I invite you to imagine that you’re a great big bus driving through life and that all the passengers are different parts of yourself.
The part who cries yeah but and what if, the part that wants everyone else to like you, the part who just wants to be left alone, the part that’s excited about your big goals, the part of you that just wants to do nothing, and so many other subpersonalities with their own desires and beliefs.
Sometimes, you’re driving along the path through life, aligning with your values, reaching your goals, navigating the twists and turns smoothly, the various parts of yourself getting along with each other.
Other times, you arrive at a gate and the passengers on your bus argue about how to proceed. Do you open the gate and move ahead? Turn around? Take a sideroad?
Sometimes, the parts mediate their disagreements well and choose their next moves easily. Other times, they start battling it out, trying to yank the steering wheel in different directions, going back and forth about what to do next, staying stuck in one spot rather than moving forward.
And yet other times, you decide to move toward a goal or dream, but then part of you slams on the brakes, hijacks the bus, or careens off the road.
Why so many conflicting feelings?
Because different parts of us have different opinions about which needs we should prioritize and which strategies best meet our needs.
To understand what I mean by this, I’ll briefly define needs and strategies (with definitions that come from the Nonviolent Communication lineage). Whereas needs are the universal and constant motivating forces behind all human action, strategies are the actions we take to meet our needs. In other words, needs are why we do what we do. Strategies are what we do.
For example, we all have a need for connection. Strategies to meet our need for connection may include calling an old friend, watching a movie with our child, eating lunch with a coworker, or turning off screens early to catch up with our partner at the end of the day.
Most of our strategies meet most of our needs most of the time. But we go off course when a part of ourselves reacts habitually with a strategy that matches the current situation less well.
Why do parts of ourselves cling to strategies that don’t meet our current needs well?
Well, you and I came into this world with lots of needs but limited strategies for meeting them, and so, to meet our needs, from the moment we were born, we started learning all sorts of strategies.
Some strategies were more difficult for us or earned us frowns and rejection, or we didn’t receive support to learn them. So we practiced those less often and sometimes even swore that we’d never do them again.
Other strategies were easier for us or earned us smiles and praise, or we received enough support to develop them, so we practiced them more.
We practiced some strategies so often they became like subpersonalities or parts of ourselves, and we started identifying with them, saying things like: I’m the type of person who… or This is just how I am or I always… or It’s just in my nature to… or I was born this way…[1]
Now, some parts of ourselves cling to strategies they’ve come to rely on, even though they don’t serve our current callings well. And other parts are shackled by promises they made to always or never behave in a certain way, and these parts need support releasing these unconscious contracts to access the freedom to move forward.
The struggling parts need compassion, understanding, and support. Our task is not to get rid of any part of ourselves, break a bad habit, become a better person, or discipline ourselves (i.e. punish for the sake of correction). Instead, our task is to get curious about what the struggling parts are trying to communicate, what needs they’re trying to meet.
Every action is an attempt to meet a need.
Every single thing that every single person does, from waking to sleeping—even the most harmful actions—is a strategy, an attempt to meet a need.
Every part has a positive intention. It fears that if it relinquishes its strategy and you proceed with your plans, your needs won’t be met and you will be hurt. Every part of ourselves is doing its best to meet our needs.
For example, the strategy of screaming at our child might be an attempt to meet needs of ease, peace, or safety. The strategy of focusing on everyone else’s needs besides our own might be an attempt to meet needs of belonging, protection, or purpose.
Likewise, when we feel conflicted about what to do next, there are almost certainly two or more parts that are in disagreement about which needs to prioritize and which strategies to use.
For instance, one part decides to apply to graduate school but another part fears that you’ll have to give up too much and tries to slow down the process. Or you may decide to set a boundary with someone who isn’t treating you well but another part fears losing a sense of belonging and says you’re being selfish. The more high stakes the situation, the louder the parts will clamor for their preferred strategies.
To get unstuck, we must listen.
Until we listen with genuine curiosity to what each struggling part is trying to communicate, it’s unlikely to relinquish its effort to meet our needs.
Besides, we need each part of ourselves to be whole. Every part of ourselves has gifts to offer, even if we don’t see them yet. Like a tuba in a big brass band, each part has an important role to play. If it takes over, we can get a headache, and we probably don’t want each instrument to play all the time. But we can make space for our wholeness over the course of a week, a month, a lifetime.
Our work is to learn how to consciously choose when to allow each part to rest and when to take them out to play. Our work is to include and transcend everything we’ve been until now, become more fully ourselves than we’ve ever been before.
When we refrain from striving to fix ourselves and instead turn toward the struggling parts of ourselves with warmth and welcome, we are far more likely to soothe our nervous systems, choose strategies that meet our needs better, and cultivate the resilience we need to align our lives with our values for the long haul.
And so, to get clear about what to do next and make choices that honor our needs, our task is to pause, turn toward the struggling parts of ourselves with warmth and kindness, get curious about what’s really needed now, and then do our best to choose a next step that honors our needs.
I call this sequence the Discernment Pause, the heart of radical discernment. Here are the steps—
- When you notice you’re struggling, pause.
- Turn toward the struggling part of yourself with warmth and kindness.
- Get curious about what this part feels, needs, and thinks.
- Get curious about what your situation needs.
- Choose a next step that honors your needs.
I invite you to write these steps where you’ll see them and experiment with them over the coming days. To help you get a better sense of needs and which needs you’re most called to meet now, I invite you to download my Needs List & Priority Needs Wheel.
And, as always, feel free to share with me any questions that arise.
May you discover clarity and courage to make the choices that honor your needs.
[1] I first learned to call these parts strategy children during my apprenticeship with Allan Hardman, alchemical hypnotherapist and student of Don Miguel Ruiz—author of The Four Agreements. Parts work is commonly attributed to and was developed in large part by Dr. Richard Schwartz, creator of Internal Family Systems therapy.