**🔼 Up:** [[Parts Work]] **\#️⃣ Tags:** #Dictionary #Psychotherapy #Parts #InnerWorld #Healing > **🌱 Planted:** Mon 30 June 2025 --- # Protector Parts A Protector Part is any Part of us that protects us from feeling the emotional pain of our [[Hurt Parts]]. They do this by having us behave in certain ways so our lives can be arranged in such a way that hurtful feelings and experiences—such as shame, rejection or abandonment—are kept out of our conscious awareness. Whether it is through modifying our behaviours, trying to modify the behaviours of others, or protecting us through inner mechanisms like [[Dissociation]] and [[Lab/01 Incubator/Sleeping/Repression|Repression]], they tend to have a common quality which can be identified through the need to gain and maintain control. They need to maintain this control through whatever job they do because they're terrified of feeling the emotional pain they remember. These are the Parts most people act from in everyday life, and they’re also the Parts that we encounter as we start to explore and get to know our system of Parts. Protector Parts were created at times when we weren't resourced enough as children to be able to see, be with and process our hurt. While they serve (or rather served) a really important job for us, they're also frozen in the times where we got hurt, so they're completely unaware we now have the capacities and resources to handle and process our hurt as well as approach life in entirely new ways. Where Hurt Parts carry the emotional truth of the hurtful feelings we experienced, Protector Parts carry truths about the strategies we used in order to protect ourselves from those hurtful feelings. There are two kinds of Protectors Parts[^1] we can look out for: 1. **Proactive Protectors / Managers:** Protectors that get ahead of the game by employing strategies which involve the control and management of our environment, behaviours and circumstances to make sure we don't feel the pain of our Hurt Parts. 2. **Reactive Protectors / Firefighters:** Protectors that come in to save the day either when a Proactive Manager doesn’t do it’s job effectively or unexpected circumstances arise. These Protectors often, but not always, use more immediate and drastic measures like keeping us numb or having us dissociate to protect from the pain of our [[Hurt Parts]]. # Hurt Parts A Hurt Part[^1] is any Part of us that got hurt as we were growing up. When we were little, we expressed ourselves freely and spontaneously, but sometimes those expressions weren't acceptable to our parents, caregivers or the environment, and so we might have been judged, shut down, opposed or criticised for expressing ourselves exactly as we were. We might've felt like we weren't valued, that we didn't matter, and that it wasn't okay to be our essential selves—our [[Presence|True Nature]]. Because our [[Generational Trauma|personal subjectivity]] and essential value weren't acknowledged or validated (our [[Developmental Needs|normal emotional needs]] weren't met), we were left with a lot of hurt. This hurt brings with it a sense of deficiency, a lack—as if something fundamental were missing in us[^2] (see: [[Narcissistic Wounding]]), and is where our [[Protector Parts]] are also created from. A Hurt Part therefore carries with it the emotional truth we experienced when we were hurt, but they also point to essential qualities of ours—like courage, strength, creativity, compassion—that we've since long forgotten. [^1]: Internal Family Systems (IFS) calls these Parts 'Exiles'. In [[Aletheia Coaching|Aletheia]], we call them Hurt Parts, which I personally prefer over the IFS terminology as 'Exiles' can sometimes feels a bit impersonal. Other terms could be; the Inner Child, child states of consciousness. [^2]: [[A.H. Almaas]] refers to the impact of the hurt as 'holes', which can be read about as '[The Theory of Holes](https://www.diamondapproach.org/public-page/theory-holes)' in the [[Diamond Approach]].