The Addictive Part of Your Mind Isn’t Evil: How IFS Helps Heal Porn Addiction from the Inside Out with Conor McMillen

It’s easy to believe that the part of us that brings us to porn addiction is an evil part of us.

We condemn this part. We suppress it. We get angry at it. We try to control it. We make promises against it. We shame it. We call it disgusting, weak, lustful, immature, selfish, or broken beyond repair. And after all that straining, many of us find ourselves right back in the same cycle: craving, white-knuckling, relapsing, hiding, confessing, recommitting, and wondering why our deepest efforts never seem to produce lasting freedom.

I believe one of the reasons this happens is because most of us were never taught how to work with the mind in a way that actually heals the roots of addiction.

We were taught how to control behavior. We were taught how to avoid triggers.

We were taught how to make commitments, build discipline, and resist urges.

And those things matter. But if we never learn how to understand the deeper emotional world underneath porn cravings, then our recovery stays stuck at the surface.

Negative thoughts and dark inclinations are not meant to be blindly obeyed, but they are also not meant to be merely suppressed. They are meant to be understood. Addictive parts of us are not meant to be hated. They are meant to be compassionately led.

That is the heart of Internal Family Systems, or IFS. And in my conversation with Conor McMillen, founder of InternalFamilySystems.org, we explored how parts work for addiction can give men a completely different way to understand pornography addiction, emotional pain, sexual shame, and the inner war that keeps so many men stuck.

Conor’s story is powerful. In 2012, after a painful separation, near bankruptcy, and severe addiction struggles involving drugs, alcohol, pornography, and sexual compulsivity, he reached a breaking point. He knew something had to change.

He made major lifestyle changes. He quit destructive substances, changed his health habits, and refocused his life. But eventually he realized something many men in recovery eventually discover: willpower can change behavior for a season, but it cannot fully heal the pain underneath the behavior.

That deeper healing began for him when he discovered IFS, the therapeutic framework developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz. Through IFS, Conor began to see his addiction parts, shame parts, self-critical parts, abandoned parts, lonely parts, and worthless parts. He began learning a calm, curious, and compassionate way to relate to his inner world. That work became a central part of his sobriety, his healing, his remarriage, his fatherhood, and his mission to help others practice self-led IFS.

This episode matters because it offers men a path beyond simply asking, “How do I stop watching porn?” It invites a deeper question: “What is the part of me that wants porn trying to protect me from feeling?”

Porn Addiction Is Often a Protector, Not the Deepest Problem

One of the most important ideas in IFS for porn addiction is that addictive behavior often comes from a protector part of the mind. That does not mean porn is good. It does not mean the damage caused by addiction is harmless. It does not mean we excuse lying, hiding, objectification, betrayal, or the emotional pain caused to a spouse or loved one.

It means that underneath the destructive behavior, there is often a part of us trying to help us survive.

In IFS, protector parts often develop because some deeper part of us is carrying pain. That pain may be loneliness, abandonment, rejection, worthlessness, shame, fear, or a belief that we are not good enough to be loved. When that deeper pain gets close to the surface, another part rushes in to distract us, numb us, control us, or get us away from the feeling as quickly as possible.

This is where porn addiction begins to make more sense. The craving is not always about sex. The urge is often about relief. Porn becomes a fast, powerful, dopamine-driven escape from emotional discomfort. It offers a temporary sense of control, pleasure, validation, novelty, comfort, or disconnection from pain.

But the cost is high. The pain does not go away. It gets buried again. And the protector part learns, “This worked. We escaped. Let’s use this strategy again.”

This is why a man may sincerely hate pornography, deeply love his wife, care about his faith, want to be a good father, want to live with integrity, and still feel pulled back toward the behavior. There may be a part of him that is not trying to destroy his life. It is trying to get him away from the pain he has not yet learned how to feel, understand, and heal.

This shift matters. Instead of saying, “I am evil because I want porn,” a man can begin saying, “A part of me is reaching for porn because something inside me is hurting.” That does not remove responsibility. It creates a better path to responsibility.

Why Willpower Alone Cannot Heal Porn Addiction

I believe deeply in discipline. Men need structure. We need boundaries. We need to make clear decisions. We need to build habits that support sobriety.

Sometimes, especially early in recovery, we need to do whatever it takes to stop the bleeding. That may mean filters, accountability, removing access, changing routines, confessing honestly, and creating immediate safety around the behavior.

But discipline has a limit when it is not paired with self-awareness.

Conor described how he made dramatic changes after his rock-bottom season.

He changed his relationship with drugs and alcohol, improved his diet, stopped smoking, and rebuilt his life around health. That worked for a while. But what he had not yet included was emotional recovery.

I relate to that deeply. Years into sobriety from pornography, I had my own realization that I was still living from an addict mindset. I was not watching porn, but I was obsessed with nutrition, exercise, productivity, busyness, and control. I had built discipline, but parts of me were still running from pain. I had stopped the behavior, but I had not fully healed the inner system that had once needed the behavior.

This is one of the hard truths of porn addiction recovery: a man can stop watching porn and still be living from addiction.

The addiction may simply change form. It may become work addiction, video games, endless scrolling, emotional shutdown, food control, compulsive exercise, religious performance, or constant productivity. The substance changes, but the inner strategy remains the same: “I do not know how to feel what is happening inside me, so I need to escape, control, numb, or distract.”

This is why self-awareness is not optional in long-term recovery. It is not enough to ask, “How do I stop the behavior?” We also have to ask, “What is the behavior doing for me emotionally? What does porn help me avoid? What pain does this addiction protect me from facing?”

Busyness Can Become a Replacement Addiction

One of the most practical points Conor made is that busyness can become another addiction. That statement may hit uncomfortably hard for men who have built their recovery around constant motion.

Busyness can look noble. It can look productive. It can look disciplined. It can even produce good fruit for a while. A man may get in shape, work harder, build a business, serve more, study more, and stay constantly engaged. Those things are not wrong. In fact, they may be part of a healthy recovery lifestyle.

But a good thing becomes dangerous when it is used to avoid the inner world.

If I cannot sit still without feeling anxious, if silence feels threatening, if rest brings up loneliness, if unstructured time creates panic, then I have not become free. I have simply found a more socially acceptable way to run.

Porn addiction thrives in emotional avoidance. But so do many replacement addictions. This is why men need more than a busy schedule. We need the capacity to be present.

A simple practice is to create five to fifteen minutes a day with no escape. No phone. No podcast. No music. No planning. No productivity. Just sit, breathe, and ask, “What am I feeling that I usually outrun?”

At first, this may feel uncomfortable. That discomfort is not failure. It is information. It may reveal grief, stress, shame, longing, boredom, anger, or fear. But the more we practice being with what is real inside us, the less power compulsive escape has over us.

Self-Leadership: Calm, Curiosity, and Compassion

At the center of IFS is the concept of Self. Conor described Self in a simple and practical way. Self is the part of us—or the place within us—that can be calm, curious, and compassionate.

These three qualities are incredibly useful in porn addiction recovery.

When a craving hits, most men do not feel calm. They feel urgent, tense, overwhelmed, excited, anxious, or afraid. When shame hits, they do not feel curious. They feel condemned, trapped, or disgusted. When they relapse, they often do not feel compassionate. They feel hatred toward themselves.

IFS gives us a way to pause and ask, “Am I in Self right now? Do I feel calm? Do I feel curious? Do I feel compassionate?” If the answer is no, that does not mean

we are failing. It means a part is activated.

This is a powerful mindset shift. Instead of saying, “I want porn,” we can say, “A part of me wants porn.” Instead of saying, “I am disgusting,” we can say, “A part of me feels disgusted and ashamed.” Instead of saying, “I am out of control,” we can say, “A firefighter part is trying to take over because something inside me feels overwhelmed.”

That small shift creates space. And space creates choice.

Self-leadership does not mean letting every part do whatever it wants. It means listening without surrendering leadership. It sounds like this: “I see that a part of me wants relief. I understand that this craving makes sense. But porn is not how we are going to meet this need. I will stay here. I will listen. I will lead.”

That is not a weakness. That is mature masculine leadership turned inward.

Managers, Firefighters, and the Cycle of Porn Relapse

Conor explained two important types of protector parts: managers and firefighters. Managers are the day-to-day protectors. They try to prevent pain through control, planning, performance, perfectionism, morality, criticism, or vigilance. Firefighters rush in when pain breaks through and try to put out the emotional fire quickly.

Porn addiction often involves both.

A manager part may say, “You need to be perfect. You need to stay disciplined.

You cannot have sexual thoughts. You cannot mess this up. You need to be righteous. You need to control your mind.” That part may be trying to protect good things: integrity, faith, marriage, family, sobriety. But if it leads through pressure and shame, it creates internal tension.

Then, when the pressure gets too high, a firefighter part may rush in and say, “I need relief now.” That relief may come through porn, fantasy, masturbation, scrolling, checking out, binge eating, video games, alcohol, or emotional shutdown.

After the escape, another part may attack: “You are disgusting. You failed again. You are never going to change.” Then the manager tightens control again. The cycle repeats.

This is why shame-based recovery often fails. The very part trying to stop the addiction may be creating the pressure that fuels the addiction.

A better approach is to map the cycle. A man can begin asking, “What parts try to control me? What parts try to escape? What parts shame me afterward? What is each part trying to protect?” When he sees the pattern clearly, he can interrupt it earlier.

The goal is not to remove all discipline. The goal is to let discipline be led by Self rather than fear.

Exiles: The Wounded Parts Beneath Porn Cravings

In IFS, exiles are the parts of us that carry deeper emotional wounds. These are often younger parts that hold painful beliefs like “I am not good enough,” “I am unlovable,” “I am worthless,” “I will be abandoned,” or “I am not safe.”

Conor made a powerful point in the episode: when we are very young, abandonment or rejection can feel like death. A child depends on love, attachment, and care for survival. If a child feels unwanted, unseen, rejected, or unsafe, the mind may interpret that pain as something unbearable. The exile carries that burden deep inside, and protectors develop to make sure we do not get too close to it again.

This has major implications for healing porn addiction. A man may think his relapse happened because he saw a trigger or had a sexual thought. But underneath that moment, something deeper may have been activated. Maybe he felt rejected by his wife. Maybe he felt like a failure at work. Maybe he felt lonely after a long day. Maybe he felt unseen, unwanted, or powerless. The sexual urge became the surface-level expression of a deeper wound.

This is why cravings can feel so intense. They may be connected to old emotional pain.

A practical question is, “How old does this feeling seem?” Sometimes the answer is surprising. A man may realize that the shame he feels after rejection does not feel like an adult emotion. It feels like a twelve-year-old boy who was embarrassed, excluded, or unwanted. He may realize that the craving is not only about the woman on the screen or the fantasy in his mind. It is about a young part of him, desperate to feel wanted, powerful, soothed, or safe.

That realization can become a doorway into real healing.

The Question That Builds Compassion: “Does This Make Sense?”

One of the simplest and most powerful tools Conor used throughout the episode was the question, “Does that make sense?”

This question matters because compassion is difficult when we do not understand something. If I only see the addictive part of me as evil, stupid, selfish, or disgusting, I will not be able to lead it with compassion. But if I can understand why it developed, what pain it is protecting, and what good desire it is trying to meet in a distorted way, compassion becomes possible.

This does not mean we approve of the behavior. It means we understand the system.

Does it make sense that a lonely part wants comfort? Yes.

Does it make sense that a rejected part wants validation? Yes.

Does it make sense that a stressed part wants relief? Yes.

Does it make sense that a shame-filled part wants to disappear? Yes.

Does it make sense that a perfectionistic part tries to control everything? Yes.

When something does not make sense yet, that becomes an invitation to curiosity. Instead of condemning the part, we ask, “Tell me more. What am I not understanding yet?”

This is how inner war begins to soften. A man stops fighting shadows and starts understanding the real emotional system driving his behavior.

The Good Desire Beneath Distorted Sexual Craving

One of the most meaningful parts of the episode was the live IFS session Conor guided me through. We used a real-life trailhead: seeing an attractive woman at the gym and noticing the rush of emotions that came up. On the surface, there was attraction and arousal. But as we slowed down and listened, something deeper emerged.

The part that first looked like sexual arousal had something more innocent underneath it. There was childlike curiosity, joy, longing for connection, appreciation of femininity, and grief over not knowing how to relate naturally to girls and women when I was younger.

That discovery matters for men in porn recovery.

Porn corrupts good desires. It takes the desire for connection and turns it into fantasy. It takes the appreciation of beauty and turns it into objectification. It takes the desire to be wanted and turns it into compulsive validation-seeking. It takes longing, play, attraction, comfort, and intimacy and distorts them into consumption.

But the original desire underneath the distortion may not be bad. It may be profoundly human.

This is one of the reasons I believe healing sexuality after porn addiction requires more than avoidance. A man has to learn how to redeem desire. He has to ask, “What is the good thing this part is reaching for in the wrong way?” Maybe the answer is connection. Maybe it is affection. Maybe it is beauty, joy, tenderness, confidence, emotional safety, or being seen.

Then the next question becomes, “How can I pursue this good desire in a clean, honest, values-aligned way?” That is how desire matures. We do not heal by hating desire. We heal by bringing desire under love, truth, integrity, and Self-leadership.

Sexual Shame Can Increase the Pressure of Addiction

In the episode, we also explored how religious and moral conditioning can sometimes create confusion around sexuality. I want to be very clear about this: I believe sexual values matter. Fidelity matters. Chastity matters. Marriage matters.

Integrity matters. Conor also affirmed that sex within marriage can be a beautiful and meaningful value.

But there is a difference between sacred values and fear-based suppression.

Many men were never taught how to relate to sexuality with reverence, maturity, emotional honesty, and confidence. They were taught, directly or indirectly, that sexual feeling itself was dangerous. They learned that attraction was threatening, that desire was shameful, that relating to women was risky, or that the safest option was to shut the whole thing down.

But sexuality does not disappear when it is shamed. It goes underground. And like a lid on boiling water, pressure builds.

That pressure can come out through porn, fantasy, anxiety, objectification, avoidance, emotional splitting, or compulsive sexual thoughts. The man may think he needs to suppress harder, but the real need may be to understand, mature, and integrate his sexuality in alignment with his values.

This is especially important for Christian porn addiction recovery and for men who come from faith backgrounds. Healing sexual shame does not require abandoning sexual morality. In fact, it may help a man live his values more fully.

But he has to separate his true values from fear, panic, silence, and shame.

A man can ask, “What do I truly believe about sexuality that is good, sacred, honest, and aligned with love?” Then he can also ask, “What beliefs came from shame, fear, confusion, or emotional suppression?” That distinction helps him become a man of integrity rather than a man ruled by fear.

Feeling Your Feelings Is a Recovery Skill

When I asked Conor why he believes IFS works, his answer was simple: IFS helps us feel our feelings more deeply.

That may sound basic, but it is one of the most important teachings in the entire episode. Porn addiction is often a strategy for not feeling. Not feeling loneliness.

Not feeling rejection. Not feeling grief. Not feeling fear. Not feeling sexual confusion. Not feeling shame. Not feeling the ache of being human.

But unfelt emotion does not disappear. It gets stored, buried, avoided, or converted into compulsive behavior.

Men often think emotional work is soft. I believe the opposite is true. It takes strength to feel what you have spent years escaping. It takes courage to sit with loneliness without numbing it. It takes maturity to feel attraction without objectifying. It takes discipline to feel shame without collapsing. It takes inner

leadership to feel pain without running to porn.

A simple daily practice is to ask, “What am I feeling? Where do I feel it in my body? What does this feeling want me to know? What does it need from me? What is the next right action?”

The goal is not to drown in emotion. The goal is to increase capacity. The more a man can feel without escaping, the less power porn has over him.

The Body Is a Doorway Into Porn Addiction Recovery

During the live parts-work process, Conor asked me where I felt nervousness in my body. I noticed it in my gut. He invited me to put a hand there and simply acknowledge it: “I feel you there. It makes sense.”

That simple moment helped the nervousness soften.

This matters because porn addiction is not just a mental problem. It is also a body and nervous system pattern. Cravings show up in the body. Shame shows up in the body. Anxiety, excitement, loneliness, and fear all have physical signatures.

If we try to think our way out of every craving, we miss one of the most direct pathways into regulation. Sometimes the most powerful thing a man can do is pause, locate the sensation, put a hand there, breathe, and say, “I feel this. I can be with this. I do not have to escape.”

That kind of practice teaches the nervous system something new. It teaches the body that discomfort is survivable. And when discomfort becomes survivable, porn becomes less necessary.

Recovery Is Integration, Not Just Control

The ultimate goal of this episode is not to help men become better at suppressing themselves. It is to help men become more integrated.

Porn recovery is not just about removing a behavior. It is about becoming the kind of man who no longer needs that behavior to survive emotionally. It is about learning to lead the parts of us that have been trying to protect us through escape. It is about understanding the root causes of porn addiction, healing sexual shame, building emotional regulation, restoring healthy desire, and becoming more present in real life.

This is why IFS and parts work can be so powerful for men. It gives us a practical way to generate internal love instead of internal war. It teaches us how to listen without obeying, understand without excusing, and lead without shaming.

The addictive part of your mind is not evil. It may be immature. It may be afraid. It may be carrying old pain. It may be using a destructive strategy. But it is not beyond healing.

You do not overcome pornography addiction by hating the part of you that wants escape. You overcome it by learning to understand that part, love it, update it, and lead it from your truest Self.

That is where real freedom begins. Connect with Conor McMillen

Learn more about Conor’s work with Internal Family Systems, self-led IFS, and parts work at InternalFamilySystems.org.

To book a one-on-one session with Conor, visit ConorMcMillen.com.

Conor is also leading men’s backpacking retreats focused on sobriety, presence, and brotherhood. Interested participants can email him directly at conor@internalfamilysystems.org.

Visit No More Desire Tools for Recovery for recovery tools and training, including my free eBook, Workshop, The RAIL Method ™ and more to help you break free from porn.

If you’re tired of trying to quit porn on your own, the No More Desire Academy gives you a structured path to recovery through coaching, brotherhood, practical tools, and step-by-step training. Learn more about the Academy.

If you want deeper, more personalized support, I also offer 1-on-1 porn addiction recovery coaching. We’ll work directly on your patterns, emotional triggers, recovery plan, and long-term growth. Apply here to explore coaching with Jake Kastleman.

Recommended Episodes: 

The Purpose of Painful Emotion | Why You Can’t Quit Porn—and the Emotional Healing Path Forward (with Jenna Riemersma)

The Beliefs You Must Let Go of Before You Can Quit Porn | Why Painful Emotions and Unconscious Beliefs Are the Real Trailheads to Sobriety

From Dopamine Overload to Deep Presence: The Real Path to a Recovery Mindset

Full Transcription for Episode 145: The Addictive Part of Your Mind Isn’t Evil: How IFS Helps Heal Porn Addiction from the Inside Out

Jake Kastleman (00:00.16)

Welcome to No More Desire, where we build the mindset and lifestyle for lasting recovery from porn. My name is Jake Castleman, and I'm excited to dive in with you. Let's get started, my friend.

Jake Kastleman (00:21.698)

I was just in this space emotionally at the time, realizing how much of a death grip I had had on life and trying to control everything. When I mapped my parts, that blew my mind. I had no idea I could do that. And I found a part in my heart that identified itself as hurt. Eventually that part became what I call the nurturer. And it's a part that's about compassion and connection and relationships. And it was just...

deeply suppressed and hurt and when that part emerged I began crying uncontrollably and most people would think crying that sounds miserable it was not it was cathartic it was a massive release of emotion and I spoke with this part and it told me you've ignored me your whole life

It's easy to feel that our addiction comes from an evil part of us. We condemn this part, suppress it, get angry at it, try to control it. And at the end of all this, we find failure. Why? Because most of us have been taught to work with the mind in a way that is insufficient and often damaging. We treat our pain as an enemy and this causes it to respond with even more vehemence, leading to self-sabotage and further relapses.

Here's the paradoxical truth, my friend. Negative thoughts or dark inclinations are not meant to be suppressed, but understood and shown compassion. Addictive parts of us are not meant to be hated, but seen and loved. When we do this, we step out of self-control and into self-compassion. We stop biting ourselves and start leading ourselves. That is the kind of approach that my guest, Connor McMillan,

founder of internalfamilysystems.org is advocating for. In 2012, Connor faced a series of devastating events, a divorce, near bankruptcy, and severe addiction. He knew he needed a change, but didn't know where to start. That was when he discovered IFS, or Internal Family Systems, a revolutionary new way to process emotion and heal trauma. Connor began learning a compassionate, curious, and calm approach.

Jake Kastleman (02:41.39)

to the mind. He got sober, he remarried and is a happy father, husband and man who has spent thousands of hours helping others on their journey too. Connor trained at the IFS Institute founded by Dr. Richard Schwartz and is an IFS-trained life coach, empowering people to heal around the world. In this episode, Connor and I discuss how addiction often functions as a protective strategy, not just a destructive habit. Why willpower and discipline

help us change behavior, but not fully heal the pain underneath that behavior. How busyness, productivity, exercise, food, video games, or even self-improvement can become replacement addictions when we do not address the deeper emotional needs. And how IFS teaches that there are no bad parts, only parts of us using outdated or harmful strategies to try to protect us.

Feeling your emotions more deeply may be one of the most important skills for long-term recovery in IFS is a practical, daily tool for emotional regulation, self-awareness, and freedom from porn addiction. Through what you learned today, you can begin to experience less cravings, less setbacks, less relapses, and healthier relationship with sexuality, as well as more internal peace as you stop fighting yourself and start working alongside your mind. Before we dive in,

I remind you to follow and rate this podcast so that other men looking for help can find it. And make sure to hit that notification button as well so that you can keep finding it. All right, let's get started. This is a joy. You're the founder of ifs.org, internalfamilysystems.org. When I watched you on YouTube and just what you shared on, I think it was the seven questions for parts, it was so practical, it was straightforward.

It was a way that people could relate to. And it even helped me. took down those seven questions and I've used, used them in my own work and my work with clients. So you break this stuff down in a way that's really practical and helpful to people. So today we're going to do some of that kind of in session and in practicing that and showing people how it goes. And then also talking about you, your story and diving into all this stuff of, of the mysterious inner world of

Jake Kastleman (05:04.142)

hearts, if you will. Yeah, yeah, it's an exciting, it's an exciting world. And it's exciting for everybody. You know, once you kind of go there, there's so much to see. It really is like your choose your own adventure inside your own system. incredibly helpful for starting to figure out how you operate the way that you do. And being able to compassionately make the changes that you want to make to your life to ultimately improve it.

Yes, I agree. I like the choose your own adventure thing. It's, it's so I've never heard anybody say, Oh man, I do. I do remember those books. My, my siblings read all those and I was so young. was so young. I don't even know if they came out when I was younger, if we just had them laying around, but yeah, they were older. Yeah. Yes. Right. I'm missing the gray hair. Maybe it's not of my generation, but we had them.

In our house. Yeah. Well, for your audience, give it a Google, choose your own adventure books, um, and then apply it to your IFS journey. Love it. Love it. Already getting practical. so Connor, I would love for you to just start off by sharing your story, especially when it comes to, know, kind of wherever you want to start with that. But then, especially for my audience, um, guys who are struggling with pornography addiction.

and other associated addictions and then their spouses who are in betrayal trauma. So you have an amazing story with addiction and recovery all locked into that. yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's so many places to start when we tell our story. And I like to say, obviously it's not the first time I've told my story, but the cool thing about retelling your own story is noticing how you tell it today, you know, and the updates that you make it or reflections that you have today. So it's always a good opportunity.

Thanks for the invitation. I could just jump back to kind of the crux of the situation, which was a little over 12 years ago when my wife at the time chose to separate from me. it wasn't, I mean, most of these things are messy and painful. And it was one of those messy, painful things where I really felt betrayed. felt used.

Jake Kastleman (07:28.814)

Just a lot of pain. It was also a relationship that I've been in since I was 16, 16 to 28, very formative years. And so I really felt like the attachment bond that we had, the lack of communication that we had, the self-awareness that we didn't have, you know, all those things are kind of a reflection of what it looks like when you're quite young getting into a relationship.

And there wasn't really a lot of development for me over that, that 12 years. So when I found myself, you know, recently as I felt it abandoned, I had felt abandoned. I felt rejected. I really felt worthless. But in addition to that, some of those things I had already been feeling regardless of the relationship. Retro, retrospectively, I could see that my coping mechanism was drugs and alcohol.

and pornography and sort of, could maybe even say, deviant sexual behavior, who want to go that far with expression, but just engaging with checking out a lot of women, having a lot of fantasy, getting into kind of fetishistic thoughts, just sort of like more and more and more. So I definitely had these three kind of areas, drugs, alcohol, pornography, sex addiction, kind of stuff going on before.

the separation happened. So the worthlessness I was experiencing, the abandonment that I was feeling, the loneliness that I was feeling, all of those things I had already been feeling, but they sort of blew up at this time of the separation. So I think there's a handful of times in our lives when we really do have these breakthrough moments. And this was one of those. This was one of those for me. And there was just

something of a time where I realized like, okay, I can keep doing the same things that I've been doing. Or I can change literally everything. And somehow, you know, the amalgamation of the situation gave me enough momentum through the experience of pain to choose to do things really differently. And in a very short amount of time, I changed my relationship with drugs and alcohol, changed my diet.

Jake Kastleman (09:55.746)

You know, I quit smoking cigarettes, quit drinking, I quit doing drugs. And I just kind of refocused on health. And that worked really, really well for a period of time. But what I didn't include was stealth awareness, emotional recovery, components that will inevitably catch up with you. When we make these big changes in our lives,

Sometimes we could do a really well for a short amount of time with enough willpower. But at some point, if we don't go to the root, if we don't start developing the self-awareness, we don't start looking at what are our pay points, why did they develop? How can it be with it now? I think that in one way or another, we're going to return to some of those same habits. So I happen to be listening to a podcast. I can't even tell you which one or where it was from or.

how it happened, but I was listening to a podcast and it just so happened that Richard Schwartz came on that podcast. He's the creator of internal family systems. listened to this podcast for two hours and it was like a light bulb just went off in my system. I literally from that one podcast talking about the idea of parts, my system kind of reorganized.

Just in that moment. And it was like, I can see, I can see my addiction parts. I can see my shame parts. could see myself critical parts. I could see my worthless parts, my loneliness parts, my abandonment parts. Just from that two hours. And so, you know, that, that change.

You know, it wasn't like everything all of a sudden, fit into place, then I'm all, because I'm healed. But it was like such a big shift that I just knew like, okay, this is, this is what I want to focus my attention on. And so that's what I did. You know, I bought every book that was available at the time. There weren't that many. I watched every video I could find, every podcast I could find. And I kind of dedicated myself to.

Jake Kastleman (12:13.0)

stealth led IFS, which wasn't something that was really being promoted. I just kind of made it up at the time. I figured I can do this. And so, you know, I just kind of started doing IFS with myself and on myself. And over the next, you know, six months, just profound change, profound change, profound change, lot of self development, a lot of self reflection. And I, at some point decided, okay, I think I want to do something with this, like for my life.

And I was in construction at the time. I was actually in foreclosure management, which was a whole different story. And I decided, okay, you know, I've got like $5,500 in my bank account. Let's see if I can get into the IFS Institute's training, which was $5,000. And I was like, they're probably not going to accept me because I'm not a therapist.

You know, I have, I have a history degree. I'm in construction. Just this kind of random guy at the time in Massachusetts. Um, but I started the application. Lo and behold, I got accepted, uh, without a blink of an eye. I almost all the money I had to get into the Institute's training. I did the training and from that point forward, I started doing sessions with individuals, um, developed a program that's geared to help individuals learn how to do the same things that I did.

which is self-led IFS therapy. And yeah, I mean, I've other things, but this has been a cornerstone of my career path, my dedication and my passion for well over a decade now. So lot more nuance there to share, but that's the general setup. I love that story so much, Connor. I find it incredibly relatable and I think it's interesting.

the patterns that we share as individuals because your story mirrors mine in ways. Actually, a podcast with Richard Schwartz. Is that right? Yes, yes. It was the Rich Roll podcast. it was much later he had released the book, Bad Parts. And I was seven years into

Jake Kastleman (14:33.728)

sobriety from pornography, right? And I had some drug addiction and alcohol addiction previous to that as well. And I had hit this, I had this major rock bottom experience. I consider it my real rock bottom, even though I had been sober for so long, where I realized I still have an addict mindset. I remember it was, I was in the hospital, not for myself, but my first

My son was being born and after he was born, I remember I was just in this space emotionally at the time with all these factors that were going on in life and realizing how much of a death grip I had had on life and trying to control everything. And that I was obsessed with my nutrition. I was obsessed with my exercise. I was obsessed with busyness and productivity. I was obsessed with work.

And I just, I remember just laying on the, on the little bench in the hospital room and just thinking, I'm still an addict. I'm still an addict after all this time. am still, I am, I still am living in this way. And that's when, as you say, self-awareness became the center of my recovery. And within a matter of months after that, and I was praying to God, I don't know what.

to change, like I don't know what to do. I just know I've got problems and I literally have no idea how to change. I don't know how to think differently than this. This is my approach to recovery. Stay busy, stay productive, know, bear down and just be disciplined. And so my, that answer to that faithful prayer was IFS. That was when I was listening to that.

The ritual podcast, Richard Schwartz came on. was two hour podcast, just like you're saying. And my mind, I was just like, I'm just, listening and I'm just like, what, what, what, what, what? And it all starts, it just made sense to me intuitively. It was like, yes, yes, yes. I relate to all of that. Yes. And this is a way of understanding the mind that is empowering and amazing. And so we had so little money at the time.

Jake Kastleman (16:59.756)

my dad actually purchased No Bad Parts as a gift for me. He's like, I'll send it to you. I was like, thank you. And I began reading it and I began doing the meditative exercises in there and I began having breakthroughs. When I mapped my parts, that blew my mind. I had no idea I could do that. And I found a part in my heart that identified itself as hurt at that point.

what it was called, right? As we say, what it called itself in the IFS realm. And it was, eventually that part became what I call the nurturer. And it's a part that's about compassion and connection and relationships and people. And it was just deeply suppressed and hurt. And when that part emerged, actually reading No Bad Parts, he has another podcast episode.

that's transcripted that he did with someone. I walked, I read that and it's like he was like Richard Schwartz was speaking to me and I was the guy he was doing the session with. I began crying uncontrollably. And most people would think, crying, that sounds miserable. It was not miserable. It was amazing. It was cathartic. It was a massive release of emotion. And I spoke with this part and it told me, you've ignored me your whole life.

I felt so abandoned and I just, spent this, you know, 45 minutes apologizing to this part. I'm so sorry. I didn't know you were here. And it's, it's when you haven't done it, it sounds so, it can sound so bizarre, but when you experience it, it's so real. That was so real for me. And that began to unlock my whole life. Stuff I'd worked for a decade to try to overcome. IFS began to unlock in a number of months, same as your

saying. Yeah, yeah, it's really incredible. I mean, you bring up a great point when it comes to making lifestyle change, especially for those of us who struggle with addiction. Busyness can become another addiction. And what is addiction? You essentially, it's a distraction. So busyness can definitely be a distraction. It can actually be a really helpful distraction. So it's not to it's not to put that down and stay like,

Jake Kastleman (19:24.95)

me getting really busy with my health was bad. That's great. You got, used that to get over, to get through. did a very similar thing. I think a lot of people choose that route. It's awesome. But as you found at some point, there's another layer to go into. And there's never, it's never too late and it's never too early to start developing a higher level of self-awareness. The other thing you referenced here is something so pivotal and key in IFS is

compassionate approach to understanding our system. That's really like a different kind of mindset when we start thinking about change. I need to change who I am. I want to change a specific thing about me or what I do. Which is great and we have the power to do that and we can absolutely do that. What IFS offers us is to slow the desire down, the need to

change and to actually just accept and be with what is currently in our present moment. But I don't think it's one or the other. think both things can work together. And especially with addiction, sometimes we just got to make the change by any means necessary. We got to just do it. And to be able to do that, awesome. Get on the other side and then start bringing in the IFS, the self-awareness stuff. I think that's a great way to do it. It's also possible to do it in tandem.

Yes. Yeah. So good. So good. I, and I agree. think I needed that for a time. They're just the con the constant kind of busyness. I, I, I built discipline, right. And then I just continued to, I felt like I, continued to carry that on for years and it became my new way of distracting myself from all the stuff I actually suffered with. So life will either, I think either we can kind of consciously choose.

to take those steps into self-awareness and emotional work, or life will bring us something. life will bring something to us that as brutal as it sounds will crush us because we have to experience that breaking so our heart can open and we can be like, whoa, like you said, what I've been doing, it's not working. It's not working. And I have to do something else.

Jake Kastleman (21:52.458)

It's a beautiful place to be. It's beautiful. Super brutal, super painful, as you say, but it offers profound clarity. And that is the time. That is really the time to say, okay, let's do a different, let's make a change. Let's see what we can do here in this beautiful thing called life. Yes. I want to break down some of the basics of IFS. Anyone who's been listening to my podcast for a while will know these things, but

as we kind of prep to do our own little IFS session today and break down for people how this is done in a basic sense and maybe with some deep components too, we'll see where it goes. But I want to kind of talk about these roles of parts and really talk about the self. Cause especially when you say self-awareness, IFS transformed that for me. People said self-awareness, what does that mean? But IFS self-awareness,

Awareness, so we'll talk about the self and why that's so crucial. I think for life in general, but recovery specifically to Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, let's do it. I think I could take a pretty Quick easy to understand kind of breakdown of ISS and you can get more specific as as you like So at the center of it all the IFS framework the IFS ideas this place that we're referring to call self

I think of self being relatively synonymous with mindfulness or presence, but we do add in some characteristics to self specifically. I really like to just focus on the three that's calm, curious, and compassionate. That's the easiest to remember. And I think those are the most beneficial characteristics of self. You don't like to go with the eight C's? I think it's too many. Even I forget all the eight C's. It's too many for people.

And at the end of the day, you know, what I've, yeah, go ahead. It's, it's so funny to me when Richard shorts, there have been multiple things I've watched where he forgets like two of them. He's trying to say all of them. Richard, you created this. It is, they're, really good. But yeah, they're all really good. I mean, I have a video that breaks them all down. You know, you could totally watch it. Maybe you have a podcast people can reference, whatever they're out there, but this for our purposes.

Jake Kastleman (24:19.778)

Just remember these three, curious, compassionate. And so the question we're asking ourselves again and again is, do I feel calm? Do I feel curious? And do I feel compassionate? Now we're asking ourselves those questions in order to develop self-awareness. Just asking ourselves that question develops more self-energy. And then if we get the answer back, yeah, you know, I do feel calm, curious and compassionate. Awesome. means.

most likely self is on board. If we get the answer back, I do feel calm and curious and compassionate and feel kind of frustrated right now. Awesome. That means a part of us is feeling frustrated. So we have again at the core self and we are kind of looking to live and certainly to lead from self energy as much as is reasonably possible.

Beyond the self, there are the protectors, the protective system. And these are broken down into two different roles, managers and firefighters. Managers are going to be more the day to day. Firefighters are going to be the ones that rush in to kind of help out. The protective system is there to just do exactly that. It's there to protect you. It might be an out-of-date system. So the ways that it is trying to take care of you, the system as a whole, may not be relevant.

to your current reality, but at some point in your life, it was incredibly important. It was like the best strategy your system could come up with. Addiction can be one of those strategies. So that can be a protective part that is trying to take care of you through addictive behavior. And that can be a difficult thing for other parts of us to accept, that there's goodness

to our addictive behavior, it's a lot. Right. Yes. I know how revolutionary that was for me. It was so counterintuitive, but it so fundamental once you learn it. That's right. And again, that's coming back to what is self-have, it has compassion. So can we come back into self and have compassion for this part of us that's trying to protect us through the use of something like addiction?

Jake Kastleman (26:42.496)

It's not always extreme stuff like addiction. It can be all kinds of stuff. know, part of us that likes to track of our day-to-day activities, maybe a part of us that's a little bit perfectionistic, maybe a part of us that is a little self-critical or other critical. None of these things are inherently bad. They're not necessarily inherently good. But the root, core and desire is always

inherently good in these parts and that is to make sure that you stay alive. And if they can do that, then okay, let's have like the best life.

So I bring that up because it's important to keep in mind a lot of protectors are still in survival mode. They're still in survival mode. They may not know, I'm actually in a pretty safe environment right this moment. Nothing's trying to get me. I'm not being attacked. Things are actually pretty okay. Those protectors can actually relax. They may just not know that. they're on guard, they're vigilant. So we got self at the core, we have protectors around.

You know, taking care of the day-to-day, maybe rushing in to take care of specific situations. The deeper level is something that we call asiles. And those are parts of us that have experienced trauma, most likely when we've been very, very young. And they've taken that trauma and they have gone deep inside our system to hide it. So that we don't have to live with the experience of trauma every single moment.

The theory is that if we had to live with the experience of that trauma when it happened every moment, we wouldn't survive it. It would be that painful to our system. And so the system, with the beautiful intelligence it has, it grabs that trauma and it buries it. And these protectors develop in order to protect us from getting close to that trauma.

Jake Kastleman (28:48.119)

So if the trauma may be associated with something like worthlessness, I am not good enough. The experience of a part of us that is holding onto that trauma is, well, if I'm worthless, I probably shouldn't be alive. That's a pretty intense narrative, right? And if you were living with that narrative 24-7, you could see how that could potentially lead to your non-survival, let's say.

So we store that trauma, have protectors that protect against re-triggering that trauma, maybe through something like an addictive behavior. And we, in general, most of us are kind of living our lives through the protective parts. Unless we start becoming self-aware, it doesn't have to be through IFS, there's lots of techniques to develop mindfulness, right?

But unless we actively are choosing to step into a state of presence, most of us are living from parts. And so what we're trying to do with IFS is not only better understand how our protective system operates and how we can help them, how we can also update them in the present reality, in addition to maybe getting in touch with some of those exiles and helping to actually unburden them. can talk about that more.

later on, but helping them basically process the trauma that they're holding onto, that letting them know it's safe to release it. But we're also maybe more important than any of it. We're just learning how to be mindful. We're learning how to be present. We're learning how to be here right now with the beautiful complexity that we are and that life has to offer. How can we do that with grace and integrity? How can we do that with calm, curiosity, and compassion? So that's...

That's the main premise, would say, especially when you're first getting into IFS. It's just kind of start asking yourself that regular question, you know, am I calm, curious and compassionate right now?

Jake Kastleman (30:55.7)

I really, I really like this explanation, Connor, and I like something I just learned. Cause again, every time we discuss things like this, feel, I feel like you always learn just a little bit more knowledge is added to you, understanding is added to. You said that exiles take our trauma and our pain and they bring it down deep inside so that we don't have to feel it.

And then then the protectors keep us from accessing them, which I, I know that, but it's interesting because a while back when I first learned IFS, thought that managers and firefighters, they had their roles, but exile wasn't a role, an exile is a role where that part has chosen to, I will take, I will take this and I will make sure you don't feel, I will carry it down deep inside.

so that you don't have to feel it. Is that right? That's totally right. Yeah. I think that's that's a great way of explaining that. Her role is absolutely vital. It may not be vital today. So at the time, absolutely essential, most likely for your literal survival, literal survival. That's how serious it is that we're talking about here. Before we get back to the show, I want to take a few minutes to share a story of one of my clients.

Because if you're someone who's been battling with porn addiction yourself and feeling stuck, I think that you'll relate to this. My client, Gabe, came to me discouraged about the impact that his porn use was having on his life. It got in the way of his productivity at work, made him feel more distant from his wife and kids, and caused him to experience brain fog, lack of motivation, and a lack of confidence. All things that I relate to deeply and personally. Gabe was a good man. He valued his family, served his community,

He had a good job and he had ambition. He could even get a decent streak of sobriety sometimes, but nothing long lasting. Gabe's problem was not discipline. It was a lack of knowledge and skill. He didn't understand how to regulate his emotions and train his nervous system properly so that cravings, anger, and other painful emotions could be moved through effectively. By the time he finished my program, Gabe had five months of sobriety without a single relapse. His perspective on life had changed dramatically.

Jake Kastleman (33:18.21)

And for the first time, he felt fully connected and in harmony with his principles and who he was. I'll share a few of his words directly. I would leave every session with Jake feeling like my eyes had been opened to a new level of understanding that changed my self-talk, my relationship with my spouse, and my ability to connect with my children. The program felt incrementally tailored to my needs and had the exact building blocks I needed to live a sober lifestyle and mindset.

I've kept in touch with Gabe since then. His success has continued and he is now seven months sober. Gabe's story is one of many. Men who've joined my intensive coaching program and experienced sobriety. If you want to join these men, dig deep and finally be sober for good. Head to nomordesire.com slash program to learn more. Back to the show.

Jake Kastleman (34:14.646)

Yes. And so, somebody listening might think, well, then why do I need to go to these exiles and even touch those burdens? Why would I need to do that? And why would I need to do that for addiction? So let's talk about that. Yeah. You know, I don't think it's a straightforward answer. I think it's going to be a bit nuanced. So let me see if I can make it a little specific.

Most of us have some part that struggles with feelings of worthlessness. Pretty much everyone I've ever worked with has some version of that. The experience of worthlessness, as I just referenced, it might be associated with abandonment, the experience of abandonment when we were infants. And when we are very, very young, we're trying to make sense of

world. If we are abandoned, we're left. We have this feeling of abandonment. The way that we make sense of that is there must be something wrong with me. I must not be good enough to be cared for or to get my needs met. So this exile would be actually having that experience and hiding it down. The, what we call birding,

here would be the belief that that exile is holding onto, that I am not good enough to be loved.

And if we're not good enough to be loved, by the way, when we're an infant, we literally die. So, you know, this is the experience that is the closest thing to the scariest event possible in our lives, which is death. That's how serious it is that we're talking about. And so this is the experience that this, this exiles hold. And then again, to make sure that we don't re-experience that trauma on the day to day, we have all these.

Jake Kastleman (36:21.682)

that are trying to avoid getting close to anything that resembles a feeling of worthlessness. We have so many opportunities in our lives to get a little tickle of not feeling that good about ourselves. Then it makes sense if that tickle could lead to a catastrophic storm of traumatic, am worthless, I'm not good, I'm gonna die, that we would have protective layers

trying to combat that, to make sure that we don't even get to trickle, we don't even get to raindrop of feeling worthless. And that can manifest in distraction, i.e. addiction. So while we can, as we were talking about earlier in the podcast, we can go after the habit of getting through the addiction, getting over the addiction, getting past the addiction, we can stop it. If we don't somehow return to that root

cause, which in this case would be that exile, we are very likely prone to either go back into the same addiction or develop another addiction in order to cope with the underlying primary pain that we are attempting, or protective layers attempting to avoid at all costs. it's incredibly common to, I hear it from the men I work with often, right?

Well, okay. I'm not watching porn as much, you know, I'm getting weeks of sobriety, but now I started playing video games a lot. Like I feel like I cannot stop. I'm like, your protectors has switched. It's what it's form of, of, of escape and it's just chosen a new one. That's right. And again, a great, a great option, you know, to change, one addiction or another, maybe less overwhelming or impactful addiction. That's not a.

terrible strategy initially. But long term, what do we really want? We want freedom from addiction. We want the opportunity to choose our distractions, not have our protectors choose to distract. There's a huge difference there. We all need a certain level of distractions. It's totally okay to pop on a movie and just chill. That's great. Sometimes we need that. But wouldn't it be nice to choose that rather than just

Jake Kastleman (38:42.518)

A protector coming in, most likely a firefighter that's getting close to maybe a feeling of, uh-oh, I might not be good. And rush this in to have a start checking out women or fantasy or porn or drinking or overworking. can be so many things. And by the way, this is, this is not, this is a prolific issue in our day and age. It is, it is not only isolated to.

specific, you well-known addictions like porn or alcohol or drugs, you know, almost everyone is doing it in some form. So in that sense, we're all kind of in a similar boat here. We're all trying to work on the same thing. Yes. So good. Again, a very, I think a way to explain it that most people can understand. So Connor, I would love to show people

an example of how this works in day-to-day life. This will not be a self-led process as in me by myself, which I do every day for at least 15 minutes a day. It's absolutely changed my life to do parts work. But it will be with you leading me. I want to pick a... This is what I was thinking of today as I kind of brought up this idea to you.

And I've already done some parts work for this. So we'll see where this goes. But I think it's one that's relatable to a lot of men in my audience. This experience of being at the gym and seeing a woman that's very attractive, very beautiful. So I'll kind of break down this experience. And if I'm ever looking down, I may be writing little notes to keep myself on track.

Okay, so I'm gonna try to give a couple of details. So at my gym that I go to, this is so funny this happens because I feel like life again brings us experiences, triggers our trail heads. This is something that is actually an opportunity for me. So at the gym I go to, a girl began showing up that went to my high school.

Jake Kastleman (41:07.47)

I wasn't sure if I recognized her at first, but she was one of the most beautiful girls in my whole high school. High school was very difficult for me. Never felt like I'm matched up, right? To the guys or the girls, any of that. Never felt worthy of, you know, to be with a great girl, right? So this girl shows up. There are so many emotions that come up for me.

The initial emotion on the surface obviously is kind of that arousal, that excitement, right? But there's a lot of other emotions. So that is what I would like to use as our trailhead to kind of move into this. Yeah. Yeah, let's do it. Okay. And, you know, we can, we can break it down a little bit, Asker, and, we'll just kind of go into the way that I typically do with most people. So I'll give you the option.

There's two different ways that we could do it. It's more conversational or a real kind of drop in. We're not happy to close your eyes. It's a tiny bit of breathing in the beginning.

Let's drop in. Let's just go in. Let's do it. Let's go. All right. Yeah. Jake, I'm going to invite you to close your eyes. That's great. Just some big breaths like that. Let's do two more. Slow it down a little bit on this one.

Jake Kastleman (42:36.992)

Only one more like that, nice big in the eye.

Jake Kastleman (42:44.345)

And release and go.

Jake Kastleman (42:50.954)

Awesome. Now can just keep breathing in a way that feels good for you.

I invite you at any time to open your eyes, to your body, stand up, whatever you need to do.

We're going to start with a really simple question, which is, how do you feel right now?

There's nervousness. think purpose and joy in being able to do this, but also the nervousness of part of me that shows up and says, will people think? Yeah. But let's pause there before you continue. I want to hear the next part. Let's give that nervousness just a little nod of recognition.

Just kind of let it know, I feel you. And where do you feel that nervousness, by the way? How do you know that you feel that nervousness? Right down in my gut. Gut, all right. If you would, put a hand on your gut. Just for a moment. Yeah.

Jake Kastleman (43:58.306)

Just saying internally, I feel you there.

the nice sense of you give that an absence check. It makes sense to me.

Jake Kastleman (44:16.014)

As you do that, just noticing, is there any change or shift in the nervousness? Relaxing. Mm-hmm. Softening. Yeah, yeah. I'll just let it know also, hey, I feel you relaxing. And I'm guessing that that feels pretty good. Does that feel good to have it kind of relax a bit? Yeah, let it know that it feels good. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Awesome.

Ha ha ha.

And if that nervousness comes back up, you just let me know. We can be here for it. It's not a problem.

need anything else right now.

Jake Kastleman (45:03.694)

I don't think so. I think there's a feeling of confidence. Great. Great. That's one of the C's. That's one of the C's. That's right. One of those eight. Yeah, one of those eight. Good. All right. Yeah, so you mentioned purpose, mentioned confidence. I'm just kind of tuning into those emotions, letting those expand a bit.

Jake Kastleman (45:35.734)

and you did bring up this particular trailhead. You definitely get to that in just a minute. Is there anything else that you're noticing right now?

I think that there is a desire, there's an expectation a part of me has that this be really meaningful to do significant good for people, right? I think there's a lot of good in there and there's also a bit of the manager kind of energy of like, I've got to make this good. Yeah, yeah. It makes so much sense for me that that's there.

Makes sense to you too? Yeah. I think that's, that's in my heart. Yeah. Well, that's great. You just made that hand to body connection. Just kind of same deal. You know, just let it know. You really understand its desire to have this be meaningful for you. Yes. But mostly for your audience, you can kind of show something. It makes so much sense.

Jake Kastleman (46:53.87)

Does it have anything else it wants to share with you right now, any needs?

There's a feeling of recognition there. You know, like, thank you for seeing, for seeing me. Nice. Nice. think that's good. Good. Yeah. And it too, Tim, it can just be here and it can business and it's welcome to come back in any time.

HIT

What's left?

Jake Kastleman (47:32.462)

think there's an anxiousness to proceed into the trailhead. Yeah, some readiness. cool. Let's jump into it. I think that we can name that there might be an anxious part already. There's some anticipation and I think it's also time. So yeah, we hear that desire and I'm ready to meet it. Okay, sounds good. Thank you so much for the narrative story.

around the trailhead gives me a lot to work on. As you kind of go through that story again, you know, as we're entering that trailhead, what's the first thing that comes up? Whether it's a visual, body sensation, energetic, anything. Entering the trailhead, what happens?

Jake Kastleman (48:23.342)

It's a clear image of this girl, actually, just at the gym.

Jake Kastleman (48:35.07)

nervousness, overwhelm. There's like excitement and arousal. There's also fear. immediately one of the emotions I noticed was, was like a, a shame. Like, Ooh, I gotta just avoid this situation altogether. Yeah. If that makes sense. totally makes sense. And as you referenced a lot of different parts.

showing up kind of all at once, simultaneously. Yeah. Does it make sense to you that there's kind of a rift of different parts?

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

What's the vision? Go ahead. I was going to say, I think.

the part that gets excited and aroused kind of that's the firefighter type of deal of it wanting to mask all the other emotions. because of doing this parts work, I can see those other components that are going on too, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Kind of sounds like firefighter would typically be the biggest one. Those other ones would probably be there.

Jake Kastleman (49:56.888)

but you have enough self-awareness to be able to kind of pick apart. There's these different parts here. One of those is the firefighter that comes in with the arousal. Yeah. Makes so much sense. How do you feel witnessing these parts? How do you feel about these parts right now? I've just had another part come in that says, it's kind of says to that.

firefighter responding part, like shut up, go away, stop being so obnoxious.

Don't want to feel this right now. You're being overwhelming.

Does that make sense? That's what I call my organizer saying.

Jake Kastleman (50:55.16)

We need to be moral. We need to be righteous. We need to have a disciplined mind. is not a part of that. That all makes a lot of sense to me. Really clear, organized. Here's our principles. This does not align with our principles. Makes a lot of sense. So just letting it know, I hear you. I hear you.

The messages received are so clear.

Jake Kastleman (51:29.39)

How do you feel towards the organizing part?

There's more openness now in saying that it's an understanding, like a...

Like an admiration, like, I see how you're trying to help. Nice. Nice. Yeah. The admiration and maybe some gratitude. If you can just send a little bit extra of that to the organizer. thank you. See the way it's by now. Yeah. And now we wanted to see if the organizer would be open to giving you a little bit more time.

with the firefighter that comes up. It's welcome to stay here. It can watch everything and it can come back in any time. We just want to see, would it give you a little bit of space?

Jake Kastleman (52:24.398)

Yeah, there's actually a very immediate detaching, which is nice. Nice. Nice. So just thank that parts for giving you space. That's really awesome.

Jake Kastleman (52:39.931)

wait a minute.

And we're turning back a little bit our attention to the firefighters. still there. If you still have a connection. Where you at? What's happening inside of you right now?

Me asking him that? Or are you asking me that? Yeah, I'm asking you. Give me an update. Yeah, I think there's a... I feel curiosity. I'd like to understand the part better and just feeling openness to being here, seeing it more clearly. So taking that curiosity, almost like it's a light.

And if you can kind of visualize shining that light towards the firefighter, doesn't have to be exactly that. Whatever makes sense to you to send the curiosity to that firefighter. Really letting it know, I am curious about you.

And then just seeing what happens. think just had an interruption in my mind, which was, time. What if we go too long? What if Connor doesn't have time? You tell me, how about this? Let's do this. Cause I think it's a really important part that's coming up and tracking time. have that same part too. Really want to honor that part. So on my computer, it's 10, six, three, eight. When would be a good complete end time for you?

Jake Kastleman (54:09.486)

I think I have till 11.25 or what would it be your time? Yeah. 10.25 year time. I don't remember. Anyway, 25 after. 25 after. Now is that for the entirety of the podcast or just for this segment?

Jake Kastleman (54:28.75)

I think there's a part of me that's trying to stretch it. So how about 20 after is good for this segment and we can wrap up. That sounds good. So this is what I'm going to do. I'll be time keeper. I'm really good at that. And speaking mostly to your time keeper part. that part can, and if it's willing, trust me to key track the time. And what I will do is five minutes before 20 after.

I'll give you a heads up. Hey, it five minutes out. Okay. And we'll kind of wrap it up nicely. Sound good. Perfect. Thank you, Connor. Appreciate it. my pleasure. My pleasure. Okay. Take a big breath.

Jake Kastleman (55:10.766)

yeah, just coming back in. Nothing has to be done right now. We're just kind of exploring. You tell me, what's alive right now? What's happening?

Jake Kastleman (55:25.998)

It's a gratitude towards you for helping me calm. Thank you. Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for expressing that. It feels really good.

Thank you.

Jake Kastleman (55:41.132)

Okay, I'm ready to reengage.

And we're sort of looking at this firefighter that came up.

Jake Kastleman (55:51.775)

and was just starting to connect with the curiosity you're feeling towards the firefighter. It's okay if any of that has changed. So just tell me, you tell me what's alive right now, where are you at, where's the firefighter?

I think it's, I think kind of.

I'm just, noticing that that timekeeper showed up, right? Right as I was approaching. I think that that makes sense to me. And I think in that recognition, there's opening.

Jake Kastleman (56:37.27)

Yeah. So I'm re-approaching that firefighter part.

Jake Kastleman (56:44.153)

And...

I sense,

It's like a childlike curiosity, I would say joy in that part, which I didn't anticipate, honestly. In the firefighter part, there's a childlike curiosity and joy. Yeah. How do you feel just saying that, being able to witness that? How do you feel towards that part?

I think I'm feeling from that part it communicating like a...

It's almost like a grieving, like a cathartic grieving and being recognized. Like, thank you for actually seeing me rather than just treating me like I'm bad. If that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. It sounds like you being a little more in self, being able to witness, you're getting to really feel the essence of this part and it's being able to really be seen without other parts that tend to judge it.

Jake Kastleman (57:51.68)

makes complete sense.

Mm-hmm. That feels good. Yeah. Yeah.

Jake Kastleman (58:04.43)

I feel a gratitude for that part. And it's like we've moved into the same room together, kind of sitting down with it and seeing it. Beautiful.

Is there anything that it would like to share with you? Anything more about its experience? How it feels? What it needs?

Let me ask.

Jake Kastleman (59:09.55)

There's a feeling of...

I'm so sad. Like it's taking me back to like 12 years old.

And like I'm so sad that...

I didn't get to connect with these girls at my school and around me, my community. My thoughts go back to my first crush in my neighborhood. And that there was a, it's like this part of me just wanted to connect, like to really have fun and like really just enjoy like the...

the femininity of girls and just how different and fun they are and being able to be friends and hang out and get to know them and be fascinated by them. And there is this barrier of other parts of this anxiousness and this nervousness and this like, I have to do everything right, you know?

Jake Kastleman (01:00:25.742)

And I think this part grieves that and saddened it didn't.

get to be fully alive. huh. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm kind of hearing one, there is like missing out on really deep long for just connection with the feminine connection with women, your age, that girls at the time that would been just been fun, you know, expiration and the joy of that experience really missing out on that. And then there is also something else that you brought up.

about having to kind of do things perfectly, some anxiety around. Yeah. I'm curious, is that a different part or is that part of the same construction? It's like this part is pointing to, I would say two other parts that are involved in that. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. One that is nervous and one that is anxious. If that makes sense.

Yeah. And so it gets kind of core desire was masked by the experience of these other quotes. You have part that was anxious, the part that was nervous. Yeah. I will say the anxious part, it's like,

Jake Kastleman (01:01:50.162)

anxious about, I can't express that, I can't connect in that way, I can't be close to those, I can't risk that. It would be inappropriate, dangerous, sex is dangerous, sexuality, you know. And then the nervousness, on the other hand, is distinct in the part saying, I'm not worthy, I'm not enough, I'm

I'm scared. So very different, different motives, different feelings in those two. Yeah. Okay. So let's just kind of recap. Very good. So here's like three parts that we're kind of engaging with. One is the anxiousness around sex is dangerous. It's kind of this kind of narrative. There's nervousness that relates to feelings of not being good enough.

And then there's the of the arousal that happens present-day rooted in fun curiosity and that kind of feeling blocked by the nervousness and the anxiety. that following tracking correctly? Yes. And actually what just came up as you said that is the narrative within my religion.

within my faith that I grew up with and it's like a very childlike recognition of like

Jake Kastleman (01:03:25.772)

When I say the word sex, it's sexuality as a whole, it's engagement with the other sex. Like that's left for marriage. Like there has to be, I have to keep that bound down, if that makes sense. And I think that belief is very strong and has been there throughout my whole life. And so it goes beyond just,

Anyway, I think you understand what I'm saying. do. Yeah. And I think it's like putting a lid on a pot of boiling water and the steam builds up. And at some point something's gonna happen. You can feel the pressure. At the very least you're gonna feel the pressure. And it makes sense, that would kind of translate to the experience of anxiety.

Jake Kastleman (01:04:23.111)

Mm-hmm. Now I have a part showing up with paranoia.

saying people are going to hear this and be like, great. Jake's going to go cheat on his wife now. How's that paranoia? It's there's no realisticness to it, but there's definitely like a real kind of manager inclination of like, I have to explain this right now and reassure people that that's not happening.

To me it looks very uncomfortable the experience that they have

Jake Kastleman (01:05:10.924)

I think to me, Jake, just so you know, doesn't sound like that at all. Can really make the distinction between you present day adult Jake with capacity to process, make the right decisions for yourself. And the experience that kind of referencing has to do more with your childhood self where this, this lid

was put on, placed, and through that, we've had other parts kind of develop. And I also totally want to give you the opportunity to say very frankly and clearly to your audience what's true for you. Yes. Thanks, Connor. I appreciate that deeply. Yeah. I think it helps me a great deal to engage with all the emotion and to really, really understand

You know, and for me, the distinction between that and my choices that I make, there's a very distinct, anyway, there's a distinction between those two and understanding these parts me helps me with that, right? To be clear about what I want and who I am. So that's good. Good. Makes perfect sense to me. And I think you're doing an awesome job exploring that.

we've got 10 more minutes. think it could be good to.

Jake Kastleman (01:06:50.382)

be with these parts that are present and alive as best as we can. We probably won't go too deeply into any of them in particular, but how do you feel about potentially kind of coming back in self-energy and generating some of that compassion or some of that understanding for how each of them show up? And just kind of playing around with just seeing is that energetically, experientially

accessible in you. Yeah, I'd love that. Okay. we go there, is there anything else that any of these parts would really like to share in this moment while we have it open? just really, you know, if I could just be seen for this one thing right now, that would feel good. No, I think they're just excited, honestly. Okay. All right. Awesome. Mostly that, the one that we are now recognizing

feels, you know, is joy and like childlike curiosity rather than just unhinged sexual arousal. Yeah. Yeah. Sounds like that's a real breakthrough for that part is to actually be clearly seen for something sounds very innocent and actually very beautiful. Yeah.

Jake Kastleman (01:08:15.918)

So the question is, how do you feel towards these parts right now? Okay, Mark, let's talk about anxiety, nervousness, the initial firefighter.

Yeah, I think I just, I am feeling happiness. I'm that sense of gratitude for each of them. I think that the nervous one though, it's popping up a little more with that feeling of worthlessness. And it's like, I would like to be known more deeply. That nervous part with the feeling of worthlessness is the same.

See me. I want to be known. Yeah. It's just kind of like saying there's more here to unpack. And this could be a great opportunity for you, Jay, to make a commitment with that part. Hey, I hear you. I hear the quest and I'm going to commit to you to come back. generally I like to say, you know, later today or sometimes tomorrow morning, within 24 hours, you feel like that's reasonable. Make a commitment.

come back and just check in with that part. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and it doesn't have to be a huge thing. know, it could be five minutes, could be an hour, whatever is reasonable for you. But you're just saying, I'm going to come back, I'm going to hold the door open. You don't even have to come through, but I commit to you that I will make time for you.

Love that. It's hard to hear that.

Jake Kastleman (01:10:00.512)

I was getting it conceptually, so let me integrate it emotionally. Please, yeah, and just communicate directly with it if need.

Jake Kastleman (01:10:29.126)

I'm hearing, I'm hearing thank you from that part. Awesome.

And I appreciate you granting that invitation, Connor. Thank you. Yes, so welcome.

How are the rest of your parts doing? How's your system feeling overall? Any parts that need at least one friend in right now?

Jake Kastleman (01:11:01.464)

Hmm.

Jake Kastleman (01:11:08.878)

I think.

I think the part that showed up about the belief, kind of the commitment to sex within marriage type thing and how deeply entrenched and broadly reaching that was from the time I was very, very young going far beyond just sexual intimacy, but into

relation to the opposite gender as a whole is dangerous and inappropriate. think that is inadvertently, I would say, but I think that's the belief that I carried as a kid, which would kind of match up with, had, know, throughout my life had a lot of the kind of black and white, all or nothing thinking. Totally. Yeah. I love hearing that from that.

from that part, sounds like it's giving us some more detail around how it's been impacted. Because it's not to say, like, I think waiting for sex, for marriage, just to have it within that container, there's nothing wrong with that. That can be a beautiful decision. But it's more the oppression

around.

Jake Kastleman (01:12:40.534)

natural expression, the joy, the innocence, the curiosity of the opposite sex that is so inherently natural in us. That's going to happen. And to be properly maybe taught or shown or modeled, here's what to do with that in an integrist way. Most of us didn't get that. I'm guessing that you didn't really get that modeling.

Yeah. You know, and this is public knowledge. My dad struggled with pornography addiction. So I think it was very, very difficult for both him and my mother to even approach the topic. know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Makes so much sense to me. So just want to recognize like to that part, you know, I'm saying that makes a ton of sense. You're letting it know it makes a lot of sense. And again, I think it's another girl, him.

for you Jake to explore a lot more open up there. You don't necessarily have to make a commitment to that part within 24 hours, but just letting you know, yeah, I think there's more for us to explore here in a curious about that.

Okay.

Jake Kastleman (01:14:04.726)

Yeah, there's an acceptance there. It's good.

Jake Kastleman (01:14:11.406)

We've got a couple of minutes before we have our hard stopped. How are you feeling? Very good. I think it's good to wrap up this segment and it's been very helpful for me and actually has granted me insights that I really didn't anticipate. So very helpful. Nice. And I appreciate it a lot, Connor. Thank you. Yeah, it's really an honor. Thank you.

And thank you to your parts for trusting me to open up and sharing to be here with all of us. It's a big deal. It's a lot of courageous thing to do. So I expect you for it. And I do think it's genuinely so helpful for other people to actually get a taste of what this thing can look like. Yes. Yeah. Yes. And where I kind of want to wrap up the episode, think Connor is, um,

because there a lot of things that we just did. There is...

There's a simpleness to it. There's also a great complexity to it. So maybe we can break down some of just a few basic practices that people can use on a daily basis for their own happiness and emotional regulation, but also that's going to assist them in recovery. Yeah, sounds great.

And I think I might be able to do that and tie it into a little bit of the work that you and I just did because this, you know, in a way we did some relatively simple work. It also can still be very nuanced and maybe a little hard to decipher, but bringing in some IFS protocols, like here's actually what we did and here's how you can follow these protocols on your own to do that. And also here's some things that we didn't do because we didn't have the time.

Jake Kastleman (01:16:12.396)

that you can also add in for your own work at home. So one of the big factors that we were practicing here is coming back again and again to self-energy. And just like I spoke about in the very beginning, how do we do that? Most easily, it's just by asking, how do I feel right now? How do I feel? And can we access a place of calm, curiosity, and compassion?

So when we start doing IFS work, we start looking at, there's part of me that maybe is manifesting addictive behavior. Okay, there's a part of me that has a lot of self criticism, a lot of judgment towards that behavior. Or there's a part of me that has this shame. There might be a part of me that's really feeling worthless. We might be able to access all that stuff pretty easily. And that's fantastic because we're starting to develop our map like you did.

But we're starting to develop a higher level of self-awareness. While we do that, we want to keep coming back to, am I in touch with the present moment? Am I in touch with self? Can I actually feel compassion for this part of me that is addicted? Can I? Or do I also feel the self-criticism? Okay, can I actually have understanding and compassion for self-criticism? There's a really...

there's like a kind of a quick way to help generate compassion. And that is to ask the question, does it make sense? Because it's pretty hard to have compassion for something that we don't understand at all. And so that's why you heard me ask Jake many times, does that make sense? Does that make sense? Most of the time, the internal response will be, yeah, that does make sense. And from that place, it's easier to find compassion. But sometimes we get the response,

No, doesn't make sense. And that's great because what does that generate? Curiosity. So how can we make sense of it? We ask, hey, can you tell me more? Tell me more of your story. I want to understand you better.

Jake Kastleman (01:18:19.351)

So this is like, you think of your internal work in the IFS realm as your work that you would do in maintaining a good friendship, a good relationship. You hold space for your friends' feelings. You get to share your feelings. You have compassion for them. You have curiosity for them. You have care for them.

You know, this is just the way good relationship develops. It's the same kind of thing we're doing internally. And that's why it's called internal family systems. Family is the internal and we're working with it just like we would an external family to try to get everybody to function harmoniously and as a co-colected whole.

I wondered if you could share Connor, this is a little bit of a deeper question, but I was curious your opinion. How, how do you think this works from a neurological standpoint or, a psychological or a spiritual standpoint? And I'm actually just asking that from you personally. know there's so many answers. Great. I'd love to hear it because I have all sorts of ideas. So I'd to hear yours. totally.

Totally. Mine is as simple as you could get. And I think as you said, there's going to be a lot of different answers to that same question when we're talking about IFS. For me, the purpose of IFS is to be able to feel our feelings more deeply. Now that sounds very... I love that. Yeah. That's what it's here. That is what it's here for, for me. And that's how I've generated my focus.

for the work that I provide for others and also for myself. How deeply can we feel our feelings? Because it's my belief that if we're able to really feel what we are feeling in any given moment, no emotion gets stuck. It does not turn into trauma. It does not get blocked. We don't put a lid on the boiling pot of water. So we don't have either explosion or deflation. We have life. Within the context of life, we have life.

Jake Kastleman (01:20:39.15)

We have suffering, have heartache, and we have brilliant joy, we have love, we have hope. That is life. It is all of these things. So really, when I'm saying how deeply can we feel, how deeply can we live? That's what IFS should be providing for you. In my opinion, it is not something to get black and white about. It's not something to get dogmatic about. It's another tool on your tool belt.

Use it to the extent that it benefits you to live your life with more capacity to be in life. And I think initially it's really, really helpful to dive in, know, play around with some of the protocols and see, does this thing open me up more? Is this helping me? Is this generative for me? But yeah, simple answer to your question to seal your feelings more deeply.

I think I just feel I rejoice in the truth of that. And like, I just feel the depth of the simplicity and the meaning in what you're saying. Cause I think I get really caught up in the why I want to know why and I want to know how things work. And I rejoice in that as well. But with parts work I've often I've questioned for years as I've done it.

Why does it work this way and how does it work? are these parts real? are they like little spiritual beings? And so I ask, I mean, I imagine you've asked these questions and we won't go on this forever, but anyway, it's fascinating to me and I love to hear the perspective. Yeah, yeah. mean, like, you know, everyone's gonna have their different opinion. I've been doing this work for a long time, very in depth with myself and with a lot of people and what I've come to.

over and over again is it's really that simple. Real quickly, know, are these parts actual parts or not? Richard Schwartz would tend to say these are actual parts. I don't believe it that way. I think that we are too nuanced and too complex to nail something down so black and white to say this is a distinct thing and will forever be that way. That's not my experience. But it is an

Jake Kastleman (01:23:02.542)

incredibly helpful framework for developing self-awareness and Having a framework to actually generate internal love for ourselves and you know this term self-love thrown around a lot How do we actually do it? Well, I think I think that provides you a real way to actually do it and It can be incredibly profound but like anything else You could get addicted to is s

You know, you can use IFS to distract yourself and that's common. So again, it's like, please, you know, use the tool. It's a great tool. that it's not the end all be all of life. that's good, Connor. I really liked that a lot. Thank you for sharing that. Thank you for sharing that. It's helpful to me personally as well. Okay. So if people want to work with you, they want to connect with you, I'm definitely going to include.

all your links in the show notes. But where should they go if they want to connect with you? Yeah, I mean, right now, internal family systems dot org, a really easy way to to connect with me and couple programs over there and to work with me directly. I will say I just started a new venture, which is backpacking groups for men. And so, you know, we're doing our first one in May. I think that one's already going to be booked up. if if you want to.

If you're interested in something like that, I would love to hear from you and we'll be starting a new website to kind of expand on that. But I'll put the shout out here now while I have the ears and yeah, backpacking between us for men and focus on a lot of the same things I think that you talk about in your podcast, is sobriety, presence, brotherhood. You know, these things are really crucial and our society is in a massive deficit for all three.

So true. true. Well, that's awesome. I love that you've set out on that new venture. You're invited. Well, thank you. Yes. I was just thinking that was like that sounds great for me. want to come. So yeah, let's do it. All right, man. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show, Connor. Many blessings to you and to your audience. Thanks for listening to No More Desire.

Jake Kastleman (01:25:24.654)

It's a genuine blessing for me to do the work that I do and I wouldn't be able to do it without you, my listeners, so thank you. If you've enjoyed today's episode, do me a favor. Follow this podcast, hit the notification bell and shoot me a rating. The more people who do this, the more men this podcast will reach. So take a few minutes of your time and hit those buttons. If you want to take your sobriety to the next level, check out my free workshop, The Eight Keys to Lose Your Desire for Corn, or my free ebook,

the 10 tools to conquer cravings. These are specialized pieces of content that will give you practical exercises and applied solutions to overcome porn addiction. And you can find them at nomordesire.com. As a listener of the No More Desire podcast, you are part of a worldwide movement of men who are breaking free of porn to live more impactful, meaningful, and selfless lives. So keep learning, keep growing, and keep building.

that recovery mindset and lifestyle. God bless.

Jake Kastleman (01:26:38.966)

Everything expressed on the No More Desire podcast are the opinions of the host and participants and is for informational and educational purposes only. This podcast should not be considered mental health therapy or as a substitute thereof. It is strongly recommended that you seek out the clinical guidance of a qualified mental health professional. If you're experiencing thoughts of suicide, self-harm, or a desire to harm others,

please dial 911 or go to your nearest emergency room.