Letters
The Part That Reaches for the Fridge Is a Firefighter
By Billy Barnard, IFS informed practitioner · July 7, 2026
I sat down to write and felt the pull before the laptop was even open. Not toward the page. Toward the kitchen, my phone, anything with a quick reward and a low ceiling.
I've felt that pull a thousand times, and I've blamed my own willpower for it more often than I can count. This time I tried something different, and instead of giving in or gritting my teeth, I stayed in the chair and asked whatever was tugging at me what it actually wanted.
The answer came fast, and it caught me off guard. Whatever was pulling me toward the kitchen sounded worn out.
In Internal Family Systems, the model Dr. Richard Schwartz built, the mind holds many parts, and the protective ones split into two crews. One crew plans ahead so pain stays away. The other waits for the moment pain slips through, then rushes in to smother it fast. Schwartz calls that second crew firefighters, and the name earns itself, because they only move once the fire is already burning.
A firefighter grabs whatever soothes quickest. Food is the classic. Scrolling is the modern favorite. The whole strategy is speed, so it never checks the calendar or the cost. When an old ache surfaces, the firefighter's one job is to make the feeling stop right now, and the bill can go to somebody else later.
That's the loop I was standing in, halfway to the fridge with work behind me.
So I stayed with the firefighter instead of shoving it away, and the pull softened the moment I quit fighting. This was no villain holding me hostage at the fridge door. What I found was closer to someone who'd been working the same post for years with no relief and no thanks, still clocking in to a job they had quietly come to hate.
When I met the part with a little warmth, it did the last thing I expected and asked me for help. Piece by piece it set down the load it had been carrying, into a fire I could picture clearly, until the part was just sitting there, lighter than before. I asked what it wanted in place of the old dread, and the answer was calm, so I welcomed calm into the same spot in my chest where the tension used to live.
The pull didn't vanish forever, and I still feel it some evenings. A firefighter that feels understood, though, stops sounding the alarm over every small spark, and the fridge slowly loosens its hold.
So next time a hard afternoon ends with your hand drifting toward food, or your phone, or a third episode you don't really want, try one small thing. Pause for ten seconds and ask what actually hurts underneath. Skip the lecture about willpower, because willpower was never the problem. Then thank the part that grabbed the wheel, and let it know you can hold the hard feeling this time.
You'll probably still eat the snack sometimes. I do. The evening's different anyway, because a craving you talk to isn't a craving that's running you anymore.
That conversation is what Hearth walks you through, one gentle step at a time, in words that are yours. Begin free, and meet the part behind the pull tonight.