Chronic pain is hard enough on the body, but then it gets compounded with the emotional turmoil that comes from living with pain. Life can become a real struggle. The experience of living with physical pain can bring with it a whole messy list of challenging emotions. Anxiety. Guilt. Shame. Sadness. Grief. Despair. Fear. Disbelief. Anger. Just to name a few. It can be hard to know what to do when these emotions come up, right? That’s where Focusing can help. Listen to the full Painiac Podcast with Ann Weiser Cornell & Shelly Jackson. Discover how the practice of Focusing can help you manage the overwhelming emotions and strong physical sensations of pain that disrupt your overall sense of well-being, and your ability to live life with ease. Sleep can be a challenge for many people. Here’s a 17-minute recording designed to help in those moments where anxiety, restlessness, and a host of other thoughts or emotions might be interfering with your ability to fall asleep… Soothing Restful Sleep by Ann Weiser Cornell Empathy can move mountains. The power of empathy to open a space where something new can happen is enormously impressive. Empathy (and Focusing) can change the world! To read a transcript of the interview, click here. Focusing Through the Holidays Holidays are meant for celebration and the reality is that, for many of us, they bring about a mixture of delightful and challenging feelings. Being with family can be joyful and complicated. Buying gifts is a pleasure and maybe a place that evokes some “will I get the right thing?” anxiety too. Getting everyone together is fun and hectic. And Focusing can help with all that. If you need a little boost to help you move through the holidays, listen in to this very special one-hour call recording where Ann shares her best tips for Focusing throughout the holiday season. Get Bigger Than What’s Bugging You Five simple and powerful practices for getting calmer, getting smarter, getting bigger than your problems, taught by Ann Weiser Cornell and Lucinda Hayden in a one-hour phone course with guided exercises and lots of examples, for beginners and experienced Focusers alike. The Great Matter: Finding Our Way with Death, Dying and Grief Learn how Focusing can help you explore your attitudes, beliefs and wonderings about death; how to communicate with and support those at the end of life; and ways to get in touch with your own timing and process of grief using Focusing skills and practices. Focusing and Pain (and Other Symptoms) Focusing has gifts for people in pain, whether acute or chronic. If you’re enduring symptoms of any kind of illness or condition, Focusing is not a cure… but it can help you tap into your body’s resources for healing and relief. Working with Clients Who Are Experiencing Traumatic States Like Overwhelm, Panic Attacks, or Anxiety States of overwhelm (traumatic states) can arise at any point in therapy, from the very beginning to experiences that emerge once a therapeutic bond has been established. In this seminar you will learn seven specific ways to use Focusing to allow people to find relief from and healing in states of overwhelm such as anxiety, panic, and trauma. Working with Clients Who Are Experiencing Depression or Lack of Affect One of the most challenging situations for a therapist is when a client is disconnected from or unable to access their inner feeling life, or is experiencing a depressive state of low energy. In this seminar you will learn Focusing-based interventions for facilitating a client’s initial and deeper levels of contact with present experiencing, and ways that Focusing can help activate life-forward energy that seems to be missing or unavailable in depressive states. Listen to a January 20, 2009 online audio interview of Ann Weiser Cornell hosted by Joanna Harcourt-Smith as part of her Gaialogues series at Future Primitive. Includes how Ann got started with Focusing, and what her work called “Inner Relationship Focusing” has added to Gendlin’s Focusing. These recordings are mini-classes that were created to give free tastes of some of the classes we teach. Holding On & Letting Go I know this: it absolutely doesn’t work to try to stuff our feelings and impose calm. “Get over it.” “Think lovely thoughts.” All those positive thinking methods share the same problem: they ignore what is so. Wouldn’t you like to be able to be calm and cool…no matter what’s going on? The secret is to get bigger. Ann Weiser Cornell has created a free e-course to help you Get Bigger Than What’s Bugging You. You can sign up below and start the course right away. What is an e-course? It’s a course that comes by email, and you read and practice each lesson at your own pace. One day later, the next lesson arrives. It’s also easy and free to pass this along to your friends and family. Embodied Growth: Inner Relationship Focusing and Human Development by Anders B. Asphaug (link opens in new tab). An article about how personal growth occurs and the ways Focusing can facilitate personal development. Being a Focusing Schoolteacher – The Role of the Implicit at School by Arno Katz (PDF) A high school teacher who is now a Focusing practitioner as well writes about how he brings a Focusing way of being into his classroom, and the implications of that for dealing with student complaints, evaluating and grading, solving conflicts, etc. He also tells about teaching Focusing to the other teachers at the school. And finally, how Focusing supports his self-care in a stressful environment. Written in a way that is personal, readable, and grounded in the body. Inner Relationship Focusing and Embodied Awakening by Cielle Backstrom (PDF) A look at how Focusing integrates with a number of spiritual growth processes including: Waking Down in Mutuality; John Welwood’s Love and Awakening; shamanic energy healing; and the work of the Heart Math Institute. Distinguishing Between Form and Function in the Focusing Process by Jill Drummond (PDF) A look at the essential functions of the Focusing process and the various forms of instruction used to teach them. Tools for Teaching Disidentification: Some Exercises, Games, Metaphors, Humor by Marcella Calabi (PDF) This paper offers a collection of exercises and tools to help take a step back from the experience at hand and tap into a larger sense of self and the curiosity and empathy that self inhabits so that responses to emotional challenges can come from more grounded, present states. Bringing Focusing to a Counselling Supervision Group by Paula Newman (PDF) Follow the experiences of a counselling supervision group as they integrate Focusing and bodily felt senses into the clinical aspects of group supervision over the course of an academic year. An Introduction to Focusing by Susan Jordan Click on your favorite image to display it full size, then right click with your mouse to save the image. Then follow the directions below to make the image the wallpaper on your computer. Mac users, click here | PC users, click hereSign up here to get Ann’s Weekly Tips, to hear about upcoming classes, or to find out about new products.
Listen in as Ann discusses a number of Focusing-related topics, from working with Action Blocks, to working with pain and other physical issues, to working with clients in a therapeutic environment.Get Clear and Move Forward with Focusing
Focusing and Action Blocks
Focusing with Decisions
Using the Focusing Method to Manage Pain and Overwhelming Emotions
Soothing Restful Sleep
The Power of Empathy and Focusing
Focusing through the Holidays
Get Bigger Than What's Bugging You
The Great Matter: Finding Our Way with Death, Dying, and Grief
Focusing and Pain (and Other Symptoms)
Working with Clients Who Are Experiencing Traumatic States Like Overwhelm, Panic Attacks, or Anxiety with Ann Weiser Cornell & Glenn Fleisch
Working with Clients Who Are Experiencing Depression or Lack of Affect with Ann Weiser Cornell & Glenn Fleisch
A Chat with Ann Weiser Cornell at Future Primitive
Free Tastes of Our Classes
Releasing Blocks to Action
Reaching Beneath the Surface
Focusing on the Fly
Focusing & Mindfulness
Untangling
Dance of the Focusing-Oriented Therapist
Focusing & Chronic Pain
Focusing in Clinical Practice Open House
Power of Wanting
Awakening Essential Self
How Focusing Helps You Get Past Overwhelm & Distress to Ease & Calm (Level One Open House) Our Free E-Course
Keep Calm & Carry On? Doesn’t Work, Does It?
The following articles are available online for those interested in learning more about Focusing. The Library section is frequently updated with new material, so you may want to bookmark this page so you can easily return. This page shows articles in English. We also have articles in these languages:Completed Certification Projects
A collection of great articles about Focusing from the British Focusing Teachers’ Association
Touching the Source by Rob Foxcroft
Focusing and Buddhism by Margaret Hannah
Solo Focusing by Kay Hoffmann
Focusing is a way of Being-with by Greg Madison
Focusing with one ‘S’ by Jenny Brickett
How Strong is your Sense of Presence? by Jenny Brickett
Caring Feeling Presence by Kate Brightwell
Focusing as a Doorway for Spiritual Growth by Lesley Wilson and Addie van der Kooy
Focusing in Gaza by Jerry Conway
Practising Presence: Focusing, Buddhist Understanding and Core Process psychotherapy by Susan Jordan
Reflections on Being (Some Sort of) a ‘Focusing-Oriented’ Therapist by Peter Afford
Transforming our Inner Critics: the Power of Presence by Barbara McGavin
How To Think Like A Poet – And Make Better Decisions by Steve Silverton
Wholebody Focusing by Fiona Parr
The Ladybird Guide to Experiencing and the Creation of Meaning by Campbell Purton
The Ladybird Guide to A Process Model by Campbell Purton
Focusing in India by Campbell PurtonEven the most practiced Focusers can use a helpful, and beautiful, reminder of the basics. Download one of our free desktop wallpaper images here.
Get Clear and Move Forward with Focusing Remarkably, it’s in the very places where we feel uneasy and unclear that we can find the energy and wisdom to move forward. This introductory seminar includes a guided Focusing exercise that has been described as “transformational.”
Focusing and Action Blocks “I want to get that done… why don’t I?” Why do we spin our wheels and get nowhere? You know you can do it – so what’s stopping you? Find out how Focusing lets you be gentle to all the aspects of yourself so that the blocked system can release.
Focusing with Decisions Are you facing some tough decisions? Find out how Focusing can help with decisions by letting you honor all the sides of the decision without getting bogged down or stuck.