⭕️ We are not monolithic.

The parts of us that inform our decisions and reactions are based on foregone experiences in which “Shadow Selves” form.

The recognition of our internal multiplicity in “parts work” is essential.

Its the basis of Internal Family Systems (IFS) which we practice at Full Circle Counselling.

Learning how to recognise the internal :

⭕️ Managers
⭕️ Exiles
⭕️ Firefighters

who govern your conscience and react in self-defence gives you access to the Core Self - the solution maker.

The Core Self, as centralist, is the one you can rely on to make sound decisions and resolve issues.

In order for that central part to be activated, it first needs to sit with the reactive parts and listen to them.

It needs to befriend them, relinquish judgment or shame, patiently hear their story and validate it.

For example, a militant, karate-chopping part may have formed in childhood when it was wrongly blamed and failed to find the vocabulary to explain.

When a new incident occurs - something that is entirely irrelevant to that past experience- the Karate-chopper within may step forward to defend your adult self from judgement.

It will feel extreme and unlike you.

You will instantly recognise it as an anti-social reaction.

That’s your cue to take pause and find some time to sit with it and figure out where it originated. Hear that part out, thank it for trying to defend you. Reassure that part you are all grown up now and can handle this one on your own.

You’ll find the over-protective Karate arms will come down and will be happy for you that you’re capable - as an adult - of dealing with whatever issue is at play.

Again. We are not monoliths. We are multiplex. It’s a good thing.

So while some knee jerk reactions may feel out of character, they’re usually signs of past parts crying out to be heard.

Hear them. Hug them. And put them to bed. Allow the grown up or core self to take care of business.

As Founder of Full Circle Counselling Echuca I am trained in Internal Family Systems (IFS) and can help you access your parts, give them names and integrate them so your Core Self can lead forthwith.

Make an appointment today.

o full circle counselling
​​o consulting rooms
​o office left I 47 heygarth st echuca vic 3564

​​o phone
o 0478 672 867

o website: www.full-circle-counselling.com
o email : [email protected]

o principal therapist : paul medew
o abn 76613403975

o confidential counselling for individuals, couples & families
​
o "when you need to see someone..."

BY PAUL MEDEW
FOUNDER
FULL CIRCLE COUNSELLING ECHUCA

NOTE: PARTS OF THIS BLOG POST WERE PUBLISHED IN THE SHEPPARTON NEWS.
​
Its a seasonal concern and one not likely to abate. 

We're seeing increasingly conspicuous news items, locally, addressing underlying  fears of young people's exposure to a series of online attacks and more internationally, attempts at radicalisation.

The Vikings in the global online village intent on denigration and recruitment, commonly hide behind their screens when acting in the most de-humanising of ways. 

The denoted "trolls" of the village seem intent on de-humanising others as either a sick quest or more likely a projection of their own self loathing and frustration with their outlier status in the village. 

One of the most troubling aspects of online bullying and on a broader scale, modern life, is the rise of body shaming. The injuring of an Individuals physical esteem. 

The self cannot be removed from the body. Our sense of “Self", which I work with my clients very closely in my IFS and emotion-focussed psychological "Parts" work, is intrinsically linked to how we feel in the world, in the village, in the home and within ourselves. The Self has an internal compass toward safety and when our children and colleagues and friends are exposed to active humanisation of any kind, their compass toward safety sets off an alarm which usually manifests in severe and debilitating anxiety. Anxiety can take many forms (and leads to variant sometimes unhealthy coping mechanisms which is a whole other part of my work. How long have we got?)

It is daunting, unsettling and de-stabilising to be attacked online by a stranger with pejorative and sometimes very personal comments. The power that the abuser yields from doing it online is his or her knowledge that there is an audience; that its public and if comments are made through private messaging, the knowledge that they are only one step away from taking the humiliation into the public sphere where millions may see those comments.

To debunk that power is a difficult task. But there are communities online and off who are working together to break the weapons of the online bully and protect the victim from further harm.

It is the job of a therapist and if this is happening to a child, also a parent, to direct the victim’s internal compass back to a safe place or back to a strong sense of self that isn’t activated into anxiety, fear and distress by external forces. 

Online bullying - and please put your negation of the 'snowflake' phenomenon away when that term is mentioned - is a very dire reality that , as a technological extension or digital amplifier of a consumer based society itself is not going away any time soon. So the importance of education and training in how to deal with the online terrorist - and lets face it - it really is a form of terrorism in that the abuser is often masked by anonymity and often has other hidden agendas, most of which speak more about their own lack of compass control and compassion than anything else.

A shark knows where the wounded fish swim in the ocean. It goes for vulnerability and senses the blood. Knowing your Self and healing your own psychological wounds is a way to protect yourself from the social predator. 

Psychogical projection is an act of avoidance and transference. Many troubled individuals, including the classic online bully, is in actual fact projecting the self loathing, defeat, darkness, violence and chaos within themselves onto others. In fact a fully functioning, self actualising, compassionate and intelligent individual with a few sensitive wounds is often their favourite target. The conquest of the shark is to steal the strength and selfhood from the healthy and transfer on to them all the woes they carry within themselves. Its projection 101.

There's a reason they pursue and target strangers. A stranger has no context for the abuser's life. They have no come back. They can’t turn around and say “look, we all know your story, you’re not so tough buddy,” Its cowards play to attack a stranger or a distant colleague or quiet kid in the schoolyard to pick on. Online bullying is the biggest coward punch of them all. 

I am interested in the work of author and feminist, Clementine Ford. While some find her controversial or even misandristic and the profanity with which she sometimes speaks is perhaps not for children or the feint hearted, but I along with many others do admire her audacity and determination in calling out the broadly bull headed misanthropes who constantly regale themselves by attempting to threaten her sense of self. Clem’s answer to the online bully is to call them out and publish online their attacks to her legions of followers.

​She exposes the terrorist for the destructive and violent individual he or she is and calls upon the public to discuss the broader implications of their misanthropic work. Its a courageous act.

Clem holds her ground and her compass of safety very firmly and it will be public commentators such as Clem and so many women and men pushing forward in the body shaming online sphere who will eventually turn the tide on online bullying. They have found audiences who understand and who listen and who are finding practical and enlightening ways to disabuse themselves from the opine of others. 

The link between body shaming and disordered eating should not be ignored. Shame feeds on insecurity and its often the concealed insecurity that the online terrorist hunts for and feeds off. Thumbing thy nose to the attempts of the online terrorist to elicit shame is the single most powerful thing you can do. 

Who are you in the context of your family of origin? ... Were you the golden child? The black sheep? The child carer? The conflict-avoidant middle child?

💡Carl Jung brought to light the idea of “Individuation;” the process of stepping into an adult role and the invocation of identity outside the boundaries and limitations of your prescribed family role.

Individuation involves the integration or coming together of all the internalised archetypes of your identity. Making friends with your inner enemies in a sense.

All the roles that have been projected upon you by others in your developing years require a level of understanding, analysis and acceptance.

At the very same time and perhaps more importantly, the polite rejection of what others deemed your conclusive role in life is mandatory.

Family psychology is complex.

We would all like to think we are above or beyond our infant years. That archetypes don’t apply to us. That they’re far too simple or cliched to explain us.

Truth is, for better or worse, we are not.

We have all spent many many years as members of families, institutions and social circles, playing hard-wired roles that were lazily dished out to us by those too busy or uninformed to think about them as consequential.

Old habits die hard.

Educational institutions are an interesting foundation. If at school for instance, you were ascribed a role of the class clown, the high achiever, the sporting hero or back row trouble maker, chances are you’re struggling in adulthood to rewrite that narrative to suit who you’ve become.

Within the family, eldest child, middle, youngest or only child roles are deeply embedded in our subconscious story. As are step child and adopted child roles.

Years of repetition and the circuits built to keep those familial machinations in motion are hard to break.

There is a primitive comfort in the familiar.

It’s frightening to imagine how “circuit breaking” may effect the smooth flow of the ritualised and established family system.

Reluctance to mess with the hornet’s nest is common. Which is why therapists exist. To minimise damage and to help manage the paradox of needing to be part of and attached to something (family/community) that you also need to disengage from in pursuit of a satisfied life (individualism / identity). It’s tricky stuff.

With some committed work and guidance from a trained professional, we can disentangle ourselves from the unconscious biases formed within and engage in a contract of self formation.

We can, in other words, become ourselves.

Jung often represented the self as a circle or mandala. A full circle.

⭕️

Bringing the conflict between unconcious role-playing and conscious decision making into awareness and accommodating them with eyes wide open is an aspirational achievement of the self actualised.

Jungian philosophy works hand in hand with the therapeutic IFS model I work with (namely, Internal Family Systems).

To gain insight into and even befriend our often internalised or dysmorphic parts and our role in the family of origin is a critical part of Individuation and self-finding. And after the difficult years in our 20s and 30s in which we grapple to break away from our family in order to break down those expectations, most people find that - like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz - the path of Individuation invariably leads right back home, where you can reintroduce yourself to your family of origin as...yourself. Your actual self. You doing you.

There are many reasons why this may not be as easy as it sounds.

But there are far more reasons why it is the only emotionally feasible way forward.

- Paul Medew
- FULL CIRCLE COUNSELLING ECHUCA
- After hours and weekend appointments available.

BOOKINGS
+61 (0) 478 672 867
o email : [email protected]

It’s a familiar scenario; you’ve had a big fight, you’ve both been angry and said and done things you probably regret. Things have gotten a little too heated and out of hand. Later when you have both calmed down you both declare “let’s never fight again”. You probably feel raw and hurt but know you love each other and there is no doubt it is something you both mean and want.

The bad news is that it is probably a certainty that you will fight again. In fact you will likely have pretty much the same fight again… and again. The fact that despite your best intentions the same pattern keeps recurring is confusing and disheartening and inevitably undermines your belief in your relationship and your partner.

In my work with couples I start with the assumption that you will fight again. To say that you won’t is to set yourselves up for failure. As complex, nuanced and often contradictory human beings there is endless potential for misunderstandings and contradictory desires. In fact I would be rather more concerned to hear that a couple never fights. A couple that doesn’t fight is likely to be a couple that doesn’t communicate their feelings and that is a sure sign that the relationship will end up in trouble.

Accepting the reality that you will have conflict opens up the possibility of doing things differently. It gives you the opportunity to reflect on the experience of fighting.

I encourage couples to talk about how they argue.

This does not mean starting the fight again, it’s not about bringing up the subject of the conflict, rather it is about looking at what happens when you argue. It’s about planning how you are going to fight when it happens next time.

WHAT RULES CAN YOU SET AROUND CONFLICT?

• Can you agree that sometimes you need to just stop, that you’re going around in circles, that you’re too upset, that there is nothing to be gained at the moment from continuing to argue?

• Can you agree on a timeout phrase? “I need to walk away for a moment to calm down a bit” or a stop phrase “I need to stop now”.

• Can you agree beforehand to respect when your partner says these things, agree to disagree for now and walk away?

• Can you agree to avoid name calling or insults or disparaging the other’s personality?

These behaviours are a sure sign it is time to call a timeout.

You are no longer discussing an issue that can be resolved, you are now fighting to make your partner feel hurt.


FIGHT FAIR

Planning to “fight fair” recognises the reality that when we fight we often become flooded with chemicals that shut down our ability to be rational adults.

Setting some rules beforehand at least gives you both the potential to override the urge to keep fighting and agree that it’s time to walk away … until next time.

Rather than saying “let’s never fight again” I would encourage you to say “let’s fight differently next time”.

- Paul Medew
- Founder, Full Circle Counselling Echuca.