Increase Access to Self Energy with Internal Family Systems and Listening Therapies
By guiding the nervous system toward regulation, listening therapies can help create the physiological conditions for Self energy within clients to naturally emerge, allowing for greater trust, harmony and healing across the internal system.
Why IFS + Listening Therapies?
Combined delivery of Internal Family Systems and Unyte’s listening therapies restores the physiological conditions for Self energy to naturally emerge, making way for:
Deeper relational capacity for parts and their burdens
Protectors sensing the safety of Self and more easily begin to relax and soften
Embodied unburdening and integration to organically arise
A Gentle Path to Greater Self Energy Access
Listening therapies help guide the nervous system toward safety, relaxation and ease.
Working seamlessly with IFS’ approach of unblending, building Self-to-part relationships and the healing steps, combined delivery of IFS and listening therapies fosters the conditions for greater Self leadership, allowing internal systems to heal and reharmonize.
IFS + Listening Therapies:
A Healing Combination for Burdened Systems
A Healing Combination for Burdened Systems
Combined delivery of IFS and listening therapies can support clients with parts that:
- Excessively fixate on the external environment (e.g., hypervigilance, constant scanning, anxious preoccupation with the environment)
- Are overwhelmed with emotions or unable to unblend without becoming flooded (e.g., emotional flooding, panic, overwhelm, anxiety)
- Repeat patterns or cycles of thought, behavior or emotion (e.g., rumination, looping thoughts, compulsions, depressive cycles)
- Block access to emotions or body awareness (e.g., alexithymia, numbness, disconnection from feelings, dissociation from the body)
Combined delivery of IFS and listening therapies can support clients with complex internal systems dynamics, such as:
- Highly polarized systems or internal conflict between parts that creates “stuckness” and limits access to Self energy.
- Addictive systems or systems dominated by extreme firefighters, leading to cycles of impulsivity, shame and exile avoidance
- Systems burdened by early life, prenatal, intergenerational or collective trauma
- Systems with disrupted embodiment or blocked body awareness/movement
- Systems where protectors are wary of Self energy or perceive it as dangerous
- Systems where protectors find relational presence or co-regulation threatening
IFS + Listening Therapies:
A Healing Combination for Burdened Systems
Combined delivery of IFS and listening therapies can support clients with parts that:
- Excessively fixate on the external environment (e.g., hypervigilance, constant scanning, anxious preoccupation with the environment)
- Are overwhelmed with emotions or unable to unblend without becoming flooded (e.g., emotional flooding, panic, overwhelm, anxiety)
- Repeat patterns or cycles of thought, behavior or emotion (e.g., rumination, looping thoughts, compulsions, depressive cycles)
- Block access to emotions or body awareness (e.g., alexithymia, numbness, disconnection from feelings, dissociation from the body)
Combined delivery of IFS and listening therapies can support clients with complex internal systems dynamics, such as:
- Highly polarized systems or internal conflict between parts that creates “stuckness” and limits access to Self energy.
- Addictive systems or systems dominated by extreme firefighters, leading to cycles of impulsivity, shame and exile avoidance
- Systems burdened by early life, prenatal, intergenerational or collective trauma
- Systems with disrupted embodiment or blocked body awareness/movement
- Systems where protectors are wary of Self energy or perceive it as dangerous
- Systems where protectors find relational presence or co-regulation threatening
Support Parts in Feeling Seen, Heard and Understood
Discover the Power of Combined Delivery of IFS + Listening Therapies
Deepens regulation
and access to Self
Listening therapies regulate the nervous system, creating the physiological shifts for Self energy to more readily emerge and guide the healing process.
Promotes lasting
transformation
Combining inside out relational work with bottom-up nervous system support leads to more stable, embodied and sustainable healing outcomes.
Softens protectors and
supports unburdening
As the body feels safer, protective parts begin to relax, allowing exiles and underlying wounds to be witnessed and unburdened with greater ease.
Hear from the Combined Delivery Contributors
“When we remember and reconnect to what has always been within us — the innate intelligence and healing capacity of our body and the wise and loving essence of our Self — we reveal the pathway to embodied healing and meaningful transformation.
“Combining IFS and Unyte’s listening therapies bring this remembering and reconnection to life. Their synergistic application unites physiological and relational healing for greater balance and harmony within, an inner shift that naturally radiates outward, touching others and the wider collective field.”
Marcella Cox, LMFT, CEDS-C, Lead Author
Certified IFS Therapist, Approved Clinical Consultant, and Somatic IFS Assistant Trainer
“In a world increasingly saturated with cues of danger, integrating the IFS model with listening therapies deepens our capacity to listen with love, inviting safety and compassion to reach even the most tender places that ache to be heard and liberated.
“Each act of restored balance and harmony, within ourselves and those we serve, ripples outward, revitalizing the wider field of safety and opening pathways to collective healing.”
Noémi A. Sullivan, Lead Contributor
“Integrating the SSP with IFS has supported my clients in gently accessing their protective parts, allowing their nervous systems to become more regulated and open to healing.”
— Sandra Adeleye, EdS, LPC
“I have personally witnessed Internal Family Systems (IFS), combined with the Safe and Sound Protocol and the Rest and Restore Protocol, help clients quiet the inner chatter of their Protective and Exile Parts. As a result, the Self emerges, and long-lasting connectedness and inner peace become inevitable.”
— Frances McBride, DHA, LPC, LSATP
“Through listening therapies, we gently offer the frequencies of Self as a mirror and reminder of what already inherently exists in each part, the system as a whole and our collective system: Self who is Love. Do this at scale and our world becomes what it was always designed to be: a manifestation of Love.”
— Leah Dawang, SEP
Upcoming Live Webinar | Unlock Deeper Healing: Blending IFS and Listening Therapies
January 20 @ 2:30 p.m. ET
Featuring Expert IFS Practitioners Dr. Frank Anderson and Marcella Cox
Discover how intentionally centering safety and connection in your practice can open pathways to embodied healing and lasting client well-being.
In this session, Dr. Frank Anderson and Marcella Cox will guide you through two healing approaches: listening therapies and Internal Family Systems (IFS). Led by two IFS experts, you’ll leave this session with an understanding of the parallels in theory and practice between IFS and Listening Therapies, including the impact on Self and parts, both wounded and protective.
Join this session to learn more about:
- Mapping the System: Make sense of the Autonomic Nervous System through an IFS lens, identifying the crucial connections and impact on your clients’ parts.
- Integrated Practice: Explore the parallels in theory and practice to learn how combined delivery can strengthen your practice and increase safety in the client experience.
- Profound Impact: Review a powerful case study illustrating the real-world, profound impact of thoughtfully combining these two approaches.
This session will also celebrate the publication of Unyte’s new IFS and Listening Therapies Combined Delivery Guideline, available exclusively to all Unyte providers starting January 20, 2026.
Want to learn more? Speak with one of our Programs Consultants, many of whom are practitioners, to learn how to integrate the SSP into your IFS practice.
Reserve Your Spot!
Upcoming Live Webinar | Unlock Deeper Healing: Blending IFS and Listening Therapies
Featuring Expert IFS Practitioners
Discover how intentionally centering safety and connection in your practice can open pathways to embodied healing and lasting client well-being.
In this session, Dr. Frank Anderson and Marcella Cox will guide you through two healing approaches: listening therapies and Internal Family Systems (IFS). Led by two IFS experts, you’ll leave this session with an understanding of the parallels in theory and practice between IFS and Listening Therapies, including the impact on Self and parts, both wounded and protective.
Want to learn more? Speak with one of our Programs Consultants, many of whom are practitioners, to learn how to integrate the SSP into your OT/SIP practice.
Featuring Combined Delivery Guideline Authors:
Tracy Stackhouse, MA, OTR/L
Kelly Beins, BA, BHSc, OTR/L
Catherine Cavalier, Ph.D., OTR/L
Kelsey Forbringer, MSOT, OTR/L
Jamie Chaves, OTD, OTR/L
IFS + Listening Therapies Combined Delivery Guidelines
A clinical resource that empowers IFS practitioners who are also listening therapy providers with considerations for the most effective and safe combined delivery. Become an SSP or RRP provider to access the full guidelines.
The Foundation of the Safe and Sound Protocol
Understanding Internal Family Systems (IFS) Through a Polyvagal Lens
Blog
An introductory exploration by Marcella Cox, LMFT, CEDS-C, examining how IFS can be understood and integrated through Polyvagal Theory. This article highlights the synergy between IFS, Polyvagal Theory and listening therapies, illuminating how bottom-up, sound-based interventions can support safety, regulation and embodied connection.
We’re Here To Help!
Discover how Unyte’s listening therapies can create lasting change for your clients.
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