Conversations that walk at the speed of trust - IFS & autistic-led therapy

Autistic therapist learning about IFS and sharing musings here.

Wherever we go we are travelling. Even when we are still there is movement – the movement of sensations, of memories, images, thoughts. Meditation takes us to a place of stillness and invites us to ‘be in the moment’. Mindfulness – that place of pause. It’s a practice that feels so good because it invites us to begin to access a slowing down of the speed of our own selves.

And then we go out into the world where there is so much movement. The pace of the world. Of cars. Bees. Recycling trucks. Bills to pay. Deadlines to meet. Conversations to be had and decisions to be made. When you feel into all of these things, what is it that you notice? Do you feel:

An energy towards the satisfaction that comes from completing tasks, but they seem to be never-ending...

The dread of not being able to keep up

The overwhelm

A sense of flow with it all

A merging with the bees, the cars, the deadlines

An urgent need to eat chocolate to avoid that conversation

A switching on of the TV so that part of you can make it all stop for a while

The question for me at the moment is, how can we walk at the speed of trust? What does that even mean? It’s a phrase that I wrote down in my IFS training and I’m coming back to it now as I feel really drawn to it. Like another precious pebble. I love phrases that hold a beautiful truth in them.

Walking at the speed of trust in conversation

What does it actually mean to truly walk at the speed of trust in everyday life? In IFS (Internal Family Systems) terms it means checking in with one’s system in each moment of interaction and seeing if we can come into relationship with the parts that show up. It takes some practice and is not the easiest thing to do mid-conversation! Think about it – one has to be able to be in a conversation ‘live’, in the moment, at the same time as being able to pause and turn inwards and check with all one’s parts how they all feel about what’s happening and what next step they want to take. Here’s an example involving two birds who are hungry:

"Birds of China. [Brown bird on stone, green bird on branch]" The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1850.

(Prior to the conversation, Brown bird realises they are hungry and they always get Uber-eats on Friday night. At this moment in time they are open-hearted and open to a conversation about food.)

Brown bird: What shall we get from Uber-eats?

Green bird (people-pleasing part pops up: ‘What does she want? I want to make sure she’s ok.’)

Green bird (speaking from his people-pleasing part): I’m happy to have whatever you want.

Brown bird has a part pop up which thinks, ‘Why does he always leave the decision-making to me?’ A tired mental-load part pops up which says, ‘I’m exhausted from decision-making.’

Green bird: (from the part that defends against the mental-load part): Why can’t you make a decision for a change?

You can see where this conversation is going, can’t you? It’s kind of going downhill. This is just an everyday conversation, but the potential for minefields is always there, and if this particular bird couple have had this same sort of conversation over years and years, then I get the feeling that parts become entrenched and find it more and more difficult to get out of the trenches.

So how would the conversation go differently from the stance of ‘walking at the speed of trust’? Obviously what I’m about to write is an ideal-world approach, but I just want to demonstrate how it could potentially look if these little birds genuinely walked at the speed of trust.

Here we go:

Brown bird: What shall we get from Uber-eats?

(at this point in time Brown bird is open-hearted and neutral, not speaking from a part).

Green bird pauses and notices his people-pleasing part that wants to make sure she is ok and eats what fits for her without taking into account his own needs. Jay spends a flicker of a moment just acknowledging this part. He’s walking at a pace that is slow enough for him to spot the part that is trying to protect him.

Green bird: I’m noticing that there’s this part of me that wants to please you, to make sure you have what you want. It feels reassured when you’re eating food that you like. It doesn’t like seeing you in any sort of discomfort. And as I think about that further, I notice that I’m male and there’s this part of me that has absorbed this important message about not overriding my partner, and so this part over-extends itself in order to avoid any possibility of being associated with ‘men who overpower women’. Gosh, I did not even realise that was there.

The New York Public Library. "Birds of China. [Brown bird and green bird on stones]" The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1850.

Brown bird’s pace starts to slow down as she listens and starts to walk at the same pace as her partner. As she listens she notices that she’s really aware of his people-pleasing part and she notices she has a part that wishes it would go away and he would just ‘man up’. How ironic. She takes a moment to acknowledge this part and notices herself soften as she’s listening to him. She realises that the part that wants his people-pleasing part to go away and man up begins to soften.

Brown bird: I appreciate you sharing what’s going on for you. I’m noticing how your people-pleasing part works hard to look after me. I just want to let that part know how much I appreciate what it does in this relationship. It can be here for as long as it needs to. And when it’s ready and willing, maybe it might feel safe enough to step back a little so that we can revisit the Uber-eats menu together and see what each of us is drawn to.

Ok, I know that Uber-eats conversations never go like that in real life, but it’s interesting, isn’t it – how much is going on in each conversation. Some conversations are clear as a bell, with beautiful, flowing connection between partners. Others are entangled and precarious, with bombs ready to go off at any moment.

How to foster the conditions for a productive conversation

I know there’s probably a whole lot more I could write about this, but I don’t want to create overwhelm in anyone reading. Sometimes I think it’s useful to just start with three simple questions:

Ask yourself, do I have an agenda? Can I let go of it?

Have I got a sense of urgency? Can I attend to it and ease a little?

What parts are here and can I be with them?

In neurodivergent conversation, there can be an amplification of experiencing and sensations – hyper-empathy, rejection sensitivity, picking up on every nuance, pattern-spotting etc. I am beginning to think that this IFS model can be incredibly helpful for ND people in everyday conversation. What do you think?

The New York Public Library. "Birds of China. [Brown bird and green bird on stones]" The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1850.

One more thing - there’s a poem that was shared at the end of my IFS training today that I really loved, about conversation and listening that’s pertinent to this article called A Table Made For Listening by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer.