“Your Exile is Showing”: Integrating Sandtray with Internal Family Systems Therapy

Abstract

Internal family systems (IFS) therapy is an experiential model of therapy and views individuals as having numerous “parts” inside of them. These parts maintain a specific role in a client’s life and fall under one of the three categories – managers, exiles, and firefighters. Due to the experiential aspect of IFS and the concept of blending, visualizing the parts inside of a client can become challenging at best and impossible, at worst. This article provides a framework for integrating sandtray therapy with IFS to help clients name, visualize, and see the progress of their parts.