Episode Overview

Title: How To Listen When Your Parts Speak (IFS Therapy + Ancestral Wisdom) with Tamala Floyd
Podcast: This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil
Date: January 5, 2026
Guest: Tamala Floyd – Psychotherapist, IFS lead trainer, consultant, author of Listening When Parts Speak

Theme:
Nicole and Tamala explore Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapy, focusing on how understanding and listening to our internal "parts"—the various facets of self like the critic, people-pleaser, and caretaker—can lead to healing and integration. Tamala shares the fundamentals of IFS, how our parts form and take on roles, and how ancestral wisdom can help us unburden inherited pain and reconnect with our true “Self.”

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Redefining "Woman's Work" and Hearing Our True Selves

• [01:15] Nicole sets the stage: modern women's work is about authenticity and rewriting old narratives, but being yourself is "really hard if you can't hear yourself."
• Key Insight: Many women struggle to access their true inner voice due to socialization, external expectations, and suppressing aspects of themselves.

“We've been conditioned to trust external experts over our own intuition. Hell, we've been taught to trust the idiot with the loudest voice in the room over our own inner knowing.”
— Nicole Kalil [02:40]

2. What Is Internal Family Systems (IFS)?

• [04:08] Tamala explains that IFS sees the mind as naturally multidimensional—not as a single unified entity, but as an internal system made up of distinct parts.
• Fragmentation is not pathological; each part serves a purpose, even if its methods are unhelpful.
• The goal is to know and understand our parts, not silence or erase them.

"What we understand now is the mind is actually made of parts. It's multidimensional. And that is not dysfunctional or broken in any way.”
— Tamala Floyd [04:25]

3. Examples of Common Parts

• [05:37] Tamala gives practical examples:
  • The Critic: Judges or berates us for what we did or didn’t do.
  • People Pleaser: Seeks approval and harmony at our own expense.
  • Caretaker: Assumes responsibility for others' wellbeing.
  • Wounded Parts: Hold beliefs like "not good enough"; often hidden for protection.

4. Why Listening to Our Parts Is Healing

• Conventional advice often urges us to ignore or silence inner critics or people-pleasing impulses.
• [07:31] Tamala: Suppressing these parts only makes them act out louder or more destructively.
• Listening helps us understand their protective intentions and move toward self-leadership.

“The reason that we want to do this is coming into relationship with the parts… Once we know how they came into these roles, we can help them to trust us.”
— Tamala Floyd [08:12]

5. How Parts Develop and Become Burdened

• [09:22] Tamala: We're born with “parts,” but life experiences “burden” them with protective behaviors.
• Family dynamics, trauma, or neglect in childhood often shape their roles.
• Even attempts by parents to shield children can’t prevent all wounding; relationships and life experiences outside the home affect us.

“None of us escape life unscathed… Our children interact with folks outside of the home.… we can't wrap them in cotton balls and keep them safe all the time.”
— Tamala Floyd [11:51]

6. Parenting, Trauma, and Normalizing Emotions

• Parents can help by encouraging children to express emotions and process difficult experiences instead of dismissing or minimizing them.
• This reduces the likelihood that wounded parts become isolated or extreme.

7. The "Self" in IFS—Our Internal Healing Resource

• [13:41] Tamala: The Self is who we are when we’re not blended with extreme parts; an intuitive, unharmed, centered presence.
• Healing involves inviting the Self to lead rather than allowing burdened parts to drive decisions.

“The self, Nicole, is who you are when you're unblended from these extreme parts.”
— Tamala Floyd [13:46]

• Nicole offers the “bus” analogy: parts have seats, but shouldn’t drive.

8. Building Trust with Our Parts

• [15:13] Tamala: Key steps:
  • Ask parts to “unblend” so you can communicate with them.
  • Engage with curiosity: “What are you afraid would happen if you didn’t do that?”
  • Show your parts, through experience, they can trust you to handle situations.
• Many parts don’t realize we’re adults—they still operate from childhood understandings.

9. Moving from Judgment to Curiosity

• [19:14] Nicole: Recognizes the default tendency toward self-criticism; asks for advice on staying curious.
• [19:14] Tamala: Often, multiple parts are triggered at once (e.g., a people pleaser and its inner critic). It’s helpful to spend time with both, externalize them, and suspend self-judgment to understand their motives.

10. How Healing Happens

• [20:45] Tamala: All extreme parts protect a wounded part. Healing comes from:
  • Witnessing the pain and story beneath the role.
  • “Reparenting”—offering that wounded part compassion, validation, and attention it didn’t get.
  • Eventually, the part “unburdens” itself of the old beliefs and pain.

“One of the main ways that we heal those parts is in witnessing their pain. That is like the first place we go.”
— Tamala Floyd [21:16]

• Most people are surprised by what their wounded parts are truly holding—it’s more than “the story”; it’s about unprocessed pain and unmet needs.

11. Navigating Discomfort with Parts Work

• [24:24] Tamala: Feeling awkward is normal. To ease into it, try drawing or using physical objects (shells, rocks, miniatures) to represent parts and interact with them externally.

12. Embodying Self-Energy and Recognizing It

• [27:57] Tamala: Signs of being “Self-led”:
  • Absence of mental clutter (shoulds, stories, opinions).
  • No agenda—simply shows up for healing.
  • Curiosity focused on connection, not manipulation.
• [29:12] Nicole: Physical signs can include tearing up, tingles, “lit up” sensation, energy in the body, heart expansion.
• [30:01] Tamala: Resonance with truth feels embodied—energizing, heart-opening.

13. True Completion of Healing

• [30:55] Tamala: The healing isn’t just witnessing, but helping parts unburden the beliefs, perspectives, and behaviors they took on. Protector parts (like the critic) can finally relax their roles once the wounded part is healed.

“The true healing begins with the witnessing, but it's complete when that part can unburden all the beliefs and perspectives and behaviors that it took on as a result of that trauma.”
— Tamala Floyd [31:05]

14. Closing Reflection

• Nicole invites listeners to spend less time fixing and more time understanding, exchanging judgment for listening. Integration, not perfection, is the path to living authentically.

“Because those parts of you that feel scattered, conflicted, too much or not enough, they're not the problem. They're the proof that you're human, that you've lived and that you've survived.…Listening to the whispers before they have to start screaming.…And that, of course, is woman's work.”
— Nicole Kalil [32:54]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “The critic is a common part. Another common part is the people pleaser.…These are parts of ourselves that we hide away. But sometimes the energy of those parts gets activated.” — Tamala Floyd [05:37]
• “Our parts take these roles on when we're really young. So a lot of times our parts don't know that we're grown, 30, 40, 50 year old folks, right? They still think we're five, six or seven.” — Tamala Floyd [16:14]
• “So much of adulthood is reparenting yourself.” — Nicole Kalil [23:43]
• “None of that is present. Everything you just said vanishes. So that's the first thing. The second thing is we are not…agenda driven. Like the self is offering healing but it's not pushing it.” — Tamala Floyd [28:00]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Intro & Theme Setup: [00:30]–[03:50]
• What is IFS Therapy?: [04:08]–[05:11]
• Examples of Parts Explained: [05:37]–[06:57]
• Why Listening (Not Silencing) Matters: [07:31]–[08:50]
• How Parts Are Created & Burdened: [09:22]–[11:51]
• Parenting & Emotional Expression: [11:51]–[13:19]
• Defining "The Self": [13:41]–[14:27]
• The Bus Analogy & Self vs. Parts: [14:27]–[15:13]
• Steps toward Healing Relationships with Parts: [15:13]–[17:28]
• Shifting from Judgment to Curiosity: [19:14]–[20:14]
• Healing & "Reparenting" Wounded Parts: [20:45]–[22:30]
• When Healing Feels Weird or Uncomfortable: [23:43]–[25:29]
• Physical Embodiment of Self-Energy: [29:12]–[30:31]
• Final Insights on Healing: [30:55]–[32:03]
• Closing Reflections: [32:53]–end

Takeaways for Listeners

• You cannot truly be yourself if you can’t hear your internal parts; healing requires listening, not silencing.
• Every “problematic” part—like your inner critic or people pleaser—serves a protective purpose learned in childhood.
• True healing means getting curious, witnessing your pain, and “reparenting” wounded parts with compassion.
• Self-leadership arises when your parts trust you to guide your life, freeing them from extreme roles.
• Physical and emotional cues (like heart expansion, tingling, peacefulness) can signal when you’re connected to your authentic Self.
• Your “parts” are not the problem—they’re proof of your survival and humanity. Listening to them unlocks true integration and power, which is at the heart of today’s redefined woman’s work.

Resources Mentioned:

• Tamala Floyd’s book: Listening When Parts Speak
• Instagram: @tamlafloydauthor
• Website: tamlafloyd.com

Closing Message:
Spend less time judging or “fixing” your inner world and more time listening with compassion—that’s how you reclaim power, wholeness, and belonging.