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Jim
Dr. Jim Psychologist Mentor Guide
http://www.drjimpsychologist.com
Dr. Jim Leonidas Ph.D., C. Psych.
Registered Clinical Counselling Psychologist
Canadian Register Health Service Providers Psychology
1.416.484.9912 voice mail
Skype Name: drjimpsychologist.com
10 MCNAIRN Avenue Suite H1 Toronto Ontario Canada M5M 2H5
Nearest major Intersection LAWRENCE and YONGE Streets LAWRENCE PARK NORTH TORONTO Neighborhood GREATER TORONTO AREA GTA
Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. Plato
What is true is already so. Owning up to it doesn't make it worse. Not being open about it doesn't make it go away. And because it's true, it is what is there to be interacted with. Anything untrue isn't there to be lived. People can stand what is true, for they are already enduring it. Eugene Gendlin
Summary
Development of a Style and Approach to Counselling Over 36 Years
YouTube Videos Eugene Gendlin Focusing
Focusing-Oriented Experiential Psychotherapy
Focusing
Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy: A Manual of the Experiential Method
Focusing Web Resources
Focusing Can Help You
YouTube Videos Eugene Gendlin Focusing
Your physically felt body is in fact part of a gigantic system of here and other places, now and other times, you and other people, in fact, the whole universe. This sense of being bodily alive in a vast system is the body as it is felt from inside. Eugene Gendlin.
Development of a Style and Approach to Counselling Over 36 Years
The development of my own style and approach to counselling over 36 years has been strongly influenced by the Experiential Humanistic and Person-Centered traditions, represented by such people as Carl Rogers, Eugene Gendlin, Clarke Moustakas and Abraham Maslow, the teachings of Psychosynthesis developed by Roberto Assagioli, David Grand’s Brainspotting, and the EMDR method originated by Francine Shapiro.
The following two web pages will describe the nature and purpose of two, among many, different methods used in the counselling process, for the purpose of inviting and creating a profound, organic, evolving, and unfolding of the life forward direction of the person.
The essence of working with another person is to be present as a living being. And that is lucky, because if we had to be smart, or good, or mature, or wise, then we would probably be in trouble. But what matters is not that. What matters is to be a human being, with another human being, to recognise the other person as another being in there. Eugene Gendlin.
A full explanation of the nature, purpose, benefits and outcomes of Focusing-Oriented Experiential Psychotherapy can best be understood by reading various sections the many web sites devoted to the method, and by reading selected pages from the following 2 books written by Dr. Eugene T. Gendlin:
"Focusing" by Dr. Eugene Gendlin (ISBN 0-553-27833-9) Bantam published 1981 in paperback, readily available in most bookstores and libraries.
Part One Unlocking the Wisdom of Your Body,
Chapter 3, What the Body Knows, pages 32-40;
Part Two Focusing,
Chapter 4, The Focusing Manual, pages 43-50; Chapter 5, The Six Focusing Movements and What They Mean, pages 51-64; Chapter 6, What Focusing Is Not, pages 65-70; Chapter 7, Clearing a Space for Yourself, pages 71-82; Chapter 8, If You Can't Find a Felt Sense, pages 83-101; Chapter 9, If You Can't Make Anything Shift, page 102-109.
These 77 pages are easy to read and quickly provide you with an understanding of the process.
As these connections are made between what the body knows and what the mind knows, one is enriched with an inner strength and direction. This freeing process allows life energy to flow forward into positive new ways of being. Eugene Gendlin
"Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy: A Manual of the Experiential Method" by Dr. Eugene Gendlin (ISBN 1-57230-376-X) Guilford published 1996, paperback for $31.99, available by special order in most book stores, from Caversham Booksellers, 98 Harbord Street, Toronto (1 800 361-6120 or 416 944-0962).
Part One Focusing and Listening,
Chapter 2, Dead Ends, pages 7-15;
Chapter 3, Eight Characteristics of an Experiential Process Step, pages 16-24;
Chapter 4, What a Client Does to Enable an Experiential Step to Come, pages 25-40;
Chapter 5, What a Therapist Can Do to Engender an Experiential Step, pages 41-56;
Chapter 6, The Crucial Bodily Attention, Pages 57-68;
Chapter 7, Focusing; pages 69-75;
Part Two Integrating Other Therapeutic Methods,
Chapter 12, Working with the Body: A New and Freeing Energy, pages 181-191;
Chapter 14, Experiential Dream Interpretation, pages 199-211;
Chapter 15, Imagery, pages 212-220;
Chapter 16, Emotional Catharsis, Reliving, pages 221-226;
Chapter 17, Action Steps, pages 227-237;
Chapter 18, Cognitive Therapy, pages 238-246;
Chapter 20, The Life-Forward Direction, pages 259-263;
Chapter 21, Values, pages 264-275;
Chapter 22, It Fills Itself In, pages 276-282;
Chapter 23, The Client-Therapist Relationship, pages 283-298;
This book provides the most comprehensive and systematic description of the method, and its integration with other therapeutic methods.
Focusing is a specific process through which we learn that each aspect of living, great and small, joyful and sad, expansive or insignificant, is carried in the body in a particular way. Through Focusing we can unlock doors and move into dimensions that cannot be entered through the intellect alone. Eugene Gendlin
Focusing Web Resources
The Focusing Institute web site http://www.focusing.org/index.html provides a rich source of information. The home page provides a general introduction to Focusing, the Institute and what is available on the site. The Focusing Institute invites you to browse The Gendlin Online Library. http://www.focusing.org/gendlin/ Sections of the web site cover a wide range of Focusing topics such as: Afghanistan, A Better World, Psychotherapy, Trauma, Body Work, Research, Children, Spirituality, Medicine, Creative Process, Science and Business. http://www.focusing.org/focusing_and.html Many published articles and book chapters by Gendlin and others are freely available to be read online. The research section of the site has an online article titled "Focusing-Oriented/Experiential Psychotherapy" by M. N. Hendricks 2001, where 80 research studies on Focusing and Experiencing are systematically reviewed. http://www.focusing.org/research_basis.html The Focusing Institute has centers in over 31 countries with publications in 17 languages, and its own professional journal. http://www.focusingresources.com/index.html Anne Weiser Cornell's web site has many articles available online by different authors about many aspects of Focusing. More great articles about Focusing are available from the British Focusing Teachers' Association: http://www.focusing.org.uk/articles.html
Life always has its own forward direction, whatever else might also be going on. Eugene Gendlin
Focusing Can Help You
Learn how to sense what makes you come alive and live more fully from there
Accept and love yourself as you truly are
Learn to be more deeply connected with yourself
Become a compassionate listener to yourself and others
Help you to know how you feel and what you want in any situation
Transform self-criticism and confusion into powerful allies
Help you to seek a way to live more fully in the present
Make decisions with confidence
Discover a way to sort out emotional reactions so they make sense and release themselves
Get your counselling moving again, or just go deeper
Live more fully embodied, gently grounded in your physical being
Express yourself with more clarity, power, depth and authenticity
Access and support the positive and creative life energy within you
Feel more and more like yourself
Experience increasing ease, power and joy in your life
Know what you really feel and what you really want
Ground your spirituality, trust your body, your spirit and your heart
Get off the merry-go-round of repetitive feelings and thoughts
Take responsibility for your own psychological health
Enhance your listening skills
Deepen your capacity for contact and empathy with others
Support others to tolerate and understand their difficult feelings and to befriend themselves
Stay aware of your own experiencing and needs
Develop or improve your capacity for self care
Help you in coping with conflict, change, overload and other sources of stress
Learn a skill that you can use over and over with many of the issues of your life
Your body is a wonderfully intricate interaction with everything around you. That's why it knows so much just in being. Through Focusing, you can access what your body knows. Eugene Gendlin
YouTube Videos Eugene Gendlin Focusing
Eugene Gendlin introduces Focusing at the International Conference Toronto 2000. Presentations introducing Focusing and the 'felt sense' by philosopher and psychologist.
Part I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7PEC5Mh5FY
Part II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmL4zjVi8Dk
Why Focusing works? Eugene Gendlin Focusing Institute Summer School 2010.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PG360ZWs9B4Why Focusing works? summer school 2010
Eugene Gendlin World Conference Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapies 2010.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47N_XtKggDc
Focusing is... the murky edge. Eugene Gendlin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRqQ7PQFLM0
Introducing Focusing. Eugene Gendlin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHO84URSKp8
Eugene Gendlin discusses with a participant how Focusing can enhance young players at game of football... focusing... Focusing Institute Summer School 2009.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kTfED-3zJk
Does Focusing give hope? Eugene Gendlin The relation of hope, finding hope, and focusing, and shares a couple of useful moves, and more.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T17V5qymKMo
Eugene Gendlin His vision for how people might be with one another, about public institutions, and steps forward from here. "I am looking forward to...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMPVX5g6BZM
Experience is a myriad richness. We think more than we can say. We feel more than we can think. We live more than we can feel. And there is much more still. Eugene Gendlin
Jim
Dr. Jim Psychologist Mentor Guide
http://www.drjimpsychologist.com
Dr. Jim Leonidas Ph.D., C. Psych.
Registered Clinical Counselling Psychologist
Canadian Register Health Service Providers Psychology
1.416.484.9912 voice mail
Skype Name: drjimpsychologist.com
10 MCNAIRN Avenue Suite H1 Toronto Ontario Canada M5M 2H5
Nearest major Intersection LAWRENCE and YONGE Streets LAWRENCE PARK NORTH TORONTO Neighborhood GREATER TORONTO AREA GTA
Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. Plato
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 of 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