Reimagining Healing with Ruth Culver

2025-03-09

On today’s podcast, I chat with Ruth Culver, a Level 3 trained and certified IFS practitioner. We look at Ruth’s Survive and Thrive Spiral, a visual map that connects the nervous system and IFS in a way that just makes sense. We also talk about her work with IFS Constellations, a group process that brings parts work into a shared, somatic experience, and Drawing into Self, a creative way to explore and externalize parts through colors, lines, and shapes. Key Takeaways:

On today’s podcast, I chat with Ruth Culver, a Level 3 trained and certified IFS practitioner. We look at Ruth’s Survive and Thrive Spiral, a visual map that connects the nervous system and IFS in a way that just makes sense. We also talk about her work with IFS Constellations, a group process that brings parts work into a shared, somatic experience, and Drawing into Self, a creative way to explore and externalize parts through colors, lines, and shapes.

Key Takeaways:

“Parts all have stories, don’t they?” Ruth explains how mapping parts onto her Survive and Thrive Spiral can help people unblend and understand their nervous system responses.
How can we recognize if we’re in Flop, Fix, or Flow? Ruth introduces these simple but powerful words to track nervous system states and move toward Self Energy.
We can be in multiple nervous system states at the same time.
Ruth describes how different parts may be in fixing mode, collapsing mode, or Self Energy mode—all at once.
How does IFS Constellations allow for deeper healing? Ruth shares how this group process creates profound moments of witnessing, connection, and transformation.
What happens when we let parts express themselves through drawing? Ruth walks us through Drawing into Self, a process that invites parts to communicate beyond words.

Favorite Quote:

"So, to me, the healing process is story-based, and it is imaginative. At the core of healing is a reimagining. And that’s what we can do with story." – Ruth Culver

About Ruth: Ruth Culver is a Level 3 trained & Certified IFS Practitioner based in Brighton UK, working with adolescents, adults and groups in private practice. After 25 years in charity event management, she burned out, re-trained as a hypnotherapist then found IFS in 2017. Her passion for embodiment and externalisation has led to 3 IFS integrations: 1. The Survive/Thrive Spiral: 2. IFS Constellations, and 3. Drawing into Self.

Episode Sponsor: Pisgah Coaching Institute

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