"I am out with lanterns looking for myself." — Emily Dickinson
The Power of Permission
Nothing returns without permission and until we understand the why.
What Does It Mean to "Call the Spirit Back"?
In the context of psychotherapy, calling the spirit back means:
- Reconnecting with exiled parts
- Reclaiming lost qualities of aliveness, contained in protectors and exiles alike
- Bringing parts and self energy back into the body
- Returning to a sense of coherence and inner unity
- Restoring the ability to feel without being overwhelmed
- Welcoming home the aspects of self that went into hiding for safety
When a painful event overwhelms the system, parts retreat because leaving was safer than staying. But these parts do not disappear. They wait — sometimes for decades — for conditions of safety, compassion, and presence that allow them to return.
Therapy is all about creating new conditions to allow for integration and recovery.
Befriend Protective Parts
Every part that we meet along the way holds a treasure, a piece of the puzzle and a chance for more inner connection and Self energy in the moving towards. Every time we attend to our selves like this we are calling something back in to connection.
The Gentle Homecoming of Exiled Parts
IFS offers a clear, compassionate pathway for reuniting with the parts of us that were forced to take refuge in the past. This is the beginning of a return, as we let go and grief moves. Grief is so magical and it is so healing. A great book for understanding the power of grief and how it is so essential in nourishing us and helping us to live, renew and heal from loss is The Wild Edge of Sorrow. I also talk about what it means to go to loss in my podcast episode 'Becoming real - IFS and healing times'.
Why Parts Return: Because Safety Grows Inside
A person cannot call the spirit back by willpower. The return happens naturally when:
- The Self is available
- The system is less polarised
- Protective parts trust the process
- The inner world feels safer than it used to
- The past is no longer re-enacted in the present
- Parts are known and connected to
When these conditions develop - which is the main work of therapy - parts that left long ago begin to sense, often on their own, that they can return. This is how healing happens: not by force, but by invitation but just as a natural process and over time.
The Gifts of a Returning Spirit
As parts come home, people rediscover experiences they thought they had lost forever:
- Joy that doesn't feel fragile
- A sense of balance and feeling grounded
- Energy that doesn't feel manic
- Stillness that doesn't feel empty
- Creativity unburdened by fear
- Emotional presence without overwhelm
- A sense of belonging within oneself
Many describe it as feeling "more me than I've ever felt." The body relaxes, the breath deepens, the eyes brighten. It is not dramatic; it is profound. This is what it feels like when the spirit — the essential self — begins to return.
Another way of seeing this is from an energetic perspective: in IFS you go to your parts, you befriend and support them, you set them free/help them to relax, you get energy from that experience and this helps the system to get 'inspired', or inspirit.
Space Emerges
Something has left and something must take its place in that space. After unburdening we always allow for time to integrate learnings and wishes for the future.
Hypnosis: Opening the Door to the Returning Self
Hypnosis supports this process by creating a relaxed, focused state where deeper layers of the psyche can surface safely. This is useful when we want to explore gifts and resources.
In hypnotic work, people can experience:
- Meeting younger parts in symbolic landscapes
- Support from guides
- Seeing the moment of separation
- Feeling the impulse to return
- Reconnecting with inner light, breath, warmth, or presence
- Integrating forgotten or suppressed strengths
- Integrating and exploring wishes and dreams for the future
- Getting into contact with parts along their timeline - especially the future resourced self
Hypnosis doesn't "bring spirit back" — it creates the inner quiet where parts feel safe enough to explore the unconscious life where much of spirit lives. And we always check for permission from protectors before we move further in this way. Resourcing like this can be incredibly helpful for systems that are shifting in really profound ways and need support from their future self.
Reconsolidating Memories and Remaking Pathways
This part of the healing process connects deeply with what we know of memory reconsolidation. In therapy we are always working with time and the experience of memory (our identities.) Memory is really the relationship between now and then. In therapy we are changing that relationship as we move to all these different experiences in time. We are changing the meaning of these experiences for the better as we get into contact with them, experience them with a level of separateness and attend to parts that were burdened in that time. We are prioritising contact with these dreamers inside, and reconnecting with the magical thinking of childhood, when we liberate them.
