A Non-Shaming Way to Work With Anxiety: IFS Therapy in Portland
A non-shaming approach to anxiety therapy in Portland with Eric Goodwin, LPC, integrating IFS therapy and mindful self-compassion.
It would be understandable to be looking for anxiety therapy in Portland to get rid of your anxiety. Maybe you’re self-diagnosed with an anxiety disorder or have received feedback from others that you really need to do something about all that worry or avoidance or panicking. There is a tendency to experience challenges or suffering as a problem we need to solve. That, clearly, there must be something that’s broken or gone haywire if we’re white-knuckling daily activities or skipping out on social events we truly value because the anticipation itself has worn us out completely.
This perspective is reinforced through “wellness influencers,” even some within the mental health field, creating volumes of content aimed at helping you name your patterns, habits of mind, behaviors, quirks, what-have-you. All of this adding to more focus on a problem, and oh my, if this is who I am then it’s an intractable problem at that. I may as well stay home and skip that scary friend dinner. Don’t want to burden others with my whatever it is I just saw on Tik Tok or read in that new trendy self-help book. (There’s a term called Medical Student’s Disease where med students begin to identify with the symptoms of whatever illness or condition they are studying – one has to wonder how all of this focus on self-diagnosing our mood, behavioral and thought patterns is impacting our relationship to our human conditions).
Now anxiety is very real and it can have a noticeable impact on both our experiences and our self-concept and internal world. It is also very human. It is likely that most people are going to experience it in some form or another throughout their lifespans. For some of us, our relationship to anxiety is something we want to address. What I propose is, what if how we address it focuses on care and understanding in place of pathologizing and trying to “fix” it?
If anxiety is human, we’ve evolved with it for some very important reasons. Like survival. If there is a fire, we want to be alerted to that threat and find a way to escape it. If there is a predatory animal that could hurt us, we want to be aware of the danger and know how to circumvent it. We’ve evolved to now apply that same survival mechanisms to avoid being shunned, misunderstood, fired, etc. More advanced cultures have more nuanced and context-rich threats. However, that same survival instinct kicks in as though that business meeting or that embarrassing social flub can carry the same weight as that fire or sabretooth tiger.
When Anxiety Therapy Feels Too Focused on “Fixing” the Symptoms
A lot of standard anxiety treatment starts with symptom relief (which in itself is a big deal). If you’re having panic attacks, losing sleep, avoiding meaningful parts of your life, or feeling like your body is constantly bracing for impact, of course you want things to feel better. Relief is incredible to experience.
Traditional, structured approaches are genuinely helpful for many people. CBT, for example, can help people understand the connection between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. It can help us notice anxious predictions, question assumptions, and practice responding differently. There’s nothing wrong with wanting structure, skills, or practical tools.
And, for some people, especially people who are already hard on themselves, symptom-focused therapy can unintentionally start to feel like another form of self-correction. You might already know the anxious thought is unlikely and that you’re catastrophizing. You might already know that the awkward thing you said at dinner is not, in fact, being reviewed by a committee. Knowing that doesn’t always stop anxiety from taking root.
That’s when we can begin to feel demoralized. Not only are we anxious, but now we’re feeling like we’re failing at therapy because the “rational” explanation didn’t land deeply enough to change the experience. And that’s such a painful place to be. If anxiety is already tangled up with shame, another round of “correct the thought, fix the response, reduce the symptom” may not reach the us at our cores.
Is it Normal to Feel Anxiety?
The insurance system often asks therapists to translate human experiences into diagnosis, symptoms, treatment plans, and “medical necessity.” For a lot of people, having a name for what they’re experiencing can be clarifying and validating. The medical model can also flatten anxiety into something that needs to be measured, justified, and reduced. Anxiety is rarely floating around by itself.
For a lot of us, anxiety is connected to self-criticism, identity, family history, grief, burnout, perfectionism, people-pleasing, chronic stress, and all the ways we learned to stay acceptable or safe. It can be shaped by old experiences of being judged, excluded, shamed, misunderstood, or expected to hold everything together on our own (needing help being a sign of a weakness in that scenario). A more humane approach doesn’t have to ignore symptoms to respect the whole person and our own internal resources for healing and change.
People don’t usually come to therapy as a list of clinical goals. They come in with lives, stories and parts of themselves that are exhausted from trying so hard, and other parts that are convinced trying harder is the only thing keeping everything from falling apart entirely. Anxiety may be the reason you reach out but it is not the whole of who you are.
How IFS Therapy Offers a Non-Shaming Way to Work With Anxiety
This is where IFS therapy can be so useful. Internal Family Systems, or IFS, is an evidence-based therapy model developed in the 1980s that helps us understand the different parts of us that can get activated when we’re anxious, overwhelmed, ashamed, or trying very hard to keep everything from falling apart.
IFS gives us a way to work with anxiety without treating it as evidence that something is wrong with you. The point isn’t to dress anxiety up in nicer language or pretend it feels good. Anxiety can be painful, disruptive, and limiting. IFS helps us see anxiety as one part of our internal experience rather than as a definition of who we are.
When anxiety shows up and our first response is, “Oh no, what is wrong with me?” we are no longer only dealing with anxiety. We are also dealing with shame, pressure, and the exhausting sense that we should be able to manage ourselves better by now. IFS helps to explore and shift that pattern. We can begin to notice what is happening inside with more care and less panic, which can create more room for choice.
That doesn’t mean anxiety gets to run your life. It means we stop engaging shame as the main driver for change. Instead of only asking, “How do I make this stop?” IFS helps us ask, “What is happening here, and how can I respond to myself differently?”
For many people, that shift alone can make therapy feel less like another place to fix yourself and more like a place where real change has room to begin.
If I Stop Fighting Anxiety, Won’t It Take Over?
This is such a real concern. When anxiety has been active for a long time, the idea of responding to it with care can sound suspiciously like surrender. Some part of us may worry, “If I stop being hard on myself, will I ever do the hard thing?”
A lot of us have used shame as a management system for years. It may have helped us push through when we didn’t know what else to do. But pushing through is not the same as healing, and shame does not have to be the price of change.
A non-shaming approach does not mean anxiety is always right, nor does it mean we hand anxiety the keys and call that growth. There is a meaningful difference between obeying fear and understanding why it feels so urgent.
In IFS-informed therapy, we can work toward those moments when the spiral begins and you’re able to notice, “Something in me is scared,” rather than immediately becoming consumed by the fear. That small shift in perspective can create a little more room to decide what comes next instead of letting anxiety decide for us.
That is where hope lives in this work. Not in a promise that anxiety will never show up again, but in the possibility that anxiety can show up and still not get the final word.
What a Non-Shaming Approach to Anxiety Looks Like in Therapy
So what does this actually look like in therapy?
For me, it means we can take anxiety seriously without making it the enemy. We can be interested in what makes certain situations feel so charged, what happens internally when anxiety takes hold, and what you have learned to do in response to it. Sometimes that means avoidance. Sometimes it means overthinking, preparing for every possible outcome, criticizing yourself into action, or trying very hard to appear completely fine.
My approach to anxiety therapy in Portland is warm, collaborative, and non-pathologizing. I don’t want therapy to become another place where you have to perform insight correctly or prove that you are working hard enough on yourself.
You also don’t have to arrive already knowing which “part” is which. You don’t have to use IFS language if it feels unnatural. And you don’t need a polished explanation of your anxiety or a clear map of your internal world before we begin.
We can start with what’s here.
Finding Anxiety Therapy in Portland That Doesn’t Treat You Like a Problem to Fix
If this approach speaks to you, you might also find it helpful to read my broader guide to finding the right anxiety therapy in Portland. It explores what to look for in a therapist, how to think about fit, and what kind of support might feel right for you.
And if you’re tired of fighting anxiety, turning every anxious moment into evidence against yourself, or feeling as though therapy has to become one more system for managing yourself better, we can start there.
You don’t have to be in crisis to reach out. You don’t have to prove that your anxiety is “bad enough.” And you don’t have to know exactly what kind of therapy you need before we talk.
You can bring the part that wants help and the part that is wary of help.
You and all your parts are welcome here.
If you’re looking for counseling for anxiety in Portland or online therapy anywhere in Oregon, I offer a free 15-minute phone consultation so we can talk about what you’re looking for and see whether working together feels like a good fit. Just call me at (971) 533-5590 or click here to reschedule your consultation.
Eric Goodwin is a Licensed Professional Counselor in Oregon and offers online therapy in Portland and throughout Oregon.
Eric works with adults navigating anxiety, harsh self-criticism, high internal pressure, and identity-related stress. His approach is warm, affirming, and focused on helping people better understand themselves while creating more room for ease, clarity, and self-trust.
He offers support for anxiety, LGBTQ+ affirming counseling, and Internal Family Systems, IFS. You can learn more about Eric here.
Frequently Asked Questions About Anxiety Therapy and IFS
What if I already know my anxious thoughts aren’t logical?
That’s common. Many people already know the worst-case scenario is unlikely or that their anxious interpretation may be exaggerated. But knowing that intellectually does not always settle what is happening emotionally or physically. IFS-informed therapy gives us a way to work with the fear, self-criticism, pressure, and protective responses surrounding the thought rather than only trying to reason our way out of it.
How is IFS therapy different from CBT for anxiety?
CBT often helps people identify anxious thinking patterns, understand connections between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, and practice responding differently. That can be very helpful.
IFS takes a somewhat different approach. Instead of only asking whether a thought is accurate or how to change a response, we can also become curious about the part of us that is afraid, critical, avoidant, or trying very hard to keep something bad from happening. As parts learn that they can trust us to manage situations without them having to activate, they can soften so that we can make the decisions with more choice.
Do I have to use “parts” language?
No. You do not need to come to therapy fluent in IFS, and you never have to use language that feels artificial or forced. Some people connect immediately with the idea of parts. Others prefer more ordinary language. We can use whatever helps you understand your experience with more clarity and less shame.
Do you offer anxiety therapy in Portland and throughout Oregon?
Yes. I offer online anxiety therapy for adults in Portland and across Oregon. My approach integrates IFS, mindfulness, Mindful Self-Compassion, person-centered therapy, and LGBTQ+ affirming care. You can reach out for a free 15-minute phone consultation to talk about what you’re looking for and whether we might be a good fit.