry, people make fun of me and they withdraw from me. Dad makes fun of me and withdraws from me. So in the psychodynamic model or interpersonal process, the goal of the therapist is actually to slowly allow that same Dynamic to play out between she and I, which eventually it did nine months into it, that dynamic plays out.
[00:07:37] John: She eventually cries in front of me and in session. And then rather than laughing at her or mocking her, I'm warm and attuned and compassionate. And I invite her to notice that and say, through your tears, could you look up and just see what do you notice on my face? And she says I see you're not judging me.
[00:07:56] John: Okay. And what's that to not be judged? Okay. It's a relief. Yeah. [00:08:00] Just feel that relief, see how much you can take that in. And then the hope is that's what they call a corrective emotional experience. I'm basically being her attachment figure, her surrogate attachment figure, and hopefully that template gets healed and she can take that out into the world.
[00:08:16] John: and use it, right? And be a little more open, a little more vulnerable, a little more in touch with her feelings. That's the psychodynamic model in a nutshell.
[00:08:27] Mannah: And then, where did that work for you?
[00:08:32] John: It works. And when it works, it really works. A few problems with that is number one, it's really taxing to as a therapist to have to be someone's attachment figure, right?
[00:08:42] John: It requires a tremendous deal of psychic energy to be that person, right? To basically work with her transference, right? So in this example, I'm working with her father transference and I'm allowing myself to be like her father [00:09:00] and, but I'm using it for good and not for evil. It's a model that is very slow.
[00:09:05] John: It's very tedious. You have to be really skilled to use this model and to stay in relationship with your client and you have to use yourself a lot and your feelings and your reactions and your personhood. If I were to compare this to IFS, just to show you right away, like how that's different rather than me being her attachment figure or her attachment object, we want that part of her.
[00:09:29] John: that was laughed at by dad and that took on this belief of if I cry, people don't love me. We want that part to then turn to what IFS calls self, right? Or her self, which is her true self, her authentic self her heart, who she really is. And self can be the attachment object and self goes into that memory when she was seven and it pauses that scene and sits down on the floor And rather than having dad make fun of her and berate her, maybe We [00:10:00] pulled that out of that room and we just have that little girl with the client self in that room and self provides a corrective emotional experience and lets the girl cry and resonates with her and offers her a hug and offers her a blanket and says, your tears make so much sense to me.
[00:10:17] John: And then that healing is happening right there and right away. And that could happen in the first session, not nine months in to the therapy. And then what that shows the client too is, Oh my gosh, I have this core self. I have this quality inside me and I can bring that to parts of me that are hurting and parts of me that are protecting the ones that are hurting.
[00:10:36] John: And the therapist is more like a facilitator of that. I'm more like a guide in helping her. Helping herself meet that little girl, meet that part and helping the repair happen.
[00:10:49] Mannah: Oh, yes. So many curiosities in that. And that is the major shift. And I love how you explained it. And yeah, beautiful example as [00:11:00] well.
[00:11:00] Mannah: One curiosity is. Does it then not matter about the very spoken about therapeutic alliance anymore?
[00:11:10] John: Well, IFS says the therapeutic alliance is still important and the therapist is facilitating these sessions from a place of as much self or self energy as possible, right? So in order to do this work safely I need to also work with and heal my own parts as much as I can and have an idea of what's going on.
[00:11:30] John: What it feels like for parts of me to jump in and get activated and to blur the therapy. So if I have a client who's dealing with an issue that hits really close to home, I might have parts to get activated during session. And so my job is to Mannahge my own system, to be with my own parts, to be in as much self energy as possible so that the client can do the work, right?
[00:11:54] John: Now, there's, so there is that relationship there, but it's not as much of a dependent [00:12:00] relationship. It's not, I need to come to my therapist so he can be my attachment figure, right? That repair can't happen unless my therapist, is in the room when I cry and provides this warm, corrective emotional experience.
[00:12:14] Mannah: Yeah, that, that is really a big one that I can work on this on my own.
[00:12:19] John: That's right.
[00:12:19] Mannah: And one thing is that I can sit down and actually do the work. I can do some meditations. I know you've done an eye face meditation on your channel and yeah. And so there are many things you can do, but also it's it just happens as well because it happens a lot when I dream.
[00:12:34] John: Yeah. Yeah. So
[00:12:35] Mannah: that's something that's not just, I think in all therapy, I hope there is some kind of component of the unconscious there as well, that we're not just working on a mental level.
[00:12:47] John: Yeah.
[00:12:47] Mannah: But I've tried nothing like IFS with going deep into my psyche, the psyche, the parts of the reality that I usually deny, that I'm not aware of.
[00:12:59] John: Yeah. Yeah. [00:13:00] It's not
[00:13:00] Mannah: in my everyday consciousness. It can bring that up. It's so powerful.
[00:13:06] John: It does. The role of the unconscious is a really important one coming from the world of psychology, right? And even going back to, again, psychoanalysts and Freud saying, okay, we have the id, the ego, the superego and we have these unconscious drives, toward violence, toward sex.
[00:13:24] John: These are the original models of psychotherapy that were not that long ago. The way that IFS might look at the unconscious is, until made conscious, until we make this contact with our parts are operating on an unconscious level, right? And so if I have a strong perfectionist part that's been driving the bus for 15 years, and on the outside, it's really helped me a lot, because I go really far in work, my supervisors love me, I rarely make mistakes, and when I do, I clean them up right away. I'm impeccable in my appearance. All those things are rewarded, right? Until eventually that perfectionist part burns out. [00:14:00] Or in order to compensate for the perfectionist part, when I get home, I have what IFS calls a firefighter part that has to drink or smoke or numb out or eat or whatever until I can.
[00:14:10] John: Feel okay again. And so this part, this perfectionist part, the way we can make it more conscious is if a client comes in and goes, my anxiety is killing me, right? And I'm so terrified of being imperfect or of making a mistake. Okay? So as you think about making a mistake, can you shift your focus inside?
[00:14:31] John: This is what we call going inside or insight work in IFS. . And I wonder if you could just try to find and get to know that part of you. That wants to be perfect that part of you that helps you be perfect and the client might go inside They might close their eyes. They might go well Yeah, it's this little almost like a figure on my shoulder Okay, and what can you make that figure aware of you?
[00:14:57] John: Yeah, he's like a businessman in a suit [00:15:00] Okay And can you just get to know him a little bit and ask him what he's up to? Or how he got this job of trying to help you be perfect and he says when you were seven years old, you were playing a piano recital and you missed a few notes.
[00:15:13] John: And on the way home, mom didn't, mom just didn't talk to us. So this perfectionist part came online and said, when I am imperfect, when I miss a note, people withdraw love. So 15 years later, I've been as perfect as possible to try to not lose love. Can you let that part know? That makes sense.
[00:15:32] John: That story makes a lot of sense about how this part got here. And why it does what it does. And now all of a sudden, this is a conscious relationship and a two way street and IFS holds that all parts have good intention, right? Dick Schwartz, the founder wrote this book, no bad parts. Parts are trying to do good for you.
[00:15:50] John: They're trying to preserve the system in whatever way possible in their method, whether it's perfectionistic part or a drinking part or whatever. And so then you ask the part [00:16:00] again, what could be good about being as perfect as possible? And it says when we do that. People don't withdraw love from us.
[00:16:07] John: And the logic of our parts is sometimes that simple and that black and white, right?
[00:16:12] Mannah: And I feel that is a thread that the newer trauma therapies are onto that you can turn it around and say, what's the function in this? What's the quality? Like you said, what's the intention? What's the positive help that it wanted to give?
[00:16:31] Mannah: But in IFS and the, I feel there's an extra dimension because it's like, It's a sub personality of yours? It's like a real person?
[00:16:41] John: Yeah.
[00:16:45] John: Parts are sub personalities. They hold their own unique perspectives and beliefs and ideas and agendas, right? And in general, I find that parts do have agendas, and part of what separates a part from self [00:17:00] Is having an agenda, right? So sometimes if we're doing the work and we go in and I asked the client, we do this in order to check for what IFS calls self energy.
[00:17:12] John: And you ask the client, how do you feel toward this perfectionist part? And the client says I feel a little annoyed. Like I wish he wasn't here.
[00:17:18] Mannah: Yeah.
[00:17:18] John: Then we would see that as another part, right? And say, okay, can you. Get to know that part that wishes the perfectionist part wasn't here, right? And you could start that dialogue.
[00:17:27] John: So it's a very relational way of working. It's just that we're dealing with these internal relationships again, which is. a big paradigm shift from the relationship between therapist and client as the primary agent of change, the primary therapeutic factor.
[00:17:43] Mannah: Yeah. Okay, great. So I want to get a little bit into the shifting from different, you can maybe talk about different pathologies, things that you would come to a therapist with, and then talk about the different ways you work with that, that maybe that you personally worked with it [00:18:00] before and now.
[00:18:01] Mannah: Or just that you know of
[00:18:03] John: yeah.
[00:18:03] Mannah: So I don't know. Do you have any examples? Otherwise I'll go into my jukebox, but maybe you have some examples.
[00:18:09] John: I could bring examples. I'd be more curious to hear yours and see if we can break it down a little bit.
[00:18:16] Mannah: What about depression? Come in, you're depressed and yeah.
[00:18:24] Mannah: Can you maybe take us from there? The traditional therapies into IVs, perhaps, with thinking.
[00:18:31] John: Yeah, definitely. This is a good one. If I were to see depression through a CBT lens, cognitive behavioral therapy, which is a model I've learned and trained actually with Aaron Beck himself, the founder of CBT and it's a really effective model, and there's a lot of research behind it.
[00:18:46] John: CBT would basically say, If you're feeling a certain way, you're thinking a certain way, and your thinking is creating your feelings, right? Creating your reality, right? If you think it, then it is and if you're feeling sad, you're having sad [00:19:00] thoughts. And those sad thoughts are often not based totally in reality.
[00:19:06] John: They're what CBT would call cognitive distortions, right? So maybe one of the depressed thoughts is no one likes me or I have no friends. You can just feel the weight of that thought, right? As I say it, you can feel the weight of that sentiment, right? Almost like a little kid who says, I have no friends.
[00:19:25] John: No one wants to play with me. So from a CBT perspective, we would go in and we would refute the thought. So in CBT, we would say we use cognitive restructuring or what they call Socratic questioning with that thought. And we would go, okay, so the thought is no one likes me and you write down on a piece of paper, no one likes me.
[00:19:45] John: And then you would say, or the therapist would say. What's the evidence that's true? Recently someone at work said that they didn't want to be on this project with me, and also recently my partner broke up with me, and my [00:20:00] sister doesn't call me very often. Okay, so that's the proof that no one likes me.
[00:20:06] John: What's the evidence on the other side? I do have a couple friends, and I do have this one club that I'm a part of, where we do projects, every Thursday or whatever. And I do have sometimes my friends call me, or sometimes my sister calls me.
[00:20:21] John: Okay, is there a possibility that there's a cognitive distortion here? And the client might say, oh yeah, I remember from that worksheet black or white thinking. The black or white thinking is nobody likes me or everybody loves me, and so you work it that way. It's a really heady approach.
[00:20:38] John: You're looking for the evidence for and against, you're looking for the distortion, you're looking for a possible replacement belief, which it could be something in the middle, like some people like me and some people don't like me.
[00:20:52] Mannah: And
[00:20:52] John: I can practice being more okay with that.
[00:20:54] Mannah: And so the client is realizing, okay, I have a black and white approach, which [00:21:00] is maybe where you could be stuck in a younger age and then seeing that in itself can resolve something.
[00:21:08] John: Yeah. Yeah. Having even just having more awareness of your thoughts themselves can provide some relief. If I'm sitting at home and I'm feeling sad and I go let me do that thing and try to notice my thoughts or journal about my thoughts. And you write down, I'm afraid no one likes me. And you're like, okay, I'm having that thought.
[00:21:27] John: And I know that's not true. So I can get a little distance from it. Or I can reassure myself. There's some people that like me and you might get a little relief there, right? Now to shift it into an IFS perspective for the sake of this conversation, IFS would see that a part is holding those beliefs.
[00:21:50] John: And probably what IFS would call an exile part, right? These often tend to be young, frozen paralyzed parts of us that are locked away and have [00:22:00] been pushed away and pushed down, right? Our inner child, right? So an inner child that at some point probably had an experience, a formative experience where that part took on this belief or this fear of no one likes me, or what if no one likes me?
[00:22:16] John: In that regard, We would just see it even from this parallel to CBT that a part is holding these beliefs, right? That are outdated and that are based on a historical context and usually a moment. So if we go in and say, so when you focus on the part of you that believes or fears, no one likes me, where do you notice it in or around your body?
[00:22:44] John: It's like the sinking feeling in my gut. Okay, what would it be like to, Just put a hand or two on that spot in your gut and just see if you can start listening with your hands.[00:23:00]
[00:23:00] John: See if you can just listen and see if you get anything. And if you're not getting anything you might even ask. Just ask inside. What should I know? Tell me the story of And then maybe a part emerges and says, yeah, I'm the part that fears that no one likes me. And then we're off to the races, right? This is what IFS calls a trailhead.
[00:23:30] John: This is where therapists and clients start walking down that trail. And exploring parts and getting to know it and getting to know its role, or whether it's an exile or what IFS calls a protector, hearing the story of that part, validating that part. And then eventually, if we get to a place where it is appropriate and called for to, to do what IFS calls an unburdening, we would walk that part through the unburdening sequence, which I can talk more about.
[00:23:59] John: But [00:24:00] that's how we would start is, yeah, starting this dialogue.
[00:24:05] Mannah: Okay. I'm holding two questions, but just for what you just said here, would you say that it's a matter of experience that you would be able to go through and unburdening as a client, I'm thinking of, can it be like, this is just my hypothesis based on my little experience that sometimes it doesn't really happen because it's in the beginning because the client will be like, yeah, I'm like so happy to find that in a child and then not really being able to check for all the things yet.
[00:24:36] Mannah: What do you think?
[00:24:38] John: It takes a lot of skill and tact and grace to unburden a part. And a lot of therapists, myself included, we have self like parts and parts that want to go in and help and rescue and save, right? So the first time meeting this little boy who's locked in the basement and holding this belief, I might have a [00:25:00] part that wants to get him out of there, right?
[00:25:03] John: And this is how IFS can be unsafe. This is how we can bypass protectors accidentally and unintentionally. So to unburden a part, and especially in exile, we need consent From all parts, especially the protector parts, right? So let's say if we step back for a second and say, this is the same client. We have the exile part that holds that fear of no one likes me.
[00:25:30] John: What if no one likes me? And that client also has a perfectionist part. That keeps him operating on an extremely high level. 15 years, of being a high achiever, being really career driven, making lots of money, being impeccable in my appearance, right? That's this is a really common orientation, an IFS.
[00:25:51] John: So if I just go in and yank this little one out of the basement and unburden him I might've bypassed that protector part. Who's been working for 15 [00:26:00] years. to keep the system safe, right? And to keep me functional and to keep me successful in my career so that people think I'm great and worthy of love and all that.
[00:26:09] John: And so we have to work with both parts. We have to work with the whole system. And if you learn IFS as a practitioner, you learn to always start with the protector parts. That's how we enter the ecosystem, right? Is we always start with protectors and they're usually the parts that show up first, although not always, sometimes you go into someone's system and you meet an exile like this one right away.
[00:26:30] John: And you could work with it. And if there's no objections and the work is safe and the client has. enough self energy. You could hypothetically unburden this part but it's not always the goal and we don't want to carry an agenda about unburdening the part. Sometimes just going in and getting to know that exile is quote unquote enough or more than enough for the client to get some relief from these depressive symptoms.
[00:26:54] John: Right.
[00:26:55] Mannah: Yeah. I feel that's the thing that I've experienced with especially [00:27:00] new clients to this work that it's easy and a part of me is I wonder if it's too easy, is something wrong but then it gives such release. So what I'm starting to think is maybe it's just the beginning, like it's just the beginning to feeling yourself.
[00:27:18] Mannah: That's right. And then all the nuances may appear later.
[00:27:21] John: Yeah.
[00:27:22] Mannah: Wondering about that.
[00:27:23] John: You're absolutely right. For most people, going inside is a new phenomenon. It's a new experience. Communing with their parts is a new phenomenon, right? I might've known I have this inner critic, My whole life.
[00:27:36] John: This is my first time interacting with him and realizing he has a voice and a perspective and a personality and an outfit maybe or whatever, or people might just experience their part semantically right might be like I just feel him in my gut or my shoulders when that part is here. There's a million ways to experience your parts.
[00:27:55] John: But what's so unique about IFS is. We start a dialogue [00:28:00] and we, the goal is to hear from our parts, right? You want the part to speak and share information with you. Whereas a lot of people try to figure out their parts or they might go, yeah, I know that one thing about that piano recital. And that's when I started to get really anxious.
[00:28:12] John: So I already know. What this part is and they bypass it, right? We'll go ahead and ask the part. About that piano recital, just to make sure or ask the part it's perspective on the piano recital. And can you shift into a position of just listening, just hearing that story and witnessing that story. So it's a new way of getting information, right? That most people are. It takes a bit of getting used to because so much of psychotherapy and the helping profession in general is about being heady and intellectual and try to figure it out, right? And just noticing and drinking is not good for you and yet you keep doing it.
[00:28:50] John: So why do you keep doing it? I don't know why I keep doing it.
[00:28:55] Mannah: Oh yes. Yeah, exactly. I love that point about now [00:29:00] we don't have to talk about only what we know of the parts and of the inner children, but we can. ask them, we can ask, we can speak to them instead of just about them.
[00:29:12] John: Yeah.
[00:29:13] Mannah: Okay. There's different pieces coming up here and I have to make choices.
[00:29:18] Mannah: Okay. So I wanted to just back on track with different pathology. Sufferings when you come, When you have, when you're on the neurodivergent continuum, that is something I'm also trained in the trauma therapy NAM for complex trauma. And and that's in, in that training, I had different discussions with other students about this.
[00:29:43] John: Yeah.
[00:29:44] Mannah: How to accommodate the growing clients per relation that who has that. Who identifies with being neurodivergent. And then, yeah, how do pathsway go about that?
[00:29:59] John: Yeah, [00:30:00] what I'll say is, First of all, I'm not an expert in neurodivergence.
[00:30:06] Mannah: This is, I want to make that disclaimer. This is straight from my jukebox and I've not prepared you.
[00:30:12] John: Yeah, no, I appreciate it though, because it, this is happening and more and more people are understanding their own neurodivergence and their differences through a parts perspective. It would be plausible to see something like ADHD through a part's perspective, right? Like an ADHD part or a part that gets really distracted.
[00:30:34] John: So you could see it as both a part or a part that holds some of those ADHD symptoms or a really hyperactive part. And then we would think if all parts have good intention and roles that are built for the system, what could be good about being distracted? What could have been good about being distracted or hyperactive?
[00:30:56] John: So as a parallel, what could be good about dissociating? We [00:31:00] have parts that dissociate, especially in my work as a trauma therapist. If you ask the part that dissociates, what could be good about what you do, and it says when things were too intense when I was getting beaten when I was nine I learned to just pull us out of there entirely and just go elsewhere.
[00:31:16] John: That makes sense, right? And it sounds like, This part is still feeling the need to do that sometimes, right? And then self is coming and saying, you don't need to do that for me anymore, right? We're not nine anymore, right? I'm 34 and I have a partner and a family and friends and I'm safe now. But that dissociative part is going I didn't know that, right?
[00:31:37] John: I'm still operating out of that nine year old perspective. For instance, that being said the default for IFS around anything is just ask, right? So in this neurodivergence, whether it's ADHD, dyslexia, whatever it might be folks that are on the spectrum again, the IFS would see it all through a parts perspective and we would go in and just [00:32:00] ask or just ask which part is the one that dissociates, which part is the one that is distracted.
[00:32:06] John: or whatever it might be. Yeah.
[00:32:09] Mannah: Yeah. And yeah. Yeah. That is really a great way to think about dissociation. That is also a part of someone who's doing that in my internal system. When it comes up, I feel it's also, in therapy. And this can happen to myself. I have a lot with dissociation. I think it's pretty common.
[00:32:32] Mannah: But I'm a Pisces, so it's definitely a quality there. I think I started to go to IVs. therapy myself, like three or four years ago. And what would come up in my mind would be this constantly, Oh, I need, maybe I should tell the therapist, like you, I am neurodivergent. You need to know this about me because I can't do the thing.
[00:32:53] Mannah: And it still comes up sometimes, where it's like a part who's just, Hey, wait, I'm neurodivergent, so I can't do the thing you're asking me. [00:33:00] And that's where it came up and the training I was referring to is that do we have to make another setting for this type of brain, this type of neurology?
[00:33:10] Mannah: That's a
[00:33:10] John: great point. To that regard, yes, there's a lot of implications in terms of a client being able to do IFS or IFS being a good fit for them based on how their brain processes information. So for instance, people experience their parts differently. Like I said I am very much what they would call a visual thinker.
[00:33:31] John: And so when I encounter my parts, I feel them somatically, but more so I see them visually, right? So I would like to see that literal seven year old boy wearing overalls and a red bandana, right? One of my parts. And that image is very clear and vivid to me, and I maintain that image when I'm working with that part, right?
[00:33:52] John: I can see him, and he can see me. That's as best as I can explain that. And so for other people, for instance, And They're not visual [00:34:00] thinkers, right? They don't see their parts at all, right? They might be totally kinesthetic or the, they might just be more auditory. They might just hear their parts.
[00:34:09] John: Dick Schwartz just hears his parts. He doesn't see them. However we get information from parts, that's the way we get information. So again, for some people it's a kinesthetic thing or a somatic thing entirely. The therapist just wants to work with that and adapt. That the therapy around the client's experience of their parts or the way they process information could also have parts or clients that struggle with dyslexia.
[00:34:32] John: And so their ability to translate what they're hearing or seeing or receiving from a part and saying it out loud to the therapist, there might be a disconnect there, right? Things might get jumbled up or it might take longer. So then the therapist needs to adapt to that piece as well. In theory, all therapy should be about Accommodating to individual differences and really creating a custom fit therapy for the client, right?
[00:34:53] John: That's a foundational piece of our world and our profession is based and being client centered or [00:35:00] humanistic We don't always do it and there's a lot we don't know about neurodivergence, right? And in that regard, I think we're at ground zero with a lot of it and yet more and more people are Learning about it and clients are learning about it and reading about it and coming in saying hey, I've learned This is how my brain works And I'll say, great let's figure out how to use that, that knowledge to make this therapy really work for you.
[00:35:23] Mannah: Yeah. Yeah. Great. Yeah. But for me, it's definitely helped to have all the different parts of me acknowledged. Not that it can't be in one session, they can't all fit, fit into one session but then I have something that I can do. I can then visit them afterwards, right? But just that there's do you do that thing where you put the parts in chairs?
[00:35:46] John: Sure.
[00:35:47] Mannah: Yeah. Like just that, that there's so many, that is a relief I feel as someone who can identify with the neurodivergence. That's a relief, right? Because I don't have to just be [00:36:00] one and I don't have to just speak for one. That's one of my issues as this human being. I can only speak. one at the time, but inside of me, I want to say many more things at the very same time.
[00:36:16] John: That's right. This is what IFS calls the paradigm shift, which is, again, they were all multiple and all parts are welcome and all parts are good. And it's a really powerful stance to take. It's a very therapeutic. and de shaming and non stigmatizing stance to take in itself, right? So an offering to the client might be if you can get behind this idea of self energy or self, which is basically like your internal your internal core that is profoundly good, and innately good and full of calmness and curiosity and compassion and creativity and love, basically.
[00:36:57] John: If you can bring some of that to your ADHD [00:37:00] part your dyslexic part, or your drinking part, and really honor and embrace that part, then it de shames and it softens the whole system. And it also tends to soften that part. No one needs to be changed here, right? We're not coming in to try to change people or control parts or to get to kick them out.
[00:37:20] John: We're here to go in with love and compassion and get to know them and hear their story and bring them out of extreme roles that they're in. So again, like not crying ever. That part of my client was an extreme in an extreme role, right? So we're not trying to get rid of that part by any means.
[00:37:38] John: We're trying to offer her the opportunity to come out of that extreme role and into the loving embrace of self so that the client can have more coherence in her system and be more self led. And be more in herself and in her heart and in who she is. And she can go and heal that part that was so [00:38:00] terrified to cry all these years for very good reason.
[00:38:03] Mannah: Yeah. What do you think that old cliche of, Oh, I don't, I'm not, I'm afraid of going into my trauma that it will open up and it'll just stay open. And I don't know, I need someone to close the trauma. What do you think, maybe where that comes from, if but also what's a different approach when we were asked to that?
[00:38:27] John: The verdict is out on whether or not we need to reaccess traumatic memories in order to heal from trauma. I'm more on the camp these days of, we don't need to access all of it, we don't need to go back there. IFS would say we don't need to go back there, right? IFS would say we just need to unburden that part that took on that belief or that burden or that wounding of the transcript.
[00:38:54] John: I'm not enough, or I'm worthless, right? Someone hit me. I was seven. I [00:39:00] took, a part of me took on this belief that I'm worthless. We can go in, be with that part. If that part wants to share some of the story of being beaten and some of the vivid details of that, the part might. And when you're in self can hold that and handle it.
[00:39:13] John: You can also ask the part not to overwhelm. Sometimes parts will want to share every excruciating detail about the traumatic event. You can ask them not to overwhelm the system by sharing it all. Because self knows what happened, right? Self knows just how bad it was. And self can say, come tell me how bad it was.
[00:39:32] John: And then we can help that part out of that place and into the present and into, again, the loving embrace of self. On the other hand, so I've trained in models lots of different trauma models, whether it's IFS somatic experiencing, I like to work somatically, I'm going through more of that training right now, which would say basically, trauma is held in the nervous system, and it's not helpful to go back there to the traumatic memory.
[00:39:57] John: That's just going to get you re traumatized and triggered. [00:40:00] That's what trauma is, right? That's why people come to therapy, because they're getting triggered. Go ahead.
[00:40:05] Mannah: But in working with parts, don't we go back to sometimes at least, go bring yourself into that situation?
[00:40:13] John: If we need to. If the part is still there, yeah.
[00:40:16] John: But the difference would be so If that 7 year old was severely beaten once a month for 12 months during that year, some therapies would say we need to go back to every memory that's in there and desensitize it. Right and work through it and do reprocessing work, right? This is what EMDR would offer.
[00:40:37] John: So I also do EMDR Which is eye movement desensitization and reprocessing. So EMDR says that PTSD happens because Memories are impartially processed memory processing stopped when that seven year old was being beaten and that memory processing never resumed And so people are still [00:41:00] living in their trauma and it's that trauma is just right here in the front of your brain and EMDR helps it go to long term storage.
[00:41:06] John: So EMDR would say we need to go in and we need to excavate every single traumatic memory. It's a form of exposure work in my opinion. So in that regard. We do need to open the trauma, and you do need to be very careful, and it is possible once you open that lid that it all comes out, and it can be way too much, and people can get super destabilized.
[00:41:25] John: So I just want to put that out there knowing how potent this stuff can be.
[00:41:32] Mannah: But So it can be super destabilizing if you don't know what you're doing is what you're saying.
[00:41:38] John: Or if you go too fast. So IFS can be destabilizing if you go too fast. Like I mentioned, if I have a lot of eagerness and I'm using IFS or I'm too excited about IFS and I go in and there's this exile.
[00:41:51] John: that I noticed in the very first session. I say, let's go toward it and be with him and go into that living room where that seven year old was beaten. The [00:42:00] client might go along with it, but I, again, I might be bypassing protectors there. in getting a client back into their trauma. And then at the end of the session, it's over and say, Hey, see you next week.
[00:42:11] John: And the client walks out of there and a dissociative part comes in and goes, we need to dissociate more or a drinking part that night goes, I can't sleep if I'm thinking about this trauma again. So I'm going to have seven or eight or nine drinks so I can go to sleep again. This
[00:42:26] Mannah: is when Pat didn't unite with the self, right?
[00:42:29] John: It would be, right? Or when we just simply go too fast, right? All the work in IFS work, it needs to be incredibly slow, slower than we think it needs to be. And until we have fully been with and heard the story of that seven year old exile that part is not and should not go anywhere.
[00:42:48] John: We shouldn't be proceeding with anything. And so it just needs to be really slow and steady.
[00:42:55] Mannah: Oh, good. Good to be cautious about that. [00:43:00] Okay. So I am aware of time but we have a little bit left. I want to save some time to also just say a little bit about, about your astrology. But, so I have a thing that's on my mind because okay I'll share it with you and let's see how it goes.
[00:43:18] Mannah: But the thing is my ex husband was recently he was the victim of random violence. walking in a park where, he didn't do anything. He was just walking in that park and there was some guys there and, he got knocked out. And ever since that accident, incident I've been really eager to get him to some help, some psychological help.
[00:43:42] Mannah: And we've got into his insurance and because he's not the type of person who would like to pay for these sort of things, right? So now, okay, we get something from insurance and it is crisis psychologist, working with crisis. So he [00:44:00] got that. And I've really been looking forward and nudging him, urging him to go to this.
[00:44:05] Mannah: It's going to be really good. It's going to help you. And he was there today and he said it was a waste of time. I would, I left after 30 minutes and I said what happened? I just, and then he told me I just said, I don't know exactly why I'm here. Maybe you can help me. And then the psychologist has just went through like a standard list of things.
[00:44:25] Mannah: And then the psychologist had said, there seems to be nothing wrong. And sent him, I sent him off again. And I was so angry when I heard that, because I can't believe that. And I'm, the reason why I'm bringing it up is because I'm wondering if this is also part of the shift, at least that we want to see happen.
[00:44:47] Mannah: I can say more, but let me hear your reflections on just,
[00:44:50] John: I have a lot of thoughts about this, and I really appreciate you sharing it with me. And yeah, I'm also just, I'm so compassionate to what happened to your ex husband and [00:45:00] just the horrible randomness of that, and now he has to deal with the remnants of it.
[00:45:05] John: First of all, Part of how I got here was realizing after, X number of years in the field, I knew I was comfortable talking with clients about trauma and what they had happened, what had happened to them. But I didn't know anything about treating it. In reality, I didn't know anything about trauma.
[00:45:22] John: I actually had a class in graduate school on crisis counseling, which is if you just lost your home in a hurricane, a crisis counselor would come in and help you just more okay and help you pick up the pieces or connect to your resilience or just validate the awfulness of what's happening and that's about it.
[00:45:43] John: Crisis is totally different from trauma. Trauma is what you're left with after the crisis. And I also have a lot of thoughts and feelings about assessments or standardized assessments, right? So if you just go in and ask these questions down the line and you're looking for a reason for nothing to be [00:46:00] wrong, then you're going to find that.
[00:46:02] John: If on the other hand, you have a trauma informed screening process and you say, is there anything at all from your past, whether it's decades ago or a month ago that you feel like is still sticking with you and the client says, yeah, this thing that happened in the park and these random guys came and knocked me out.
[00:46:23] John: And I still think about it. I feel nervous right now when I remember it. I look over my shoulder a lot when I'm walking through the park, even during the daytime or whatever, then I'm picking, I'm starting to put together a picture, right? This client has on untreated trauma, right? There's all sorts of work to be done here to help your ex husband process what happened to help the memory processing piece.
[00:46:51] John: If you think of it like EMDR, there's even a recent events EMDR protocol that could be a good fit for him. When someone has been through a crisis recently, [00:47:00] you can do a recent events protocol to help them fully process what happened. And I also would throw in some somatic work with him too, because his nervous system.
[00:47:09] John: is carrying the memories of what happened and the shock of what happened, right? And the lack of preparedness for what happened. And so renegotiating this trauma with his nervous system would be a big part of the work. So there's all sorts of work to be done here.
[00:47:22] Mannah: I'm so glad that you're saying this.
[00:47:24] Mannah: I was a little nervous you were going to say, Oh no, that's protocol. But then inside what I feel so what's going on? Someone in that position is supposed to see a little bit behind what's being said. Yeah. And I think that's what we do in drama works you say you're fine, maybe just look behind the fine, because that's also a protector.
[00:47:45] Mannah: It's, I guess it's a better protection than being completely suicidal. Of course, that's a bit of, and
[00:47:51] John: from an IFS perspective, and I might ask the client maybe there's parts of you that are fine and know that it was random and it probably won't happen [00:48:00] again, being attacked in the park and other parts of you that are not so sure other parts that are still.
[00:48:05] John: Worried and on edge and looking over your shoulder. What happens as I say that to you? Do you notice any parts inside that are still freaked out about what happened? Still afraid of it happening again? That makes sense to me, right? So again I don't know what the percentage is, but I would say 60, 70, 80 percent of therapists are not trauma therapists.
[00:48:27] John: They're not even trauma informed. And so they don't know about this stuff. Teachers in schools and elementary schools are just now starting to screen for trauma, right? If a kid can't sit still, right? In my case, I was labeled as an ADHD kid. It was really just trauma, right? If someone had just asked me what had happened or what my nervousness was about, right?
[00:48:50] John: It, my, my life would have been totally different, right? But, We're still just waking up to this stuff and starting to understand what trauma is and how it works and how to ask about [00:49:00] it.
[00:49:01] Mannah: I'm so glad we are waking up to this, right? Because it seems so,
[00:49:05] John: yeah,
[00:49:05] Mannah: seems so old and outdated, and like just the way that you were just talking here.
[00:49:12] Mannah: So how does that land in you? And, what do you, what comes up when I say that, even that, that, You could say that is also a psychotherapeutic form in its more traditional form, but it's very rare, I feel, to meet it in something that, at least here, that an insurance would cover, like in something that is so extensive.
[00:49:34] John: And that's part of what this therapist is doing as well, to your point about insurance, is he's trying to look at how he would build a case for why your ex husband needs this therapy and it's medically necessary. And when you work in Mannahged care, which a lot of therapists do you have to rationalize it.
[00:49:51] John: You have to find something wrong. You have to find pathology right off the bat, right? So it's if this attack in the park isn't ruining your life you don't really [00:50:00] qualify for treatment or insurance might reject these claims, right? So I might not take you on if. Insurance might reject these claims.
[00:50:06] John: So there's that piece too is it's a matter of resources, and a lot of therapists and doing these screenings and stuff like their resources are being guarded, yeah. There's a lot to that as well.
[00:50:19] Mannah: Yeah. Let's leave the topic. I'm too angry.
[00:50:22] John: Okay. I share your anger.
[00:50:24] Mannah: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:50:27] Mannah: But this, it just shows the importance of this. It's not just something theoretical out there. Yeah. And we've found this thing. It's. Like we are part of this we are really entangled with it because it, it has to do with financing it. Yeah.
[00:50:42] John: Finances
[00:50:42] Mannah: help.
[00:50:43] John: It does.
[00:50:45] Mannah: Okay. So you can maybe, I wanna say just a little bit on your astrology and then maybe go for it.
[00:50:51] Mannah: I'll ask you about if there's anything we need to say. But yeah. So what I feel is there's a lot of interesting stuff in your chat, but just [00:51:00] one thing that repeats is. This blend of something very conservative. and something very high minded coming together. Okay. Like it could be like a really a respect for the old tradition, for example, and yet having another kind of mind to That's just more open to something that's out of the norm.
[00:51:28] Mannah: There's also a journey in that, there's a journey in that, because with Capricorn you always, it always starts out with wanting to live up to certain credentials and stuff like that, and then it changes. But in, in that pool of potential that I see, it's, There's really a higher mind as well. This, I hope you know what I mean with higher mind, it's like a higher vantage point than just living up to standards.
[00:51:54] Mannah: That's very clear. And what I also saw is mercury is right on your ascendant. So [00:52:00] there's something about communication. That's really such a talent. a super talent in communication and also a need, of course, a need. But what kind of communication, because it's in Capricorn. So it has to be really methodical and it has to be coming from verifiable sources.
[00:52:22] Mannah: Credible sources that you've really checked through and your teachers can only be someone who's experienced and who's gone through it. And it can, it can get very, you can get very critical if someone is not living up to, yeah, what you find is credible and reliable. and realistic like that.
[00:52:44] Mannah: And then when we say realistic, then it's interesting again, because yes, it's realistic, but then you are, you have a mind that's opening up to something else being realistic than what is maybe defined by the consensus, right? So how do you feel about [00:53:00] all of that?
[00:53:01] John: Wow. But doing these types of readings is not something I'm super familiar with.
[00:53:07] John: Years ago, when I was a CBT therapist, I would balk at most of it. And in the past few years, I have opened myself tremendously to different ways of knowing things and different possibilities, and my spirituality has expanded in a big way and still is expanding. I'm very open to these new ways of knowing.
[00:53:30] John: knowing things. And so I'm laughing too, because the knowledge thing definitely is accurate. I both have a lot of reverence for the history, even of my craft and my profession and the lineage of that. And also I'm annoyed by it and I'm ready to buck the trends and to move on.
[00:53:49] John: And I like to break rules and I have this podcast. And so I both revere academics, and I am an academic in some ways, and I'm also like, feel like a renegade [00:54:00] in some ways. And that can at times create tension. I also, to your point of getting knowledge from teachers, mentors, I definitely have that thing.
[00:54:09] John: There's even been tension in my life where I was working with a professor that I didn't really, think knew what she was talking about and I spoke up and it did not go well. On the other hand, like I have reverence for my own mentors and the therapists in my life who have been doing this, for 30, 40, 50 years.
[00:54:25] John: It's definitely ringing some bells. I'm curious.
[00:54:28] Mannah: I love that. I love that. Yeah. And to people who want to know what I'm talking about, it's Capricorn, like I said, and it's also the, this unification of the conjunction of Saturn and Uranus. So what you were just saying about, I hear, I heard some rebelliousness as well.
[00:54:42] Mannah: That's the Uranus part. It's the higher vantage point, but if that's not allowed, if you cannot, if we're not allowed to go up there, then it can turn into something like a little bit of a struggle, a rebellion. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, [00:55:00] I, it makes sense that there has been some in recent years because Pluto has been in Capricorn.
[00:55:04] Mannah: It is right now, as we speak in 29, Capricorn just about to shift into Aquarius for the next 20 years. But so it has been going over your planets in Capricorn. So that would bring up stuff. open up stuff too. Yeah. Okay. Wow. There's a balance, right? Because so this is what I combined with therapy, because if I only told you about this, maybe you can feel that it can be a little bit frustrating because it's not completely nuanced, right?
[00:55:29] Mannah: It's not completely that. So that's why I want to, always open it up to be working more therapeutically. And if we were in a session, I would not just sit here and talk at you, right?
[00:55:39] John: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:55:41] Mannah: It'd be more of a dialogue.
[00:55:43] John: I think even conversations like this and seeing things through this lens can be affirmative in some ways of at times, let's say my rebelliousness has felt like a problem.
[00:55:54] John: Why can't I just be more compliant? Like my peers in that class. And then hearing this from you, [00:56:00] it's maybe I'm not so crazy, right? It doesn't mean don't be accountable to your behaviors and be a jerk, but it's like these things rising. within me, right? That I'm moving through or that are moving through me.
[00:56:12] John: It gives some validation to, to that. Yeah.
[00:56:16] Mannah: Yeah, exactly. Okay. So I hope we're going to meet again. I would love
[00:56:22] John: to. Yeah, this was so great. I hope it was helpful. I also for as much as I'm on the other side of the microphone interviewing, I'm not on this side as much as I would like. And so I also get really excited and I hope I didn't, overwhelm or.
[00:56:36] John: Give too much because I get so passionate about this stuff.
[00:56:40] Mannah: I was with you the whole way.
[00:56:42] John: That's good.
[00:56:43] Mannah: Do you have, do you feel fulfilled or do you have anything that's like lacking at this point?
[00:56:49] John: I always I guess I always just want to offer to people that. The hope comes from this idea of self and this idea is my IFS [00:57:00] teacher Derek Scott, who's passed, offered this idea of what if there was nothing really wrong with you?
[00:57:07] John: What if you're not broken, right? What if parts of you are just hurt and there's parts of protecting the hurt parts. And. Who you are is good and pure and is basically love and a good IFS practitioner can help you access some of that love and just bring it to parts that need it. That's basically the whole model.
[00:57:27] John: That's the promise of IFS that it offers. And you can start doing that now or today or by doing an IFS meditation or just learning about the model and getting curious about. Your internal world. And so I'm just so excited to offer this message, to the world.
[00:57:47] Mannah: Yeah. I love that. Just want to acknowledge you were interviewing Derek Scott, right?
[00:57:51] John: Yeah.
[00:57:52] Mannah: It was it right. Was it just close to his, when he's. Yeah.
[00:57:56] John: Right before.
[00:57:58] Mannah: How special, huh?
[00:57:59] John: [00:58:00] Yeah.
[00:58:00] Mannah: That you got to be with him there.
[00:58:02] John: Yeah. It was really. Special looking back on it. And I didn't know he was sick, and so close to passing. And yeah, I had
[00:58:10] Mannah: to go ahead. Do you think that he knew when you say he knew?
[00:58:13] John: Yeah he knew that he had a month or two left to live. And he was still actively teaching. program that I now help teach at, which is called Stepping Stones or IFSCA. So yeah, I, I had parts that had big hopes for my relationship with him as a mentor and a teacher, and so there was a lot of.
[00:58:34] John: Yeah, a lot of feelings after he had passed and still now working in his organization and talking about him is both interesting and sad and also really special to think of him and tell students like, this is a Derek thing. And I'm going to say a Derek thing that he would say to me.
[00:58:52] Mannah: Yeah. Very special.
[00:58:54] Mannah: Wow. All right. Thank you so much for now.
[00:58:58] John: Thank you for having me. [00:59:00] I can't wait.
[00:59:01] John: Thanks for listening to another episode of Going Inside. If you enjoyed this episode, please and subscribe wherever you're listening or watching and share your favorite episode with a friend. You can follow me on Instagram, @JohnClarkeTherapy and apply to work with me one on one at JohnClarkeTherapy.com. See you next time.