More About the Capacities Development Program
Capacity Development focuses on the healthy capacities you would like to have to live your life more fully, joyfully, and effectively.
We have learned how to integrate capacities into the IFS process to make it even more powerful.
You work on developing each capacity by:
- Understanding the capacity
- Doing IFS work on the parts of you that get in the way of the capacity
- Cultivating the capacity
- Practicing the capacity in your life
In the Capacity Development course, we develop a wide range of capacities. We explore and understand the typical parts that block each capacity and those that produce distorted versions of each capacity (See more on the Capacities, Patterns that Block Them, and Distorted Versions here), so we can transform these parts using IFS to make our capacities more available to us.
In addition to IFS work, we have a variety of other processes for cultivating each capacity:
- Working on a part that blocks the capacity using IFS.
- Guided meditation to help you feel and embody the capacity.
- Movement and music to embody the capacity.
- You learn to feel the inner experience or presence of the capacity in your body and consciousness.
- Your Inner Champion is a healthy part that supports you in being yourself and feeling good about yourself. You craft Inner Champion statements to say that support the cultivation of the capacity. While you say them, you focus on feeling the presence of the capacity.
- You access the healthy part that manifests the capacity and then you consciously become it. Your homework partner asks you questions and you respond as the healthy part. This helps you fully feel and embrace that capacity.
- You discuss with your homework partner an upcoming situation where you would like to act from the capacity and what it will take for you to do that. (Your partner may do the same.) After the situation, you meet again to share what happened. This provides support and accountability.
- With your homework partner, you role-play acting from that capacity in an upcoming situation in your life. Your partner role plays a person in that situation.
- You negotiate with a protector that blocks the capacity to allow the healthy part that manifests the capacity to lead in a specific situation that is coming up in your life.
