What is the IRF way of working with an either/or decision? Read on…
Elizabeth writes:
A friend of mine has a corporate job she hates but needs the money. She feels stuck. Traditional therapy had her compare leaving the job versus not leaving the job. What does Inner Relationship Focusing do?
Dear Elizabeth:
We do the same, at first… but with one huge difference. Felt sensing.
I’d have her get a felt sense of leaving the job, and a felt sense of not leaving.
What’s unique about a felt sense is that it contains more than you’ve already thought, more than your conventional reactions. It’s a fresh sense of the whole thing, and it can surprise you.
But assuming doing that much doesn’t make the decision obvious, there is more.
I would now invite her to sense the part of her that is worried about leaving, and sense into what it doesn’t want to happen to her if she leaves. (Having not enough money, I’m guessing.) She can make a relationship with that part of her, and listen to what it’s not wanting to happen if she doesn’t have enough money. What it doesn’t want her to have to feel.
Then she would do the same thing on the other side, listen to the part of her that is worried about staying. What it doesn’t want her to go through if she stays. Feeling stuck, it sounds like. She can sense into what is not wanted from feeling stuck.
There is a lot of richness here, a lot to explore. And quite often there will come a point where it’s all clear, where what is wanted outweighs what is not wanted. Not always, but often!
After listening to all the parts, it’s the whole person who makes the decision. And it all comes through inner sensing in a compassionate way.
