Focusing
The felt sense. Grew directly out of research into why some therapies worked and others did not.
A felt sense is not a mental experience but a physical one. Physical. A bodily awareness of a situation or person or event.
Focusing is a practical manual with a theory underneath it. Eugene Gendlin, a psychologist and philosopher, sets out six movements, from clearing a space to checking a change against the body, by which a person can attend to a problem that is felt before it can be spoken. The steps are written plainly enough to be followed alone or taught to a client.
Gendlin argues that the body holds knowledge the intellect cannot reach on its own, and that durable change follows a bodily shift rather than fresh insight or the same feeling repeated. For the consulting room, the value is a disciplined way of slowing a session down, helping a client stay with what is still unclear and letting its meaning form instead of pressing for interpretation.
The book was first published in 1978 and revised for this Rider edition in 2003.
About the author
Eugene Tovio Gendlin
Eugene T. Gendlin (1926 to 2017) was an American philosopher and psychologist. He earned a doctorate in philosophy at the University of Chicago, where he studied and collaborated with Carl Rogers on psychotherapy research. Gendlin developed the concept of the felt sense, a bodily awareness that carries the meaning of a situation before it is put into words, and the Focusing method built around it. His 1978 book Focusing set out a step-by-step practice for attending to that inner experience.
Details
- 1978
- English
- Rider
- Rider, 25th anniversary edition, 2003
- 192
- 9781844132201