An Introduction to Focusing
What is Focusing? When Might It Be Beneficial?
Inner Relationship Focusing, or Focusing for short, is a body-centered, evidence-based, experiential process that supports clients to:
Build Self-Awareness, Empathy, Regulation
Break Through Patterns
Get Unstuck
Relieve Inner Critics and Increase Confidence
Calm the Monkey Mind
Relieve Anxiety and Depression
Release Emotional or Physical Pain
Reparent the Inner Child
Heal Trauma and Old Wounds
Ease Major Life Transitions
Make Authentic Decisions
Be a Centered, Less Reactive Person
Be a Stronger Leader
Fully Realize Dreams and Potential
Humans naturally have the ability to focus, yet our culture and environment do not cultivate it. We often live in our heads (and can forget or neglect our bodies) due to our emphasis on cognitive ability and achievement, our increased use of technology, our over-scheduled and fast-paced lives, our decrease in movement and increase in sitting, or past trauma. Focusing is a way to reconnect with our bodies and our emotions and rebuild communication pathways to hear our bodies in real-time. This reconnection supports us in being more centered, grounded, and calm, and communicating and acting more authentically in all aspects of our daily lives.
What is the Focusing Process?
The focusing process is supported by a trained focusing coach. The focusing coach creates a safe, empathetic space to support YOU in creating a safe, empathetic space for all of your emotional parts and perspectives.
The focusing coach helps you identify your focal topic, get into your body, put words to your experience, hear and acknowledge all that arises, welcome and accept your parts for how they feel, navigate and build relationship to each of your parts, go deep and explore new territory, listen out for and fully feel positive shifts. The diagram below outlines the full circle process of a focusing session.
One often has profound learnings and experiences in just one session. And over time, consistent and ongoing focusing work can result in major transformation and healing. The beauty of focusing is that one doesn’t have to create a comprehensive action plan after a session and do a bunch of work in your day to day. The learnings and shifts integrate naturally by themselves. These body and brain shifts are reinforced the more you do focusing and come back to your parts.
Focusing is practiced by coaches, therapists, and all kinds of healing professionals all over the world who support human development and change. It was developed by the philosopher and psychotherapist Eugene Gendlin in the 1970s while doing research on what made psychotherapy clients successful in making lasting positive change. It can be applied to anyone seeking to further develop and achieve shifts in their lives. To learn more about focusing and the research behind its effectiveness, visit https://focusing.org/felt-sense/what-focusing.
Focusing Offerings
Clients are welcome to schedule one introductory session to get a taste for the approach and schedule one-off sessions as they like.
We recommend that focusing clients sign up for a package of 3-6 sessions to get a feel for the approach, begin to learn and apply some of the key concepts, and see even greater impact.
At times, an experienced client may want to schedule an extended 2-hour session to allow for extra time for a focusing session on a specific topic or for processing together.
To meet Lucan and learn more about the focusing approach and what you are seeking to achieve, book a free intro call
or feel free to reach out via EMAIL with questions.
Want to learn more?
Coaching vs focusing
Focusing sessions can be purchased one by one and do not require an intake or assessment or the focusing coach having knowledge about you. You can walk in off the street with no introduction, and the focusing coach will guide you through an impactful focusing session where you will develop greater awareness and insight into yourself, your body, and your emotions. We recommend that clients sign up for 3-6 sessions to get a feel for the approach, begin to learn and apply some of the key concepts, and see even greater impact. New clients are welcome to schedule one introductory session to get a taste for the approach and schedule one-off sessions as they like.
A coaching engagement is a more structured engagement which involves an intake, an assessment, and program development supported by 3 to 6 months of biweekly coaching sessions to support you achieving your goals, after which one-off sessions can be scheduled. The coach may employ focusing as a technique within the coaching engagement as appropriate. Learn more about our coaching approach here.
Testimonials
I participated in 3 focusing sessions with Lucan. I was unfamiliar with the concept of focusing – but was experiencing professional and personal stagnation and other strategies were not working. However, following each focusing session, I experienced a revitalization, uncovering underlying reasons for my stagnation and achieving immediate progress thereafter. While challenging to explain – the profound impact of focusing is undeniable. I highly recommend Lucan as a focusing coach.
Kavitha, Strategic Advisor
I have consistently seen the same highly sought-after therapist for the last 18 years. I got more out of an hour session with Lucan than I’ve gotten in all the years I have been seeing him.
Julie, Coaching Client
I recently had the blessing to have a focusing session with Lucan to process my grief over the loss of my brother who died suddenly and unexpectedly. Lucan provided me with the much-needed space to sort through all the noise and clutter in my head regarding the sudden news and the shock that came with it. Lucan’s empathetic style provided me with a very safe and comfortable space to grieve and yet shift and discover inner peace and for that I am extremely grateful. Lucan is extremely compassionate and helped me to connect to these deeper positive feelings of strength. I highly recommend Lucan for her ability to coach people struggling to get out of their mind and their noisy self-talk and conflicting emotions and find deeper meaning and understanding of themselves.
Jeanne, Career and Life Transitions Coach
Lucan’s coaching helped me immensely. Through six months of one-on-one virtual sessions, we explored tension and stress inducing topics, identifying and de-mystifying inner critic thought patterns. She helped me recognize and strengthen my ability to be more objective (less defensive) and to set boundaries without building walls – which feels great! Difficult conversations are part of life, and now that I am more in tune with my own reactions, uncomfortable topics are far easier to tackle with others. Thank you, Lucan!
Anne, Chief