Transforming Shame with Parts Work: The Self-Love Triangle
What if your inner critic, your shame, and your perfectionism are all working together in secret? In this episode, John Clarke sits down with Jessica Fern and David Cooley, authors of Transforming the Shame Triangle: From Shame to Love Using Parts Work, to explore the unconscious internal system that keeps us stuck—and how to break free. Whether you're a therapist, coach, or someone doing deep inner work, this conversation introduces a powerful IFS-inspired framework for turning shame into compassion and healing from the inside out.
Key Takeaways:
Why shame is rarely just one part—and how inner critics, shame, and escapers work in a triangle
How to transform the inner critic into an inner coach and move toward self-led healing
The hidden connection between shame and “success”—and why high-functioning clients often stay stuck
👤 Guests: Jessica Fern & David Cooley
Jessica Fern is a therapist, certified trauma professional, and trained IFS practitioner with 25+ years of experience across somatic, narrative, and psychospiritual healing modalities. She's the internationally recognized author of Polysecure, The Polysecure Workbook, and Polywise. Through her international private practice, she helps clients break free from trauma, insecure attachment, and reactive relational patterns.
🌐 Learn more: JessicaFern.com
📧 Contact: connect@jessicafern.com
📸 Instagram: @jessicafern411
David Cooley is a restorative justice facilitator, cultural broker, and creator of the Restorative Relationship Conversations model. He works with LGBTQ+ and non-monogamous partnerships through a trauma-informed, attachment-based lens—integrating narrative theory, somatic work, and mindfulness.
🌐 Learn more: RestorativeRelationship.com
📸 Instagram: @rrconversations
📖 Their new book: Transforming the Shame Triangle — available wherever books are sold.
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Jessica Fern: [00:00:00] The end result, so to speak, is the self-love triangle, which we can talk to second, but how we first get there just dialoguing with these parts. We need to have self access and so many people try to work on their inner critic or tune into their shame or work on procrastination or perfectionism from just other managing parts, and it doesn't work.
John Clarke: Going Inside is a podcast on a mission to help people heal from trauma and reconnect with their authentic self. Join me trauma therapist John Clarke for guest interviews, real life therapy sessions, and soothing guided meditations. Whether you're navigating your own trauma, helping others heal from trauma, or simply yearning for a deeper understanding of yourself, going inside is your companion on the path to healing and self-discovery.
Download free guided meditations and apply to work with me one-on-one at johnclarketherapy.com. Thanks for being here. Let's dive in.
All right. Excited to introduce my guests for today. Um, I'm always excited when I have, um, [00:01:00] multiple guests and in this case, uh, authors of a new book that just came out last week, transforming The Shame Triangle From Shame to Love Using Parts Work. Jessica Fern and David Cooley. Thank you all so much for being here.
Um, and. I wondered if I could just have each of you kind of introduce yourselves and talk a bit about your story and your background, uh, and especially as it relates to this book. And then we'll get into what the book is about and some of the core concepts. So, um, yeah, Jessica, you were here not long ago.
Maybe we'll start with you and go to, and then go to David.
Jessica Fern: Yeah, great. So people might have listened to our episode, but I've been on before. Um, I'm a therapist and an author and you interviewed me about Poly Secure and then, um, that was a book about trauma and non-monogamy and attachment theory. And then Dave and I wrote Poly Wise Together.
And then this is our, our newest book, which is not about relationships between external people, but the internal [00:02:00] parts dynamic.
David Cooley: Great. Yeah. I'm David Cooley, and as Jessica said, the co-author of her second book. My first book was Polly Wise, and I'm a restorative justice facilitator by trade, and what I've done is sort of created my own model of restorative work for intimate partnerships, and so facilitating a space for clients that come to me with interpersonal issues and really applying that restorative lens.
To that process. Mm-hmm.
John Clarke: Wonderful. I'm very curious how the, uh, go ahead Jessica.
Jessica Fern: I was gonna say, it's may be nice to say our relationship to each other as well. 'cause it's a unique one. Um, we met back in 2002 at massage school in California. Neither of us do massage anymore. Oh. Um, but we have been married, we have a son together, we got divorced.
Um, [00:03:00] and we co-author books together and are sort of. Creative professional partners and still live in a family raising our son. Yeah. So we've had many iterations over these last, uh, 23 years.
John Clarke: Yeah. Well, the therapist in me has to ask, what was it like to write this book together? Considering all these iterations of your, your own relationship with one.
David Cooley: Yeah, I think because it's our second book written together, we've gotten into a stride. We've learned a lot about each other and how we work, but I think one of the strongest elements of our relationship has always been sort of the intellectual, and we really stimulate each other a lot, and it's a place that we love to connect.
Language is both really important. To both of us and yeah, I think being excited about ideas because there's so much crossover in the work that we do in the world. It just feels like a really fluid and. Relatively easy process. You know, writing a book's not easy, but [00:04:00] working together and collaborating really feels pretty harmonious.
Jessica Fern: Yeah. Even when we hit bumps, um, like one of us is struggling with something or struggling to access a certain voice that we want for a certain section, Dave shares a story in the book about, um, the struggling with sort of biographical parts of the book and, and so there's a real. Support that's there too because of, you know, what our relationship is and has been where we can actually like, you know, help be coaches and therapists to each other to work through it.
John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
Jessica Fern: Yeah.
John Clarke: Tell me about, um, the inspiration for this book.
David Cooley: Yeah. This inspiration really came from an idea that. Jessica had, um, that's born out of again, our respective work, but she came to me and was suggesting this as a real sort of clarity that she was distilling in her work with [00:05:00] clients, specifically doing parts work and seeing how there was this real constellation of parts working in conjunction with shame.
You know, that when work was stalling out. It wasn't just one part. There was always this influence that was influencing the way that shame showed up. And when she started to recognize the interplay between the inner critic shame and these escaper parts, which we'll elaborate a little bit more on in just a moment, it really felt like the linchpin or the cornerstone of a lot of.
Places where people have problems moving forward in their own work. So when she started to talk to me about it, I was already thinking about shame as one of the big obstacles to people doing repair work successfully. So much of what really hinders people getting into a state of accountability or vulnerability is shame.
And I was really wanting [00:06:00] something specific and detailed to help people get through their own shame before then being able to really hold space for the feedback around impact of behavior in their interpersonal relationships, especially when there's an attachment, um, based relationship at play.
Jessica Fern: Mm-hmm.
David Cooley: So for me, it was a no brainer when she was naming it with this level of specificity. It felt really inspired. And as we talked about it and developed the idea more, it just became yeah, a really exciting possibility.
John Clarke: Wonderful. Yeah. Maybe you all can, um, set things up a bit here with, uh, so chapter one is the drama triangle, and then chapter two, you get into the shame triangle.
And I thought those were both very concrete ways of, uh, illustrating. Shame and how it happens and, and kind of the underpinnings of it, which helps us to kind of zoom out and go, what is this thing that I'm feeling [00:07:00] or this thing that happens in therapy? Or when my partner says, Hey, can we talk? Or your boss says, Hey, can we talk?
You know, or I have some feedback for you, or why the hell do you always load the dishwasher that way, or whatever. Um, so yeah, maybe you all can unpack those kind of core concepts a bit.
David Cooley: Yeah, absolutely. I can start with a drama triangle and you know, I love that lead in because I think it's, you're talking about the way that we're primed to have a negative or painful or adversarial response to something that's really an important moment between people.
Yeah, right. I'm wanting to give you feedback about something that's not working in our relationship and what unfortunately we're conditioned to do is respond in a way that sets us up for failure. Right. And so if we think about the drama triangle, for me doing conflict work, this is one of the most efficient, elegant, I think, accurate models to describe the way that we fall into these kind of preset patterns with people when things feel [00:08:00] hard, interally, you know?
And essentially what happens is. You know, two or more people fall into one or three roles. There's someone who's labeled, kind of stuck in the role of perpetrator, right? The person who's done quote unquote wrong or harm. Then there's the person who's the victim of that, and that's the the role who's subject to the wrongdoer, and then the person who swoops in, even if it's just another part of ourselves, the rescuer.
Right who comes and tries to fix in a very codependent way the situation, you know, by either scolding or chiding the perpetrator and trying to quote unquote save the victim. And so neither point along this triangle is really a successful place to start conflict resolution. And so we're really wanting to make ourselves aware if we're in one of these roles.
We need to figure out how do we step out of that and come into a more powered, empowered [00:09:00] relationship to the dynamic. Right? And so that leads us into the Shame Triangle, which is an internalized version essentially of this drama triangle model.
Jessica Fern: Yeah, and that's what I was queuing into. I, I love the drama triangle. Um, I have a degree in conflict resolution, so it was coming through a lot there. But when I was working with couples, it was like, oh, this is not just what we think of as big conflicts on the international stage. This is how you blow the dishwasher kind of content, you know?
Or. Or the way that we bicker or snap or, you know, try to rescue our each other and over function, under function, all of that. Um, but then working with people more individually, seeing that what we kept getting in the way was this internalized drama triangle. So we have that persecutor, which internalizes the inner critic.[00:10:00]
So that's that voice we have in our heads that's beating ourselves up and saying, what's wrong with you? How could you, you shouldn't have. Yep. You know, and it's usually in second person, which is interesting. It's pointing the finger, you know? Yeah. And then our inner victim is what we're calling shame or shame parts.
Shame with a capital S. Um, not just the feeling, but a part of shame. That's. Is this part that here's the inner critic and says, you're right, I am broken. I'm not enough, or I'm too much. There's something wrong with me. So it's a first person, totalizing essentializing of who we fundamentally are. Not the behaviors I just did, but who I'm fundamentally floor flawed or unworthy.
Yep. Just that dynamic's enough to feel really intense inside. And so our rescuers are our escapers, which are usually several different parts of us that want [00:11:00] to kind of mute the inner critic and stop the feelings of shame and deflation. And we can do that in different ways, like over functioning, perfecting, over, caretaking, achieving, or we can do it through under functioning, zoning out, scrolling too much, streaming too much, or we can do it through being aggressive, whether that's to ourselves like self harm or aggressive to others, where we become that persecutor or outer critic now onto someone else so that I don't have to hear my own inner critic.
John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah, this is great. Um, uh, you know. Uh, coming from, in my case, a psychology background, I think about how we got here and understanding things like conflict or defensiveness or even the, for an idea of like an ego defense. Mm-hmm. And if we are defensive, like who or what are we defending? Um, and of course now I operate like primarily from an IFS perspective, so I have, you know, kind of a new [00:12:00] version of that.
But, um. Even if you get into a conversation where you can see that your opinion is about to be challenged, um, something changes. And we kind of get ready for that. Um, and sometimes, and not to mention just the state of, I don't know, being alive in 2025 right now, like a lot of our parts are very quick to go there and go, I'm about to be challenged.
In other words, I'm about to be seen as wrong or dumb or less than or whatever. And it's off to the races, right? So yeah.
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David Cooley: Yeah, and I think, I think one of the things that you're signaling too, that you know, we address in the book, and that feels really foundational in the work that I'm doing with clients, is queuing people into the way that as human beings, we have nervous systems.
And those nervous systems are constantly scanning our inter relational environment for threats. And so these threats to opinions, right, are essentially threats to ego. Register in our organism as if they were literal survival threats.
Jessica Fern: Yeah.
David Cooley: Um, and I think we're still learning how to sensitize ourselves to that.
Um, so I think there's a way in which it can't be overstated. That influence of the nervous system on the way that we respond to, uh, even just emotional, intellectual conflict.
John Clarke: W yeah. We [00:14:00] demonize our feelings and, um. You know, there's a lot. We go to great links to avoid the physiological experience of a feeling, whether it's social anxiety at a party.
It's like, is it the party that I'm avoiding? Is it really the physiological experience of, mm-hmm. I'm feeling nervous and someone might notice I'm nervous. Right. Um, in the case of shame or, um, I often look at, uh, guilt and shame together. Guilt, like I did something bad. Shame, like I am bad and my badness is being witnessed.
Um, but a lot of times when clients are grappling with their guilt, um. I don't know. I think there's often just a lot of value in kind of going toward that guilt. Like, if I really did something wrong, it could be very valuable to learn from that. Right. Or even like I think about this as like a father of young children.
Like it's not always bad to sit in that a little bit and go, yeah, you're feeling really bad about that, that thing you did. Right. And that feeling is not necessarily something to be rescued from. Right. Exactly. And yet Exactly. A lot of us do that, whether it's with our kids or in [00:15:00] this case, like talking a lot about our partners and our relationships.
Yeah.
David Cooley: Yeah, and the trick to do that is it has to feel safe enough. That's to be with that physiological experience. And so it's so much depends on how we're socialized to relate to our own physiological responses to these things.
Jessica Fern: Yeah. And developmentally, many of us, even though we're biological adults or chronological adults, we didn't developmentally have that experience of the emotion being allowed and just accepted.
So we don't, we don't know how to do it.
John Clarke: Yeah, yeah, yeah. My, my experience is that a lot of times in a, um, when I'm working with like a, an adult client and they're. Talking about their, their, their partner. Oftentimes both partners feel like they are the problematic one.
Jessica Fern: Mm-hmm.
John Clarke: They're like equally blinded by that piece or that they feel they are more of like a burden to the other.
And sometimes bringing [00:16:00] that piece into the open, they're like shocked. Like, no, I'm the problem child. You know? So I'm curious how you all make sense of that and especially given this piece. 'cause I know you all talk about Yeah, the shame triangle and origins, which is really interesting here.
Jessica Fern: Yeah. Well, I think in some ways you're talking about like competing shame parts.
Like my part, my shame part is competitive with yours. Yep. Right. Yeah. Which, which in that case, that pairing will think we're both the problem. I think a lot of times though, the pairing I also see is you have someone who is more. Anchored in their shame part and someone who's more in their critical parts.
And so it's, you're the problem. And the other one's like, you're right, I am the problem. And there's that dynamic, which is also really difficult.
David Cooley: Yeah. Go ahead David. Yeah, I think one of the, the signature features of the shame part, you know, as we're defining it within the sort of model that we're proposing [00:17:00] with this book is that it's really the spinner of stories. The inner critic is really sort of just labeling the behavior and making an assignment of this is what the problem is, but it's that internalization of a story about who we are and what's fundamentally true.
And what I see is, I think you're rightly highlighting that for a lot of people, that's kind of one of the most. Terrifying or repugnant stories that we can imagine being true in a relationship that I'm the one who's really the problem here. Yeah. And if we see that and that becomes exposed right. It's, it's kind of an unbearable possibility.
John Clarke: Yeah.
Yeah, and it, go ahead Jessica.
Jessica Fern: And it feels like it's our own, like you were saying, you know, these two people who each think they're the problem. But the origins of this, you know, the shame triangle is more of a byproduct of some combination of either our direct [00:18:00] experiences with people actually criticizing us.
Whether that's overt or the subtle ways that people can sculpt child behavior. Um, but then the culture and society we live in that just very simply tells us certain people are better and certain people aren't. Certain people are worthy and certain people aren't.
John Clarke: Yeah.
Jessica Fern: And we learn that really quickly.
John Clarke: Well, yeah, absolutely. Right. And, and again, thinking about. I, I, I'm thinking all the time, of course, about my own kids and how, um, everything they're doing, especially when they're really little, which mine are, is like an experiment. Like, does this thing that I do get me more loving connection or less?
Jessica Fern: Mm-hmm.
John Clarke: Right? And I just see adults as no different, right? Everything is either like bids for connection or coming from parts that fear losing connection, whether it's I'm gonna be more shiny in my career. And there, then I'll get the love and keep the love. [00:19:00] Right. Um, and that, yeah. They also like, you know, we, we have extreme polarities in that, right.
You might have like this really overachieving part and then also this really active firefighter or, or whatever. Um, who also has to kind of like douse the flames when they're too much Right. Or when again, my, like, my badness gets witnessed, whether it's by my boss or my partner or my whomever. Yeah. Yeah.
Jessica Fern: Yeah. And I think that's some of the tragedy of the shame triangle, especially with these escaper parts that like, they might be doing great things in the world, or they might be wonderful caretakers or high achievers or busy bees that get stuff done, you know, um, very attentive, and yet it, it can still actually be a survival strategy that's not fully authentic and not fully actually mm-hmm.
Embodied and, you know, self-led. Yeah.
David Cooley: Yeah, there's sort of an interesting point that you were making earlier [00:20:00] about, you know, kids in that experimental phase of figuring out what's going to give me a sense of safety and connection relationally. And it really begs the question for me is what is authentic experience then?
Right. Other than a strategy, right? Yeah. To get in, uh. Need met an attachment, essentially an attachment need met.
John Clarke: That's right.
David Cooley: And so for me, it's a really compelling journey to start to develop a sense of self that lives kind of beyond just those. Can I get these needs met through this particular strategy?
So many of the strategies are shaped by what society says is acceptable or sort of what is going to get that need met to feel safe, secure, to feel good about yourself, but what's beyond that?
Yeah, and I think this is really where IFS gets super exciting to me, is inviting people into this new relationship [00:21:00] with a facet of being that potentially has never come onto the radar.
John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah, maybe we can talk more about that piece because, um, first of all, the book is, um, is very thorough and there's pieces that are both like, very kind of technical, which I love, but also very personal. And you all, you know, are quite, uh. Y Yeah, vivid with your own like personal illustrations, which I really appreciate.
Um, but of course when p when you set up kind of like what is the problem also people are like, okay, now help me fix the problem. Right. What's the solution? What's the solution? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So, uh, maybe talk, we can talk more about that piece. 'cause you offer lots of, um, ways to, to, to work with shame.
Jessica Fern: Yeah, I think we can talk about it in two ways. The the end result, so to speak, is the self-love triangle, which we can talk to second, but how we first get there just dialoguing with these [00:22:00] parts. We need to have self access. Um, you know, and so many people try to work on their inner critic or tune into their shame or work on procrastination or perfectionism from just other managing parts, and it doesn't work.
Yeah. And we kind of really do need, like big self to have this strength too. Holds this shame triangle 'cause it's so powerful. So I'm very proud. We have two chapters in the book on self 'cause Yeah, we're like, this is one of the hardest things for people and clients. Right. It's like the most important thing.
And yet it can be so hard just to talk about what is self. Yeah. And then how for people to access it. So one, one chapter is just devoted more in the traditional I-F-S-A-I-F-S way of here's what it is, and here's I think like 15 exercises to, to work with it, to experience it, to play with parts.
John Clarke: Yeah.
Jessica Fern: Um, and then,
John Clarke: yeah, [00:23:00] one, yeah, one that you offered in there, which I love is, uh.
Externalizing shame because part of why it feels like too much is 'cause we're it's too close. Yeah. We're so in it and in, in my experience, when we are having that fight with our partner or whomever a friend or whomever a sibling, um, we're in it and we're in it in an instant. Right. And a lot of times just the basic awareness, which you all talk about awareness as one of the solutions or like one, a path on the path, um, of working with shame is like noticing what it feels like.
When I'm blended with, with that shame part or one of these parts, or a multitude of these parts, right? All of a sudden if I'm like looking at that person and things are feeling kind of like foggy right, or tense, or my stomach is going like this, right? It's like it's a pretty good, uh, you know, indicator for me that I might be blended.
So I work with clients a lot around just that basic. Mind body connection, which you all talk a lot about and, and just noticing and sometimes just [00:24:00] noticing. Yeah. And letting that part know that you are here and can lead or can be the adult, you know, uh, self in this, uh, conversation or this meeting with your boss.
Sometimes the parts will unblend just from that. Just noticing and like letting the part know, but yeah.
David Cooley: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's one of the things that we're really excited in terms of. Illustrating the self and helping nuance, really, what does that look like? As you said, the, the chapter on self-centered model.
Helping people, because everyone I think relates to their own experience from these different centers differently. You know, some people really have more connection or sense of identity through the mind. Other people have a lot of connection to feelings and needs, but not so much to the somatic experience, you know?
And so we're really wanting to give people this multi-tiered way of feeling into. How do parts function? How do they operate [00:25:00] and what do each of those centers look like when you're really grounded in self energy? Yeah. How do things shift in a very embodied, experiential way versus just an intellectual exercise?
John Clarke: I, maybe we can, uh, go back a second. I meant to ask this because I'm personally very and professionally very interested in inner critics and mm-hmm. I think an inner critic is often like. One of the easiest kind of parts to get to know when you're introducing someone to a parts model. Yeah. Or like that voice that's like, dude, you suck and your podcast sucks and no one's gonna, it's like, okay, man.
Yeah, I hear you. You know that that could happen and that could mean loss of love and connection. You know, it's like we're pretty aware of that one. Right. And like, uh, but you all talk about Yeah, the inner critic and. So I guess my question is why and how is inner critic like such an integral player in this triangle and in this kind of dance of, of shame and um, and why is it important [00:26:00] to get to know the kind of origin story of critical parts?
Jessica Fern: Yeah, any of the parts can kick off the triangle, but it's usually the inner critic that is the one that is the loudest that we, like you said, we all kind of know if your teeth just wanna be general about parts work. People nod their head very quickly when you start to talk about that specific voice. So it really, so far seems like a pretty universal archetypal voice and experience that we have, and it's so damaging to be an inner inner bully.
Yeah, to speak to us that ourselves that way. Um, so since it usually is the one starting, what I found is that if we don't work with that one to start with, it just doesn't give shame any space to breathe. Right. And the Escapers are really doing their behaviors to stop the inner critic in the first place.
David Cooley: Yep.
Jessica Fern: Yeah. Or to stop, [00:27:00] obviously if there's outer criticism in our life that we're experiencing too. But
David Cooley: yeah, I think it's one of the easiest parts to link. To its source once and and help people conceptually recognize, oh, this is actually isn't something indicative or innate in you. This isn't something that actually reflects your identity or your personality.
You can really hear the way that this is a social. Construct that we've internalized. And so that's one of the things that we're really wanting people to understand is divesting yourself of a sense of responsibility for these parts and their activity is really powerful. Mm-hmm. And recognizing that as a self, as an individual, you were really the intersection of all of these narratives, just these concentric circles of meaning that we're swimming in constantly, like family, community, peer group.
Society at large, right? There's so many ways that these messagings about what's wrong with [00:28:00] us, quote unquote, or how we should be different fundamentally are just being, we're just inundated constantly with these messages. So I think it helps people start to make that link between, oh, that is something that I've heard.
I see where that comes from, and now I can start to externalize it with more and more consistency.
John Clarke: Mm-hmm. Yeah. How am I not enough? Um, or less deserving of loving connection. You could boil a lot down to, to that. I had, um, yeah, someone I was, uh, working with earlier today, they were talking about how, um, you know, this thing is happening where I take on too much in life and then I like have to tell people no, or tell 'em I can't hang out with you.
Um, and then the person's like, I hate that I'm. Doing that again, right? I hate that, that I'm in that cycle again. And my question was, what do you fear? It means that you're in this cycle again, right? Mm-hmm. Because it's the same [00:29:00] thing. If I'm working with a client who has relapsed, um, and if their goal is to like be sober, whatever that means to them, I'm less concerned.
At least initially about the fact that they relapsed and more about the story they have around it. And shame and addiction go hand in hand. I mean, it's just Yeah. Deeply, deeply rooted and insidious, right? And so, um, same thing if my client's like, my goal is to go to the gym more and this, and it's like, Hey, okay, how did it go last week?
And if it did, they didn't, didn't go well. Right? I'm very interested to hear. What that brings up, right? What's the story they have around the fact that they didn't go to the gym this week or whatever? Because that story is often like this insidious, um, cycle that they're in of taking them further into shame, which means they're less likely to try again or hit the reset button or go, oops, oh yeah, I'm in that thing again, where I take on too much.
So I, you know, have to set something aside. Yeah, I'm doing that thing again. Oops. There, there I'm biting my nails again. Yeah. And I'm trying to work on [00:30:00] biting them less. Just, just notice that, right?
David Cooley: Yeah. Right. Yeah. I like that. You know, there's a, there's a section in the book where we're really talking about how do parts organize their logic.
One of the ways to identify and, and strengthen or sensitize our perception of the way that parts work in us is to identify how they think, how they organize thought stories and beliefs. You know, one of the categories is black and white, all or nothing. So it's really interesting to think about human life in terms of success and failure, right?
And our own wellbeing, right? I either did or didn't do the behavior, and if I didn't, then I'm a failure. Yeah. And so it's the way that we've internalized that dualism. Yeah. And then it's such a rigid measure against which, yeah. Right. Our self worth is put against. And it's, if we can see that for what it is, we can start to expand our sense of, uh, what does wellbeing really mean [00:31:00] to me?
How does it
Jessica Fern: Yeah.
David Cooley: Sort of go beyond just that collapsed narrative of duality. Um, but if we're stuck there, it's really, it's hard to get another perspective.
John Clarke: We, we do have a need to put things into the binary and. I think some of that is like an evolutionary thing of like, is this a threat or a friend?
Mm-hmm. But even again, like my five-year-old, if she's watching a movie, the first thing she wants to know is like, is this a good guy or a bad guy?
Jessica Fern: Mm-hmm. The drama triangle. The drama triangle. Right.
John Clarke: We're kinda the same way again with like whoever in our lives is like, is this person bad or good? Right.
Or former or against me. Yeah. Friend or foe. Um, and then we're just in that battle, both in this case, internally and, and externally. Right. It's like, how open should I be? How open should my heart be to this person?
Jessica Fern: Yeah. And that way we have like, we're still in amoeba nervous system that just does like move towards or moves away.
Like expands or [00:32:00] contracts.
David Cooley: Yeah. Well I think there's also something in that. There's. For us, we really see this work as a genuine path towards deepening and expanding human consciousness. And I think, I think you're right in the sense that there's been an evolutionary preset. For our species to survive in.
That friend or foe was necessary shorthand for a long time for our survival, and now it seems like we're being invited to move beyond that, that that's now not enough and could actually be a deterrent to our continued sustainability and we need to learn how to work with. The uncertainty of gray area.
Yeah. Right. Not have this sort of, it's this or that thinking to really get to where we need to be. Um, and so to me that's a really compelling thing that I see. 'cause a lot of times it's easy to just fall into superlative thinking. I see this a ton in conflict.
Jessica Fern: Yeah.
David Cooley: You always, you never, or I always, I never.
[00:33:00] Right. And that's a, that's a dead giveaway or red flag. Oh, a part's active. My thinking is going back to these categorical limited frames, I'm probably in a part.
John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, zooming way out and going. Um, I, I really do think like, uh, our dwindling ability to be in nuance with one another. Mm-hmm. And to have different opinions, whether it's about politics or how you loaded the dishwasher.
That is like at risk of going instinct, and it's so much easier and more fun and efficient just to see something on Instagram and go, that person is bad.
Jessica Fern: Mm. You know?
John Clarke: And that's it. And it's, it feels really comfortable for whatever reason, for many reasons, to just arrive at some conclusion and go, that person's bad.
They always do this. Right? Or my partner always does this thing. Um. And I just think it's incredibly insidious and, and [00:34:00] dangerous. And I think so much, so much of that is this, uh, this dance and, uh, the drama triangle. Right. Um, yeah. Shame and protectors.
David Cooley: Yeah. And it's, it, the tragedy as we said before, is we're doing that to ourselves all the time.
Yeah. We're collapsing our own deep complex experience internally. Yeah. And making ourselves the bad, the bad one. Yeah.
John Clarke: And a lot of the conflict is this the external thing, bringing up the thing inside of me, right? Yeah. It's like when someone is like, you know what you, why are you making me feel this way?
Or making me feel guilty?
Jessica Fern: Yeah. Yeah. We can think of the shame triangle, like psychological autoimmunity. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Where this, you know, it's not an actual virus or illness that our immune system needs to effectively. Um, I had to relate to metabolize. Yeah. Becomes, yeah. It becomes an autoimmune psychological reaction inside.
Yeah.
John Clarke: Um, well, I'm really [00:35:00] excited for you all to bring this book into the world, as you mentioned before we hit record. Yeah. It just came out last week. So when this releases, it'll be about, uh, two weeks ago that it was released. But, um, yeah. Anything else for now that you feel like is missing from this conversation?
And then of course, like, um, yeah, how can people learn more and get their hands on the book?
Jessica Fern: Yeah, I think just to give people the teaser of what the transformation is, and so each of these parts transforms. So the inner critic transforms into an inner coach. We let people, you can name your own, but where it's still a part of us that is holding us to standards, but it's doing so with encouragement and support instead of us beating us down.
So it's actually a growth mindset instead of a fixed mindset. Our Escaper parts, um, and in their many varieties. Instead of they're ultimately turning away from ourself, they're turning away from the feelings and [00:36:00] experience of shame or wounded parts. And so our escapers transform into an inner nurture that is turning towards.
Instead, and then shame doesn't necessarily transform into another part. We distinguish it as just becoming our raw experience of what is, without the story of shame laid on top of it.
John Clarke: Great. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Anything else, David, on your end that you wanted to tell us in?
David Cooley: Yeah, I think just that, you know, it's really knowing that there's something practical on the other side. That it's not just the swirl of being stuck in the shame triangle and that this is really a, a powerful work that we've seen be extremely transformative in the lives of clients.
It's, it's been so interesting to apply this work and to see people rapidly start to experience their internal [00:37:00] relationship. Differently. I mean, it's, it's kind of an audacious claim in some ways that, you know, our inner voice can be different and that we can actually be our best ally instead of our worst enemy.
Mm-hmm. And so I'm, I'm really excited to share this book with people, a larger audience. I,
John Clarke: well, I'm, I'm kind of shocked that, um, I know people like Martha Sweezy has done a lot around shame, um, and shame and IFS, but like, I, I'm. Kind of shocked that it isn't a bigger part of the global conversation, even the conversation around among like coaches, helpers, therapists, because again, it's just so incredibly insidious and central to what we do.
And when you start kind of listening for shame and parts that hold shame, like you just hear it absolutely everywhere. Yeah. And a lot of times clients come in because they're in conflict with someone. Right. With themselves, with others. Right. And not thinking about, and working with shame is like missing kind of the whole, the whole thing.
So, [00:38:00] um, I guess part of it is like people, uh, don't even wanna talk about it to an extent. 'cause it can be shameful to talk about shame, but, uh Right. We're, we're doing something about it today on this podcast, so that
David Cooley: That's right.
Jessica Fern: That's right.
John Clarke: Yeah.
Jessica Fern: Yeah, and people can find the book, all the places you can find books in terms of, you know, online and yeah.
And our websites. My website is jessicafern.com.
David Cooley: Yeah, mine is restorativerelationship.com.
John Clarke: Excellent. We'll put links to everything in the show notes and description. Um, thank you both for being here and for your contribution. I'm really excited, like I said, for this book to get out there into the world and certainly we'll be recommending it to, to, to clients and practitioners alike.
So thank you all again and, um, uh, yeah, keep in touch and best of luck with, with the new book. Awesome. Thank you.
David Cooley: Thanks so much for having us.
John Clarke: You're so welcome. Keep in touch all.
Thanks for listening to another episode of Going Inside. [00:39:00] If you enjoyed this episode, please like and subscribe wherever you're listening or watching, and share your favorite episode with a friend. You can follow me on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok at johnclarketherapy and apply to work with me one-on-one at johnclarketherapy.com.
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