Some Reflections on Transactional Analysis & Internal Family Systems

by Gerry Pyves, TSTA

Following a stimulating conversation at a recent TAAANZ webinar with Francesca Glenn, as well as completing a reading of R. Schwarz’s book “Internal Family Systems” (2020), I wanted to jot down a few thoughts regarding the similarities and differences I find between Transactional Analysis and Internal Family Systems (IFS).

What is undeniable is the popularity of IFS and its usefulness in teaching a lot of therapists how to dialogue with internal parts.  Yet to a TA therapist, much of this “talking to the parts” reads like a simple reframing (without attribution) of at least seven pre-existing and well-published TA theories and practice:

• Ego State diagnosis

• Intrapsychic dialogue

• Self-Reparenting

• Working with internal figures

• Revising early decisions

• Strengthening of an integrating Adult

• Parent and Child interview work

Schwarz’s definition of these “parts” as sub-personalities that “…behave like internal people of different ages, temperaments, and talents and respond best when related to as such.” (Schwarz, 2020, p.282) reads rather like Berne’s phenomenological definition of both the Child and Parent ego states as historical events and people with actual post codes (Berne, 1961). 

Likewise, Schwarz’s categorisation of these multiple “parts” into three major groupings bears an uncanny resemblance to at least two of our three groupings in TA. For his “managers”, simply read Parent, for his “firefighters,” simply read activated and reactive Child ego states, and for his “exiles” simply read those parts of the Child that have either been split off or frozen. Also, it is hard to see Schwarz’s descriptions of the self as “the only inner entity that is fully equipped to lead the internal family”(Schwarz, 2020 p.282)  as any different from what we call the integrated or integrating Adult.

Schwarz’s concept of “blending” where these parts (or entities) are mistaken for reality or the real self is little more than a fancy and unattributed rehash of the psychological concepts of “syntonic” and “dystonic” and TA’s more colloquial “contaminations” and “exclusions”.

Whilst some clients may find the terminology of “firefighters”, “managers” and “exiles” more accessible, I doubt I will ever hear my clients replacing one of the most common statements heard in my therapy room:“at that moment I realised I was behaving exactly like my father” or “I felt like a lost and lonely child”, with the much less personal or relational terms of “manager” and “exile” respectively. For a family therapist to remove words like “Parent” and “Child” that were already common (best-selling, in fact) intrapsychic psychological terms used by TA ,and far more widely, for at least a decade before Schwarz was even beginning to develop his ideas, perplexing to say the least. Likewise I find it odd that a “Family Systems” man such as Schwarz would want to replace the influence of real historical family members and their transactional patterns with the descriptor of “entities” as if all his clients were biblically possessed.  

The idea of complex “multiple parts” that went far  beyond Freud’s somewhat theoretical concepts of superego, ego and id, was drawn with prescient clarity by Berne in his stack of pennies diagram, where each penny resembled a new ego state (Berne, 1961, p.53). His drawings of multiple Parent ego states going back 100 years suggested a similar complexity for the Parent ego state  (Berne 1961, p.201; 1972, p.322).  So there is nothing much that is new here for the well-trained TA practitioner. There is, however, an alarming lack of awareness on Schwarz’s part [sic] of seventy years of best-selling and worldwide TA.  Maybe he just didn’t get out very much.

There is much attribution by Schwarz to his early experience and training in Family Systems Therapy. These clearly formed the basis of his “new method” of talking to the different internal manifestations of the external interactional patterns found in families. However, seeing intrapsychic dysfunction and conflict as a problem to negotiate with the “community within” is pretty much old hat for TA therapists. We are trained in understanding where the different voices originate and and how they replicate the systems and patterns in which we grew up. I see little to separate redecision therapy from Schwarz’s “negotiation”, apart from the lack of attribution.

TA practitioners are also trained to see these internal patterns (scripts) as fundamentally survival strategies, in the same way that family systems therapists see external behavioural patterns as systemic survival patterns. Seeing our external behaviour as meaningful and comprehensible in the context of these historical relational roles has been the daily bread and butter of TA therapists since the inception of the San Francisco Social Psychiatry Seminars in 1957 and the analysis of observable transactions emanating from different (historical) ego states. Understanding how the so-called “symptoms” of dysfunction stabilise the system was fully articulated and published in both Script and Game theory early in the 1960s.

Schwarz’s concept of the self as somehow outside of or beyond our ego structure, seems remarkably similar to the circle that Berne drew around all three ego states which he termed “the complete personality” (Berne 1964 p.25). Schwarz’s attribution of quasi-mystical or spiritual qualities within this organising “self”adds little to pre-existing spiritual concepts such as Jung’s “Transcendent Self”, or Assaglio’s “Higher self” in Psychosynthesis“ or Victor Frankle’s “Noetics,” and Carl Rogers’ “spiritual resonances” that emerge with the authentic self.

What is strikingly effective within IFS, is that change comes through negotiating changes in patterns, not blaming persons or parts, and this comes from the recognition that all parts are framed as protective. Compassion, curiosity and cooperation are central concepts.  I think it is this emphasis on compassion over controlling or correction that makes IFS so attractive to many therapists, especially those who have been indoctrinated into corrective and time-limited behavioural systems of therapy. Within the history of TA we have also seen a similar softening of approach through the contributions of later writers in understanding the significance of empathy, the relational and attachment needs of our clients and the depth of the psychodynamic and transferential issues involved in script change work. All of this work goes far beyond IFS in both psychological depth and pedigree.

Overall, I can see that IFS might be useful for those therapists who have never trained fully in the rich depth of TA. Yet my concern is that IFS lacks the organising principles and mapping that TA so beautifully provides. Knowing where and when in a person’s script certain ego states originate and what their true historical experiences were, takes us away from falling into the trap of what I would term ‘magical’ or ‘metaphorical’ “as if” therapy.

Whilst stories and fantasy are useful, TA enables us to deal directly with the historical and phenomenological experiences of our clients and their ancestors. When it comes to dealing with trauma and abuse I think this is essential, whatever reticence or hiding those “parts” or ego states might prefer. There is a danger that the truth might remain hidden or covered up which only benefits the perpetrators of violence and abuse. Bad things happened to real people and sometimes internal dialogue can simply reinforce patterns of secrecy and hiding embedded deep within scripts. This is not healing.

For clients with fragile Adult ego states, such expeditions into the unmapped and often warring regions of the psyche can create greater fragmentation and instability. When both the client and the therapist have a clear map of what is going on, the journey is made safe. And when it comes to dealing with trauma, I  believe that safety is our prime directive as therapists.

Perhaps the real question to be asking ourselves is not “How come IFS gives so little attribution TA?” but rather “How come so few therapists know about the rich depth of understanding available through TA?” 

As one CTA therapist put it “I think TA has a branding issue”

References:

Berne, E. Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy 1961

Berne, E. Games People Play 1964

Berne, E. What Do You Say After You Say Hello? 1972

Schwarz, R, Internal Family Systems 2020

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