Similarly, IFS errs on the side of having strong priors on the form/structure of the parts: exiles, firefighters and managers, and on the side of doing “family therapy” with them.
For what it’s worth, my experience is that while the written materials for IFS make a somewhat big deal out of the exile/firefighter/manager thing, people trained in IFS don’t give it that much attention when actually doing it. In practice, the categories aren’t very rigid and a part can take on properties of several different categories. I’d assume that most experienced facilitators would recognize this and just focus on understanding each part “as an individual”, without worrying about which category it might happen to fit in.
I guess this is what you already say in the last paragraph, but I’d characterize it more as “the formal protocols are the simplified training wheels version of the real thing” than as “skilled facilitators stop doing the real thing described in the protocols”. (Also not all IFS protocols even make all those distinctions, e.g. “the 6 Fs” only talks about a protector that has some fear.)
For what it’s worth, my experience is that while the written materials for IFS make a somewhat big deal out of the exile/firefighter/manager thing, people trained in IFS don’t give it that much attention when actually doing it. In practice, the categories aren’t very rigid and a part can take on properties of several different categories. I’d assume that most experienced facilitators would recognize this and just focus on understanding each part “as an individual”, without worrying about which category it might happen to fit in.
I guess this is what you already say in the last paragraph, but I’d characterize it more as “the formal protocols are the simplified training wheels version of the real thing” than as “skilled facilitators stop doing the real thing described in the protocols”. (Also not all IFS protocols even make all those distinctions, e.g. “the 6 Fs” only talks about a protector that has some fear.)