Elmar Kruithoff is an authorized clinical psychologist in Denmark and a Certifying Focusing Coordinator at The International Focusing Institute in New York. Certified Focusing Trainer since 2004. He founded the Center for Focusing Competencies in Roskilde in 2011 and works in German, Danish, and English, online and in person.

He has worked closely with Ann Weiser Cornell for more than 25 years. For two decades he organized Ann’s seminars in Germany, and from 2012 to 2019 taught in her Focusing Resources training program in Berkeley. He contributed clinical vignettes to her book Focusing in Clinical Practice (W. W. Norton, 2013). They recently co-authored “Focusing within EFT: Therapists’ Perspectives on Integration” and are currently writing a book together. Elmar was the first IRF coordinator in Germany, and since 2009 the first in Denmark, where he has been establishing Inner Relationship Focusing as a known method and runs a free monthly online community.

Clinically, Elmar is trained in humanistic, body-oriented, and trauma-focused psychotherapy. Since 2020 his main focus has been the integration of Inner Relationship Focusing into Emotion-Focused Therapy. Drawing on interviews with 21 EFT therapists, he has developed a competency model that translates Focusing and empathy into twelve concrete therapeutic skills. He runs masterclass series for therapists at IEFT in Munich and at EFT-Instituttet in Copenhagen, and Focusing is now part of the four-year training curriculum at PUC in Copenhagen.

Beyond clinical work, Elmar has taught Inner Relationship Focusing in a range of social and professional contexts, including the German teachers’ union (GEW), the Center for Peace and Reconciliation in London, hospital leadership programs, and university teaching.

Individual learning sessions, supervision, and Focusing-oriented therapy available online.