Fleet MaullThe Entrepreneur’s Zen Master

Your fear isn’t the enemy… it’s a part of you that needs compassion. ⁠@InternalFamilySystems

5 May 2025 · 1 min

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1:07

A short YouTube video (uploaded by Fleet Maull) featuring Richard Schwartz discussing the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model: how managers and protector parts work to contain anxiety by guarding exiled parts that hold terror from past experiences; the process involves appreciating protectors, negotiating to access exiles, and 'unburdening' fear (Schwartz references returning to the 'OCD bar').

Chapters

And then they have these parts that are stuck in these. These dreadful scenes where they. They feel like it's needed, you know, because something bad happened. And if you. If you don't have a protector on the lookout all the time, something bad is going to happen again. The same thing could happen again. And so it's that kind of combination of managers and these terrified parts that. That the manager is desperately trying to contain, that we call anxiety, and often will go to that protector with a lot of appreciation for how hard it's working to try and keep the system safe. And then negotiate permission to go to the exiles that it protects, that carry that terror from past experiences and get them out of those experiences and help them, what we call unburdened, all the fear. And then we'll come back to the, like, the OCD bar.