What Really Happens in an IFS Therapy Session

Last time, I wrote about the healing power of the Self, what Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy calls Self-energy and how central it is to emotional and psychological transformation. Today, I want to take you inside the IFS therapy process: what a typical session actually looks like, and what it feels like to experience this healing from the inside.

As someone who works with IFS, who has also done this work myself, I can say this with confidence: there’s nothing quite like it.

IFS Therapy begins like any session and then gently shifts

A typical Internal Family Systems therapy session starts with a conversation. It might be brief, or it might take the whole hour. You talk about what’s come up since your last session: overwhelm, anxiety, self-sabotage, stress, or a recurring emotional trigger.

What makes IFS therapy different is the lens through which the therapist hears you: the parts lens.

Instead of saying, ‘I keep procrastinating,’ your therapist might reflect:

‘It sounds like there’s a part of you that’s procrastinating.’ Or even: that might be your Procrastinator Part trying to help you avoid something difficult.’

This subtle reframing is powerful. It helps you unblend from the feeling and see it as just one part of a larger inner system. From there, the healing work can begin.

Internal Family Systems: understanding the parts

IFS therapy is built on the understanding that our minds are made up of many different sub-personalities, or ‘parts.’ Each part has a role, and many are trying to protect us, especially from old emotional pain.

These protector parts often guard younger, more vulnerable exiles, parts of us that carry trauma, fear, shame, or unmet needs from childhood. In therapy, we begin with the protectors. Through a calm, structured process, the therapist offers gentle questions. You then direct those questions inward to the part itself.

Yes, it sounds unusual at first. But parts respond. They communicate through images, emotions, body sensations, memories. They explain why they do what they do, and what they’re afraid might happen if they didn’t. This is the heart of Internal Family Systems therapy: building trust with these parts, helping them feel safe enough to step back, and allowing the deeper healing to happen.

Meeting the Inner Child: Working with Exiles

Eventually, if the protector part is willing, it steps aside to reveal the part it’s been shielding; the exile. This is often a younger, wounded version of the self. It may carry unresolved trauma, grief, or the pain of abandonment and rejection. These exiled parts are where the original emotional wounds live. They hold the stories and feelings that were too overwhelming to process when they happened. In IFS therapy, we don’t relive the trauma, we witness it. We meet the exile with compassion. We listen. And then, we help it let go.

The Unburdening Process in IFS Therapy

The most powerful moment in Internal Family Systems therapy is the unburdening. This is when the exile part releases the painful emotions it’s been carrying—fear, shame, sadness, rage. It chooses how to do this: throwing it into the wind, burying it in the earth, washing it away in water. These symbolic rituals are often profound. Sometimes there are tears. Sometimes it’s silent. Always, it’s meaningful.

After unburdening, the part takes in new, positive qualities; joy, peace, connection, lightness. Then, we return to the protector, who may also want to let go of its old role and take on something new. This is how the IFS model promotes neuroplasticity: the brain and nervous system learn new, more adaptive ways of being. The internal system rebalances.

What it feels like to experience IFS therapy

No two sessions are the same. Some are emotional. Some are quiet. Some feel almost magical. Others unfold slowly over time. But all are rooted in the same principle: that every part of you deserves to be heard, understood, and welcomed. The healing that happens in IFS therapy is not forced. It’s allowed. It arises naturally when your parts feel seen and safe. As Dr. Richard Schwartz, founder of IFS, says:

‘You and all your parts are welcome here.’

And once you truly believe that, everything begins to change.