Volume I

Pavlos Zarogiannis, Greece

Pavlos Zarogiannis has studied Psychology, German Literature and Linguistics in Germany. He is Co-founder and Co-director of the Hellenic Focusing Center in Athens. He offers Client-Centered and Focusing-Oriented psychotherapy training, psychotherapy, and supervision, and is a Certifying Coordinator for The International Focusing Institute, New York. He has interests in literature, art and philosophy.

[web: new.focusing.gr]

Akira Ikemi, Japan

Akira Ikemi, PhD, studied with Professor Eugene Gendlin at the University of Chicago around the time the book Focusing was being published. After working in clinical settings, he has become full time faculty at universities in Japan. He is currentlyprofessor of psychotherapy at Kansai University Graduate School of Psychology. Akira is one of the founders and past presidents of the Japan Focusing Association. He has served as Certifying Coordinator of The International Focusing Institute(TIFI), as well as former board member and former ILC member of that organization. He also served as a board member of other organizations including the World Association for Person Centered and Experiential Psychotherapy and Counseling, and the Japanese Association for Humanistic Psychology. Akira has written many articleson Focusing in Japanese and English and he travels to bring Focusing to many partsof the world. In the last couple of years, he has taught in China, Australia, NewZealand and Switzerland as well as in many regions of Japan.

[web: www.akira-ikemi.net]

Hideo Tanaka, Japan

Hideo Tanaka, PhD, is a certified Focusing professional and an adjunct lecturer at Shitennoji University, Japan. He has been focusing for 25 years. He talked to Eugene Gendlin about the philosophical background of Experiencing and the Creation of Meaning (Gendlin, 1962/1997) and the work of Plato, Aristotle, Wilhelm Dilthey, John Dewey, George H. Mead, Susanne Langer, and Richard McKeon in a Thinking Freshly from Experiencing workshop (2004) in New York. He completed his Master’sdegree with Prof. Naohiko Mimura, studying Gendlin’s philosophy. He completed his doctorate with Prof. Akira Ikemi, studying Gendlin’s psychology. In his doctoral dissertation, he clarified Gendlin’s philosophical and psychological achievements(theories and research) in chronological order of the years before Gendlin participatedin the Wisconsin Project. This clarification enables him to illuminate present-day Focusing practices.

[web: http://previous.focusing.org/cfp-page/2475/tanaka_hideo.html]

Sarah Luczaj, Scotland

Sarah Luczaj, PhD, is a Person-Centred counsellor who worked in private practice in rural Poland for almost two decades, and is now based in Glasgow. She is the originator of the Creative Regeneration process—a blend of Focusing, meditation, free-writing and intuitive painting—and runs live and online workshops. She is a widely published poet, writer and literary translator who is also actively involved in visual art and music. Sarah is also co-founder of the terrealuma healing refuge(www.terrealuma.com) in Poland. The refuge facilitates healing through reconnectionto nature, on all levels from the nutritional, through permaculture practices and use of wild herbs, to the creative and spiritual. She is also a Reiki practitioner (at Masterlevel), staying close to the original roots of Reiki in Buddhist and Taoist practices. She is currently turning her PhD thesis, entitled ‘Felt Senses of Self and No-Self in Therapy’, investigating the intersections between Focusing, therapy and Buddhism, into book form.

[web: www.terrealuma.com & counselling-glasgow.co.uk]

Campbell Purton, UK

Campbell Purton, PhD: My background is in philosophy, and I completed my PhDthesis at the University of Alberta. I then lectured in philosophy at universities in Canada and Scotland before training in Person-Centred counselling. I worked at the University Counselling Service at the University of East Anglia for many years, and taught there on the postgraduate Diploma in Counselling. I introduced Focusing to this programme, and also ran a postgraduate Diploma in Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy. More recently, I have been involved in introducing Focusing-Oriented therapy in China. My book Person-Centred Therapy: The Focusing-Oriented Approach was published in 2004, The Focusing-Oriented Counselling Primer in 2007, and The Trouble with Psychotherapy: Counselling and Common Sense in 2014. I amcurrently working on a book on the use of Focusing in self-therapy. I have beenespecially interested in the philosophy of Wittgenstein, and its application to issues in psychotherapy. I have also a long-standing interest in Buddhist philosophy, and have written several articles in that field.

[web: www.dwelling.me.uk]

Donata Schoeller, Switzerland

Donata Schoeller, PhD, is a senior lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Koblenzand guest professor at the University of Iceland, where she is leading an internationalresearch project on Embodied Critical Thinking (web link: ect.hi.is). Currently, she is an invited Fellow at the Max-Weber-Kolleg in Erfurt (University of Erfurt). Amongher recent publications are Close Talking: Erleben zu Sprache bringen, Berlin: De Gruyter, 2019, Saying What We Mean, Chicago: Northwestern University Press, 2017, and Thinking Thinking, Freiburg: Alber Verlag, 2016. She translated Gendlin’s A Process Model into German together with Christiane Geiser: Ein Prozess-Modell, Freiburg: Alber, 2015. In recent years, she has written extensively on Gendlin’sphilosophy in international journals of philosophy. She is an associate member of Mind and Life, a Focusing trainer and Thinking-at-the-Edge teacher. Her home is Zurich and her family are three daughters.

[web: www.donataschoeller.com]

AnnWeiser Cornell, USA & Barbara McGavin, UK & USA

Ann Weiser Cornell and Barbara McGavin are the co-creators of Inner RelationshipFocusing, a lineage of Focusing that emphasizes the quality of the relationship between the ‘I’ and the ‘it’. They have also developed the Untangling™ method, an application of Focusing to challenging issues such as addiction, depression, severeself-criticism, and unfulfilled desire (‘obsession’). Their joint publications include The Focusing Student’s and Companion’s Manual, Parts One and Two (Calluna Press, 2002). They have taught their Untangling™ method since 1995 in 15 countries.

Ann Weiser Cornell, PhD, is the CEO and President of Focusing Resources, and offers seminars, books, manuals, and audio supporting the learning and practice of Focusing. She is authorized by The International Focusing Institute as a CertifyingCoordinator, offering Focusing training through certification with worldwide access(online). Her books include: The Power of Focusing and Focusing in GROUPPractice: The Essence of Change.

[web: focusingresources.com]

Barbara McGavin has been practicing Focusing since 1983. She has a widebackground in humanistic psychology, teaching, fine art and graphic design. She has developed a way of bringing Focusing into the creative process which she calls From Spark to Beacon. She has also developed a collective decision-making process whichhonors and includes every voice in the group which she calls Spectrum DecisionMaking.

Tadayuki Murasato, Japan

Tadayuki Murasato, PhD: I was a graduate student in Western history from 1971 to 1976 and in philosophy from 1976 to 1981 at Waseda University and in psychology at Gakusyuin University from 1996 to 2001. I taught philosophy and psychology at Tokai university and Waseda University from 1981 to 2011 and was AssociateProfessor at Teikyoheisei University. I earned my PhD in psychology in 2011. I havebeen a clinical psychologist since 2001.

Jun Xu, China

Jun Xu, a researcher and clinical psychologist, lives in Shanghai, China. He is a Certifying Coordinator of The International Focusing Institute, and also serves as a postgraduate tutor in the School of Psychology and Cognitive Science of East ChinaNormal University, teaching Person-Centered Therapy and Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy. He does much promotion and teaching work for the development of Focusing in China, long-term research on Focusing and its therapy, Buddhism, psychoanalysis, self-psychology, and also actively participates in the dialogue between Buddhism and psychotherapy.

Akiko Doi, Japan

Akiko Doi, PhD, is a certified Focusing professional, certified clinical psychologistand a licenced psychologist in Japan. After graduating from Kobe College majoring in English / American Literature, she worked in All Nippon Airways, taught English at high school, and became a translator in an electric company. She studied with Professor Akira Ikemi on the Master’s and Doctoral programs at Kobe College. Akikohas worked as a translator for many Focusing professionals including KevinMcEvenue, Paul Huschilt, Ton Coffeng, Doralee Grindler Katonah, Elfie Hinterkopf, Shaun and Alexis Phillips, and Peter Cheng. She was one of the Emerging Teachers at the Focusing Weeklong in NY in 2010. She is also working closely with KevinMcEvenue with his Wholebody Focusing and co-authored a book with him. From 2018 to 2019, she was a visiting academic at the University of Nottingham where sheworked with Dr. David Murphy. Currently she is a professor in CounsellingPsychology at Kobe Gakuin University, Japan, and sees clients in companies and the Self-Defense Forces. Akiko has served as one of the Group Leaders of the JapanFocusing Association and an editorial member of the Journal of Japanese Humanistic Psychology for 6 years. She has offered workshops on Focusing and self-care through Focusing in the business field widely throughout the USA, UK, Mexico, China and Japan.

[web: doiakiko.jimdofree.com]

Greg Madison, UK & Ernesto Spinelli, UK

Dr. Greg Madison is an existential psychologist (Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society) and Focusing-Oriented psychotherapist (UKCP, ECP) contributing to various activist, academic, and professional trainings internationally. For some years Greg has avoided exclusive affiliation with any institution and insteadenjoys creative collaborations as an independent person. He has written and co-editedbooks and articles on Existential Migration, Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy, Existential Therapy, and contemporary topics related to psychology and society. He is a Coordinator for The International Focusing Institute and founder of The LondonFocusing Institute (a team of teachers and students of Focusing working according to democratic principles).

[web: www.gregmadison.net]

Professor Ernesto Spinelli has gained an international reputation as one of the leadingcontemporary trainers and theorists of existential therapy and, more recently, the related arenas of coaching and conflict mediation. He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society (BPS), a UKCP registered existential psychotherapist and an APECS accredited executive coach and coaching supervisor. In 2019, Ernestoreceived the British Psychological Society Award for Distinguished Contribution to Practice. His most recent book, Practising Existential Therapy: the relational world, 2nd edition (Sage, 2015) has been widely praised as a major contribution to the advancement of existential theory and practice.

[web: www.plexworld.com]

Claude Missiaen, Belgium & Siebrecht Vanhooren, Belgium

Claude Missiaen (°1961) is a clinical psychologist and Client-Centered, Focusing-Oriented and existential psychotherapist. He started his psychotherapeutic ‘career’ in 1984. He is a team member of the training in Client-Centered Psychotherapy and the training, Existential Wellbeing Counseling, both at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium. He is mainly involved in the experiential and existential modules of thesetrainings. He started a new training in Belgium on Focusing-Oriented Therapy, for therapist and counsellors. His special interest is looking for ways to combineexperiential and existential dimensions in psychotherapy, in training and in daily life. He organizes international workshops on such topics as: Focus on the inner critic, Facing our existential demons, Waiting at the murky edge, How to make therapy more experiential…? He is a team member of QIT (Quality Improvement in Therapy), an organisation that tries to connect the craft of psychological care with innovative technology and therefore develop a digital compass for the therapists of the future. He is certified by The International Focusing Institute as Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapist, Focusing Trainer and Certifying Coordinator. He is currently a member of The International Leadership Council (ILC) of TIFI. He has a private practice for individual psychotherapy and experiential supervision.

Siebrecht Vanhooren, PhD, works as a professor in the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences at KU Leuven (University of Leuven) in Belgium. He teacheshelping skills, psychological interventions, and Person-Centered, Experiential, and Existential Psychotherapy. He is the director of the Person-Centered postgraduate programs at KU Leuven and Kulak, and co-coordinates the MOO C Existential Well-being Counseling for the EdX platform. As a psychotherapist he works at PraxisP (KU Leuven) and is a board member of the Federation of Existential Therapy in Europe (FETE). As a researcher at the Research Group for GROUP Psychology, he runs different studies about experiential and existential processes in psychotherapy. Together with his team, he is developing an experiential-existential framework that allows for innovative interventions and a deeper understanding of the existential realm in psychotherapy. Being at home in Person-Centered, Focusing-Oriented, and Existential psychotherapy, and having immersed himself in the recent developments of Positive Psychology and meaning in life, he aims to weave a more experiential understanding into the field of existential psychology, meaning in life, and psychopathology. He recently received the inaugural Gendlin Grant for Original Research in Psychology of the Eugene T. Gendlin Center for Research in Experiential Philosophy and Psychology for his promising research.

Alan Tidmarsh, UK

Focusing-Oriented therapist, clinical supervisor, Focusing teacher and attachment-focused EMDR therapist based in Norwich, UK. He has investigated Focusing-Oriented therapy with ‘addictions’ and his doctoral thesis (https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/48047/) draws on ten years’ work in substance abuse services. Recently he has concentrated on trauma work with clients from a charity that provides support for survivors of sexual abuse. Currently Alan is exploring the resonances between Focusing and EMDR therapy.

Joan Klagsbrun, USA & Julian A. Miller, USA

Joan Klagsbrun, PhD, has been a psychologist in private practice for the last 40 years. She has taught Focusing to the general public, to mental health and medicalprofessionals and to clergy, for four decades across seven continents. She is a longtime adjunct professor at Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts and has published articles, book chapters, CDs and other Focusing resources. In 2010, she wasawarded the Alice Ladas research award from the U.S. Association of BodyPsychotherapy for her research study on Focusing with women with Breast Cancer. Joan is a certifying coordinator for the International Focusing Institute. Her currentpassion is working at the intersection of Focusing, Positive Psychology and Spirituality, with a particular interest in their relevance to psychotherapy.

Julian A. Miller is the author of Breaking Through, The Conquest of Aging, and I Should Praise, a book of poetry. He is a poet, writer, and has been a teacher of Tai Chi for 30 years. He has taught programs in Stress Management, Memoir and Focusing, and the Integration of Tai Chi with Focusing. The practice of Focusing has intrigued and engaged him for the past 40 years.

Kathy McGuire, USA

Dr. Kathy McGuire studied with Eugene Gendlin, creator of Focusing, at the University of Chicago from 1968-1975. Along with Gendlin and many others, she was a co-founder of the original Changes Listening/Focusing Community in 1970. She did herdissertation, with Dr. Gendlin as advisor, on ‘The Expression of Negative Feelingsand Explication of Meaning as a Function of Contingent Interruptions and ContingentListening Responses in Task-Oriented Groups’, 1975. While working as a Focusing-Oriented therapist/clinical psychologist and workshop leader, her avocation has beenthe preservation and spread of the community-building uses of empathic listening and experiential Focusing at home and work and in many aspects of living. Her severalmanuals can be found as free downloads in the Store at her website for Creative EdgeFocusing™, www.cefocusing.com. Sign-up for her free nine-month e-course, manyarticles, and access to her YouTube channel as Dr. Kathy McGuire can all also befound there. She believes that spreading empathic listening and experiential Focusing are key to overcoming the gaps in understanding pervading our world and reaching equitable solutions to world problems.

[web: www.cefocusing.com]

Mary Jeanne Larrabee, USA

Mary Jeanne Larrabee, PhD, was born in California, USA, and received her PhD in philosophy from the University of Toronto, Canada, with a dissertation on E. Husserl’s phenomenology of time-consciousness. Her research since then has appliedHusserl’s methodology, crossed with a feminist narrative/intersectional approach to experiences of sex/gender and trans, the Body in postmodernism and medical science, racialized women’s knowledge in slavery, and meditative practices. Recently she has written on comparative spiritual experiences, Husserl’s critical phenomenology, and trauma studies.

Johannes Wiltschko, Austria/Germany

Johannes Wiltschko, PhD, born 1950 in Vienna, is a Client-Centered psychotherapist and trainer. In 1979 he was asked by Eugene Gendlin to become a Focusing Coordinator of the International Focusing Network. Since then he has been workingon transferring Gendlin’s philosophical concepts and methods into psychotherapy and into everyday life. In 1981 he founded the International Focusing Summer School, in 1988 the Deutsches Ausbildungsinstitut fur Focusing und Focusing-Therapie (DAF), in 1998 the magazine Focusing Journal and in 2019 The Academy for Focusing, Focusing-Therapy, and Process-Philosophy (DAF-AKADEMIE). Over 70 of his articles have been published in professional journals, magazines and books.

Frans Depestele, Belgium

Frans Depestele, MD, MA: I studied medicine and psychiatry at the University of Leuven, Belgium. My interest in psychosomatics brought me to study in depth the work of Gendlin. Through this my interest in philosophy was awoken and I went backto the university and obtained a Master’s degree in philosophy. I work with outpatients in an individual setting and offer them experiential psychotherapy. Thisspecific work instigated me to study the rhetorical and poetical characteristics of the client’s language. I have been developing a scheme of spaces by which these languageaspects and many other aspects of (experiential) psychotherapy may be understood in a new way (see the PCEP journal, 2004, 2005, 2006). Another main interest is how I can specifically intervene in the sessions in order to help the client get in touch with his experiencing and allow its power to develop. I published some papers on this subject, which can be downloaded from the website of The International Focusing Institute; when you search with ‘Depestele’ you will find the 2012, 2013 and 2014 papers. My actual interest is developing a process theory of physical illness and examining how medicine and psychotherapy can be integrated in the treatment of it.

Tine Swyngedouw, Belgium

Tine Swyngedouw is a clinical psychologist and Client-Centered and Experiential psychotherapist. In her private practice in Louvain she has been doing individualtherapy with adolescents and adults for more than 25 years. She specializes in working with trauma, depression, loss, grief and bereavement, stress and burnout, chronic fatigue syndrome, chronic pain and cancer. She is a Focusing Trainer and Focusing-Oriented Therapist (Chicago, 1995) and Certifying Coordinator for Focusing with children and adults from Belgium. She offers Focusing workshops and training to become a Focusing Trainer and/or Focusing-Oriented Therapist. She has a special interest in Inner Relationship Focusing, Interactive Focusing, Existential Well-being, Experiential Creative Work and TAE/Thinking At the Edge.

[web: https://efocusing.be/]

Astrid Schillings, Germany

Astrid Schillings is a chartered psychologist and psychotherapist as well as a Certifying Focusing Coordinator. Focusing came into her life in 1982, when studyingPerson-Centred Counselling. It resonated deeply with her wondering what it is to behuman and why we are here. In that spirit she now teaches Focusing with the WholeBody (FWB)—Relational Embodiment to professionals and interested laypersonsinternationally as well as in her Focusing centre in Cologne, which she founded in close cooperation with Eugene Gendlin. Astrid has developed an FWB-training for therapists, counsellors and coaches grounded in Gendlin’s expanded understanding of the living body and philosophy. She has been exploring and teaching extensively on the interface of Focusing and sensitive body-mind-awareness (Somatic Experiencing, Qi Gong, Authentic Movement, Feldenkrais, Meditative Inquiry) which informs her trainings. Her heart is engaged in supporting herself and others to experience the life-changing dynamics of Focusing with the Whole Body in how we work, live and act—every day.

[web: www.focusinginstitut.eu]

Bart Santen, The Netherlands

Bart Santen, PhD, studied Developmental Psychology at the University of Amsterdam (1979–1984). He worked as a Client-Centered/Experiential clinical psychologist, mental health psychologist and psychotherapist in child and youth psychiatry in The Netherlands. In the eighties he was the Dutch Coordinator of The Focusing Institute. He assisted Eugene Gendlin in workshops in The Netherlands and the USA. Bart lectured about his work with dissociative children in courses for psychiatrists and psychologists on the Medical Faculty of the University of Antwerp, Belgium. In 2011 he presented the seminar ‘Into the Fear-Factory: Connecting with The TraumaticCore’ at the ‘2nd World Conference on Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapies’ in StonyPoint, New York. Bart spoke at conferences in The Netherlands and internationally. He publishedwidely in books and journals in Europe and the USA, mostly about Focusing-Oriented Therapy with dissociated children. Three of these publications are: Santen, B. (1999). Focusing with children and young adolescents. In C. H. Schaefer(Ed.), Innovative Psychotherapy Techniques in Child and Adolescent Therapy. NewYork: Wiley. Santen, B. (2014). Into the Fear-Factory: Connecting with the Traumatic Core. Person-Centered & Experiential Psychotherapies, 13, 2. Santen, B. (2015). Treating dissociation in traumatized children with body maps. In C. A. Malchiodi (Ed.), Creative Interventions with Traumatized Children, 2nd edition. New York: Guilford. Based on his experiences with traumatized children he developed‘Focusing-Oriented Body Mapping’. Currently retired, he is a Professional Associateof The Focusing Institute, New York, and a member of the World Association for Person-Centered and Experiential Psychotherapy and Counseling.

Atsmaout Perlstein, Israel

Dr. Atsmaout Perlstein is a clinical psychologist, active for the past 35 years. Dr. Perlstein was a student of Dr. Eugene Gendlin, philosopher, psychologist and founderof the Focusing process. Dr. Perlstein has devoted her life’s work to lecturing and training psychotherapists in blending the use of Focusing-Oriented Therapy (FOT ) and Mindfulness, in working directly with clients, and in bringing the principles of Focusing to diverse organizations around the world. She was co-founder of the firstIsraeli Focusing & FOT center in Israel and the first Israeli Focusing Coordinator. Over the years, Dr. Perlstein has worked with and trained hundreds of individuals, couples and groups both locally and globally. Currently, Dr. Perlstein’s main activityrevolves around integrating KOL·BE Body Mapping into psychotherapeutic use. KOL.BE Body Mapping is a non-verbal method which helps people of all ages and backgrounds to connect with their natural inner self-healing process.

[web: https://www.kol-be.com/]

Rene Veugelers, The Netherlands

As a Coordinator specializing in Children Focusing, with an emphasis on the non-verbal world, Rene teaches parents, therapists, teachers and others how to be with children in a Focusing way, how to (re)connect to their own inner child experiencesand how to integrate creativity and flexibility into their life and work. His work and experiences, from the early eighties, as a psychiatric nurse and as an art therapist with children (of any age), embraces an expanded richness of creative elements and supports a natural unfolding of creative process. Rene lives in the Netherlands and has worked for two days a week at a special school for teenagers for more than 20 years. And he has taught Children Focusing for more than 15 years and also promotes thesepractical skills in daycare centres and hospices. He is specialized in working with children with ADHD , ADD , trauma and attachment disorder. He teachesinternationally: Israel, Russia, Germany, England, NY, Seattle, Gaza, Ireland and France. He is an inspiring teacher who brings considerable experience, subtlety and joy to every person attending his workshops or training.

[web: www.ftcz.nl]

Sara Bradly, UK

Sara is director of Inner Focus Ltd—a company which delivers Focusing training and Children Focusing training, as well as Focusing workshops and therapy in the UK. She is a Child and Young Person’s Counsellor, a Focusing and Children Focusing Trainer, and currently a Coordinator in Training of The International Focusing Institute. Sara began her Focusing journey at the University of East Anglia, UK, where shecompleted her MA in Counselling with a study on Focusing with Children. Upongraduation Sara quickly became one of the UEA counselling team where she workedas a Personal Development Group Facilitator, utilizing Focusing for the group’sprocess. She also worked collaboratively on the PG Certificate in Focusing-Oriented Therapy course at UEA, bringing in aspects of Children Focusing. More recently Sarahas been employed by Norfolk’s CAMHS tier 2 service as a children’s counsellor, delivering Focusing-Oriented Therapy to child clients and delivering Children Focusing training workshops to practitioners within the organization. Sara is a conference speaker, having delivered presentations and workshops on Focusing with Children at the 12th International Conference on Children’s Spirituality (2012), andthe British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy’s (BACP) Children, Young People and Family Conference (2019).

[web: www.inner-focus.co.uk]

Nada Lou, Canada

As a teacher by profession, Nada’s name is known throughout the Focusing world as a Coordinator for The International Focusing Institute (TIFI) who is certified to teachthose wishing to learn. Nada’s double specialty is in Focusing and Thinking at the Edge. She taught many courses around the world since the 1990s. Nada’s ability is to gently and patiently nurture each person’s felt sensing and thinking edge, guidingthem at every step. More often Nada’s name is also associated with Focusing video productions. Nada is a prolific video maker of more than 45 DVDs featuring GeneGendlin and other Focusing luminaries, which have brought their teachings into homes and offices around the world. Immersing herself in Gendlin’s thinking throughher DVD Productions has made Nada one of the experts in TAE. Since co-presentingTAE workshops with Dr. Gendlin, Nada evolved a personal approach to a TAE coursecalled THINK DI FFERENT–(TAE), and is in the forefront of spreading the ‘method’ of this practice around the world as study programs, live lectures, personal projects, seminars and webinar courses. Nada is the author of The Grassroots ManualIntroduction to TAE.

[web: https://nadalou.com/]

Volume II

Mia Leijssen, Belgium

Prof. Dr. Mia Leijssen is Professor of Person-Centered/Experiential/Existential Psychotherapy at KU Leuven (University of Leuven, Belgium). She is an International Focusing Trainer and Coordinator of the New York Focusing Institute aswell as Director of KU Leuven Online Training in Existential Well-being Counseling. She was born in 1951 and is married with two children and five grandchildren.

[web: www.existentieelwelzijn.be]

Peter A. Campbell, USA

(with contributions from John Keane, Ireland, and David Young, USA)

Peter A. Campbell, PhD, holds a doctoral degree in the psychological study of religion and spirituality from the University of Ottawa, Canada. He was born in California in 1935, was ordained a catholic priest and has spent a lifetime working asa theologian, author, teacher and, with his colleague Edwin McMahon, co-foundedthe BioSpiritual Institute. He has co-written several books with Edwin McMahon, including Becoming a Person in the Whole Christ, The In-Between – Evolution in Christian Faith, Please Touch, BioSpirituality – Focusing as a Way to Grow, and their last work together, Rediscovering the Lost Body- Connection within Christian Spirituality. These books have helped develop a body-based, psychologically healthyfoundation for a global spirituality. The human body contains some deeper, implicit, evolutionary current which lies waiting to move forward within every human life. Our body, which we so identify with mortality and decay, is itself our conscious bridge into immortality! It is our precious ‘link’ to the universe as a whole—and beyond! Body meaning comes asa spontaneous gift or surprise. There is a transcendent, ‘graced’ quality to the feltsense as it unfolds meaning in the body. McMahon and Campbell emphasized this giftdimension, linking the mind-knowing of our information-based culture with ourspirit-based body wisdom, opening a whole new paradigm of human consciousnessfor exploration.

[web: https://www.biospiritual.org]

Greg Walkerden, Australia

Dr. Greg Walkerden’s research centres on practical problems of adaptation to, and transformation of, socio-ecological systems. His focus is building adaptive capacity at both regional and personal levels, through the development of regional strategies and platform skills for professional practice. Researching reflective practice is central to his exploration of adaptive capacity. His academic roots are in philosophy and psychology, and he draws particularly on Eugene Gendlin’s Philosophy of the Implicitbecause of the contribution that it makes to understanding how we can act astutely. Much of his research has a design focus: designing policies, strategies, systems, and practices to support shifts to socially, economically and ecologically sustainableforms of life. He is based at Macquarie University, where he teaches environmentalmanagement and planning. Prior to joining Macquarie, he worked for 18 years as an environmental manager and planner, using professional practice as a medium for action research. He has been a Focusing practitioner for 35 years, and has taught feltsense-based decision-making at Macquarie University for about 15 years. Gendlin invited him to teach A Process Model at his Thinking at the Edge retreats in New York in 2000, 2001 and 2002.

[web: https://researchers.mq.edu.au/en/persons/greg-walkerden]

Fiona Parr, UK

Fiona Parr is a British Focusing Association (BFA) recognised Focusing Teacher and Mentor, Focusing-Oriented therapist, and Certifying Coordinator for The International Focusing Institute (TIFI). She teaches in Devon, UK, and online, and offers individual Focusing sessions. She teaches the Focusing Skills Certificate course, and professional trainings to Practitioner and Teacher level. She has facilitatedpersonal development in others and herself since 1978, and practised Focusing since1991. She has lived at the Findhorn Foundation, which is a spiritual community in Scotland. Her spiritual life is most important to her, and Focusing supports herspiritual practice. She believes that Focusing is a truly wonderful ability for life. Itenables people to gain an invaluable resource and support in their lives. She works with people who are working with others, such as practitioners and health professionals, to deepen their work aswell as people who want Focusing for their personal healing journey. Fiona travels to India by invitation of the Just Being Centre, teaching Focusing and Thinking at the Edge (TAE) on their Presence-oriented therapy training courses. She is an active member of BFA, and also the European Focusing Association (EFA), and sheinitiated a special interest group for Focusing teachers in Europe.

[web: https://fionaparr-focusing.co.uk]

Leslie Ellis, Canada

Dr. Leslie Ellis is an author, teacher and therapist who specializes in inner work through dreams, Focusing and embodied imagination. She has a PhD in GROUPPsychology from the Chicago School of Professional Psychology with a focus in somatic approaches to therapy. Her dissertation on using Focusing-Oriented therapy to treat PTSD for refugees with recurrent nightmares won the Ernest Hartmann awardfrom the International Association for the Study of Dreams (IASD). She has a Master’s from Pacifica Graduate Institute and was a therapist in private practice in Vancouver, BC for more than 20 years. Her approach to therapy combines Jungianand Focusing-Oriented techniques to treat individuals suffering from depression, anxiety and the effects of trauma. Her current focus is dreamwork and online dreamtraining based on her book, A Clinician’s Guide to Dream Therapy (Routledge, 2019). She is Vice President and Certifying Coordinator with The International FocusingInstitute and runs a Vancouver-based Focusing certification program for mental healthprofessionals. She has numerous articles, chapters and presentations on dreamworkand Focusing, and continues to research ways to constructively engage and cultivateinner life.

[web: http://drleslieellis.com]

Salvador Moreno-Lopez, Mexico

Dr. Salvador Moreno-Lopez is director of Focusing Mexico, a psychotherapist, groupleader, writer and lecturer, and a Certified Focusing Instructor and CertifyingCoordinator for Mexico of The International Focusing Institute. He has been a professor at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City and Leon, and at the ITESO in Guadalajara, in Psychotherapy and Human Development Master’s degree programs. He has led workshops in several Mexican and Brazilian universities and has published three books, as well as several book chapters and articles. His most recent book is Descubriendo mi Sabiduria Corporal, Focusing. Chapters and articlesinclude: ‘Actualizing Tendency, Organismic Wisdom and Understanding of the World’ (2018); ‘Focusing with the Stresses of Everyday Life’ (2016); ‘Focusing, Mindfulness and Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy’ (2014); and ‘Vivirsaludablemente y Enfoque Corporal’ (2010). His professional focus is understanding the interaction between body and socioemotional health, relating the Philosophy of the Implicit and Focusing to everyday life and health care, as well as crossingFocusing with Mindfulness and neurosciences.

[web: www.focusingmexico.mx]

Zoe Voulgaraki, Greece

Zoe Voulgaraki is a psychologist with an MA in Special Education. She is also a Person-Centered and Focusing-Oriented psychotherapist in private practice and a trainer-intraining in the Hellenic Focusing Center. She is currently working in education.

Svetlana Kutukova, Russia

Svetlana Kutukova is currently Director of the Institute of Person-Centered Psychotherapy and Focusing in Russia and President of the Professional Association of Person-Centered Psychotherapists. She trained in the Person-Centered Approachwith OGwG in Austria and in 2006 joined with colleagues to establish a long-termPerson-Centered educational program in Russia, based on her Austrian training. Sheis now Head of this training program which is run by Moscow State University. Sheoffers Focusing workshops in Moscow and, since 2015, has run longer-term programsin Focusing at different universities and is Russia’s first Focusing Coordinator. In terms of her own therapeutic practice, she works in both a Person-Centered and Focusing-Oriented way.

[web: www.carl-rogers.ru]

Isabel Gascon, Spain

Isabel Gascon is a Certified Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapist and Trainer and a Coordinator of The International Focusing Institute. She writes: I learned about Focusing more than twenty years ago while studying for a Master’s Degree in Psychotherapy at the University of Comillas, Madrid. Focusing surprised me, I was passionate about it, and it made my personal and professional life take a veryimportant turn. I was grateful to receive that gift at a time when Focusing was littleknown in Spain. Since then I have been training in Focusing and integrating it as a methodology in my work as a therapist. I also work on the dissemination of Focusing in general so that I can help as many people as possible find their own growth withoutthe need for more specialist training. I offer courses on the subject of in vitro fertilization, and different aspects of maternity, pregnancy, childbirth and lactation. I am also very committed to the development of new areas where this powerfulmethodology can be applied to everything related to health: patients, professionals, and families.

[web: www.asociacionfocusingcentro.org]

Michael Seibel, Greece, Germany

Michael Seibel was born in Germany and lives in Greece. He studied Music and Theatre (Saarland University—University of Music and Theatre of Saarland). He holds a Master of Arts in directing theatre and opera from Middlesex University, London. Furthermore he is a PhD candidate at University of Hildesheim, Germany for a dissertation entitled ‘Aesthetic production processes in acting and training of actingas a phenomenological practice’. He has directed theatre and opera performances in Germany and Greece and has been awarded with international theatre awards for Best Directing and Best Performance. He has been Artistic Director of theatre groups, theatre programs and festivals in Germany and Greece. From 2015–2018 he was alsothe Artistic Director of the Opera department as well as the Int. Opera Studio at the Municipal and Regional Theatre of Patras. He is doing research particularly into the fields of acting, improvisation and voice training and publishes in accreditedprofessional journals. He is a recommended lecturer at universities and conferencesall over the world (such as the University of Hamburg, Democritus University of Thrace, Penn State University). He teaches Acting and Voice since 1996 in Drama Schools, workshops and masterclasses.

[web: www.michaelseibel.eu]

Stephanie Aspin, UK

I am a psychotherapeutic counsellor, coach, academic and senior academic developer.Originally from London, I am currently based in Norwich (in the UK) where I work at the University of East Anglia. My doctoral research looked at the intersectionbetween literary theory, poetic practice and mental health.

Jen White, UK

Jen received her doctorate in 2018 from the University of East Anglia (UEA) where she first learned Focusing as part of her Person-Centred counselling training. She works as a student counsellor at the UEA Counselling Service where she offers Focusing-Oriented therapy and Focusing inspired workshops to students. She lives with herhusband Andy, daughter Willow and Van Damme, their ginger maine coon, in Norwich.

Rob Parker, USA

Dr. Rob Parker was born into a scientific family and grew up with a deep appreciationfor the power and elegance of modern science. Rob was also interested in spiritualityfrom an early age, and has practiced yoga and zazen meditation for many years. And all along, he sensed that science and spirituality must be related, because realitydoesn’t come in separate packages. These interests led to a career in psychology, an area where science and spirit seem to overlap, and to an interest in the philosophicalassumptions that underlie modern science. Rob specialized in psychological trauma, designing and directing several treatment programs for trauma survivors and trauma perpetrators, publishing and lecturing for professional audiences, and appearing on national media. But the whole time, he continued to think about the problems inherentin our current approach to science. In 2000, the search for a new scientific paradigmled Rob to visit philosopher Eugene Gendlin. Rob quickly recognized the importanceof his work and in 2003 began studying with Gendlin for several hours a week untilGendlin’s death in 2017. The current chapter is part of a project to outline how Gendlin’s A Process Model opens new avenues for research andunderstanding in all of the sciences.

[web: lifeforward.org]

Peter Afford, UK

Peter Afford, MA, is a counsellor and psychotherapist in private practice in London. He has been practising Focusing for over 30 years and teaching it alongside listeningskills in small group workshops for most of that time. He is a founder member of the British Focusing Association and a Coordinator for The International Focusing Institute. He also works as a trainer and supervisor in university and other settings, specialising in Focusing and in the application of neuroscience to the understanding and practice of psychotherapy. He is the author of Therapy in the Age of Neuroscience, an important theme of which is the concept of the felt sense(Routledge, 2019).

[web: www.focusing.co.uk]

Satoko Tokumaru, Japan

Dr. Satoko Tokumaru is a professor at Kaichi International University, Japan. She also teaches at Tokyo University and Sophia University Graduate School. She is also a Certifying Trainer of The International Focusing Institute and has applied Thinking at The Edge (TAE) for educational purposes. In recent years, she has been developing TAE as a qualitative research method. Her books include Writing With TAE (ThinkingAt the Edge) and Qualitative research with TAE steps—thinking at the edge: theory and applications.

[web: http://taejapan.org/english/index.html]

Monika Catarina Lindner, Germany

I love to spend my time enabling people to find their language(s) and to get in touchwith their unique implicit source of thinking. The one opportunity to do this is my work as an adult educator and coordinator for programs for Second LanguageAcquisition. Furthermore I am experienced in Focusing and ‘Thinking at the Edge’ asa trainer of the approach ‘Experiential-Concept-Coaching’ (ECC). Doing this, I accompany people to cross their fuzzy meaningful edges to find more and more wordsand ways to speak from those edges. I enjoy doing this in my mother language, German, as well as in English and Spanish. As a researcher in educational sciences I am, among other methods, trained in Microphenomenology which is a way to explicate embodied layers of experiences. In my PhD project I am following my curiosity to investigate and describe the process of creating differences and commonality in terms of Gendlin’s Theory of the Implicit and his A Process Model. In this I am supported by the research group of ‘Embodied Critical Thinking’ (ECT) at the University of Iceland.

[web: www.monicalindner.com]

Jenny Newman, UK

Dr. Jenny Newman has written two novels, Going In (Penguin) and Life Class(Arrow), and her short fiction has been widely published and broadcast. She is the editor of The Faber Book of Seductions and contributing co-editor of Women TalkSex: Autobiographical writing on sex, sexuality and sexual identity (Scarlet Press); British and Irish Novelists: an Introduction through Interviews (Arnold) and The Writer’s Workbook (Arnold). She has also written extensively on contemporary British writers, and the process of writing fiction, including A Novel in Nine Steps (MslexiaPublications). She was awarded the degrees of BA, BPhil (Distinction) and PhD by Liverpool University, and a Postgraduate Certificate in Education by King’s CollegeLondon. She was formerly Head of Creative Writing at Liverpool John MooresUniversity, UK, where she founded the MA, MPhil and PhD programmes in Writing.

Yael Teff-Seker, Israel

Yael Teff-Seker, PhD, is a researcher and lecturer at the Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning at the Technion Israel Institute of Technology and at the AravaInstitute of Environmental Studies. She received her PhD in Conflict Studies from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem (2013) and studies the social and political aspects of environmental planning and policy. Her research and teaching foci are environmentalplanning, environmental education, and environmental conflict and cooperation.

[web: https://shwartzlab.wixsite.com/website/yael-tef]

Anna Magee, UK

Anna Magee, PhD, is a UKCP registered psychotherapist. Anna’s approach to therapy is grounded within an Integrative Tradition. She has developed a special interest in the field of trauma resolution and has undertaken trainings with leading trauma specialistssuch as Babette Rothschild, Professor Franz Ruppert, Dr. Peter Levine and Dr. Stephen Porges. From 2005-2017 Anna contributed to teaching research methods on the Master’s in Counselling Studies at the University of East Anglia. Following herown particular interest in the field of family systems and intergenerational trauma, between 2004–2006 Anna trained with the Hellinger Institute of Great Britain (nowCSISS) learning Bert Hellinger’s Systemic Constellation Approach. Since 2006 Annahas been a facilitator of this approach, leading workshops in England and in Hungary. A key concern in Family Systems work is the issue of how people may come to experience a sense of belonging, particularly when this may have been problematicfor them. In 2014 Anna completed a four-year period of doctoral study. Her thesis was entitled The Creative Dance of Love and Consciousness, presenting the findingsof her integral and embodied inquiry into the experiences of Belonging and not-Belonging.

[web: www.loveandconsciousness.org]

Friedgard E. Blob, Germany

Friedgard E. Blob is a Certifying Coordinator of The International Focusing Instituteand a German Focusing Teacher since 2001. She has a particular interest in intermodal Expressive Arts Focusing (EAF) and Focusing Presence in Atmospheres (FPA). She offers workshops and training programs at all levels in her field of Continuing Education and Community Wellness Focusing. EAF and FPA areinfluenced by her background of Design Techniques, GROUP Psychology and Educational Sciences. There is a focus on Focusing with the Whole Body (Germ. Focusing mit dem Ganzen Korper, FGK) and Existential Well-Being both in hertrainings and in her practice of Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy. Her developmentfrom Person-Centred psychotherapist and counsellor to wholehearted focuser has found a new stage in crossing Focusing-Oriented Expressive Arts (FOATR) andGuided Drawing, a body-focused technique of Sensorimotor Art Therapy.

[web: www.focusing-tuebingen.de]

Tomonori Motoyama, Japan

Tomonori Motoyama is a GROUP Psychologist and a Certified Psychologist in Japan. He is currently an Associate Professor at the Fukuoka University, Fukuoka, Japan, and was a Visiting Scholar at the University of Nottingham in 2016–2017. He trainedas a Person-Centred counsellor and is a member of the Society for Human Relationship established in 1970, which has held more than 16 workshops / EncounterGroups over many years. The Society was awarded the prize of the JapaneseAssociation for Humanistic Psychology in 2019. He is a contributing author to The Person-Centered Approach in Japan: Blending a Western Approach with Japanese Culture (ed. Mikuni, 2015) published by PCCS Books.

[web: http://resweb2.jhk.adm.fukuoka-u.ac.jp/FukuokaUnivHtml/info/5196/R107E.html]

Mick Cooper, UK

Mick Cooper is Professor of Counselling Psychology at the University of Roehampton, where he is Director of the Centre for Research in Social and psychologicalTransformation (CREST). Mick is a chartered psychologist, a UKCP-registeredexistential psychotherapist, and a Fellow of the British Association for Counsellingand Psychotherapy. Mick is author and editor of a range of texts on person-centred, existential, and relational approaches to therapy; including Working at Relational Depth in Counselling and Psychotherapy (2nd ed., Sage, 2018, with Dave Mearns), Pluralistic Counselling and Psychotherapy (Sage, 2011, with John McLeod), and Existential Therapies (2nd ed., Sage, 2017). Mick has led a series of research studies both qualitative and quantitative—exploring the processes and outcomes of humanistic counselling with young people, and has published in a range of leading international psychotherapy journals. Mick’s latest book is Integrating Counselling and Psychotherapy: Directionality, Synergy, and Social Change (Sage, 2019). Mick is the father of four children and lives in Brighton on the south coast of England.

[web: https://mick-cooper.squarespace.com/]

Brian Thorne, UK

Brian Thorne is Emeritus Professor of Counselling at the University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK, where he founded the Centre for Counselling Studies in 1992. He worked with Carl Rogers prior to Rogers’ death in 1987 and was instrumental in introducing the Person-Centred Approach to the UK, co-authoring Person Centred Counselling in Action (with Dave Mearns, Sage Publications, 1988) and writing an early biography of Rogers (Sage Publications, 1992). He has maintained a passionatecommitment both to the theory and practice of Person-Centred therapy and to membership of the Anglican Church and was for many years a Lay Canon of Norwich Cathedral. He has always emphasised the spiritual dimension of the person and has written extensively on how this dimension might beintegrated in the Person-Centred Approach (e.g. The Mystical Power of Person-centred Therapy: Hope beyond Despair, Whurr Publications, 2002). Brian Thorne is Co-founder of The Norwich Centre for Personal, Professional and Spiritual Development.

[no web url]

Nada Lou, Canada

As a teacher by profession, Nada’s name is known throughout the Focusing world as a Coordinator for The International Focusing Institute (TIFI) who is certified to teachthose wishing to learn. Nada’s double specialty is in Focusing and Thinking at the Edge. She taught many courses around the world since the 1990s. Nada’s ability is to gently and patiently nurture each person’s felt sensing and thinking edge, guidingthem at every step. More often Nada’s name is also associated with Focusing video productions. Nada is a prolific video maker of more than 45 DVDs featuring GeneGendlin and other Focusing luminaries, which have brought their teachings into homes and offices around the world. Immersing herself in Gendlin’s thinking throughher DVD Productions has made Nada one of the experts in TAE. Since co-presentingTAE workshops with Dr. Gendlin, Nada evolved a personal approach to a TAE coursecalled THINK DI FFERENT–(TAE), and is in the forefront of spreading the ‘method’ of this practice around the world as study programs, live lectures, personal projects, seminars and webinar courses. Nada is the author of The Grassroots ManualIntroduction to TAE.

[web: https://nadalou.com/]