Stop Escaping Pain: The Emotional Healing Path Out of Porn Addiction With Jenna Riemersma
- Jake Kastleman
- 13 minutes ago
- 39 min read
Most men trying to overcome porn addiction are asking the wrong first question.
We ask, “How do I stop watching porn?” We ask, “How do I get more discipline?”
We ask, “How do I finally resist urges and stop relapsing?” Those questions matter, but if that is all we ask, we usually stay trapped at the surface. We keep trying to control a behavior without understanding the pain that keeps driving it.
That is one of the reasons my conversation with Jenna Riemersma was so powerful. Jenna is a CSAT supervisor, an IFS therapist and consultant, and someone whose work has deeply shaped the way I understand addiction recovery and emotional healing. Her new book, Move Toward, puts language to something I have seen again and again in my own life and in the lives of the men I work with: real recovery begins when we stop escaping pain and start moving toward it with wisdom.
That sounds counterintuitive at first. Most of us have spent years doing the opposite. We move away from shame, away from loneliness, away from fear, away from grief, away from the unbearable feeling that we are not enough. Porn becomes one of the fastest ways to do that. It offers stimulation, distraction, fantasy, and temporary relief. But the relief never lasts. The shame gets heavier, the loneliness gets deeper, and the disconnect gets worse.
That is why porn addiction recovery cannot just be about controlling urges. It has to become a deeper process of emotional healing.
Porn Addiction Recovery Begins When You Stop Treating Pain Like the Enemy
One of the biggest lies many of us have inherited is that painful emotions are problems to eliminate as quickly as possible. When shame rises, suppress it.
When fear rises, override it. When loneliness rises, distract from it. When pressure builds, keep grinding.
But painful emotions are not random glitches in the system. They are signals.
They reveal where something in us is wounded, burdened, or cut off. Pain has a purpose. Shame does not mean you are shameful. Fear does not mean you are weak. Loneliness does not mean you are unlovable. It means something inside you needs attention rather than avoidance.
This is a massive shift for a man trying to heal porn addiction. If porn has become your go-to way of escaping emotional pain, then every time pain rises, your brain and body may automatically move toward the old solution. Recovery requires retraining that pattern. It requires learning that pain can be faced, understood, and worked with without being consumed by it.
What I appreciate about Jenna’s work is that it does not treat painful emotion as an interruption to recovery. It treats painful emotion as part of the recovery path itself. That is a mature shift. It means instead of seeing shame, grief, or fear as proof that you are failing, you can begin to see them as invitations to slow down, listen, and lead yourself with greater honesty. That one change in posture can alter the entire direction of a man’s healing.
Emotional Triggers and Porn Addiction: What’s Really Happening
A trigger is not just an external event. It is an internal activation. Something happens outside of you, and it touches something already living inside of you.
Maybe you feel rejected, overwhelmed, unseen, criticized, exhausted, or crushed by pressure. Porn then looks attractive because it promises fast relief.
That is why Jenna’s framing is so important: triggers are trailheads. Instead of only asking, “How do I survive this trigger?” we can ask, “What did this trigger activate in me?”
Often the answer is not lust. It is a shame. Fear. Aloneness. Grief. Pressure. The feeling that if people really knew you, they would not love you. Porn becomes the escape hatch.
This is why behavior-only strategies often fall short. A man may manage urges for a while, but if he never learns how to recognize and respond to the deeper emotional trigger, the cycle tends to keep returning.
Internal Family Systems and Porn Addiction
One of the most helpful frameworks I have found for understanding addiction is Internal Family Systems, or IFS. It gives language to something many men already feel but do not know how to describe: there is an inner war happening inside of us.
One part of you wants freedom. One part wants relief. One part is trying to perform. One part is exhausted. One part wants a connection. One part does not trust the connection at all.
IFS helps us understand that we are not a monolith. We have different parts carrying different burdens and roles. At our core is what IFS calls Self—our deepest grounded essence, marked by clarity, courage, compassion, calm, and wisdom.
Then there are parts carrying pain—often shame, fear, grief, or loneliness. These vulnerable parts are often what drive compulsive behavior underneath the surface. Other parts try to manage life so we never have to feel that pain. They may show up as perfectionism, people-pleasing, overworking, self-criticism, or spiritual performance. Then, when those strategies fail, another set of parts comes in to put out the fire fast. Porn is often one of those firefighter strategies.
This means pornography is often not the whole problem. It is one part of a bigger inner system. If a man only attacks the porn use without understanding the shame, pressure, fear, or loneliness beneath it, he will often stay stuck in the same pattern.
Why Fighting Yourself Makes Addiction Worse
Many men approach recovery like a war against themselves. They tighten the screws, shame themselves, make extreme vows, and try to overpower the behavior through force. Sometimes that creates a short burst of motivation. But often it does not last.
Why? Because when you fight yourself, you increase the distress inside the system.
If the part of you acting out with porn is already trying to soothe pain, and then another part attacks it with shame and disgust, the whole system becomes more inflamed. The critic gets louder. The pain deepens. The acting-out part becomes even more desperate to provide relief.
This is where one of the strongest points from the episode comes in: healing comes through relationship, not control.
That does not mean porn is okay. It means transformation is more likely when the burdened part of you is understood instead of simply condemned. The part using porn may be doing something destructive, but if you slow down enough to ask what it is trying to do for you, you will often find something deeply human underneath it—comfort, escape, soothing, connection, or relief.
The behavior is harmful. But the need underneath it matters.
Self-Sabotage and the Hidden Logic of Relapse
Addiction is one form of self-sabotage, but it is rarely the only one. Many men sabotage intimacy, peace, healing, momentum, and growth in ways they do not fully understand.
Maybe things start going well with your wife, and suddenly you pull away, pick a fight, or relapse. Maybe your business starts growing, and you procrastinate or numb out. Maybe recovery is actually working, and then part of you panics and runs back to what is familiar.
From the outside, self-sabotage looks irrational. But inside, it often has a logic. A burdened part may believe getting closer will lead to deeper hurt. Another part may believe healing will bring more responsibility than you can handle. Another may fear that if you become visible, you will be exposed.
This is why a better question is not just, “Why did I do that?” but, “What is this protecting me from?” That question helps a man move from shame into understanding.
The Real Need Beneath Porn
One of the most useful questions a man can ask is this: what does porn seem to give me?
For many men, porn appears to provide comfort, excitement, relief, reward, escape, control, or connection. If you never identify the false promise, you will struggle to identify the real need.
A part of you may want comfort. That is not bad. A part of you may want connection. That is not bad. A part of you may want rest, validation, or aliveness.
Those are not bad desires. But porn does not truly meet them. It gives counterfeit relief while deepening the pain underneath.
This is why real porn addiction healing is not just about saying no to porn. It is about learning to meet your real needs in mature, grounded, life-giving ways.
Perfectionism Can Fuel Porn Addiction
Many men assume the hard-driving, disciplined, demanding part of them is the healthy part because it looks responsible. But sometimes that part is carrying tremendous fear. It is trying to make sure you never fail, never disappoint, never slow down, and never get exposed.
That kind of pressure can become brutal inside a man. Then another part finally says, “I cannot do this anymore,” and porn becomes the counterfeit form of rest or rebellion.
This is one reason men can feel confused after relapse. They think, “Why would I do this when I care so much about healing?” Often because another part of them is trying to survive the crushing pressure created by their own internal system.
If your recovery is driven mainly by fear, perfectionism, and self-criticism, your nervous system may keep looking for a way out. That means part of recovery is learning how to pursue growth from grounded strength rather than internal oppression.
A Practical Method: Notice, Know, Need
One of the most helpful tools Jenna shared is the framework: Notice, Know, Need.
First, notice. Notice that something is happening in you. A part of you feels shame. A part of you wants porn. A part of you feels overwhelmed, angry, lonely, or numb. This helps create enough separation for a relationship.
Second, know. Ask that part what it wants you to know. What is it feeling? What triggered it? What is it afraid of? How is it trying to help you? Slow down and get curious.
Third, need. Ask what this part needs from you right now. Not from porn. Not from fantasy. What does it actually need from your grounded self? Comfort?
Honesty? Rest? Reassurance? Breath? Connection? Grief? Boundaries?
This framework helps a man move from reaction to self-leadership. It interrupts the automatic cycle and gives him a practical way to respond differently in the moment.
And this is where the neuroscience matters too. When you slow down, name what is happening, and bring curiosity online, you help shift yourself out of pure reactivity. You give your brain and body a chance to regulate instead of staying trapped in the old urge-relief loop. Over time, that kind of practice builds a different internal pattern. It strengthens steadiness, awareness, and the ability to choose rather than simply react.
Overcoming Porn Addiction Means Learning to Be With Yourself
A lot of men still want to ask, “Okay, but how do I fix it?” I understand that. But one of the hardest and most freeing truths in recovery is that healing often begins not with fixing, but with being with.
Being with the shame. Being with the fear. Being with the part of you that wants to escape. Being with the part of you that feels like a boy inside. Being with the pain instead of immediately running from it.
For many men, this feels foreign because we were trained to suppress, perform, stay busy, and tough it out. But there is a deeper form of strength available to us: the strength to remain present.
When a burdened part of you finally feels seen without being attacked, something begins to soften. The urgency can come down. The chaos can be quiet.
That is not a weakness. That is courageous self-leadership.
The Emotional Healing Path Out of Porn Addiction
If I could summarize the heart of this conversation in one message, it would be this: the way out of porn addiction is not through more self-hatred. It is not through deeper internal violence. And it is not through pretending painful emotions do not exist.
The path forward is more courageous than that.
It is the path of turning toward what hurts. It is the path of understanding the emotional triggers beneath the behavior. It is the path of recognizing the real need underneath the false promise of porn. It is the path of leading yourself with clarity, compassion, honesty, and grounded masculine strength.
Men do not heal by becoming machines. We heal by becoming integrated. We heal by becoming honest. We heal by learning how to stay present. We heal by building the capacity to face pain without collapsing into escape.
That is the emotional healing path out of porn addiction. And for many men, it is the beginning not only of sobriety, but of becoming the kind of man they were meant to be.
Learn more about Jenna Riemersma:
Books:
On-Demand Workshop for Altogether You — Get 15% off Jenna's workshop with discount code: AY15
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. Join before May 1st to lock in the $130/month Founding Member rate. Learn more here.
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:
Full Transcription for Episode 141: Stop Escaping Pain: The Emotional Healing Path Out of Porn Addiction With Jenna Riemersma
Jake Kastleman (00:00.204)
Jenna, welcome. You are a hero of mine. You're in the space of IFS that means so, so much to me. It's changed my personal life. It's changed so many of the lives of men that I work with. So thank you for being here. It's a privilege.
Thank you for inviting me. It's good to be with you.
Yeah, yeah. many of us, know, today we're centering this episode on, of course, your book, which we're to talk a lot more about your book that's coming out in April when this episode will launch. But we're talking about the purpose in painful emotion, especially with reference to addiction. And many of us are taught in kind of our current society to escape or suppress or fix or think positive.
our way out of painful emotions. But your work introduces a counterintuitive approach for a lot of us, which is to move toward every emotion. And this is the title of your new book, Move Toward, launching in April of 2026. You break this down into a very practical approach that anyone can use. So today we're going to talk about how this works, how anyone can do it, the basics of what your book teaches. And to start off, for those of you
For those people who don't know you and your work, I want you to just talk a bit more about the work you do, this book coming out, and the details there.
Jenna Riemersma (01:28.814)
I'd be glad to. So I'm a CSAT supervisor and teaching faculty for ITAP. So that's one of my clinical worlds, working with compulsive behavior and betrayal trauma. And I'm also a certified IFS therapist and IFS clinical consultant. So I get to live in the world of internal family systems. And it's a real joy of mine to bring those two worlds together.
And the gift of being able to do that is to invite people to take the hardest parts of themselves and move toward them rather than fighting against them. Because let's be real, fighting against the parts of ourselves that are feeling and doing the things that are the most difficult doesn't usually work and it often makes our struggles worse. And counter-intuitively when we move toward them,
With a little curiosity and compassion, we can get to know the important messages that our painful feelings and behaviors have for us. And it turns out, based on the work of Dr. Richard Schwartz, that that's a much more effective way to help them transform.
Yes, yes. I wondered, Jenna, if you can share a bit about your story and what led you here to do this work. Because I think it's a wonderful story and you shared more with me in our initial meeting, but it's so meaningful. Could you share some of that with people and what brought you here?
Well, I could get off in the weeds with a very long story. I will avoid that, but let's just say the short version is that I never intended to be a therapist or an author or anything in this sort of genre of life. I started out my professional life with a degree in public policy working on Capitol Hill. And I just kept having a sequence of events that led me
Jenna Riemersma (03:23.118)
It mid-life to start a whole new career trajectory and become a therapist and then quite reluctantly also to enter into book writing. And it's now of course such a joy of mine. I can't imagine doing anything else. I love it. But there was a convoluted series of events that got me here for sure.
Yes, and altogether you again, as we discussed before that book, especially when it comes to spiritualize your parts and just the Christian end of all this and understanding, you know, a lot of the kinds of toxic patterns that can go on with us emotionally and how these play into addiction as well. It was such a meaningful book to me. Very, very good. this
Again, this concept of move toward is something I use every day with my own emotions and with my clients. It's so, so good. So kind of opening into that in your experience, want to open up this conversation. What are the primary emotional patterns that keep us addicted? So my audience is primarily pornography, sex addiction. You're very familiar with this as a CSAT and having done this for many years.
Perhaps specifically when it comes to porn and also in general, what are these emotional patterns that keep us in this cycle of addiction?
Sure. Well, I think it's important to really start out by saying that obviously compulsive behavior of any type is complex and multifaceted. And anytime we're wanting to address compulsive behavior, we always want to be looking out for underlying diagnoses for any neurodifferences that might be present. And also acknowledge that particularly with the world of online compulsive behavior,
Jenna Riemersma (05:21.39)
content and the graphic nature of online content is such that the brain can very quickly develop a habitualized pattern of repetition seeking. So there's many things that we look at here, but the kind of high-level piece that I like to encourage people to be curious with is what we call in addiction work or betrayal trauma work, the trigger. So the trigger that comes up
and causes the part of us that wants to act out in a certain way to take over. And usually that trigger is a painful emotion, cognition, something along the lines of shame. I'm all alone. I'm powerless. There's no one here for me. If you really knew me, you wouldn't love me. Something's wrong with me. Those types of messages and feelings.
It's so helpful, I think, to realize that when those triggers take us over, they're not all of who we are. They're a part of us that's gotten activated in that moment for a particular reason. And usually we approach this trigger management, handling triggers with an approach of sort of fighting against it. So here's a way to push it down, squash it.
grin and bear it until we can get through, you know, the activation, force our mind to go somewhere else. And those all have their place and can be helpful in certain situations. But I like to really encourage us to turn fully toward whatever the trigger might be and really become curious about it. What is this part of me that holds these feelings and beliefs? And how long has this part of me been carrying that? And I wonder what this part
might want me to know. And it can be very helpful to think of it rather than as a battle we have to fight against ourselves as an invitation into a deeper relationship with ourselves. And it turns out that it's relationship, not control, that truly is transformational.
Jake Kastleman (07:33.102)
Let's talk more about this relationship rather than control, because I think it's so important. So tell people more about what mean when you say that.
So this is a beautiful phrase from CeaseSykes, who is a lead IFS trainer. And for folks who aren't familiar with IFS and are interested in knowing more about it and the way that it applies to addiction, I highly commend Cease's work to you. And I love this. Yes, she is wonderful. And I love this phrase that she uses, that it's about getting in relationship with the most difficult parts of ourselves, not getting in control of them.
And what that does is it completely reframes our approach to our inner struggles. And I think it's important always to underline, bold-face, italicize. That does not mean that what we're saying is that what these difficult parts of us are feeling or doing is okay or not problematic. It is definitely not. What it is saying is that when we...
these parts of ourselves with curiosity and compassion and connection is actually more effective in helping them transform and it tells us what messages they hold for us. And as long as we're fighting against them, we lose the opportunity to learn the gift of the message that they are bringing. And I think that's a really powerful shift in how we approach
triggers addiction, compulsive behavior, and recovery.
Jake Kastleman (09:12.49)
Yes, 100%. It's very true. And I know you were talking about triggers and I love the phrase triggers are trailheads. Right? That actually, that concept changed my life because I think there is this message out there that's very predominant, which is triggers are bad. Avoid triggers. Don't feel them. You want to get away from those because they will weaken you.
when in reality engaging with, if you know how, right? And you have some basics for the approach and a practice that works like move toward, then they can grow you. They're actually trail heads for deeper self-understanding and development. Very, very powerful. You actually, you also use the phrase in altogether you tore, well, I think it might be originally Richard Schwartz, but.
Absolutely.
Jake Kastleman (10:07.822)
Tormentors, like the tormentors, the things that we go through that are the torments in our lives are actually mentors for us.
Absolutely. That's a beautiful phrase coined by Dr. Richard Schwartz that it is exactly the things that are tormenting us that are actually an invitation to us to be mentored by what they have to teach us. And there's another wonderful phrase in IFS that just is so helpful. What's in the way is the way. What's in the way is the way.
What I find, and especially working in the field of addiction and compulsive behaviors, before I came to IFS is the approach that I would usually take. What I was trained to do is to try to eliminate or lock in the basement or shame and vilify the things that were in the way. And there were...
a lot of lost opportunities there to get to know what it was those things were trying to bring to our awareness and also why they keep coming up because when our approach is to fight against them, that might work for a little while, but if that's all that we do, they tend to fight back. And that's why we have, I think, such high rates of relapse and chronicity of behavior is because when we just try to lock a part of ourselves away in the basement,
It doesn't tend to appreciate that and it tends to burst out and take us over again, which then tends to activate our internal critic and the part of us that wants us to stop it. And we just get into this inner battle that's really, really painful and it increases our suffering rather than decreasing the behavior that we'd like to change.
Jake Kastleman (12:02.958)
Yes. Yeah, let's talk about more about this inner battle actually between this manager firefighter polarization as it is, right? Because this is one that early on in my recovery actually 11 years ago when I started to really make headway, I started noticing the perfectionism that I carried, the massive expectations I was always like this. I actually,
in my early twenties realized that my shoulders were up like this all the time. I didn't realize that from early. I don't know when I started doing it, probably as a kid, as a small child. And I realized I started to actually practice resting my shoulders and bringing them down. had so much tightness. So all that perfectionism, I realized as I worked on that, my cravings for addiction began decreasing and that I didn't have any
vocabulary for that at the time. had no education for that at the time. But I learned about that later, right, through multiple areas, including IFS is the biggest framework for me that really taught me. So let's discuss more about that.
I think you're making such an important point and I know we're speaking as though your listeners are very familiar with IFS. So I hope that's the case. I hope this is making sense as we use jargon like managers and firefighters.
talk about it a lot, but there's also people who are new, I'm sure. So we can kind of cover the basics of manager versus firefighter and then how these parts battle and what that looks like.
Jenna Riemersma (13:44.238)
Absolutely. So for people who can see the video portion of what we're doing, Internal Family Systems or IFS developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz is really a way of understanding ourselves that's quite different from how we typically view ourselves. So a way that we can typically view ourselves is, I am one thing. I am a monolith. And that has some advantages. So if a part of us is feeling or doing
something we tend to over identify with it. So we'll say, am anxious or I am a people pleaser or I am an addict. And I really do feel that sometimes that can be beneficial to people to really identify, especially for folks who resonate deeply with a 12 step approach to finally kind of utter these words, I am an addict. And it can be helpful because
you're in a room full of people who are similarly articulating that and it can really be de-shaming that you feel like, I'm not alone. Or even that the part of oneself that is engaged in the addictive behavior almost has a place at the table, almost as though we're speaking for it. So that's one way of viewing ourselves is that I am this one thing. And so if I'm engaged in a behavior that I don't like or I'm feeling a feeling that I don't like or that I do like,
then I am such a perfectionist. I'm a workaholic. That's often something people see as a badge of honor. It's the only addiction that people tend to like to identify with. either way, we see ourselves in that one way. IFS has a different way of helping us to understand ourselves. It's got a little bit more nuance, a little bit more complexity, and a lot of people find it helpful.
The idea being that who we truly are kind of would be represented by this heart. That at our core, at our essence, who we truly are is what IFS refers to as self with a capital S, kind of our authentic self. Spiritual traditions have different words for this, the God image or the Amago Dei, the Buddha nature, Atman, Chi, there's many ways to describe it, but it's that core essence that is
Jenna Riemersma (16:05.578)
loving, wise, centered, calm, clear-minded, courageous, compassionate, and it's always present. And then we have many different parts of ourselves that make up our unique personalities. And those parts of us are different person to person to person, because we all have different personalities, but they make up who we are. And let's just say that this little blue ball represents one part.
of this individual. And if I had lots and lots of hands, I'd have lots and lots of blue balls. And these parts of us are all positive. They all bring inherently positive attributes to our inner worlds. But what happens is when we go through life and difficult things occur, they become burdened as if a blanket is thrown over them. And so let's say that this part of us was the attribute of playfulness.
If we're shamed for playfulness and being messy, it may get covered over by a blanket or a burden of shame. And so now we don't have access to the playfulness, it's still there. But now when this part takes us over and gets triggered, so to speak, all we can feel is the shame. And so notice in IFS, this is a very different concept than I just am filled with so much shame versus a part of me
a good part of me has become burdened carrying shame and sometimes it gets triggered and takes me over. So that's kind of the idea of how parts become burdened and are vulnerable parts that get burdened with vulnerable feelings that tend to drive addictive tendencies like shame, powerlessness, worthlessness, brokenness, loneliness. Those are called exiles because everything in us wants to exile them.
And then we have parts that take on burdens or get covered with those blankets who are trying to help us never have to feel those exile feelings. One group does it proactively, they're called the managers because they try to manage our lives. The other group does it reactively, those are called firefighters because they're trying to come in and put out the fire. So rather than seeing ourselves as just one lump of humanity, one lump of human,
Jenna Riemersma (18:22.476)
we actually see we actually have quite a bit of dimensionality and that there are many different parts inside of us and those parts are often at war and it's the warring of those parts that causes our suffering. So that leads us to this concept that you described of polarization where the manager parts are working hard to help us not feel the pain of our exiles by doing things like people pleasing, overworking, perfectionism, the inner critic is in there.
are spiritualizer parts. Spiritualizer parts are good parts, trying to help us do it right spiritually. They're stuck in bad roles, meaning they're trying to do something they're not powerful enough or designed to do, using God language, God behaviors, churchy activities to make us good enough for God, to get us on over there closer to God.
you
Jenna Riemersma (19:18.754)
And that's distinct from this core self that we talked about that's our authentic connection to the divine. And that's in a very simplified sort of way of understanding that all parts of us also have an essence, a divine essence inside of them. And those parts tend to want us to get sober, do it right, be a good church person, work really hard, keep everything very, very, very shiny.
And the harder they work to suppress the pain of our exiles, the more the firefighters have to come in when the managers fail and the exiles flare up. And the managers, pardon me, the firefighters are the parts that come in with the compulsive behaviors. Looking at porn, drinking alcohol, compulsive shopping, binge eating, suicidal ideation, dissociating, blame shifting, all of those dynamics. And so,
What we tend to do is get our manager parts to try to get rid of the firefighters. And so the firefighter will take over, act out to try to soothe some shame or some sense of being alone. And then the critic will jump up or the spiritualizer and yell at the firefighter and try to get it to stop it. You know, I'm never gonna drink again. I'm never gonna look at that again. I'm never gonna do this again.
And round and round they go. And the more they battle, the more intense the battle gets. That is why addiction is described as an escalating, quote, disease, because every time that they go through that little battleground of managers activating exiles, which then activates the firefighters, which then activates the managers, all the parts get more and more burdened, which means they're carrying more and more pain.
which requires the managers and the firefighters to work harder. So our critic has to yell louder. The firefighter has to look at more porn or at more intense porn or act out with a person instead of a pixel and on and on it goes in this escalating battle. What we do in IFS is we actually say rather than trying to battle these parts of ourselves, the healing begins here in this
Jenna Riemersma (21:39.264)
authentic self, this connection to the greater divine. And when parts of us get triggered and take us over, rather than fighting them, we actually try to get to know them and develop a relationship with the authentic self. So the self can get curious about what's going on for them when they became burdened and can really help them to unburden and transform back to their fundamentally positive state. So it was a really
Quick overview of IFS and how complicated it can
It's well done for such a complex system, right? It's simple in ways, but it has a lot of complexity. Yes.
It really helps us to see that the parts of us that are trying to help us avoid pain by doing everything perfectly are actually a really important piece of the dynamic that is fueling the acting out. Because the acting out is polarized with the parts that are the inner critic and the ones that are trying to do it perfectly and the parts that are trying to get us to stop it, whatever it is. Quit eating all the Oreos or drinking all the wine or buying all the shoes.
And they're an important part of the equation to take into consideration.
Jake Kastleman (22:59.958)
Yes, I definitely want to get to this core concept of your book, Move Toward, because I think it's so powerful in breaking this down in just the three-step system. And we will do that. But here's a question that I have about what you've just shared, because I think that this will be powerful for people. The way I understand it, all three of these parts in roles, right, manager, firefighter, exile, all kind of develop at once.
But I would love to hear your perspective on that. The managers can activate exiles. In other words, exile part of me that carries these burdens of shame, of fear, of grief that are kind of unconscious, but also come out into the conscious. The managers will criticize or berate or say, why aren't you better? Stop being weak. And then the firefighters will come in and say, whoa, stop all that. We're going to take our foot off the gas and
We're just gonna check out here. How do you see, is it the exile that develops first? Is it the self criticizing? Kind of what does that dynamic look like for people?
That's a great question and I'll answer in an overly simplified way because there are certainly what we call legacy burdens that are handed down generationally that we're sort of born with. And those can be any of the three, managers, firefighters or exiles. But typically speaking, the tender parts of us that get wounded first with wounded vulnerabilities like shame, fear, aloneness, that sort of thing.
Those are the exiles. We don't need an inner critic or a firefighter to jump in and try to bring us relief unless there's some part of us holding pain. If we don't have shame, we don't need a critic yelling at us to make us do it better. If we don't have a part of us that feels alone or unwanted, we won't need a firefighter to jump in and try to soothe that. So...
Jenna Riemersma (25:08.526)
really it's the exile or what we call in the clinical world, this is the deeper trauma work. That if all we try to do is quote, get sober or stop it, and we don't look at what's driving it, we don't unburden or heal those exiles that are driving the compulsive behavior and the people pleasing, spiritualizing, perfectionism overworking. We really are.
missing the bigger picture and our chances for really prolonged sobriety and then recovery are really limited. So the exiles definitely tend to come first.
Yeah. And I think it's so powerful to say too, kind of going back to this concept of there is a divine essence in all parts. That was something that it has to be experienced, right? This is an experiential work. It's one thing to understand it conceptually, but I know for me, working with a couple of my primary parts that were involved with my addiction, one part trying to bring me comfort, another part trying to bring me excitement or pleasure, right? Through porn.
or through a couple of the other addictions I dealt with years ago as well. This is, one of them is like a peacemaker part that values comfort and bringing comfort both to myself and to others around me and developing that part. It's been such a, sometimes now it's my advisor, right? And hey, you got to slow down and you're going too fast. You're putting too much pressure on yourself.
And then that other part that was seeking the pleasure and the excitement is an adventurer that wants me to push myself to new limits and pursue dreams and do stuff that feels crazy because I've got to live and be excited. And I love these parts of me so much. there used to just be terrible internal battles in me for years. And I can still get back there, right? Sometimes when these parts move back into their roles, but more and more, they're just so helpful.
Jake Kastleman (27:16.822)
And so, so good. And to hear that they have that divine essence as well is something that I've come to experience myself. It's a powerful truth, powerful truth. So I'd love to get into, apologize if I'm stepping forward on this, but notice no need. Great framework, simple for anybody to do. Let's dive into that. This is shared in your book. So let's just.
going to what that means and how people can do this on a daily basis.
Yeah, well, one of the things I've noticed as a therapist who trains other therapists and has been in the field for a while now working with clients is that people who connect with this idea, which is most people that hear it, really want to be able to engage this, but it seems a little bit complicated, a little bit nebulous. Like, how do we exactly do this thing?
So my new book, Move Toward, I wrote to specifically teach us in really concrete ways. Here are three simple steps to help you to move toward these parts of yourself so that you can do exactly what you just talked about. If there's a part of you that has gotten stuck or burdened in an unhelpful role of looking at porn because it's trying to soothe,
When you get to know it and it unburdens you learn, this is a good part of me. That's actually it's divinely ordained nature is to help soothe and nurture me when I am out of balance or there's stress in my life. It's actually really important part to know how to listen to rather than fight against. So what we can do with this approach is simply when we are triggered.
Jenna Riemersma (29:07.17)
which means we no longer feel calm, clear-minded, connected, courageous, compassionate. We feel anxious, ashamed, alone. We feel like acting out. We feel dissociated. If we feel any of those qualities that wouldn't be representative of our authentic self, then we simply notice that and we notice it with some curiosity. One thing that I like to do is say, gosh, I'm noticing there's a part of me
that's present right now that's feeling some shame, that's carrying the burden of shame. And even just by saying that out loud and often just like I'm doing here in the video, I'll almost extend my hand in front of me to visually give the energy of that part of me kind of a place to go to help separate a little bit from it. And even just using that language, there's a part of me here that's feeling shame.
Or there's a part of me here that's feeling like behaving compulsively. There's a part of me here that's feeling like raging, blame shifting, eating all the cookies, buying all the shoes, whatever it might be. That in and of itself creates a little bit of this helpful separation. Not so that that part of us will go away, but so that we can separate enough to connect with who we truly are to begin to build relationship with it.
If it's completely taking us over and all we feel is the feelings of that part or the thoughts of that part, then we can't have a helpful relationship. There has to be me and a part to have a helpful relationship. So we notice it with some curiosity first. Then we literally ask the shame, the anxiety, the compulsive behavior, what do you want me to know? What do you want me to know about you? What do you want me to know about?
how you're trying to help me or why you got triggered just now or when in my life you first started feeling or doing this thing. And we just kind of ask and we don't try to figure out the answer. We just notice that, excuse me, the answer will kind of naturally emerge in our system often. We'll get a memory or a sense of something. And once we've kind of gotten a sense of whatever that part of us wants us to know,
Jenna Riemersma (31:31.938)
then we can just ask that general question, is there anything that you need from me? And that's important, from me, my authentic self, not from the world around me or my partner or my parents or any of that. Is there anything you need from me right now to feel a little more comforted, a little less activated? And that's a beautiful question because the behaviors that our parts are engaged in
They're seeking after things that aren't their actual needs. The actual need is not to look at the porn or eat the cookies or drink the wine or shop for the shoes. The actual need is comfort or excitement or connection. The need underneath it is the important thing to hear so that we can try to meet that need in a much more effective way. Because at the end of the day, the burdened attempt to meet that need
the burdened behavior is always trying to help and it always makes it worse. So if the need is connection and the burdened behavior is looking at porn, the desire is wonderful. It's for connection. The behavior is making that pain worse. Now, you know, looking at the porn and then you feel more alone and more unlovable afterwards. And so the true need is
is made worse by the burdened behavior.
Yeah, protectors always cause the problem that they're seeking to fix. Yes. Yeah, that is very, very aptly described and a powerful framework that I'm sure you go into far more detail in your book, Move Toward, but notice no need. Such a great framework for people to use on a daily basis. I wanted to move a little more into this concept of
Jake Kastleman (33:30.734)
We see this in a lot of ways with addiction, but self-sabotage. Self-sabotage, ultimately addiction is a self-sabotaging behavior, right? Is one lens to see it through, one component of it. Why do we get into this pattern of self-sabotage? Probably on a deeper level, why is that? And how can we start to come out of it using
Notice no need.
This is a really important question because there are so many reasons why parts of us may be self-sabotaging. And remember, any behavior that is self-sabotaging is a burdened behavior. It's not the fundamentally positive nature of that part of us. And there are so many different reasons why parts can become burdened, and we can't really know until we ask them, until we get into relationship with them.
And that's why noticing with some curiosity when that part that self-sabotaging takes over to get a little relational connection to it, and then finding out what it wants us to know and what it really needs will give us the answer to that question. So let me give you a hypothetical example that would be typical of a client that I might work with. A part that would, let's see, if we stay within the realm of addiction.
the self-sabotaging nature of pornography viewing, let's say, might emerge any time the primary relationship got too close. And in that case, it may be that what this part is afraid would happen is, if I get too intimate, too vulnerable in this relationship that matters so much to me, I'm ultimately going to get rejected and it's
Jenna Riemersma (35:27.576)
that's too painful of a reality. So I'm actually gonna sabotage it first before that perceived or feared reality can come to be. And in the line of thinking of this burdened part, it's better for me to sabotage this relationship before I'm seen and intimately known and rejected. And that could be one reason. Another completely different type of self-sabotage could be
Let's see someone who is wanting to Step out into the world more boldly. This would be kind of on that manager side of things where maybe a manager part is trying to push us to build a career or a business or get out there on social media or take this risk or write this book or start this podcast whatever it might be and a procrastinating part
may jump in or a part that jumps in in daydreams or organizes the closet instead of working on the business proposal. I mean, hypothetically, not that any of us would ever do that. But when in that case, when those parts come in and take over and we get to know them, we notice them with curiosity so we can get in relationship and then we get to know what's going on with them. Sometimes the fear is I have to sabotage that
big effort that you're working on because if you get out in the world, the world is going to hurt you. You're not going to succeed and that's going to be more painful than if I just get you distracted. So you can't ever try. So the positive intent underneath that self-sabotaging behavior is trying to limit the pain. And of course, how it's making it worse is then we're stuck in a loop.
of not living up to our desires, our potential, our calling, and it's actually making that pain worse. So there's so many different ways, those are just two small examples of ways that parts of us can self-sabotage. And until we get to know those parts and literally ask them and get a sense of how are you trying to help me? What are you afraid would happen if you didn't distract me from working on this project? If you didn't.
Jenna Riemersma (37:50.946)
take me over and make me act out in this way. The answer to that tells us the positive intention of that part. And once we know how the part is trying to help, we can help it to unburden, which is beyond the scope of this conversation, but we can help it to be restored to its naturally positive state. And a lot of times those parts that were self-sabotaging actually wanna be cheerleading us.
in their naturally positive state, they're designed to do and when we unburden them, what they will do for us is actually encourage us to wisely step out in those risks.
Yes. it's so good. And I think of two examples of this. One, you know, when it comes to relationships and feeling like we're getting too close, you know, maybe I'll get hurt, is another type of addiction, if you will, or another behavior that can be very destructive. Aggression or anger, right? I have found in my own life, and I know that there's men that I work with where anger will come in because
I am getting closer and there's things are actually going well in my relationship. And then a sabotaging part comes in to start some kind of drama or some kind of conflict. And then afterwards I'm just loaded with this shame and the sad like, Oh my gosh, things were going so well. And at times when I've taken time just to journal and do parts work or meditate upon, you know, what happened? I found those parts. It's like, Oh my gosh, I was getting closer.
to my wife and part of me was very afraid that that relationship we might end up getting too close and that might lead to a deeper hurt in the future, right? It would be reflective of relationships I had in my, you know, in my youth, right? Or in my childhood, right? Maybe that pain could be repeated. And I think one of the things that I didn't understand
Jake Kastleman (39:53.982)
Until doing IFS is just the emotional end of this, we can know this conceptually, but feeling through it, as we carry all this in our nervous system, we carry it in our mind. If I can get to know the part, like you're saying, notice it, understand it, know it, see what it needs and feel with it, right? I'll always say to men, I'll say, just let the part know I'm here, I'm listening, I welcome you.
I'm with you, right? And a lot of us aren't, especially as men, I think we're not taught the importance of just, you don't have to fix it. Cause guys will be like, okay, well, how do I fix it? You don't just be with it for a while and see if that shifts. And it'll only take, you know, a minute, maybe two. there's relaxing happening. And a big part of that is, this part of me feels seen now, right?
Yeah, it's such a powerful thing. Is there anything more that you have seen on that or have seen for people when it comes to this?
I love how you're really creating such a beautiful visual for us of the power of being with. Without an agenda to fix, figure it out, shine it up, make it work, get shiny. But just to be with this part of us exactly the way that it is. We're not saying what it's doing or feeling is good. It probably isn't. But...
offering it the gift of that relationship. And again, it all comes back to that healing presence of compassionate, non-judgmental relationship. And especially as men in our Western culture, our culture does not encourage men to even be aware of their emotions, let alone to be present with them. So this is really counterintuitive.
Jenna Riemersma (41:57.618)
deeply courageous when men kind of go into this realm that, it's like the space, the final frontier, only it's our internal space and it takes a very courageous Western man to really bring this curious attention inside and it is so profoundly healing and beautiful.
One of the other example I was thinking of was, you know, I had an experience fairly recently with kind of that procrastination behavior that you were talking about, right? Where I noticed I have a part of me that I called the achiever, that it's all about getting it done and task lists and ambitions, and I have goals and dreams and all this, right? This is kind of this part's idea of this is what's going to make me feel like I'm enough or like I'm worth it. Now, when that part...
is calmed and self-isolating, it can just be who it is, ambition and the goals and it loves all that, right? It's a wonderful part of me. But when I start to move into this part, taking the lead and its burden and it gets in this manager role, then often what'll have happen is that same kind of peacemaker that comfortable will come in on the firefighter end and start to sabotage what I'm doing, get me busy with little side quests and procrastinating and organizing things or
doing mundane tasks that feel more safe and familiar, right? And I engaged with these parts and I, cause I'm just like, okay, okay, hold on a second. What's, what is going on here? Cause I'm for the last 30 minutes I've been working on, but totally what's not important today. And I just need to take some time. Cause again, that, if that achievers in manager mode, it'll say just keep work, just work, just do the thing. And I'm like, okay, I got to take a minute.
And what I realized was in working with these parts, know, one, this achiever is just like on hyperdrive, just go, go, go, accomplish, accomplish. And then this peacemaker is like, that is a lot of pressure. And so I'm going to keep you busy with stuff that feels like less pressure. Yes. And really what that part was trying to get me to see is you're way hyped up. Like you are, you are.
Jake Kastleman (44:15.616)
on overdrive and I'm just trying to get you to slow down a little bit and pay attention and calm so that you can get more focused and feel more at ease. Then these parts can start to work together actually rather than working against each other. And that is a beautiful moment. know?
Yes, and this is such an important point that you make when we have a polarization like that where the one part is hyperachieve and the other part is distract and numb or do mundane things. We really have to notice no in need with both of them because often somewhere in what they are concerned would happen if they didn't push us to overachieve or to procrastinate.
is that the other one would take over. So if we get to know the overachieving one and find out what are you concerned would happen if you didn't push me so hard to do all the things, we might learn, I'm afraid you do absolutely nothing. That procrastinator would take over and you'd sit on the couch and eat potato chips for the rest of your life. And if we get to know the one that's procrastinating and we find out, you know, how are you trying to help me? What are you afraid would happen if you didn't take me over and make me procrastinate?
It usually says, I'm afraid that hyper crazy overachieving one would run you into the ground and you will be so exhausted. Your shoulders will never come out of your ears and your family will never see you. And like, that's not cool. And so they're really both, you know, this polarization. It's important to tend to both sides because if one steps away,
and we haven't worked with the other one, we can still be imbalanced just from a different perspective.
Jake Kastleman (46:07.05)
perspective. Yes, and in that process, you know, what I didn't share is some of the deeper work that you're pointing to, which is the fears and the feelings of shame, right? The fears are, you know, what, well, all the things that you shared, but also things that will come in for me is, that's often come in for me in this procrastination is, well, if you do keep pursuing these dreams and it does get bigger, who knows how much responsibility that might entail.
who knows how much bigger it might get. That occurred for me often with my pornography addiction that I had for years because it's like, if I stop this, well, then I might actually get better and I might actually start to heal and then my response, like my capacity is gonna grow. And a part of me is really worried about what that might look like because it's so, I mean, to bring it to the exile perspective, I would say that exile on me is just so far, I'm not capable of doing all this.
So there's a lot of internal work that needs to be done there layer by layer to get to understand these parts.
Yes, and what's incredibly profound to me is how many times both polarizations, thus each of the polarizations, are trying to protect the same exile. So the one that's trying to, just to go back to our previous example, work and achieve and prove and do all the things, maybe trying to protect, typically it might be an exile that feels I'm not enough.
So I have to try and achieve to prove that I'm enough. And this one who's trying to protect us by procrastinating and not doing it is also trying to protect, I'm not enough. It maybe fears, if I put myself out there, it's not gonna work. And then everybody will see I'm not enough. So it's better to just procrastinate and not get out there and let the whole world see that. And so often they're trying to protect the same vulnerability from two opposite sides.
Jenna Riemersma (48:08.066)
which is why that exile work, the work, the trauma healing work, so to speak, is so critical because we can't expect those parts to change or transform if we don't deal with what's driving them. It's why diets don't work and New Year's resolutions don't work and spending goals don't work. If we haven't driven,
down into the core of what's driving it, excuse me, if we haven't gone down to the core of what's driving it, just saying, well, I'm just going to stop doing that is really wildly ineffective.
Yeah, and we'll stay emotionally blocked until we begin to work through layers. that's, it's like, I'll just force myself to get it done. It just doesn't work because these parts are like, nope, nope, nope. You're not seeing us. You're not paying attention. You haven't gotten to know us. And so just takes sometimes a fairly simple work of, as you say, notice no need to just feel into it for a while, get to understand and block.
unblock a bit so the self can come back in to the lead and we can actually be who we want to be, do what we want to do and live according to our values and yeah, so, so good. Well, thank you so much for coming on, Jenna. Such a powerful conversation. I'm so excited for your book. I've pre-ordered it. I loved All Together You and I look forward to reading Move Toward. So I encourage everybody to get out.
buy the book at this point when this launches, it should be, I think, a week until your book launches. I think it's April 21st. Yeah.
Jenna Riemersma (49:52.846)
21st, absolutely. Yes. Yes, thank you. And for people who are thinking, gosh, this sounds great, but I don't know how to do this, not to fear that every chapter in the book is designed to walk you through it step by step. Each chapter has personal hands-on exercises and journaling or small group questions so that I just will hold your hand through every step of the process and you don't have to figure anything out.
yourself and I'm working on filming a video curriculum to accompany that just like I have for my All Together You book. So that if you'd like to have me guiding you through it and you know on demand on video that'll be available on my website as well and my website for people who can't spell my name which is most everyone is movetoward.com.
It's so funny how long I mispronounced your last name, Jenna. It's Re-mer-sma, correct? Yes. Re-mer-sma, yes.
Well said. I have friends who've been friends with me for 30 years who still can't say it correctly. So you're doing well.
Thank you. This is my biggest accomplishment yet. So that's awesome. Okay. So it was movetoward.com, correct?
Jenna Riemersma (51:13.474)
MoveTour.com or if you're really adventurous, JennaRiemersma.com. Yes.
So good. Well, thank you so much for your time, Jenna. Such a joy to have you on and I'm sure this will be really helpful to people.
Thank you so much for having me. It was great to be here.
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