The Top 5 Must-Read Books on IFS Therapy for Non-Therapists
Are you interested in learning more about Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy and how it can help you better understand your own mind and emotions? There are plenty of great books out there that can help you deepen your knowledge of IFS and its many benefits.
Here are my top picks for the best books about IFS:
Self-Therapy by Jay Earley
This book is a classic in the IFS world. It offers a step-by-step guide to IFS therapy for those who want to learn how to practice the therapy on their own.
Jay Earley provides various exercises and worksheets to help readers explore their parts and bring healing to their inner world.
The book is divided into two parts, with the first part focusing on how to work with protectors and the second focusing on how to help heal and unburden exiles.
Past Tense: Facing Family Secrets and Finding Myself in Therapy by Sacha Mardou
Sacha Mardou is an illustrator who started to create comics about her own therapy journey. She has been publishing her IFS comics on her website and is telling the story of her own healing journey with IFS in her new graphic memoir.
She has such a visual talent in bringing her own parts to life, and many of my clients have found that reading her comics has helped them to think about and connect with their own parts.
The book also includes information on IFS therapy itself, so it’s suitable also for people completely unfamiliar with IFS.
Daily Parts Meditation Practice: A Journey of Embodied Integration for Clients and Therapists
This book is a guide to IFS therapy that focuses on developing a daily meditation practice to help work with different parts of ourselves.
The book is written for both therapists and clients, and includes step-by-step instructions on how to start and maintain a daily meditation practice.
The book provides guidance on how to work with difficult emotions and how to engage with our parts in a compassionate and curious way.
The book includes several different meditations that help you connect with your parts.
No Bad Parts is the most recent best-selling IFS book by Richard Schwartz. In this book he not only introduces the model and provides exercises for the reader, but also delves deeper into the concept of Self Energy in our internal systems and in the world.
There are exercises and case examples in each chapter, making the book very helpful if you want to directly experience the model. Many of my clients have come to me after reading this book and wanting to continue the work.
Self-Led is a beautiful book where IFS Practitioner Seth Kopald shares his insights and experiences on a Self-led life. The book covers many areas from relationships to work, and is a great guide for anyone wanting to learn more about implementing IFS in their daily lives.
