- Investigate Internal Family Systems (IFS) concepts, steps, and techniques to broaden treatment intervention options.
- Theorize how IFS brings a non-pathological perspective of mental health disorders by translating common comorbidities into parts language.
- Evaluate how the IFS view that client symptoms and psychopathology are attempts to solve an emotional problem as it relates to case conceptualization.
- Analyze a clinical session to relate how IFS treatment strategies can improve treatment outcomes.
- Practice clinical IFS interventions to enhance effectiveness in sessions.
- Argue the benefits of applying IFS to alleviate clients’ trauma symptoms.
- Propose how to integrate the IFS model into your clinical practice.
- Assess the roles of client’s protective parts to inform treatment planning.
- Investigate an alternative view of symptoms and psychopathology, showing how client’s parts are trying to protect them from emotional pain and psychological pain.
- Determine how IFS translates common comorbidities into parts language, showing a non-pathological perspective of mental health disorders.
- Appraise whether IFS increases the therapist’s curious and compassionate self when working with clients who have trauma histories.
- Differentiate a therapeutic issue from a biological condition for better decision making in your clinical practice.
- Analyze how traditional attachment theory perspectives on trauma treatment differs from the IFS view as it relates to the clients’ internal relationship to their traumatic wounds.
- Determine if extreme symptoms of trauma are rooted in sympathetic activation or parasympathetic withdrawal as it relates to treatment planning.
- Demonstrate IFS specific therapeutic techniques that shift arousal and withdrawal to improve client level of functioning.
- Utilize neuroscience principles to inform therapeutic decisions in practice.
- Determine the neuroscientific factors behind hyper-aroused or blunted affect in clients.
- Integrate IFS with your current treatment approaches including EMDR, DBT, and Sensorimotor Psychotherapy.
- Differentiate IFS and traditional phase-oriented treatment in relation to accessing and treating traumatic wounds.
- Implement mindfulness-based meditation techniques to increase clients’ internal awareness of parts and inform treatment strategies.
Join us at the beautiful Sedona Mago
Retreat Center near Sedona, Arizona
where you’ll spend 5 days filled with IFS skills-building and personal transformation!
Leave revitalized with the confidence to fully utilize IFS with your clients as an effective treatment to treat complex trauma.
PLUS, earn up to 20 CE Hours!
where you’ll spend 5 days filled with IFS skills-building and personal transformation!
Leave revitalized with the confidence to fully utilize IFS with your clients as an effective treatment to treat complex trauma.
PLUS, earn up to 20 CE Hours!
IFS is an effective healing modality for trauma, and it’s also a paradigm for improving your overall therapeutic skills. To know yourself from the inside out…to be connected with, and take responsibility for, your own parts…as well as be open and compassionate toward clients, will remarkably transform your clinical practice.
Since 1992, I’ve worked in the field of trauma. I was fortunate to learn from world-renowned trauma expert Dr. Bessel van der Kolk. Under the direction of Dr. van der Kolk, I was exposed to many severely traumatized people and quickly learned traditional therapy was not effective. One decade later, I met Dr. Richard Schwartz, the founder of Internal Family Systems (IFS). That’s when I quickly discovered that IFS is one of the most popular, new, and effective evidence-based treatment techniques to heal emotional wounds — the wounds that prevent clients from moving forward in therapy.
Through IFS, I have healed my own trauma, helped my clients overcome their painful life experiences and taught countless therapists how to do the same. Over 5 days, I will immerse you in my proven techniques on how to:
- Apply IFS into your clinical practice step-by-step
- Maximize your clinical outcomes with trauma-informed IFS techniques rooted in neuroscience
- Successfully overcome even the most complex traumas and its common co-morbidities, including anxiety, depression, panic, insomnia, obsessive-compulsive behavior and more
Please come join me at the beautiful Sedona Mago Retreat Center. There will be additional time set aside to rest, rejuvenate, heal, connect with nature and get to know yourself and your parts better, so you can help your clients heal from the inside out.
I'm looking forward to seeing you in Sedona!
Frank G. Anderson
Treating Complex Trauma With IFS:
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
LIVE in Sedona, Arizona: Tuesday, June 20th - Saturday, June 24th
Single Occupancy: $2,599.00
Plus, earn up to 20 CE Hours — included in your tuition.
Click here for CE credit details
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Retreat Schedule
All Times Listed in Local Time
Tuesday, June 20, 2023
4:00-5:30 pm
Check-in
5:30-6:30 pm
Dinner
6:45-8:15 pm
Training & Experiential Activity*
Wednesday, June 21 - Friday, June 23, 2023
7:00-8:00 am
Breakfast
8:15 am-12:00 pm
Training*
12:00-1:00 pm
Lunch
1:00-5:30 pm
Restoration and Relaxation
5:30-6:30 pm
Dinner
6:45-8:15 pm
Training & Experiential Activity*
Saturday, June 24, 2023
7:00-8:00 am
Breakfast
8:00-10:45 am
Training*
11:00 am-1:00 pm
Check Out and Depart Retreat Center
*CE is awarded during these specified times
Optional yoga sessions will be offered (times to-be-determined) and will be led by assistant Wayne Baker, MA, LPC, RYT-500.
Who Should Attend?
Whether you are an experienced IFS therapist, a novice, or someone without any IFS training, this retreat will increase your clinical sophistication and confidence with IFS so you can treat the most complex traumas more effectively than ever before.
The target audience includes:
The target audience includes:
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Case Managers
- Nurses
- Mental Health Professionals
Treating Complex Trauma With IFS:
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
LIVE in Sedona, Arizona: Tuesday, June 20th - Saturday, June 24th
Single Occupancy: $2,599.00
Plus, earn up to 20 CE Hours — included in your tuition.
Click here for CE credit details
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Retreat Content
Treating the Various Types of Trauma
The Neurobiology of Trauma
How Neuroscience Informs Therapeutic Decisions
Differentiate Therapeutic Issues from Biological Conditions
Internal Family Systems (IFS) Model
- Acute trauma
- PTSD
- Complex or relational trauma
- Developmental and attachment traumas
- Extreme or dissociative trauma
The Neurobiology of Trauma
- Fear circuitry and the development of PTSD
- Extreme reactions and Autonomic Nervous System
- Rage to suicide and dissociation to shame
How Neuroscience Informs Therapeutic Decisions
- Top-down and bottom-up strategies rooted in neuroscience
- When it’s necessary to take over and be the “auxiliary brain” for your client
- When it’s best to slow things down, hand over control and work with the body
- Sensing vs. making sense of things
Differentiate Therapeutic Issues from Biological Conditions
- Intersection of biology and situations (“Real Mind-Body Medicine”)
- Therapist’s role in biology – When to refer and when to work it through
- Psychotherapy of psychopharmacology
Internal Family Systems (IFS) Model
- The origins, goals & assumptions
- A non-pathologizing, accelerated approach, rooted in neuroscience
- How IFS differs from phase-oriented treatment
- The importance of our protective responses
- Dealing with emotional overwhelm head-on
- Multiplicity of the mind – we all have parts
- Study limitations: small sample size, no control group
- Clinical considerations for clients experiencing abuse
The IFS Technique
Attachment Disorders and Relational Trauma
Dealing with the Extreme Reactions of Trauma
Manage Common Co-Morbidities
Integrate IFS into Your Treatment Approach
Experiential Activities
- Step 1: Identify the target symptom
- Step 2: Gain access to internal strengths & resources for healing
- Step 3: Find the fear and function of the symptom
- Step 4: Healing of traumatic wounds
Attachment Disorders and Relational Trauma
- IFS as internal attachment work
- Attachment styles as parts of the self
- Attachment trauma – the role of the therapist
- Heal relational wounds of childhood
- Client’s “Self” as the corrective object
- Work with preverbal trauma
Dealing with the Extreme Reactions of Trauma
- Talking directly to the symptom
- Introducing the part to the “Self”
- Dealing with the overwhelm – no need for building resources
- How to stay clear and calm while working with clients in extreme states
Manage Common Co-Morbidities
- Depression, panic attacks, substance abuse, eating disorders, ADD and OCD
- Comorbidities as protective responses to trauma
- Symptoms as “parts of the self”
Integrate IFS into Your Treatment Approach
- EMDR, DBT, Sensorimotor/SE and other methods
- Transformation vs. adaptation or rehabilitation
- Going beyond the cognitive (experiential therapies)
Experiential Activities
- Live demonstrations
- Meditations
- Practice breakouts
- Video examples
Treating Complex Trauma With IFS:
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
LIVE in Sedona, Arizona: Tuesday, June 20th - Saturday, June 24th
Single Occupancy: $2,599.00
Plus, earn up to 20 CE Hours — included in your tuition.
Click here for CE credit details
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Meet Your Lead Instructor
Frank Anderson, MD, completed his residency and was a clinical instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He is both a psychiatrist and psychotherapist and specializes in the treatment of trauma and dissociation. He is passionate about teaching brain-based psychotherapy and integrating current neuroscience knowledge with the IFS model of therapy.
Dr. Anderson is a lead trainer at the IFS Institute with Richard Schwartz and maintains a long affiliation with, and trains for, Bessel van der Kolk’s Trauma Center. He serves as an advisor to the International Association of Trauma Professionals (IATP) and was the former chair and director of the Foundation for Self-Leadership (now IFS Institute).
Dr. Anderson has lectured extensively on the Neurobiology of PTSD and Dissociation and wrote the chapter “Who’s Taking What” Connecting Neuroscience, Psychopharmacology and Internal Family Systems for Trauma in Internal Family Systems Therapy – New Dimensions. He co-authored a chapter on “What IFS Brings to Trauma Treatment in Innovations and Elaborations in Internal Family Systems Therapy” and recently co-authored Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual.
His most recent book, entitled Transcending Trauma: Healing Complex PTSD with Internal Family Systems was released on May 19, 2021.
What does Tuition Include?
- Learn how to utilize IFS to heal clients' complex trauma
- Training, demos and Q&As with an IFSI Lead Trainer
- Up to 20 CE Hours
- CE certificate & course manual
- Healing vortexes, meditation areas, labyrinth, & optional group yoga sessions
- Peaceful lake & trails – surrounded by magnificent red rock mountains
- Healthful pesco-vegetarian cuisine
- Lodging, with private bathrooms, for the duration of your stay
PLUS, your registration includes a copy of Dr. Anderson's book, Internal Family Systems Skills Training Manual
Using a non-pathologizing, accelerated approach – rooted in neuroscience – the IFS model applies inner resources and self-compassion for healing emotional wounding at its core. This new manual offers straight-forward explanations and illustrates a wide variety of applications, including step-by-step techniques, annotated case examples, unique meditations and downloadable exercises, worksheets.
Using a non-pathologizing, accelerated approach – rooted in neuroscience – the IFS model applies inner resources and self-compassion for healing emotional wounding at its core. This new manual offers straight-forward explanations and illustrates a wide variety of applications, including step-by-step techniques, annotated case examples, unique meditations and downloadable exercises, worksheets.
In response to the continually evolving global travel situation due to COVID-19, PESI has put in place a multi-faceted cancellation policy, allowing you to reserve your spot with peace of mind.
All attendees are advised to purchase travel insurance that includes a cancellation for any reason option to protect your travel plans amid this ongoing uncertainty. We also encourage you to monitor your local government travel advisories and regularly check this page for updates.
Event Cancellation Due to COVID-19
Should the event will be canceled, all registered attendees will be notified by PESI of the cancellation policy. Registered attendees will then have the choice of either:
- A full refund, or,
- Full credit toward any future PESI live event, On-Demand Digital Seminar, or Live Webinar
Travel Advisories
Please check with your local government to see what advisories are in place before you travel.
All flights are subject to the terms and conditions of your airline carrier’s policy travel plans.
Retreat Location
Sedona Mago Retreat
3500 E Bill Gray Road
Sedona, AZ 86336, USA
Phone: (928) 204-3391
Shuttle services are available from Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport to Sedona Mago. Please contact AZ Shuttle Select (623-200-2849) or Groome Transportation (928-350-8466) for more information and reservations. Note that transit times may take longer than the geographical distance from the airport. Please inquire regarding transit times with the shuttle services and plan flights accordingly. Most licensing boards require full attendance to the program to receive any credit.
Health & Safety
Attendees’ health and safety is a top priority for PESI & Sedona Mago Retreat Center. For the most up-to-date health and safety guidelines, click here.
Treating Complex Trauma With IFS:
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
Immersion Retreat on Resolving Complex Trauma with Internal Family Systems
LIVE in Sedona, Arizona: Tuesday, June 20th - Saturday, June 24th
Single Occupancy: $2,599.00
Plus, earn up to 20 CE Hours — included in your tuition.
Click here for CE credit details
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.
Don't see your state profession listed? Contact us. Credit hours may vary by board and profession.