The essence
Focusing is a gentle yet profound practice of listening to our body, to our inner voice. It gets beneath our usual stories and self analysis to a place that knows its own way to healing and wholeness. Once we learn to listen within - we might untangle old emotional issues, we might come to deeply understand and change a limiting habit. We might find clarity about an important decision. Focusing can help us to contact what we most deeply value and know. It is a way of touching our own inner wisdom.

The practice
Focusing can be practiced alone or with a Focusing partner - someone who simply listens to you, without advice or interpretation. The role of Listening in Focusing is a rewarding practice in itself that will help us in our everyday lives. 

Its uses
Focusing can help you to: 

Feel more present to yourself and others,
Untangle life long issues,
Understand your emotions,
Make clearer decisions,
Deepen therapy or bodywork,
Ground your meditation and spiritual practice,
Trust your inner wisdom or intuition

As a practice, Focusing can be mixed with many other disciplnes and practices, such as counselling or bodywork. The best way to find out more is to try it for yourself.

Origins
Focusing was developed by Eugene Gendlin and his then colleague, Carl Rogers when they were investigating how and why therapy works. What they discovered was that the main factor in the patient’s success in therapy was not the therapist or the type of therapy but the clients own relationship with their inner experience. If, in the session the client paused in their speech, searched within for the right words, fumbled around for an image, for a sense of rightness to what they said or heard… then the therapy was a success.

You can learn through workshops, courses and retreats or try some individual sessions. Please download a new 2009 full information sheet, FAQ's and workshop programme (PDF).


What is split off, not felt, remains the same. When it is felt, it changes. Most people don't know this. They think that by not permitting the feeling of their negative ways they make themselves good. On the contrary, that keeps these negatives static, the same from year to year. A few moments of feeling it in your body allows it to change. If there is in you something bad or sick or unsound, let it inwardly be, and breathe. That's the only way it can evolve and change into the form it needs. Eugene Gendlin