What is Focusing? (draft; revised update link inside)
Ongoing, direct reference to the phenomenologically intricate
This is the draft version; I have now published a significantly expanded and revised version!
“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, Focusing, 1978
My life has been influenced, impacted, shifted, and expanded by different worldviews, philosophies, and practices. Today I want to write about Focusing1, which I have been training in and falling in love with more and more. In my experience, Focusing is a transformative practice of self-understanding, self-exploration, and self-actualization, among other things. I have wanted to write about this for some time: indeed, finally writing about this has helped me clarify and articulate some things about this practice and I’m happy to share this with you.
A good starting point for thinking or talking about Focusing is, perhaps, to begin with what it is. Definitions tend to narrow our attention in the attempt to grasp the what of a thing, in order to define it. A verbal definition will necessarily be exclusive, in the way language always is: a word means what it means by virtue of excluding everything else from the scope of its definition. So when we try to define Focusing, we necessarily exclude some things in order to include others. However, precisely as regards the practice of Focusing, what we exclude may be a matter of some debate.
Let’s start by looking at the brief definition given on The International Focusing Institute's website: "Focusing is an experiential, embodied, and evidence-based practice of self-reflection." This seems like a good starting point. There are five important elements to consider here: experiential, embodied, evidence-based, practice, and self-reflection. Let’s go one by one.
First, Focusing is an inherently experiential thing. It’s something we can talk and write about, of course, but doing so is not Focusing. We can think of experience as bodily-felt, rather than cognitive, verbal, or purely imaginative. Focusing is also experiential in that it is, itself, an experience from which we learn, and it is an experience that, itself, feeds back into our overall experiencing or living. We experience our present moment viscerally, prior to words, thoughts, or concepts; these all come later, informed (consciously or not) by the direct experience of the ever-present now2. We have “situational bodies”3 in ongoing interaction with what’s around us. Concepts, abstractions, or generalizations arise from experience and can help us more fully “understand” experience, but experience itself is always immediate (unmediated) and implicitly rich. In Focusing we orient internally and go beyond what we already know, to something inchoate which arises freshly in our subjective landscape. This means it is often “fuzzy” or vague when we try to put it into words: the edge of experience is a less-articulate, fully-felt, non-explicit realm4. It is through connecting with this direct experience that we are able to truly carry forward any insights that may arise: they come from within, and by shining awareness on them we can more consciously integrate what those experiences and insights are telling us.
Second, Focusing is embodied, because it takes place in and via the body. In Focusing, we get in touch with a felt sense, which, for most of us, arises within the body: it might start out like a vague “feeling” of something not-quite-nameable, like when a word is on the tip of your tongue. Our nervous system includes our brain and sensory nerves, of course, and also includes the enteric nervous system, which is all the nerves in the “gut” — there’s a reason it’s called the second brain! Think of a time when you got a sinking feeling, or butterflies in your stomach: that physical and emotional sensation is happening as different parts of your nervous system “talk” to each other. Here, there are sub-perceptual and barely-perceptible levels of experience. This is part of what we learn to pay attention to in Focusing; there may also arise fresh images, memories, or words that seem relevant somehow -– and that feeling of relevance is an embodied feeling: maybe in the solar plexus, or the throat, or a sense of “yeah, that’s the right word…” and something clicks into place — like when the word on the tip of the tongue comes, at last, to be said. All of this is happening freshly in an embodied way: in and through the whole body-mind.
This brings us to evidence-based. There is increasingly more research being done on the “gut-brain” connection, demonstrating how important it is for us to take seriously notions of “a gut feeling” and pay attention to the way the body speaks. There is also research into the felt sense and wellbeing, Focusing and group dynamics, and much more. Furthermore, TIFI’s website links to many articles that cover Focusing as a practice, as a philosophy, as an element in psychotherapeutic work, as a way of working with trauma, in working with children and Focusing, and more. And, Focusing empirically works to increase the practitioner’s awareness of and connection to themselves, their issues, and so forth. The empirical value of deep connection, fresh insights, and intricate experience is inherently valuable. There is a sense, when doing Focusing, that something is happening, and this is often all the proof one needs that this practice can powerfully effect change.
All of this points us to the practice of Focusing. It can be done by a solitary practitioner, someone who knows Focusing and does it on their own. However, it is often more powerful with a Focusing partner. The traditional Focusing partnership comprises two people who take turns, sharing the time, to listen to each other while the other Focuses. These peer relationships are non-hierarchical, non-directive, and become increasingly meaningful over time. The listener does not have to listen in any particular way, although good listening is a true skill that can be improved with study and practice. And, listening for Focusing, in particular, is a special skill which greatly enhances the experience of the Focuser as compared with a non-Focusing listener. Focusing can also be done in group contexts, or therapeutic environments. It is a practice, because it is something one “improves” at over time. The ability to connect with the felt sense and follow it; the ability to distinguish, as needed, between emotions and the felt sense; and the ability to gain insights and implement them: these are all skills that improve with more Focusing practice.
Finally, Focusing is about self-reflection, on a possibly very deep level. This involves an attitude of unconditional positive regard, meaning that whatever is going on in your embodied experience is accepted (not necessarily with liking or approval!) for what it is, without judgment, so the process can carry forward. Only when we can meet whatever is present can we truly listen to it and learn from it, which is one of the main purposes of Focusing: to gain insights into oneself, one’s problems, challenges in one’s life or work or relationships, and so on. From this open attitude of welcoming, we can see and engage with whatever comes up, and have it reflected back to us by a listening partner (Focusing partner, therapist, or yourself). In this reflection, we can gain powerful insights that truly get us unstuck and allow life to move forward. We are able to reflect something about the true self, rather than getting stuck in habitual loops or patterns of negative thinking, which are so common and often so subtle we don’t notice them anymore.
Ultimately, Focusing is a practice of directly referring to the ongoing, ever-present, and ever-changing bodily felt experience. We’ve seen that Focusing itself is a phenomenological skill which improves with practice and that involves looking at or being with what’s vague or fuzzy at the edges in your experience; connecting with the implicit intricacy of being alive in your given situation; and “focusing” the attention to allow new insights to carry forward. This attention is, at times, broad and open to allow into awareness that which is as yet only implicit. Then our attention may “narrow” or “spotlight” for a time on something arising freshly, before opening out again to allow new implicit intricacies to present. Focusing is being with our subjective flow of experience in a way that “carries forward”5 to insights and next steps in life. By holding space for what’s arising in experience, with unconditional positive regard, we make way for the light of the true self to shine unimpeded.
Focusing was started by Eugene Gendlin, a philosopher with a long experience of working in psychology and psychotherapy after studying and working with Carl Rogers at the University of Chicago.
“There is indeed interaction prior to linguistic communication, and this too still continues to exceed language, even with and after language. But I will argue that it is not only prior to language; it is also prior to perception.” From Gendlin, E.T. (1992). “The primacy of the body, not the primacy of perception.” Man and World, 25(3-4), 341-353. https://www.focusing.org/gendlin/docs/gol_2220.html
See: Gendlin, E.T. (1993). “Three assertions about the body.” The Folio, 12(1), 21-33. https://www.focusing.org/gendlin/docs/gol_2064.html
For instance,“...bodily interaction functions in language and precedes perception and interpretation.” From Gendlin, E.T. (1997). “The responsive order: A new empiricism.” Man and World, 30 (3), 383-411. https://www.focusing.org/gendlin/docs/gol_2157.html
Gendlin, E.T. (2004). The new phenomenology of carrying forward. Continental Philosophy Review, 37(1), 127-151. https://www.focusing.org/gendlin/docs/gol_2228.html