Coaching practices for What is My Internal Working Model and How Does it Shape My Relationships
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For What is My Internal Working Model and How Does it Shape My Relationships, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- I keep working on my inner critic and nothing shifts, and I’m realizing it’s because the second the critic eases off, the part that procrastinates takes over
- I trust my favorite framework so completely that I apply it everywhere without checking, and lately it’s been quietly steering me wrong
- We’ve been together so long that I talk to my partner like I already know everything about them, but lately something they said caught me off guard and I realized I’m relating to who they were years ago, not who they actually are now.
- I can sense my parts one at a time but I can never hold the whole thing in my head at once
- We share a roof and a calendar but it feels more like two people running parallel lives than one shared one
Practices that may help
- Track the relationships between parts
Notice how parts trigger, protect, and sometimes war with each other — the system’s dynamics are as important as its members.
IFS Parts Mapping, Made Practical - Internal Family Systems (IFS), Made Practical
IFS, developed by Richard Schwartz, treats the mind as made of distinct "parts" — protectors and wounded exiles — orbiting a calm core "Self." The work is to lead from Self, understand each part’s protective intent, and help carried burdens release. The model is widely used and increasingly studied, but its controlled-evidence base is still emerging compared with CBT or DBT. - Constantly distinguish the map from the territory
A model is a simplification — know precisely where yours breaks down.
Mental Models: Charlie Munger’s Latticework Approach - Ask genuine questions about your partner’s inner world
Keep updating your mental model of who your partner actually is right now.
The 5-to-1 Positivity Ratio in Relationships - Draw or sketch the inner system visually
Put parts and their relationships on paper — who is close to whom, who holds whom at arm’s length.
IFS Parts Mapping, Made Practical - Practise including the other person in your self-concept
Close relationships develop when you genuinely incorporate the other’s perspectives and resources into how you think — not just spend time with them.
Self-Expansion Model: How Relationships Grow (and Stagnate) Us - Surface and test the mental models driving behavior
Make the assumptions behind decisions explicit — they are often the root structural cause.
Systems Thinking - Maintain a personal model catalog with examples
Keep a written inventory of your models, each illustrated with a real example from your own experience.
Mental Models: Charlie Munger’s Latticework Approach - Develop an internalised representation of the person
Build a rich inner sense of who the person was that you carry and consult in daily life.
Continuing Bonds in Grief, Made Practical - Developing a solid but flexible self
Know clearly what you value, believe, and will not compromise — while remaining genuinely open to being changed by your partner.
Differentiation of Self: David Schnarch’s Framework for Passionate Marriage
Related concerns
- Anticipate Parts Ifs
Parts mapping is an Internal Family Systems (Richard Schwartz) practice of systematically identifying and visually or narratively charting the distinct inner parts — critics, worriers, peacekeepers, wounded exiles — and their relationships to each other. It is a diagnostic and orientation tool: it shows you the terrain of your inner system before you try to work with any single part. Evidence sits within the broader IFS and parts-work literature, which is growing but not yet on par with CBT or DBT.
- Cross Disciplinary Mental Models
Choose one model per quarter from a discipline you do not work in and learn it well enough to explain it.
Collect models deliberately from fields outside your specialty
- How To Build Mental Models
Keep a written inventory of your models, each illustrated with a real example from your own experience.
Maintain a personal model catalog with examples
- How To Map Your Parts Ifs
Parts mapping is an Internal Family Systems (Richard Schwartz) practice of systematically identifying and visually or narratively charting the distinct inner parts — critics, worriers, peacekeepers, wounded exiles — and their relationships to each other. It is a diagnostic and orientation tool: it shows you the terrain of your inner system before you try to work with any single part. Evidence sits within the broader IFS and parts-work literature, which is growing but not yet on par with CBT or DBT.
- Iceberg Model Systems Thinking
Make the assumptions behind decisions explicit — they are often the root structural cause.
Surface and test the mental models driving behavior
- Identifying Parts Ifs
Parts mapping is an Internal Family Systems (Richard Schwartz) practice of systematically identifying and visually or narratively charting the distinct inner parts — critics, worriers, peacekeepers, wounded exiles — and their relationships to each other. It is a diagnostic and orientation tool: it shows you the terrain of your inner system before you try to work with any single part. Evidence sits within the broader IFS and parts-work literature, which is growing but not yet on par with CBT or DBT.
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