The Validation Lounge, All Parts Are Welcome, Episode 16 with Bryony Smith on IFS & Dreamwork

In this episode I welcome Bryony Smith an IFS Level 2 trained Psychotherapist and Psychosynthesis coach, who has had a lifelong interest in dreams and we look together at how our parts can manifest in our unconscious via dreams and how we can get to know them using IFS.

Bryony (she/her) is an IFS Level 2 trained Psychotherapist and Psychosynthesis coach. Bryony's private practice is in Massachusetts and offers virtual IFS coaching sessions to folks all over the world. She has a warm, relational style and is passionate about IFS parts work, self compassion practice, and helping clients find more ease in their lives. She specializes in supporting folks with post concussion related struggles, grief, embodied dream work, and helping other therapists and coaches create sustainable practices. She has studied Buddhist psychology and has practiced mindfulness meditation since 1991.

https://www.heartmindhealing.net

https://ifs-institute.com/resources/research/ifs-glossary-terms

The above link is a glossary of common terms used in Internal Family Systems Therapy from the IFS Institute.

More info on my fabulous guests can be found on the podcast website:
https://thevalidationloungeallpartsarewelcome.buzzsprout.com

Sasha Jenkin website for any feedback please:
https://sashajenkin.com/

Transcript

Sasha: I'm Sasha Jenkin. I've always been really fascinated by people and what makes them tick, and I've been lucky enough to pursue this interest in my work as a therapist for over 20 years. In 2019, I discovered internal family systems therapy, which has been life-changing for me, both personally and professionally. 

In this podcast, I'll be chatting to other internal family systems therapy colleagues and practitioners about how this model has impacted them and then in each episode we will also focus on a particular piece of psychology or self-help or therapy theory and we'll look at this through an IFS lens. 

So why not join us in the Validation Lounge? What we bring will be personal reflections from our own experience - and this doesn't mean that your parts will manifest in the same way as ours - however I do hope these discussions will be thought-provoking and an interesting introduction to IFS, a setting where all parts are welcome. 

Okay, so welcome to the validation lounge. All parts are welcome. Today I have with me Bryony Smith, who's in Massachusetts, and we're going to talk about parts and dreams. But before that, Bryony, if you'd just like to introduce yourself, just let us know a little bit about you, what you're up to, and where you are. Well, I've said where you are. 

Bryony: Sure. So happy to be here, Sasha. 

Sasha: Yeah. Thank you so much for coming on. I really appreciate it. 

Bryony: Yeah, it's a great topic. So I'm a level two trained clinician in Massachusetts, a licensed mental health counselor, but also a board certified coach. So I do work with folks from all over.

I originally trained in psychosynthesis, which you probably know does sub-personality work. So that was my original interest in parts work. 

Sasha: And what was it about IFS, do you think that made it such a game changer for you? I'm assuming that, I think, just when we were chatting before you were saying it's like really how you want to work. What was it, do you think - do you know what it was when you discovered it, that you really liked it, why you liked it? 

Bryony: Yeah, I think for me, because meditation has been so important in my life, and I've been, you know, sort of a student of Buddhist psychology since I was young, it just felt like a perfect fit and connection with that, especially when they talk about it being a ‘constraint to release model’. So, for me, it really feels like an opportunity to develop and expand our - and our clients’ - psychological and emotional flexibility. And I have to say that I love that when you go through the level one, level two, all the training, we as clinicians have to do our own work. And so I think we can't ask our clients to go places that we haven't gone. So continuing to do our own inner work, I think is so important.

Sasha: Absolutely. I totally agree with that. Yeah. So you do have, are you in IFS therapy? 

Bryony: Yeah, I am. Well, I have a practitioner, she's a coach in Austin, Texas. Maybe shout out to Shannon Lowry. Yeah, she's incredible. I like it that there are practitioners all over the world that can work with folks.

Sasha: Yeah, but it's quite hard to find someone at the moment, that’s trained by the Institute, but I totally agree with that. And as you were saying that, I was wondering maybe there are some models where it isn't essential to have your own therapy and the model. I know all the training that I've done that's been that's been essential but I guess there must be somewhere it isn't. 

Bryony: Yeah I mean I think some of the old schools psychoanalytic or even some of the CBT there's the stance of still being the expert and kind of helping being the helper whereas in IFS I feel like we're to suffering being sitting next to one another and we're holding space and helping the client develop that, find that inner resource that they have. I'm sure that you find this as well, but I mean, so many of my clients have said, "I've been in therapy all my life and this is the most helpful, most effective, most healing." People will say, “What we've done in three months is more than what I've done in 20 years of therapy.” So I just cannot say enough, you know, good things about IFS. It is quite transforming. 

Sasha: Yeah. That's wonderful. Okay. So, dreams. 

Bryony: Dreams. Yeah. Did you have any last night?

Sasha: I did, actually! 

Bryony: Oh, good. 

Sasha: Yeah, we had a conversation before by email and Bryony thought it would be nice to bring some dreams. And Bryony asked me to almost, I think you said, to sort of set an intention. And I actually went out last night to see a comedy show, which was great. And I forgot the intention when I went to bed. But I woke up really early and I thought, "Oh yeah, I'll think of something." And I do have a dream which I'm very happy to bring. But I wondered, I thought it was interesting, you said it maybe worth saying a little bit about how you got into dreams as well, why it's important for you or they are. 

Bryony: I think I mentioned this in our email exchange. So I'm a second generation psychotherapist, both my parents were transpersonal psychotherapists. So I was just finding yesterday in preparation for this, my mom's master's thesis is called ‘Dream Journey’. So this was in the late 70s, she did her whole master's thesis on Jungian dream work. And so I have to say it was, you know, my parents had parts like any other parents, but it was quite an unconventional childhood in that they were both doing their own inner work and interested in the human potential movement and expansion of consciousness. So my friends would tease me, but we would sit around the table at breakfast and you know mom or dad would say does anyone remember any dreams and so my whole life we would all talk about our dreams and it was I thought that that everybody did that you know. My mom started recording her dreams in 1974 up until she died in 2019.

Sasha: Wow. 

Bryony: And she felt like when she would go back and read some of the dreams that she had like before she had cancer in the 90s, she can, she could really see some of the parts coming out that her psyche was working out different things.

Sasha: That's amazing. 

Bryony: She really felt dream work was a very powerful personal growth tool. So I've always been really interested in dreams. So she, I was thinking of this this morning too in preparation for our talk. If I called her, you know, in my 20s or 30s and I'm "Mom, mom, I don't know if I should take this job," or whatever I was struggling with, she'd say, "Oh honey, ask for a dream." And so when I suggested that to you, I sometimes will do that still. I'll put a post-it note on my pillow because it's hard to remember to do this and I'll just put a note to myself, you know, "Ask for a dream." And literally now that, you know, I know about parts work, I can sort of ask the unconscious, I'm open to getting a message, anything I need to know now, sort of like when we ask clients to go inside, see who wants attention, it’s the same thing to me. Ask for a dream, put your pen and paper by your bed or some people use their phone. But as soon as you wake up, definitely any associations just to write it down and the interesting thing is my mom said this but so did the doctor Leslie Ellis who I did my dream work training with said for folks who say “oh I never remember my dreams” you know as soon as they start writing them down they'll start remembering them and I think that’s because you're telling your parts, “I'm interested in getting to know you. I'm open to hearing from you.” The more you write down, the more you'll remember.

Sasha: I have suddenly had this sort of like this whole other life that your mother was sort of tapping into this whole really rich kind of, yeah, I guess unconscious. And I get maybe there's also, because it's something, it's making me also think about spirituality and the kind of, I don't know if that was something that I know with Jung, anyway, that was because, I did my first, as I was saying before, I did my first training in the transpersonal approach. And in which we talked about the collective unconscious. So yeah, it's really um yeah it kind of makes a lot of sense.

Bryony: Yeah when you think about it from a parts perspective when we're going inside working on parts the parts will show us things that we've a rational mind has forgotten smells from five years old we're accessing unconscious material just as we do in dreams. 

Sasha: I always kind of feel like when we have a dream, it's almost like the filter of, I guess, parts that might filter out certain bits of information that aren't present. I don't know if that's the case, because I'm just the first time really I've really thought, I mean, I think about dreams a lot, that perhaps when we're conscious, there are protectors that aren't necessarily wanting us to be aware of some stuff. I know that when I've taken the time to build a relationship with my parts and my dreams, there have been, I've been quite interested in how, how more extreme some, I like can access some like much more extreme physiological sensations than I'm able to access in day-to -day life. Does that make sense? 

Bryony: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Dr. Leslie Ellis wrote The Clinician's Guide to Dream Therapy. She was my...

Sasha: Oh ok, I'll put the notes, I'll put that on the notes. 

Bryony: Yeah. She's fantastic. This is a very small, very accessible, She's a renowned dream researcher in Canada. She's wonderful. So the year long or 11 month training I did with her was very helpful because she would, you know, of course, we all asked about, you know, nightmares and recurring dreams. And if you think about it, if you're struggling with something, it might be in the background, like you said, the protective parts don't want us to get overwhelmed. So in day to day life, it's just kind of back there. And then in our dreams, it can be so vivid, right?

Sasha: Yeah.

Bryony: It's just so, you know, more intense colors and characters and scenes and bizarre. And she and other dream work researchers and clinicians feel that it's, you know, our psyche is really, or these parts are really trying to get our attention with these extreme emotions and images, you know, it's really interesting. 

Sasha: And I wonder also, I think my experience has been as you're speaking that I've realized that I'm really able to be with much younger parts in my dreams like I'm just I am them like so it's almost like a little window to being back in that in that time.

Bryony: Yeah.

Sasha: Yeah, it's really interesting.

Bryony: Dr. Leslie Ellis says as clinicians that when we're doing our consult call with potential new clients, or at the first session, we should always ask, do you have nightmares?

Sasha: Oh, yeah. 

Bryony: She says that we should all ask because the research shows that those who struggle with chronic extreme kind of PTSD -infused nightmares have a higher incidence of suicidal ideation. 

Sasha: Oh, really? 

Bryony: And she thinks it's a really important thing to to ask regularly. And she has a very simple nightmare treatment that we can talk about if you want. It's a very simple and it really goes with IFS's you know active imagination kind of elements as well. 

Sasha: So what would that be?

Bryony: So just as an example, let's say you wake up and your heart is racing and you had a nightmare. You know a nightmare of being and explosions or maybe it was you know some kind of PTSD type dream. You regulate your nervous system through some kind of grounding breathing maybe tapping if somebody does that, whatever they need to do to get in a calm state, in a regulated calm state. And then from there, go back into the dream, and you dream it forward. So, you know, in IFS, it's almost like a do -over. So I might see the terrifying image but then it can be anything. I see superwoman scooping down and rescuing me and taking me to this beautiful paradise. It doesn't matter what it is but really keep visualizing that dreaming it forward of a positive safe ending and you're basically giving those parts and you're a psyche, that message, and eventually, you know, those nightmares do subside, they get less intense.

Sasha: It is very intense, the do over, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. And it's interesting, you know, I've just totally, I've completely forgotten about this, but when I was doing my transpersonal training, I was seeing a transpersonal therapist. And I have this experience I remember him asking me to talk about a dream and I was so I felt like I was in the dream again and actually him I don't know if he used this a slightly hypnotic approach but I could I was in the dream and I was seeing stuff that I totally forgotten I can sort of slightly remember it I don't remember anymore but it's possible he might have I don't know if I think he was more kind of getting information than actually that feels like a next step like well now let's see if we can kind of do some manipulation of the images and the vibe and let's and make it more I don't know whatever that you're lacking I guess like if you want to feel more powerful or…

Bryony:  Yeah and it's usually about safety isn't it a lot of our scary dreams it's about not feeling safe or yes, so that's a very simple and folks can Google Dr. Leslie Ellis Nightmare Treatment. She actually has a wonderful, small YouTube video about it. And so it is kind of related to what my-- - 

Sasha: Yeah, what did your dad say?

Bryony: So this, again, yeah, I was about 16. This is in Southern California. I had a recurring dream. I didn't call it a nightmare, although it's bordering on nightmarish. When I was about 16, I had this recurring dream of being chased by a man. And it was just a nameless, you know, faceless man but it was always a similar thing of maybe being chased in a dark alley or parking lot. Very common actually for women to have these kinds of dreams. But really terrifying. And my dad, I must have woken up really upset and told him and he Um, go back into the dream and turn around and, you know, 'cause I'm being chased. He said, "Turn around and face him and look at him straight in the eye and say, 'You cannot harm me.'" And so, you know, I did that in my imagination, but what is so incredible is I had just ended a three -year, very deep, it was the first love of my life, very deep relationship, but he was on drugs and it wasn't a healthy thing for me to stay in. So I had just spoken my truth, I had just ended that relationship and I had that dream again and I was being chased down into this dark cave. I remember the wet stone steps like it was yesterday. And I'm running and I remembered what my dad said in the dream. And I turned around and I I didn't know if I believed it. I knew that I might be killed. But I turned around and I said, you will not hurt me. And I never had that recurring dream again. Literally I'm honest truth, never had the recurring dream again.

Sasha: So you did that in the dream, the next time? 

Bryony: I did that in the dream, but he had suggested kind of what, in a way Dr. Ellis is suggesting is you can go back into the dream in your mind's eye. You have active imagination and - 

Sasha: Oh ok yeah I think that’s what my therapist did with me.

Bryony: - and you replay the scene. 

Sasha: Yeah, yeah. But then I guess also, because I do believe from what I've read is that the more that you kind of develop that relationship with your dreams, the more you can kind of go kind of create what you're like. So I imagine that perhaps you with your experience of dreams, you then had that dream again. It was a recurring dream, so of course you did! 

Bryony: Yeah!

Sasha: Yeah, that's great. And I wondered, as you were talking, if you can, I wonder if we can have dreams that aren't based, you know, that are like legacy burdens that could be the dreams of someone else's experience. Do you think that's possible? 

Bryony: I do. I honestly, I also have a couple clients who, one of them is, was raised Catholic and she said, I don't know if I even believe in reincarnation, but she said, I definitely, she felt like she was having some kind of past life, something, burden or entity or something. And so, yeah, 'cause I'm sure you've had dreams like that before I heard somebody where it's some some bizarre, smoky scene from, you know, the Dark Ages. You're like, how does this feel so real? Yeah, definitely.

Sasha: I had, when I was a teenager, I had dreams that came true. I had a, I went through a phase where I had very specific things that happened in my dreams and then they actually happened so that was kind of weird. 

Bryony: Weird positive or was it scary?

Sasha: They were both really like I drew my A level so in this country we have O levels and A levels which is that sets of exams that you do you do your A levels and  you're in your late teens teens and I was told by my, for some reason, my tutor had told me she didn't think I was going to do very well, but I wasn't going to go to university. 

Bryony: That's not helpful! 

Sasha: I know, it wasn't helpful. I don't know why she said it, but anyway, I dreamt that I got three Bs and I dreamt the way I saw it, I came through the letterbox and it was on like see -through paper and I saw the results through the paper before I opened it and that's, that's what I got. So, and it wasn't what I was expecting. 

Bryony: Wow! 

Sasha: One of them - 

Bryony: Oh, I have chills. I love that!

Sasha: Yeah, I just went through this phase of, um, yeah, but it's not, I mean, maybe it's something I should, um, try and develop. But I was, um, there's, have you heard the, the podcast with Heloisa Garman? Is that her name with IFS Talks? 

Bryony: I haven't finished. When you mentioned it in the email, I started to listen to it, but I hadn't. - 

Sasha: 'Cause she was, before now, she's the only person that I've been able to find that has said anything about IFS and Dreams. I know, so she said that thing, yeah, about make sure that you've got, I think it's a great podcast, by the way, but when she talks about, you were saying also she talks about making sure that you have something right by the bed and you're ready, but also that she says that if you move at all and as the dream starts going. But the other thing she would talk or she talks about is, um, it's funny because I -

Bryony: Oh, that every part of a dream is represent to you. 

Sasha: Yeah, like everything. Yeah. And she talks about asking people to go inside and to re-evoke the dream. Yeah, and everything is a part. So like the trees, everything... 

Bryony: Yeah, the toaster oven. I had a weird malfunctioning toaster oven dream the other day and I was like, "Oh, so that's a part of me?"

Sasha: Okay, so is that how you would also... 

Bryony: I do and it's, and as you know, it's not new. I mean, Jung was doing that and Eugene Jenlin with focusing dream work. 

Sasha: Oh he did that as well? I didn't know that. 

Bryony: Yeah, I was looking up, he also has a wonderful book called, "Let Your Body Interpret Your Dreams, Eugene Jenlin." And my mom did a focusing training with him. And so a lot of what he says, one of the questions is what part of you is that, meaning the dog, the tree, that all the characters, if there's a big, you know, hot air balloon, he would even say probably what part of you is that.

Sasha: She also says to keep asking about asking how the person feels towards the different aspects of the dream, which I guess is that key intervention, you know, to check to see whether you're in self or in another part could be actually talking about the dream. So shall I tell you my dream then? 

Bryony: Yeah, that's great. 

Sasha: Do you have any advice about how I would tell you about my dream? 

Bryony: That is what, yeah, I think it is good to say as if it's happening now “I'm in a scene and I see this” as if it's happening right now. 

Sasha: Okay it was a very short snippet of the dream that um so I've been training I'm a trainee ambulance person.

Bryony: Oh okay. 

Sasha: And there's what happens is that there's an accident and it's what we all know just somehow there's a group of these ambulance people that it's this this this couple and they are like the elders of ambulance people. And so my manager, he's like, I've got to go and take care of them. They need extra special treatment because of you know, they are the elders. And I'm like, okay, I'll come with you. So we go to see how they are. He goes in and they've had this terrible accident and he comes back out to me and says, "I need a piece of their blanket or sheet." I couldn't remember. It was a piece of material. And I go in to get this and they are in a really bad state. They're like, literally, there are pieces of them all over the place, like the guy's legs are hurt. And I'm like freaked out but I'm like, I can do this. I can get this just sheet, this bit of sheet for them. But then they start saying, get out. We don't want you in here. 

Bryony: To you or to both of you?

Sasha: To me, the ambulance manager guys doing something else, they get angry with me because they're worried about the impact on me seeing them. 

Bryony: Wow.

Sasha: And so, and then I get, like I lose my kind of bravado is what I wanna say, or strength. And I'm like, and I start getting tongue tied I can't say what, I actually can't say what I need to do. And then, and then I woke up.

Bryony: Wow. That's a powerful imagery there. 

Sasha: It was. 

Bryony: Those elders. Yeah. So, Sasha, if you, what were your first associations upon waking as you?

Sasha: The first when I was writing it down. I was like, oh, they're in parts. Yeah, right They're these parts of them That was my first kind of - 

Bryony: So that was an analytical part that came in? 

Sasha: Yeah, that's true. Yeah 

Bryony: Yeah asking that one if it can give us a little - just in the felt sense, there's the imagery of this, even the pieces of material and the elders. What are your associations? 

Sasha: The first thing was that it was like very charged because they'd had this really bad accident and they were really important people. Like precious people that needed to, and it was very much the sense of we need to go and give them the best care, we need to rush, we need to really get there quickly and rush, and then I'm sort of outside while the manager goes in, and then he's like, I just need you to get this sheet, this piece of sheet, I don't even, it doesn't make sense, but when I go in, I'm really shocked by the cutler's carnage is like a terrible accident, but they're kind of like their heads are like they see me like the elders heads and they're like no get out they get really angry. 

Bryony: They were caring for you?

Sasha: They don't want me in there because they don't think I can cope with it. 

Bryony: Okay.

Sasha: Yeah.

Bryony: And so does that remind you of anything in waking life?

Sasha: It reminds me of my caretaking parts. 

Bryony: Yeah, that makes sense. Just such an extreme example. Here they are in pieces. In this horrible accident and they're worried about you. How it's gonna impact you. 

Sasha: Yeah, that was the, Yeah, yeah. And actually, as you say that, I can feel some little ones resonating with that. Not so much now, but younger me would have totally not thought, but you know, something could have happened, or it has happened in the past, where little ones have had to not even be aware of my needs, because they've just gone straight for the being care of, you know, taking care of the ones that need taking care of. Yeah, so they probably are some extreme protectors, extreme managers. 

Bryony: Are you doing this training for ambulance work in waking life? Oh, this was only just in the dream. Okay, when you say I'm a trainee.

Sasha: I know and then people are like, yeah, no, I have no, I've never done any ambulance training. 

Bryony: Wow. 

Sasha: No, that's nothing. 

Bryony: And so another interesting dream work, you know, technique I think is very helpful is you explain what an ambulance trainee is, as if I'm an alien from planet so you can listen to how you're describing it. What is an ambulance trainee? What is that? 

Sasha: Oh, like I have to be, I've got lots of parts coming in. 

Bryony: Oh.

Sasha: I've got parts. I used to have a supervisor, one of my first supervisor worked with a lot of ambulance people. And I remember him saying that ambulance people have a lot, often have a lot of trauma in their what is, um, what they're attracted to because it's very familiar. 

Bryony: Yeah. 

Sasha: So an ambulance person, what do they do? So they are, when there's been an accident and a human is suffering physically, they are the first port of call that will go to rescue and take care of the human being and help try and heal them or not even heal them, but to get them to in the immediate like in the emergency -

Bryony: Stable - like stability in a crisis. 

Sasha: Yes. Yeah. 

Bryony: Yeah, does that feel yeah, that's for your parts feeling. Yeah in terms of waking life. Stability in a crisis. There might not be any immediate associations to that.

Sasha: I think what's coming up is like that. I did use to work on a crisis helpline for a long time. And I remember very much feeling terrified at the beginning. And the more that really, really learning in that experience at how much if you do something over and over, you become like the more you do something, the more confident you feel like the kind of the natural adrenaline just gets sort of you that kind of, you don't even feel that anymore, because you're just like, right, this is what we do. But the danger with that is that you can then, I mean, that adrenaline and that fear is quite important as well. It's that thing of like being too comfortable and again, I guess what that supervisor said. I don't know if this is an intellectual part of me.

Bryony: Well, it's good to just think about that what an ambulance worker is, is that they are trying to stabilize people in a crisis. The other thing I'm inclined to try if you're up for it is was one of the elders more prominent in terms of connecting with you? 

Sasha: The woman. 

Bryony: The woman. 

Sasha: I remember the woman much more than the man. 

Bryony: And so I want to try something. 

Sasha: Go on, yeah. 

Bryony: Yeah. Ask the woman, if we go back into the dream, ask the woman who's there in bits, if you have permission to embody her and see what she says.

Sasha: Yeah. 

Bryony: Okay, great. So just thank her. And however your psyche does that, Sasha, just sort of meld into her.

Sasha: Yeah. She's kind of terrified. She's smiling on the outside.

Bryony: Okay. 

Sasha: She's just, yeah. But she's just a head. 

Bryony: Yeah, okay, so notice what that feels like to just be ahead.

Sasha: Yeah.

Bryony: And terrified inside, but smiling on the outside. And just, we're just doing a brief exercise here, but look up at you, look up at Sasha as her and see what she sees. What does she see when she looks up at Sasha? 

Sasha: She just sees a little girl.

Bryony: Really good information, yeah? 

Sasha: Yeah. 

Bryony: Yeah. So just thank her for allowing you to embody her and if that feels like enough.

Sasha: You can yeah, no, that's really helpful. Yeah. Yeah. 

Bryony: Yeah really interesting.

Sasha: I think I haven't thanked her. She had a - I had that kind of sense of how you know how things can kind of happen spontaneously - her like feeling less terrified. You realized I was just little, you know, it's somehow there was a knowing in my system that I'm not this actual adult ambulance person, I'm a little girl.

Bryony: Yeah.

Sasha: So I'm just sort of letting my system know. 

Bryony: Update. 

Sasha: Yeah. That there are some things that it's not appropriate for little ones to be there for.

Bryony: I'm just leaving that scene and reminding those parts that you're an adult and you're safe. Do you work with clients in crisis now?

Sasha: No, not particularly I mean no not specifically I mean. No, not specifically.

Bryony: Okay, and no family members in crisis currently?

Sasha: No. 

Bryony: Okay, I was just curious. 

Sasha: No. Yeah, that's interesting, isn't it? 

Bryony: It is interesting also just that you could feel what it would feel like to just be ahead. So cut off, being cut off from your body. That seemed to glean an insight when I felt that.

Sasha: Yeah. I'm going to spend some more time – on that. I think I would also. So is there anything else that you wanted to say?

Bryony: Let's see. Oh, the other thing was just to ask you what are your associations with cloth, a sheet, a blanket, 'cause that's interesting that that was-

Sasha: And that's a part of me. 

Bryony: The managers felt was really important. 

Sasha: Oh, and I just realized, isn't it interesting that they're actually called a manager?

Bryony: Yeah, I know! 

Sasha: I didn't get that before! Well, god, and that's what I remember, like, well, the manager will, but I'm not, I'm under, I'm lesser than I'm still a trainee um cloth hmm I didn't I couldn't even really remember what it was it was like a sheet or I think it was the sheet.

Bryony: What is a sheet, if I'm an alien? 

Sasha: Oh yeah I'm an alien I thought I thought you're going to say you don't use that terminology in America. 

Bryony: No, I mean an alien from another planet. Yeah. 

Sasha: A sheet is, oh, gosh, well, it can be so many things. That's a, that's a, that's a heady part again. Hang on. A sheet is a bed cover, which you can either use when it's too hot for anything. That's just so you have something covering you. It's a cover something about being covered.

Bryony: Mm -hmm.

Sasha: Yeah

Bryony: It's a light - yeah - fabric. Yeah fabric cover. Because there's a lot there that is in terms of crisis and then one of them said, "Get out of here." She was terrified on the inside but smiling on the outside. 

Sasha: Yeah, that, yeah, well that kind of resonates I have those younger parts that that would feel really…

Bryony: Yeah. - So to me, it just is pointing to, yeah, if you had some time in those parts, it sounds like I was just wanting some attention from you.

Sasha: It's interesting because it's nothing like any other dreams I've had.

Bryony:  Interesting.

Sasha: And it seemed to be very specifically like I asked for one to bring today.

Bryony: Yeah. I think our parts, which is why when we ask for dreams and then we start writing them down, it only takes a few days of doing it. Like people will say, I tried three nights and I didn't get anything. I say, keep trying. And what that other woman said on that podcast. This is a strange thing that I haven't heard any, hardly anyone else have this experience. If I wake up on my right side from a very powerful dream and then I roll over and I start to write it down, I do have to get back into that physical position for the dream images to really come back. 

Sasha: Well, that makes sense, doesn't it? Like for your body to remember it, like to get back into it and do you have any examples because it would be really great to really make a kind of clear link with IFS theory or and parts theory and a dream do you have an example of a dream that you that you know of that you could share where you can say quite kind of clearly how…

Bryony:  I think so. I hadn't thought this through very well, but what I did write down was because I, too, had a weird dream the other night that I wrote down for this purpose. So this is about a former male colleague when I worked at a meditation retreat center, a nonprofit, we'll call him Jim. And the, so the prominent felt sense or feeling upon waking was agitation frustration. So that's one of the first things that you think about. What's the prominent felt set? Agitation frustration. And then the strongest image in the dream is very weird. A group of us were standing around a toaster oven like appliance where I was heating up a special meal for whoever was there and they were important people, like in your dream, important people who I rarely get to see, like Godparents or something. And I wanted to impress them, but this appliance malfunctioned and started spinning inside So fast, like a washing machine spin cycle, that this special food was incinerated from the speed and the heat, and I started crying. I was so upset and embarrassed, it was bizarre that this appliance had a life of its own. And so or a colleague, Jim appeared and I dream about him about once every six weeks or more. And it's strange because we were managers together but he wasn't in my department. We weren't friends, like I wrote this down because I have wondered why do I keep dreaming about him specifically? And so I got really curious in preparation for our conversation. He always appears flat, unemotional, monotone, super rational. And he's known for having a dry sense of humor and making people laugh. So I went inside and asked what part of me he represents because he appears so regularly and I got that it's the flattening numbing part in me.

Sasha: Oh, so is that a manager?

Bryony: Yeah, a manager, but honestly sometimes with, you know, I have some food issues like so many people and I think there's also firefighter, some numbing with food and, you know, bingeing Netflix, that sort of thing. And so I asked him what he was afraid would happen if he didn't numb and flatten inside. So him / the numbing part of me. And he said, "You'd be too emotional "and embarrass yourself. "Don't make a scene," which is also a legacy thing. My mom was given that message. My mom was a very effusive. You know, she had an exuberance, she said when she was younger, but she was told, calm down, don't get too excited. 

Sasha: She had to dampen that part of her.

Bryony: She had to dampen. It was set in California. So it feels like it's connected to a young part.

Sasha: Yeah, okay. 

Bryony: Where I grew up in Southern California. The toaster oven like appliance, when I embodied it felt like anger and destruction. And I wrote down, you know that term, if you've spotted it, you got it. Like if you say to somebody, or you say to a friend, you know, “I hate it  when so-and-so”, “I can't stand when they are always late” or whatever. It's often something we don't like within ourselves. And so there's something about, I'm not sure if I'm making enough of a connection here, but there was something about him appearing in dreams and it always is the same it's like he's too cool for emotion so there's like this numbing flattening and so that's one way is to embody the aspects in the dream. 

Sasha: Thank you for sharing that. 

Bryony: Yeah, thanks for listening.

Sasha: Is there anything else that those parts that you had throw in that dream need before we finished that bit?

Bryony: Mm, no. Yeah, I appreciate this space. I just feel safe for us to just share and explore. It's really been rich. 

Sasha: Yeah, yeah. I just feel like there's so much, isn't there? It's It's so rich. It is. I'm thinking of your mother as well, as we say. 

Bryony: Oh, thanks. The strange thing, Sasha, I don't know if you find this, but it there aren't a lot of clients who are interested in dream work, I find nowadays and I find that fascinating since all of us research shows we all dream every night whether we remember or not. Yeah. Yeah, there are interesting, important messages from the unconscious. Why wouldn't people be interested in exploring their place? 

Sasha: Makes me think of like, you know, like ancient dialects that are kind of dying out because we’re not speaking of them anymore, like you have to practice it, or any ancient practices, I guess. Unless you actually keep at it. And it's wonderful that it's been handed down to you.

Bryony: Yeah, thank you.

Sasha: I know we need to finish, I just wondered, there was something that I wanted to ask you. I wonder, do you think it's like sometimes I can wake up and I can feel really full of adrenaline and I wonder if we could have had a dream and a part wakes us up? Does that feel? 

Bryony: Yeah, that's my experience and I think clients have that as well. 

Sasha: So they might do that to protect us from experiencing it, so you might not actually remember anything of the dream. But the part’s like “no we want to take you out of that because” so it could be like a protector? 

Bryony: Maybe it's something that's too too overwhelming. But it also to me sometimes feels like a sign when I'm not resting enough for taking care of myself enough and my nervous system feels frayed then sometimes there some a client just described this the other day she's like “I could have sworn somebody was standing in my room” even though she lives alone and so there was just this you know woken up from she felt some un unremembered dream but like her nervous system was on high alert, you know?

Sasha: 'Cause that's something that can happen when you have sleep paralysis, isn't it? I've heard, do you know about sleep paralysis? 

Bryony: I've heard of it, yeah. 

Sasha: Yeah. I was talking to a friend recently who's had it and was saying that she thought she was having like really full on hallucinations as well.

Bryony: Oh, wow. 

Sasha: As well as not being able to wake up. So I guess maybe there's this real? Yes, it's fascinating, isn't it? The state that we go into this unconscious, yeah, semi -conscious, sort of half -way, half -not -way. Yeah, okay. Well, is there anything else that you, thank you, that was really, I know I could talk about this for hours. 

Bryony: Yeah!

Sasha: Is there anything you feel that's important that you'd like to share before we finish? 

Bryony: I can't think of anything. I mentioned Dr. Leslie Ellis and Eugene Jenlin. Yeah, just I guess an encouragement for folks to get curious about what parts of them might be showing up in dreams. I The clients who are interested in doing this will do basically what we just did, which is embody like somebody dreamt about a bear, ask permission first, and then embody that creature or that person, and then look at the scene through their eyes. It can just be you get so much information. 

Sasha: That's what my therapist did. 

Bryony: Okay. It's fascinating Sasha, people will have incredible insights they couldn't have had otherwise. If they ask permission, embody that person or that thing, and I do that with psychosynthesis and active imagination, I asked a client to embody a family member who they were struggling with, and when they saw themselves in the doorway going into this person, they had an emotional response and realized how that person feels, that that person feels unimportant and unappreciated.

Sasha: Okay, well, thank you so much. 

Bryony: Thank you, so honored to be on your wonderful podcast. 

Sasha: Yeah, thank you. I appreciate it and I will put more information. I'll put your website on and I really think that you were selling yourself short when you introduced yourself because I was looking at your website and there's so much that you've done and you're doing. So yeah, anyone would like to work with you or get in touch with you I’ll put your details on there. 

Bryony: Alright, thank you so much. 

Sasha: Thanks very much, Bryony. 

Bryony: Okay, take care. 

Sasha: And to you. 

Bryony: Bye.

Sasha: Thank you for listening to the Validation Lounge: All Parts Are Welcome. I'll attach to the podcast notes, information for how to get in touch with my podcast guests and also their social media to see what they're up to. There's also a glossary of IFS terms from the IFS Institute. And please do rate and review podcast if you can and finally if you'd like to get in touch with me to give me some feedback I'd be really grateful I'll also attach my personal website.