About Relational Intelligence®
Relational Intelligence® (RI) is the therapeutic model in which I've been trained, which was created in 2017 by Dr. François Le Doze, who'd been a neurologist for 35 years. It is based on three pillars that have proven themselves for decades.
Here you will find the official training site on which the basics of the model are published and here my official page, among other trained therapists.
Relational Intelligence® is in fact based on:
– attachment theory, proposed by John Bowlby in the 1950s, as well as therapeutic intersubjectivity advocated by Deirdre Fay;
– polyvagal theory (TPV) about the autonomic nervous system (ANS), established by Dr. Stephen Porges in 1994 and since applied to the therapeutic setting by Deb Dana;
– IFS: Internal Family System, founded by Dr. Richard Schwartz in the 1980s, which is one of the therapeutic models recognized for healing trauma, in particular thanks to what is called memory reconsolidation.
These are the same three pillars that I came to on my own in 2019 and 2020 when I began to become interested in trauma and traumatic dissociation, and which lie at the very heart of the book I wrote: JOURNEY IN POLYAMORY, PLURAL LOVES AND ETHICAL RELATIONS (to be published).
When I discovered that François Le Doze had created a therapeutic method based on these three pillars, it seemed essential to me, not only to start therapy myself, but also to train myself in the model.
IFS is an incredibly powerful method that I am a fan of, but... it is essentially based on the principle of self-regulation: the creation of a link between a person's "Self" and their inner parts.
However, when a person suffers from early attachment trauma (insecure attachment style), they do not always have access to their Self: they then need that of a therapist in order, little by little , to learn to co-regulate safely with another – something she did not learn to do in her childhood.
Gradually, through experience, her neurons will integrate that it is possible for her to return to safety when she becomes emotionally dysregulated, and she will be able to access her Self and learn to self-regulate.
In an IR session, we begin by ensuring that the person's body (their autonomic nervous system) is safe and that they feel sufficiently connected with their therapist, before we can begin work on the parts.
It is only when the person's Self is accessible to them, once we have gone through their body, that we can work in IFS on its different parts and free them from their traumas.
It is only when the person's Self is accessible to them, once we have gone through their body, that we can work in IFS on its different parts and free them from their traumas.
Said like that, I am well aware that it may seem a little abstract!
The reality is that each of these theories or methods was, in turn, revolutionary for me when I discovered them one after the other (attachment theory in 2016, IFS in 2018 and polyvagal in 2019 when I read THE BODY FORGETS NOTHING by Bessel Van der Kolk, an essential book on trauma).
And when I discovered that François Le Doze had created a therapeutic method that used all three, it made my neurons explode with joy, curiosity and excitement.
If you are like me, you will want to read everything on the subject and find out in advance about how I work... except that for the moment, nothing has yet been published on Relationship Intelligence® itself. talk – François Le Doze promises us a book for 2024.
To understand its foundations, it is therefore appropriate for the moment to look at its three pillars, each of which, taken separately, is already sufficient to revolutionize the way we see our daily life and our relationships.
And of course, if you decide to do a first session with me, I will be happy to be as explicit as possible about how I work. Because the mantra of IR could not be more aligned with my needs and my values:
to make explicit what is implicit.