What it was like to be together

It was bitter cold outside when we met, but the twenty of us brought plenty of warmth to an upper room at Grapevine Collective’s New City Center. We came from the western suburbs, Saint Paul and Saint Anthony, Northfield and every part of Minneapolis. We reported serving clients in our local neighborhoods, but also (by video) all over the place: in Pennsylvania, Colorado, Massachusetts, Saudi Arabia, Spain.

Many of us, till now acquainted only by email and Zoom, were meeting in person for the very first time, and we hooted in surprise at each other’s unexpected three-dimensional forms. (“You have legs!” I marveled several times. Everyone had legs, as it happened, and we were all different heights.) Our hosts had arranged an ample spread of snacks on a beautiful tablecloth, and we noshed as we mingled.

After a pleasant time of leisurely conversation, Zayla and Makai brought us together in a big circle and led our parts in a welcoming meditation. After that, we broke up into little groups to exchange ideas about the concept of Self, then reconvened in the circle to discuss what we’d learned from each other.

Generations of practice, together

Makai, who is new in clinical practice, returned to the circle glowing with enthusiasm. “It is so fruitful to learn from everybody’s unique way of interpreting the model,” he said. “I’m very excited about so many things to try!”

David Hawkinson was visibly touched to hear this. “Imagine,” he said to Makai, “being almost 75, practicing for almost 30 years, and feeling your energy. So moving.” Dorothea Hrossowyc, also 75, later told me that she is starting to feel like an elder: someone who contributes to the community not by doing anything, but by being in her dignity and wisdom.

I observed how fresh new practitioners like Makai, Zayla and me relaxed into the support of all the Minnesota elders in the room — the pioneers who learned the model decades ago, even as Dick Schwartz and his colleagues were improvising it into being, and brought it to this place. For me, that was the greatest blessing of the gathering: the palpable continuity of this work we are blessed to do, from year to year and generation to generation.

Our dreams for our community

After that discussion, our hosts invited me to report on the results of our 2024 community survey and lead a sort of conversation about our hopes for the future. To start, I reminded folks of the resources our community might be able to pool together, given the right reasons:

On average, folks seem willing to contribute $8.32, or volunteer 2½ hours, to the community every month.

With such potential resources in mind, I invited everyone to ask their parts what they hoped we might be or do in the future, no matter how outlandish, and to share whatever came up. After a brief pause for inner inquiry, we went around the circle twice and shared our parts’ ideas.

Here, in brief, are our systems’ dreams for the IFS community in Minnesota. As you read these ideas, consider: Does this idea excite my inner family enough to take some action?

Our systems dream of … 

💡 More learning from each other

• Making the email list more active, to share our expertise.
• Standing up a Minnesota practitioner directory with everyone’s particular expertise, which would let us offer free consults to each other in our specialties.
• Setting up a virtual bulletin board to show us what’s happening in the community.
• Setting up a Minnesota-specific IFS mini-conference.
• Establishing an IFS forum: given all the expertise in this very room, creating a venue for practitioners can come and share what they know.
• Establishing a weekly online same-time drop-in-consultation group.

📿 More spiritual community

• Establishing something like an IFS church: a regular meeting to come back to the spiritual elements of the model, including the best benefits of organized religion (potlucks! choir!).
• Or convening a weekly gathering for meditation and consultation.
• Nourishing the spiritual self, getting to know each other intimately and learn from each other.
• Setting up local groups to do journaling and dreamwork.

🤲 More public service

• Raising public awareness of IFS beyond mental health: breaking the link between the model and mental illness or therapists, but rather simply a powerful way to “update our programming” as we grow up, something we all need to do. Sending IFS learning out into the world.
• Being intentional about the Self-energy we offer to the world, in community.
• Setting up a free drop-in clinic where people can get partswork on demand.
• Healing ancestors and legacies.

🎉 More social community

• Social events for practitioners — like going to a play, then meeting afterward and talk about the parts of the characters.
• Gathering in smaller practice groups, where we’re known as people to each other.
• Finding ways to be a touchstone presence for each other — people we could count on seeing at the monthly gathering, for example.

⛓️‍💥 Different ways of being in community

• Creating liberatory space — a space of freedom, not bound by a lot of rules and regulations.
• Becoming a living and breathing, shifting entity — a discipline and a process, rather than a model — a lived experience.
• Doing an exercise where we make a living Venn diagram to find out where our passions intersect, in the manner of improv.

📍Attracting more IFS Institute activity

• Making the Twin Cities a hub of IFS practice, like New England or Chicago, where the Institute might bring more trainings and workshops.
• Finding space where an in-person IFS Institute training might happen — a retreat center, perhaps? ☜ Do you know of such a place? Click here to email Jess Finney about it!

An invitation to you

Our January gathering happened because Zayla and Makai just made it happen. Same with this listserv. That is how the future of our community will develop, too: when one or more of us, inspired by the enthusiasm of our inner families, just does something to build the community of their dreams.

You might have parts who feel as though you need some sort of permission to do the thing you want to do, whatever that might be. Consider this quote from Zayla your official permission slip: yes, please, “organize groups/events/etc. and communicate them through the listserv, knowing you won’t be stepping on anyone’s toes.” Whenever your system is inspired, whatever you want to do or build or convene, go right ahead!