Introduction to Focusing
18th September 2025 - 9th October 2025 Zoom
Introductory Workshop/Event
Learning Focusing will support you to treasure the richness of your inner life and treat yourself with more kindness. Focusing allows us to become more fascinated by the world and deepen our relationships with others, professionally and personally. I have been teaching the Introduction to Focusing and Focusing Skills Certificate for the last eight years and am passionate about cultivating a Focusing a way of being in the world. Focusing is a natural process of listening in to what is going on inside you. We can listen in not only to our thoughts and emotions but to what we feel in the body… some vague overall feeling of how you are right now or how you feel about a particular issue in your life – your felt sense of it – somehow captures more than only the thoughts, emotions, or body sensations alone.
When you’re trying to work out what’s bothering you, you might run through some possibilities in your mind… sometimes something lets you know “that’s it, that’s what’s really bothering me”. This is the body – your whole living system – letting you know. We are often too busy and rushed in life to pay attention, or we are not used to consulting our wider self. If we slow down and listen in, we notice there is a wealth of information waiting there about how we feel and what we need. We can develop more self compassion through this process of listening in.
As you learn to guide yourself through the Focusing process you will notice how your inner feelings shift and change as a result of finding a way to symbolise them just as they are. When we can be with what is there and welcome it, this allows life to flow forward freely. Listening inside and welcoming all that’s there isn’t always easy, and so the Focusing Skills Certificate takes you more deeply into the Focusing process, how to reap the benefits and how to tackle the sticking points. As you learn also to be a Focusing Listener or Companion, through learning to listen to another fully you are learning to listen to yourself.
In each workshop we have time together in a group and Focusing time in pairs or threes. Classes are highly experiential and we create a safe space for people to share and be yourselves. The Intro to Focusing equips you to form a Focusing-Listening partnership and if you work in a caring profession you may take what you learn into your way of being in those relationships. Learning Focusing is a great investment as it is a practice you can draw on to support you throughout your life. I love meeting people who are interested in Focusing and I love sharing this beautiful practice.
“A stunningly good workshop – thank you so much. I’m recommending it to people already”
“Inspirational workshop. It is good to be stopped in my track and to re-think, not only my practice with clients, but also my personal way of being”
“I’ve been in many well facilitated groups over the years and this one was particularly warm and inviting”
“Felt very organised, gently yet solidly held, clear expertise + really pleasant delivery and pace. Loved it!”
Introduction to Focusing – (modules one and two of BFA Focusing Skills Certificate)
In this Introductory course you will learn about how Focusing was discovered and gain understanding of what we call the felt sense. You will gradually increase your understanding of how this plays a part in our lives and how to pay attention inside in a Focusing way, both to yourself and to others. Through demos, experiential practices and Focusing-Listening partnership exchanges you will experience what can happen when we turn towards our embodied experience without judgement. You will also learn a practice that Gendlin called ‘Clearing a Space’ which can be helpful for supporting yourself if you are overwhelmed. We look at the Focusing attitude, which underpins the whole practice and discuss how you can work with what comes up in your process even if you find that not much seems to come up, or too much seems to come up!
When you have done modules one and two you can enter a Focusing-Listening partnership.
Modules one and two also allow you to go on to do the whole Focusing Skills Certificate
Weekend – 10am-5pm: 7th & 8th June 2025
Weekday – Thursdays 10am-1pm: 18th Sep, 25th Sep, 2nd Oct, 9th Oct 2025
“Well organised course, supportive group members and a comfortable group size”
BFA Focusing Skills Certificate continues Thursdays 10am-1pm: 16th Oct – 19th March (see below for details)
Workshops are experiential and usually open to six-eight attendees – book early to ensure your place!
Focusing Skills Certificate 2025-26
A full grounding in the Focusing practice over six months
Presence, Blocks and the Inner Relationship – modules three and four
Focusing is about meeting what’s inside from a place of being present with our experience. If we can cultivate this attitude of being with our inner feelings and parts then things become more manageable and we are more able to learn from what’s inside of us. In these modules we learn how to become more present and to relate to the parts and aspects of our experience from this place of presence. We also look at what gets in the way of the Focusing process with particular attention to parts that may leave us feeling criticised, doubted or judged (Gendlin called this the Inner Critic). Many, if not all of us, have experience of feeling a critical part or voice and its impact on us. We look at this area in depth in terms of how to apply a Focusing quality of attention even to parts which seem destructive or critical.
Thursdays 10am 1pm: 16th Oct, 23rd Oct, 6th Nov, 13th Nov 2025
“Very satisfying workshop. Knowledgeable, competent and calm facilitator. Will take much away to use both in work and for self”
Listening, Language and the Body – modules five and six
How we feel about the body generally and our relationship with our own body may affect our Focusing process and these modules give space to explore this. We also delve deeper into the realm of Focusing partnerships: This beautiful form of human connection can be enhanced by paying wider attention to our whole embodied communication, listening both to the words and beyond the words. We look at the potential for bringing more of yourself into your Listening practice and there is opportunity to experiment with Focusing invitations – prompts that may support the Focuser’s process. How we use language both towards ourselves and when we are in the companioning role can be very influential, so we look at how certain language may be facilitative of the process. We also explore how we can allow the body to show us how it wants to be, what support it can offer us and the potential for utilising the wider space to support us.
Thursdays 10am 1pm: 20th Nov, 27th Nov, 8th Jan, 15th Jan
“Suzi is a great teacher, clear, explanative, helpful”
Dreaming and Intuition – modules seven and eight
The Focusing process is amazingly well suited for exploring dreams and there are some specific ways we can explore dreams using Focusing that can also be applied to exploring other life issues as well. In these modules we let go of pre-existing theories of dream interpretation and fixed symbols and open to listen to our embodied sense of our dreams. Maybe the body has something different, or something more to let us know. We draw on Gendlin’s approaches to dreams from his book ‘Let your body interpret your dreams’, including his ‘dream questions’ and working with opposites. Focusing with dreams gives an opportunity to explore embodying the feeling of different characters from within our dreams or noticing how the feel of them may signify something in us. We look at how our dreams can show us what we may be needing and whether cultivating a more dreamlike space in our waking lives may serve us. We can also explore Focusing with some piece of ‘stimuli’ such as a poem or picture to see what may further unlock our connection with our intuitive realm and what is meaningful to us.
Thursdays 10am 1pm: 22nd Jan, 29th Jan, 5th Feb, 12th Feb
“Pace was really good, not too much info, clearly explained and lots of practical demos and experiences”
Creativity and Values into Action – modules nine and ten
The final modules give us an opportunity to explore areas for which I have particular enthusiasm and which, to me, seem inextricably linked with our humanness. Focusing is intrinsically relational – relating to ourselves, relating to each other. How might the process unfold if we allow ourselves to be more aware of our shared humanness, how much do we feel open to connection and can we respect the parts of us that want to keep us safe. We are invited to notice how our Focusing experience is affected by our connection with our Listener/Companion, including any difference or similarity between us. How might Focusing support our connection with our values or any spiritual sense we may have. As we come to the end of the Skills Certificate course there is the opportunity to sense into how our body may want us to live forward and what may be in the way of this. We also have a chance to utilise Focusing to help us connect with a sense of play or creativity.
Thursdays 10am 1pm: 26th Feb, 5th Mar, 12th Mar, 19th Mar
On completion of the ten modules you receive the British Focusing Association Focusing Skills Certificate.
If you want to continue your journey with Focusing after this you might consider the Focusing Practitioner Programme.
“Suzi, I really loved the tranquil and spacious atmosphere you created within the online space. The way you gently and carefully attended to what everyone was saying and allowed generous time for check in, discussion and paired work really set the tone for the slowing down and noticing in our Focusing”
All workshops are experiential and involve plenty of opportunity to practice Focusing!
A note on dates: I run the Intro three times a year and then the following workshops in the Skills Certificate follow on after the September Intro. Workshops after the Intro do not necessarily need to be done in order and if you have completed an Intro workshop with another teacher you may book on to workshops in my Skills Certificate course. I have run the Skills Certificate on weekends since 2017 and am likely to run the course on weekends again in 2027.
Intro modules 1 & 2: £160
Modules 3&4, 5&6, 7&8, 9&10: £160 per pair of workshops.
Discount! Book modules 3-10 all together for £600.
About Suzi
I have been Focusing for over fifteen years and teaching the Focusing Skills Certificate for the last eight years. I teach Focusing from novice through to Practitioner level and I am also a Person Centred counsellor and supervisor.
I also offer guided Focusing sessions, and teach Focusing one to one. I am available to deliver tailored Focusing trainings, in Sussex, London and online. Focusing has become an invaluable part of my life and I have a passion for training, having a background in training volunteers and providing training in Higher Education.