IFS-Informed Therapy
Transformative Healing Retreats
At Soul & Psyche, we offer intensive multi-day therapy retreats informed by Internal Family Systems theory that address the deeper roots of human suffering. Our evidence-based approach goes beyond symptom management to help you reconnect with your authentic Self and experience lasting transformation. Based in California, we offer a unique partnership built on 23 years of shared growth and our commitment to fostering deep inner work and authentic connection to the self.
Understanding Our IFS-Informed Approach
Our therapeutic work is deeply informed by Internal Family Systems theory, developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz. This revolutionary framework recognizes your psyche as containing multiple parts—each with positive intent and important roles in your emotional well-being. The Internal Family Systems model understands that within each person exists a core Self embodying essential qualities: Curiosity, Compassion, Calm, Clarity, Courage, Confidence, Creativity, and Connectedness.
We integrate IFS theoretical concepts into our comprehensive trauma treatment approach rather than practicing Internal Family Systems as a standalone modality. This allows us to honor the wisdom of the IFS model while utilizing our specialized training in proven therapeutic modalities.
The Internal Family Systems framework identifies three types of parts within your internal system:
Manager Parts work tirelessly to keep you safe by controlling your environment and managing how others perceive you. While their intentions show positive intent, these parts can sometimes prevent you from accessing your core Self and authentic expression.
Exile Parts carry your deepest wounds, unmet needs, and painful emotions. These vulnerable parts often hold traumatic memories from childhood neglect, verbal abuse, physical abuse, or other forms of harm and require compassionate attention to heal.
Firefighter Parts emerge when exile parts threaten to surface, using immediate strategies to distract from or numb emotional pain. These protective mechanisms provide temporary relief from distress while avoiding deeper healing work.
Our goal is to help you achieve Self leadership, where your core Self guides your internal system rather than being overwhelmed by protective parts, through our specialized therapeutic modalities.
Our Comprehensive Therapeutic Modalities
Multi-Day Intensive Therapy Retreats
We offer trauma treatment through intensive multi-day retreats rather than traditional weekly sessions. This approach allows for sustained focus that accelerates healing and creates lasting transformation. Our retreat format enables you to step away from daily distractions and fully immerse yourself in the healing process, incorporating IFS theoretical concepts throughout your therapeutic work.
Evidence-Based Therapeutic Approaches
Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing (EMDR): We utilize EMDR as a primary modality for trauma treatment, informed by IFS theory to understand the different parts that carry traumatic experiences. This integration makes processing safer and more effective by honoring the protective and wounded parts within your system.
Ego State Therapy and IFS theory: Our practice combines Ego State Therapy with Internal Family Systems theoretical framework, providing multiple pathways for understanding and healing different parts of your psyche. This approach is particularly effective for those who have experienced neglect, verbal abuse, or physical abuse.
Image Transformation Therapy (ImTT): We integrate ImTT into our trauma treatment, allowing different parts to release burdens without intense re-experiencing of traumatic events. Informed by IFS theory, this approach transforms how painful memories are stored, often resulting in profound relief from shame, self-worth issues, and esteem problems.
Trauma Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST): Our Level III TIST training allows us to work safely with complex trauma while incorporating IFS theoretical understanding. This ensures that vulnerable parts feel supported throughout the healing process, creating optimal conditions for lasting transformation.
Who Benefits from Our IFS-Informed Therapy
Individuals Ready for Deep Healing Work
Our IFS-informed approach serves those ready to engage in deep healing work and transformation. You may be carrying persistent sadness or anxiety, feeling trapped by emotional pain that lingers despite previous therapeutic efforts. Many of our clients have experienced neglect, abuse, or betrayal that has contributed to shame, self-worth issues, and emotional exhaustion.
We welcome individuals from all backgrounds who are ready to move beyond coping strategies toward genuine healing. Whether you're dealing with childhood trauma, professional burnout, compassion fatigue, hypervigilance, or deep loneliness, our approach addresses the underlying wounds that contribute to these patterns.
Those Seeking Authentic Self-Expression
We work with individuals who have lost touch with their authentic selves, often having spent years adapting to others' expectations. Through our IFS-informed trauma treatment, these individuals often rediscover buried aspects—their creativity, spontaneity, capacity for joy, and natural wisdom.
Our approach is particularly effective for those experiencing burnout in helping professions, where compassion fatigue and hypervigilance may have developed as protective mechanisms. We help dedicated individuals reconnect with their core Self while maintaining their ability to serve others from authentic strength rather than depletion.
Individuals with Established Sobriety Seeking Deeper Work
For those who have achieved stability in their recovery journey (typically 12+ months of sobriety), our trauma-focused approach addresses underlying emotional pain, shame, and unresolved trauma that may have contributed to substance use patterns. Rather than focusing on addiction treatment specifically, we concentrate on healing deeper wounds through our specialized therapeutic modalities informed by IFS theory.
Our expertise comes from extensive trauma work rather than addiction-specific training, allowing us to support your continued growth in a way that honors both your recovery journey and your readiness for deeper psychological healing.
Conditions We Address Through Our IFS-Informed Approach
Anxiety: We help you understand the Manager and Firefighter parts that create anxious responses, using our therapeutic modalities to develop Self leadership and manage protective mechanisms while addressing underlying shame and self-worth issues.
Depression: Rather than treating symptoms alone, we explore Exile parts carrying pain and protective mechanisms contributing to depressive patterns, often rooted in neglect, verbal abuse, or other early wounds, through our evidence-based therapeutic approaches.
Post-Traumatic Stress: Our integrated approach combining EMDR, TIST, and other modalities with IFS theoretical understanding provides comprehensive trauma treatment addressing both psychological and physiological aspects of post-traumatic stress.
Spiritual Abuse: We offer specialized support for those who have experienced harm in religious or spiritual contexts, using our therapeutic modalities to heal wounded parts and protective mechanisms that developed in response to these betrayals.
Professional Burnout and Compassion Fatigue: Our approach addresses underlying dynamics contributing to professional exhaustion, helping individuals reconnect with authentic motivation while developing healthier boundaries through trauma-informed therapeutic work.
Our Therapeutic Process
Simple Consultation and Intake
Your journey begins by booking a consultation call with our intake coordinator. They will answer your questions and guide you to who is most appropriate for your needs. You'll then speak with one of us to determine if an hourly format or retreat fits your needs and schedule a time to move forward.
What to Expect During Your Retreat
Day One: Establishing trusting relationships, sharing your life experience and goals, and developing safety so you're ready to move forward with our IFS-informed therapeutic work.
Intensive Processing Days: Using the most effective trauma processing modalities to clear traumatic memories and help you move forward. We integrate EMDR, Image Transformation Therapy, and Trauma Informed Stabilization Treatment, all informed by IFS theoretical understanding of your internal parts.
Integration and Closure: Ensuring you can take your newfound ease and insights into daily life with tools for understanding your internal system and maintaining connection to your authentic Self.
Beyond Symptom Management
At the heart of our practice is offering transformative psychological treatments that go beyond symptom management to address deeper roots of human suffering. Rather than simply alleviating surface-level expressions like depression and anxiety, we uncover and heal underlying wounds and unmet needs that give rise to these symptoms through our specialized therapeutic modalities.
What Makes Our Approach Different
IFS-Informed Understanding
Our therapeutic work is enhanced by Internal Family Systems theoretical understanding, allowing us to recognize and work with the different parts of your psyche while utilizing proven therapeutic modalities. This integration provides a comprehensive framework for understanding your internal dynamics while delivering effective trauma treatment.
Journey of Self-Discovery
Central to our approach is guiding clients on a journey of self-discovery, helping them realize their True Self through evidence-based therapeutic work. This includes supporting clients ready to know and integrate often unacknowledged shadow aspects—the parts that cling to control and resist vulnerability.
Empowering Lasting Change
By fostering deep inner work and authentic connection to the self through our specialized modalities, our practice empowers lasting change, greater freedom, and more meaningful, conscious life. We recognize that true healing involves not just symptom relief but fundamental transformation in how you relate to yourself and others.
Our Unique Partnership and Expertise
A Foundation Built on 23 Years of Shared Growth
The foundation of our work extends beyond our clinical expertise to our 23-year relationship—a partnership that has weathered seasons of growth, held space for each other's evolution, and deepened our capacity to hold space for others. This enduring professional bond allows us to offer something truly unique in trauma treatment: a depth of collaboration and mutual understanding that enriches every aspect of our therapeutic work.
Dr. Jordan Hamilton's Multifaceted Background
Dr. Jordan Hamilton's psychology practice is uniquely shaped by a professional journey bridging art, business, and deep psychological inquiry. With a master's degree in theatre arts from the University of Michigan and experience in Shakespearean theatre, he brings creative and empathic presence to his trauma treatment work. His business background as Vice President of a national investment firm provided insight into leadership and the psychological demands of success.
Earning his Doctorate in Clinical Psychology in 1993 with a dissertation focused on intimacy and bonding in men's groups, Dr. Hamilton became a pioneer in the men's healing movement. He integrates his EMDR training (completed in 1997) with artistic sensibility and strategic acumen. Dr. Hamilton is dedicated to helping his clients be their best selves, supporting individuals ready for deep healing work regardless of their background. He also provides spiritual direction services, offering additional support for those seeking to integrate psychological healing with spiritual growth.
Kimberly Sanders' Comprehensive Experience
Kimberly Sanders brings over 30 years of clinical, research, and global service experience. From working at Camarillo State Hospital to contributing to groundbreaking research on genetic alcoholism at UCLA's Neuropsychiatric Institute, her path has been dedicated to healing across diverse settings.
Originally certified in EMDR in 1991, Kimberly is a Level III Trauma Informed Stabilization practitioner trained directly by Dr. Janina Fisher. She integrates somatic healing through over 700 hours of yoga teacher training and brings spiritual dimensions through certification in the Global Mystics program. Graduating cum laude from Pepperdine, she brings a unique synthesis of clinical expertise, embodied practice, and heartfelt connection to our IFS-informed approach.
Taking Your Next Step Toward Healing
Ready for Deep Transformation?
If you're carrying persistent emotional pain that resists other forms of help, if you're ready to move beyond coping strategies to actual transformation, if you long for deeper peace and freedom—our IFS-informed trauma treatment might be your path forward.
Our approach serves individuals ready to engage courageously with their internal system, willing to approach wounds with curiosity rather than avoidance, and committed to the profound work of reconnecting with their authentic Self. We welcome people from all backgrounds who are ready for this deeper healing work.
California-Based Practice
We are located in California and serve clients throughout the state and beyond. Our intensive retreat format works particularly well for those traveling from other locations, allowing for comprehensive trauma treatment without requiring multiple trips. For English-speaking expatriates in the European Union seeking culturally familiar therapeutic support, we encourage you to reach out during consultation to discuss possibilities.
Begin Your Journey Today
We believe that your willingness to explore healing possibilities is already evidence of your courage and commitment to emotional well-being. Contact us today to book your consultation call with our intake coordinator. We'll answer your questions, address your concerns, and help you determine whether our intensive retreat approach aligns with your healing goals.
Ready to begin your healing journey with our IFS-informed therapeutic approach? Contact Soul & Psyche today to schedule your consultation and take the first step toward lasting transformation through our unique partnership approach to healing.