Conductor of Your Internal World

And a Personal Example

Hello ♡,

Last week I had the pleasure of chaperoning my daughter and her friends at a 2-day orchestra event. Talented kids from all over the city were nominated by their schools to come together and learn complicated pieces to perform with a guest conductor. They played for hours and hours, learning to master their own parts, then how to play together.

The result? It was stunning. I honestly couldn’t believe it. How could this group, with such little crossover (and time!), make such beautiful music.

(Press play for a sample ❤️)

It turns out, with the leadership of a committed and kind conductor, miracles were possible. The kids talked in the car about the skill of the conductor, her patience, and her artfully-timed jokes to distract and lighten the mood. They also described her kindness.

I often think about our internal worlds like an orchestra.

As I heard these teens move from the total chaos of tuning and practicing their instruments on their own in the same room (which was grating to my nervous system), to the harmony of a symphony (which felt like delight) I thought: We’re in chaos when there’s no conductor, too. And we can be transformed into beautiful music with the right internal leadership.

We are internally made of very many parts. And the task of all of us in healing and mental health work is to learn to stand in the place of the conductor and lovingly guide the music. You are not your best part, you are not your cranky off-key part, you are not your anxious thoughts, you are also not your parts remembering a trauma. YOU are the conductor.

Learning to see this YOU as the leader of your internal world can be a comforting way to guide the sounds you hear. (This is in essence moving from over-identification with your feelings (meaning you become completely engulfed in your feelings) to a more mindful state. Mindfulness means you observe your feelings as you have them).

Let me give you an example of how I stand in the role of conductor for my internal world. (I am purposefully choosing a story that mimics a trauma response in the body, but will not be triggering to read about).

I recently backed into my garage door when it was half open. The sound, the shock, and the shattered glass reverberated through my body. The garage door had mysteriously stopped halfway up, and my backup camera (that I had become too reliant on) showed a beautiful clear day in my driveway. I remember thinking, as I started to back up to go to the grocery store, “What a beautiful day!” I could see the driveway. All was clear. However, as I backed up as usual, there was a loud SMASH. It was so jarring. My eyes saw a clear path, then my body encountered a terrible shock, and the stressful aftermath.

Now every time I hop in my car to back up for carpool, work, or soccer my body reacts. My body doesn’t trust the open driveway behind me because it remembers the SMASH of crashing into the door and all the shattered glass.

This is where I come in as the conductor.

I lovingly expect my body will not want to back up. I can feel the refusal in my body to move, and the reliving of the shocking smash. I never shame it though. I know my body is just trying to protect me from having this bad experience again. I kindly say (not out loud, but out loud is great), “It’s ok to back up, I know you are scared, but this time it is safe.” I guide the scared parts of me to do the thing they are afraid to do because I DO have enough evidence it is actually safe this time (I now turn around to double check the garage door is all the way open!) I don’t shame the scared parts of me. Instead, I conduct, I lead. Go ahead, play your part, back up the car. And off we go.

Imagine inserting in this example your own struggles. Maybe an anxious pattern, an old trauma response, an attachment fear about trusting people again after that betrayal. As the conductor you know this part will likely be out of key, playing too fast in fear, or refusing to play at all. You must make it safe and observe everything in order to learn to coach this part of you into healing and participating. As the conductor you observe the whole scene, and you lead the reluctant parts as they learn to play again safely, or maybe for the very first time.

And eventually, as we learn to conduct those parts, the outliers learn to play in beautiful harmony with the rest of our insides. As you learn to coach, coax, and lovingly guide the hurting parts of you, you teach them how to play again. Of course it isn’t this simple, but it is a picture of the work you are doing internally as you make changes, choose bravely, and heal patterns: You conduct your inner orchestra. You are not the hurting or off key parts, you are observing them, and you are kindly guiding them into a new inner harmony.

With you,

Monica

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Book Update:

Have I ever told you all how much I love audiobooks? I listen to them very often. My favorite recordings are the ones done by the authors themselves. I got good news about my book: I am officially recording my own audio book! I am SO excited about this. I hope readers, and listeners (get it?!), will enjoy it too. I can’t wait to share it with you. I will record early in the new year, and I will share any updates here first.

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For further reading/exploration of “parts":

There are many psychological theories and models that use some conceptualization of a YOU that is separate from your parts. Some ideas, like mindfulness for example, emphasize observing your feelings in order to feel less overwhelmed by them and help yourself more effectively. You experience yourself as separate from your feelings as you observe. This is essential in emotional regulation. I was taught early on in trauma trainings about different parts. Essentially what can happen in a traumatic experience is that the parts of you that are traumatized become “disintegrated” with the rest of you. Meaning the trauma, and the feelings associated with it, are kind of blocked off, except when triggered. Healing from trauma incorporates integrating these parts in a loving way with the rest of you. This is a long and professionally guided process usually that helps your brain re-integrate the parts and feelings often pushed away in a safe way with the rest of you. A healed, and healing brain, is really integrated, meaning it is all connecting. Finally, some of you may be familiar with the wildly popular psychological theory called Internal Family Systems. This theory takes the idea of parts and a whole YOU to another level. It is a fantastic and helpful theory. If you want to read more about it, start here with No Bad Parts.