Easing Worry & Anxiety With Internal Family Systems

On this six-day course, Dan Roberts will help you understand how to ease your worry and anxiety, especially if they make life a struggle, day to day. You will learn about the evolutionary and neurological basis of anxiety – why it is a threat-focused emotion that warns you if something is threatening, or dangerous, compelling you to act quickly to keep yourself safe. You will also learn that, although this is potentially life-saving in dangerous situations, it is not so helpful if your fight-flight-freeze response is being triggered in uncomfortable but non-life-threatening situations like getting a critical email from your boss.

On this course you will also learn about childhood trauma and why common, but highly painful experiences such as bullying, or growing up in a high-conflict home, can make you much more vulnerable to chronic anxiety in adulthood. Trauma is far more common than was previously thought, so it's crucial to understand why traumatic experiences in childhood can dysregulate your nervous system, leaving you in a constant state of hypervigilance and high emotional arousal.

You will also be introduced to internal family systems therapy, one of the fastest growing and most popular therapy models in the world right now. Through an IFS lens, your anxiety comes from a young, frightened part of you, who needs calming, soothing and healing. And your worry comes from a Worrier part, whose job it is to keep you and that little boy or girl inside safe. You will be guided in helping both of these parts, with an exploration of IFS and how to implement it in your daily life.

Each day combines theory and powerful experiential exercises including breathwork and guided imagery, drawn from IFS and other therapy models, which will help you feel calmer, safer and more at ease. Join a leading expert on childhood trauma, and experienced IFS therapist, for this insightful and transformative course. The six days of teaching will help you live a life that is calmer, happier and more fulfilling.

Lección 1: Why Do You Feel Anxiety And What Is It For?

The first lesson explores the evolutionary and neurological roots of anxiety to explain why we feel this painful, but vital emotion. You will learn all about the neuroscience of anxiety, what happens when you feel threatened and your fight-flight-freeze response is triggered – and why this was crucial in the wilds, 10,000 years ago, but is not so helpful when you feel threatened by a critical email, say. You will also learn and practice Compassionate Breathing, a powerful breathwork technique to help you calm and soothe your anxeity.

Lección 2: How Childhood Trauma Creates Anxious Adults

In today's lesson, we explore the impact of childhood trauma on chronic anxiety in adulthood. Sadly, research like the Adverse Childhood Experiences study show that trauma is much more widespread than previously thought. And if you did experience trauma as a child, becoming highly anxious was an adaptive, self-protective way of coping. We also look at the impact of trauma on your nervous system, before guiding you through a powerful breathwork practice to help you calm and soother your nervous system, and feelings of stress of anxiety.

Lección 3: How Can Internal Family Systems Help With Your Anxiety?

In today's lesson you will learn about internal family systems (IFS) therapy, which is one of the fastest-growing therapy models in the world. It's so popular because it offers a powerful but compassionate way to work with common psychological problems, like chronic stress, depression – and anxiety. You will learn about the different parts involved in your worry and anxiety, as well as the Self – the warm, compassionate, healing inner resource that you can tap into to help your anxious little parts feel calmer, safer and more at peace.

Lección 4: How To Work With Your Inner Worrier

Viewed through the lens of the IFS model, your worries come from a Worrier part, who is hypervigilant, worrying constantly about everything that could go wrong on the horizon. As with all your parts, this protector is not bad or mean – it's trying to protect you from harm. It's just the way it does so can be stressful and exhausting, as chronic worry can make life a real struggle. In today's lesson you will learn all about this part and be led through a powerful guided-imagery practice to help the Worrier relax and stop bombarding you with worries.

Lección 5: How To Calm And Soothe Your Anxious Inner Child

According to the IFS model, we all have young parts inside, many of whom are wounded by the trauma we experienced in childhood. And one or more of those young parts are probably anxious, being fearful about the difficult things you went through as a child – and that they might get hurt again now. Learning to connect with and soothe this anxious little boy or girl inside is a key goal of IFS therapy – and a simple but powerful way to help yourself feel less anxious. In this lesson you will learn how to do that, as well as being led through a step-by-step guided-imagery practice on helping your inner child feel safe.

Lección 6: Accessing The Healing Power Of Self-Energy

The final lesson focuses on how to access your Self – and the healing Self-energy this calm, compassionate and loving you offers. In IFS, Self is who you are deep down, before anything difficult happened to you. And this inner version of you is always there, always available, if you can just learn to access it. You will be led through this process with a powerful guided-imagery practice that gives you a taste of Self-energy. And all of the six days' teaching are summarised and brought together, giving you a clear roadmap for your healing journey.

Reviews

Gosh - what an insightful, practical, credible, calming course.
I felt I was sat with a close friend helping me through a difficult time. You held my hand and have given me courage and self belief, that over time and work, I can reclaim my cheerful, confident self.
Life has slowly worn me down, and I don't like the person I have become, a tired, old woman who sees problems and not solutions.
I'm rebuilding myself literally from inside out, and this course/your words have given me faith that I can break through the grey clouds and feel the warmth of the sun on my face again.
Thank you so, so much for making the difference I needed 💖🙏🏼 x

Thank you for this compassionate course. I will be back to the practices: they are very helpful 🙏

Loved your course! Normalizing the anxiety that most of us this day and time. More tools to deal with it. Namaste 💞

What a wonderful course ! So informative . Your manner is so calm and soothing . Looking forward to taking your other courses offered

Excellent course by a serious teacher with a calm soothing voice. Even for those who don't think they suffer from anxiety this is worthwhile as everybody has childhood trauma and one shape or form. He was very clear concise authoritative without being opinionated. Ted

I found this course really valuable for identifying strategies to understand anxiety and worry, and ways of managing them - thank you.

This is a great, well thought through, paced and structured course. I had heard about IFS before, but didn‘t know many details. Dan introduces the key concepts in a clear, understandable and relatable way. Although the parts approach is not entirely unique (other teachings work with similar concepts under different names), I found it helpful to compartamentaize the exile, or the anxious self, which made it feel more managable. Thanks for the great course, I‘ll deffinitively explore more from your collection her on Insight Timer.

I am grateful for this teaching- the insights into where some of my anxiety comes from opened a window. I have started to use the ‘parts’ language and it is very helpful. 🙏🏻namaste

Never heard of ifs. Very useful. Good visualizations.

This course has opened up an entire new chapter of my life’s journey. I have learned a lot from this experience and have reached out to therapists that use IFS to help me to continue to grow. Thank you for sharing this on this platform 🙏 namaste 🙏

One of the best IFS resources I've encountered on insight timer

Great course, I have suffered with anxiety for my entire adult life. I have recently discovered IFS for healing and this course was really helpful in identifying some of the anxious parts of me. Thank you for putting this out, I will be looking at others courses Dan has published.

Really appreciate the simple and accessible way you share IFS...thank you!

This is a very insightful course definitely recommended

This is an excellent course! Steady and compassionate. Thank you so much!

Excellent course! The IFS model is a fascinating and practical approach to the understanding of how our minds and egos are structured. Very helpful!

This is a highly informative course. It’s well put together and the guided exercises were soothing and helpful. I’m looking forward to learning more. Thank you.

EXCELLENT course thank you so much, I live IFS and the way you teach it is so easy to understand, I love the visualization x

Excellent and well presented—I highly recommend this thoughtful series.

Great understanding and teaching of IFS. This course really explains anxiety in a way that I can accept it and work with it.