VOLUME 6, NUMBER 1
PSYCHOTHERAPY:
THEORY, RESEARCH AND PRACTICE
FOCUSING
EUGENE T. GENDLIN
University of Chicago
Experiential focusing is a therapeutic pro-
cedure. As I will explain later, it is not alone
sufficient for psychotherapy. Rather, I view it
as one essential sub-process. I will first describe
the focusing procedure, and will then discuss
how the procedure may fit in with therapeutic
interaction. Finally I will present the research
background which gave rise to this therapeutic
procedure.
Much of psychotherapy consists of talking
on the surface of an individual's troubles, hop-
ing very gradually to get more deeply into
them.
Recently therapists use a number of meth-
ods to begin working right in the midst of the
trouble, to reach a concrete bodily level of
working, after only some initial interviewing.
For example, those using behavior therapy and
desensitization attempt this (whether always
effectively or not, is another issue). Once a
problem has been chosen, the desensitization
patient (Wolpe & Lazarus, 1966) is asked to
imagine and tolerate successive anxiety-arous-
ing versions of it. Patients begin working al-
most immediately with the bodily concreteness
of their difficulty. Certain role-playing meth-
ods similarly attempt to involve the concrete
organism of the individual, not only what he
says and thinks.
Many patients can't easily get into the bod-
ily version of their troubles. Some do struggle
from the start toward something more real
than just talking, and do achieve a concrete
4
WINTER, 1969
change process. But others never seem to try
or attain it.
The method of focusing which I will now
outline, can be taught and used in the context
of any therapy. It is a bodily method.
First of all, the method involves a sharp
and complete shift in direction. One must
cease talking at oneself inside; one must ask:
"What's wrong?" and then keep quiet, and re-
frain from answering oneself.
It is understood that everyone knows a
great deal about what is wrong, nevertheless it
is a totally different matter to wait and listen,
than to be telling oneself about it.
Usually one thinks from the outside in, at
oneself. In "focusing" one shifts to "from the
inside out, from oneself." Rather than trying
to say or think what the trouble is, what the
answer is, one must keep quiet and listen.
Then the bodily felt version of what the trou-
ble is, makes itself felt clearly enough.
It is important to emphasize the sharpness
of the difference in set. Everyone knows the
experience of being "in a stew" and trying to
say something useful at oneself, usually suc-
ceeding but little and in an unclear way.
Focusing is a dramatic stop to this, and in-
stead, a shutting up.
Secondly, one must understand before one
starts, that words can come from a feeling.
Words come anyway, one can't shut up for
long. But there is a way of letting all words
that come go by, except for such words as
 FOCUSING
''come from" the feeling. Another way to
phrase this (since "come from" is myste-
rious), is that some rare words have a felt ef-
fect. I call it an experiential effect. As these
rare words come, one senses a sharpened feel-
ing, or a felt relief, a felt shift, usually before
one can say what this shift is. Sometimes such
words are not in themselves very impressive
or novel, but just these words have an expe-
riential effect, and no others do. (For example:
"I'm scared . . ." might not be new, but when
the words arise from one's quietly listening,
they often have the effect of: "Yeah, that's
what it is allright, (long exhale breath),
(shakes head), yeah, boy, I didn't know how
true that was.") Yet, perhaps he has been
saying for days, among other things, that he
was scared. In a little introductory discussion
the therapist first explains how words can
come from a feeling. Then the patient is in-
vited to give examples, which usually show
that he hasn't understood yet. More discus-
sion follows. When he comes up with an ex-
ample that is right, we are convinced that he
understands, and only then. (For example:
the patient knew what is meant by words
coming from a feeling when he said: "When
you don't like someone, there is what you crit-
icize objectively, but it is different when what
you say comes from your feeling of how you
don't like him. That might not be objective,
but it's from what you feel.")
Thirdly, and lastly, one must explain in ad-
vance that it is possible to sense a problem as
a whole and let what is important come up
from that bodily sensing. People rarely let the
crux of the problem come freshly to them
from their feel of the problem as a whole.
They already know what the crux is, or they
decide what it is. Therefore, before we begin,
we instruct the patient on this third point:
"When you have a feel of the whole problem,
don't decide what is so important about it.
Feel it all and don't decide anything. Wait
and let the main crux come to you freshly."
In summary, these three preliminaries are
discussed until the patient's own description
convinces the interviewer that the patient
grasps them: (1) One must wait about 30 sec-
onds without talking at oneself, letting words
go by if they come, until one freshly senses
one's bodily feelings of the problem. (2)
5
Words can come from a feeling and such
words have a special power, a sensed effect,
other words don't have. (3) When you have a
feel of the whole problem, don't decide what's
most important about it. Ask: "What's the
crux of it?" and let that come freshly to you
from how the whole problem feels.
In research we give exactly the focusing in-
structions below. For therapy it is better to
give them informally in one's own language,
to vary their order, and to work repeatedly on
steps where difficulty arises. The initial por-
tion may be omitted after the first time.
FOCUSING MANUAL1
This is going to be just to yourself. What I will ask
you to do will be silent, just to yourself. Take a
moment just to relax 5 seconds. All right—
now, just to yourself, inside you, I would like you to
pay attention to a very special part of you
Pay attention to that Part where you usually feel sad
glad or scared. 5 seconds. Pay attention to that area
in you and see how you are now.
See what comes to you when you ask yourself, "How
am I now?" "How do I feel?" "what is the main
thing for me right now?"
Let it come, in whatever way it comes to you, and
see how it is.
30 second or less
If, among the things that you have just thought of,
there was a major personal problem which felt im-
portant, continue with it. Otherwise, select a mean-
ingful personal problem to think about. Make sure
you have chosen some personal problem of real im-
portance in your life. Choose the thing which seems
most meaningful to you.
10 seconds
1. Of course, there are many parts to that one thing
you are thinking about—too many to think of
each one alone. But, you can feel all of these things
together. Pay attention there where you usually
feel things, and in there you can get a sense of
what all of the problem feels like. Let yourself
feel all of that.
30 seconds or less
'The language of this manual is objectionable in
many ways. For example, the phrase "part of you"
is theoretically wrong. Also, felt meanings are not
really "inside" a person, but are his body sense of
his external life and situations. Better phrasing can
no doubt be devised. This phrasing arose from a
great many revisions made in discussions with subjects
after focusing, and seems to communicate quickly.
6 E U G E N E T.
2. As you pay attention to the whole feeling of it,
you may find that one special feeling comes up.
Let yourself pay attention to that one feeling.
l minute
3. Keep following one feeling. Don't let it be just
words or pictures-wait and let words or pictures
come from the feeling.
l minute
4> 5 lht?ne feeHn^ Chaf,f' I T ? ' let A d°
that. Whatever it does, follow the feeling and pay
attention to it
l minute
••;; • — ;••; — • .••••
5. Now, take what is fresh, or new, m the feel of it
now and go very easy.
Just as you feel it, try to find some new words
or pictures to capture what your present feeling
is all about. There doesn't have to be anything
that you didn't know before New words are best
but old words might fit just as well. As long as
you now find words or pictures to say what is
fresh to you now.
l mmute
6.' If 'the words or pictures' that 'you "now have" make
some fresh difference, see what that is. Let the
words or pictures change until they feel just right
in capturing your feelings.
i minute
Now I will give you a little while to use in any
way you want to, and then we will stop.
When successfully taught, the patient may
be struck by the fact that he could actually
focus and sometimes even have an experiential
effect from doing so. But often the difficulty
he encounters in trying to focus is also strik-
ing (and unique to him, usually.) Perhaps he
no sooner focused, then he doubted, blocked,
found his extreme unwillingness, or whatever,
Why conduct several years of surface inter-
views, when this barrier to an experiential
process is right here, and is probably what we
most want to work on?
The way to work on this difficulty is, again,
by focusing on it. There is a "turning upon
that," which makes the block, flatness, or un-
willingness itself the object of focusing. "This
unwillingness, what is that?" "Again, don't
explain, think, talk at yourself, just feel 'all
that' and ask what, about it, is the crux of it,
and let that come."
GENDLIN
Whenever the patient is unsure about what
he hag found (explaining or doubting) the
, , , .,, ., . , • •*•!_
way to deal with it is always again with a
fresh start. One needn't decide the verbal is-
sues that arise. "Focus freshly on it instead,
j e t it come freshly again"—this is almost al-
^ answer w h a t e v e r the issue now
J
seems to be. ("But I don't know if what came
is really mine, or if that's what people have
drilled into me . . . ?" Answer: "Well, see
freshly now what comes; never mind your
, . J . . , . ' , . ... '
doubts about what you just got to, let it come
another fresh step, all new.")
Alternatively, if the doubt won't allow a
fresh start: "All right, try to focus on that
, , , , . , . TTIV ., ,-• , „
whole doubt business- W h a t s * e crux of all
that? But wait, and let the whole doubt busi-
ness come fresh."
When one attempts to teach someone how
t . t ^ c o n c r e t e l y felt version of his
6 . .*
troubles (instead of talking about them), the
difficulties encountered are themselves worth
working on. The patient can experience what
^ j s t Q re f er t o a n ( j f ee j j ^ o w n bodily sense
o f t h e t r o u b l e h e i s UP a g a i n s t - H e c a n u s u a l l y
do SO on some topics, but not on Others,
("What's your whole impression of me? See—
t h e r e y o u h a v e i t D o n > t s a y a n y t h i n g . That's
J u s t a n e x a m p l e - " ) This makes it very clear
what he must strive to do, and the time can
be spent heading straight into the concrete,
e v e n if o n e doesn't get there With ease.
Sometimes it may be hard for the patient to
keep quiet, he may have so much to say. It is
perfectly allright for him to say it all for a
while, since the therapist's responses are, of
course, another essential dimension of psycho-
therapy. But sometime soon again, after some
minutes, (after he is satisfied he has the ther-
apist with him) he ought again to focus
freshly, and let the experiential body process
move another concrete step.
In this experiential therapy, it is important
that the therapist respond to what is directly
felt even while it isn't yet conceptually clear,
What patients sense in focusing is often con-
ceptually vague. The patient feels the felt
meaning distinctly enough, but if he talks, he
often begins by complaining that it isn't possi-
ble to think about it clearly. "There's some-
thing funny there, about the way I pull out of
relationships . . . (He has talked about the
 FOCUSING
problem before, but not about what is
"funny" here, he just focused and encountered
that) .. . but I can't describe it. It's . . . ah . . .
funny, there." The therapist must be able to
talk to that, even without knowing what it is:
"You got something there, but you don't
know what it is, yet. It's a funny something
that you find, right there in how you pull out.
It's something about how you pull out."
More talking and interaction may now help,
or be just a rest from focusing. However, fo-
cusing is much easier when another person
responds at times. The far out and fuzzy char-
acter of focusing on this "funny" feeling is
very much mitigated, when the therapist talks
of it. The patient's last furthest step becomes
interpersonally anchored. It will then be eas-
ier for him to focus further.
Even though therapists are an introspective
lot, I find that I and my colleagues do not do
this sharply distinct focusing even in our own
introspections, unless we set ourselves to do so
specifically. I am as likely to go about in a
stew as anyone else, until I specifically bring
myself to focusing and say: "All right, now.
Shut up," and then wait gently as I ask my
body sense: "What's wrong?"
The key phrase in which focusing can be
summed up is "What's wrong?", understood
that one then waits without inwardly talking
at oneself.
When one's mind has wandered, (one
doesn't know that, until one catches it and
then it has already wandered) one brings it
back gently: "Where was I, oh yes, on that,
uh, and, oh yes, what's really wrong?"
The deliberate almost forced character of
this must be stressed. It isn't letting oneself
go, but very intently keeping quiet, zeroing
one's attention in, and then—within this de-
liberately made focus and quiet—only then
and there, letting come what comes.
Another special qualification concerns bor-
derline psychotics, or generally people to
whom voices and other "weird" experiences
can happen. It is important to emphasize
that focusing concerns "how you now feel." It
is not a matter of letting just anything come,
but only "how you now feel" (about some
problem of living). Focusing on how one now
feels has a sane-making effect. The "weird"
experiences do not come from how one now
7
feels, but from out of space, from somewhere
to the left of one's head. Once it is clear that
present feeling is what one is focusing on, fo-
cusing is helpful also to people who are trying
to control weirdness and rightly want to keep
that from coming. Feeling is a safe and differ-
ent "place" in oneself, than psychotic experi-
ences.
The "feelings" one focuses on are not emo-
tions as such, (though one may have emotions
about and with them). Emotions are emo-
tional tonalities such as anger, fear, hate,
depression, joy, satisfaction, excitement. If
one focuses ones attention only on the emo-
tional tonality, nothing happens, or the tonal-
ity simply increases. For example, by focusing
on the feel of being depressed, one gets more
and more depressed. Instead, what I mean by
"feeling" is really felt meaning, a precon-
ceptual richness, implicitly "that whole situa-
tion," or "everything that has to do with. . . ."
Any difficulty involves our past, other peo-
ple, situations, self-hates, past attempts, and
many more facets that are not known. But
one can feel the undifferentiated mass of "all
that" in a bodily way. Such a "feeling" isn't
only an emotional tonality (say depression),
but rather, all that which has happened and
makes life and me "the way it is now."
To focus on such a preconceptual body-
sense of "all that," one must sometimes push
past a specific emotional tonality. One can do
so (especially if another person is present,
even while that person is silent,) by moving
as it were, through it. ("Yes, I am very de-
pressed, yea, ugh . . . whew, what a heavy
feeling . . . but freshly now, what is all that?"
or another example: "Yes, I am very ashamed
of it all, granted, yes, uhunh, but now, what's
the crux of all that, that I am ashamed of?")
Felt meaning is always an as yet undifferenti-
ated mass of many aspects, but can be bodily
felt as a whole.
THEORY
I have now outlined the practical procedure
of experiential focusing. I also employed the
words felt meaning and experiential effect.
The following three theoretical propositions
may briefly state 1) why a felt meaning, al-
though felt as one, is a body sense of the many
complexities of a problem; 2) why an experi-
8 EUGENE T. GENDLIN
ential effect is a bit of body resolution of a
problem; 3) why words, images, and inter-
actions can have experiential effects.
1) A person is a bodily interaction with oth-
ers and with his environment, much as breath-
ing is a bodily interaction with an environ-
ment. How one lives and reacts is a bodily
process going on in situations. When someone
is about to jump at you, you feel it in your
"gut." When someone is in complicated ways
going to hurt you, again you feel it in your
gut. Just as a golfer feels in his body, in the
position of his feet, and in the muscular sense
of his swing, the whole scene in front of him,
so do we bodily experience the complexity of
our situations and interactions.
2) A body-sense of a problem or situation is
pre-verbal and pre-conceptual, it is structured
in very many ways but not in just one way,
and is not equivalent to any one verbal or
conceptual pattern. To attend to it or speak
from it is a further living and therefore a fur-
ther structuring, a "carrying forward." When
this bodily further living occurs, one senses an
experiential effect.
3) Experiential body process is carried for-
ward by action and feedback. As one acts, one
perceives ones own acting. This is then a new
experiencing which can again lead to an action
which is again experienced and leads to an-
other action. This "zig-zag" between body
sense and visible action is such that each car-
ries the other forward: the action is itself ex-
perienced again, and this experiencing again
leads into a new action.
Words, images, dance steps, roles played,
other people's reactions, all these are per-
ceived as feedback, and can have the carrying
forward zig-zag effect, which action has. (I
say "can have," because most often, they
don't. Only some words and some people's
reactions carry one's felt sense forward. Usu-
ally they do not. They arouse new reactions
but fail to release or carry forward the felt
meaning one just then had.)
Although focusing, in the procedure here
presented, uses words ("let words come from
the feeling"), some individuals prefer imag-
ery. Therefore the instructions sometimes say
"words or a picture." What counts isn't
whether words or pictures are used, but
whether there is again and again a genuine
fresh start from the feeling. People who use
words tend to remain in the words, thinking
and talking, rather than making again and
again a fresh start from the feeling. Similarly,
people who use images tend to be fascinated
with one image, when they ought again and
again to let a fresh start from the body feeling
change the image for them.
Any sort of perceivable objectification
(words, images, actions, interpersonal re-
sponses) can perform the same function, pro-
vided one constantly moves back to the feel-
ing, and freshly from out of it again to new
words, images, responses, etc.
We do not yet know if these different
modes of carrying experiencing forward are
equally effective for everyone, and whether ex-
actly the same effects are produced, by all
these modes. Only this we know: any of these
can be effective when consistently remade by
fresh steps from feeling, and any of them can
fail when one gets involved in them and for-
gets fresh starts from felt experiencing.
SYNTHESIS BASED ON EXPERIENTIAL
PRINCIPLES
To try out a new method, one must put
first the patient's present immediately felt
sense of what is going on. If this is put first,
if the therapist always attends to it and asks
about it, then any method can be tried with-
out damage. One must honestly tell the pa-
tient: "Here is a method which I know of. It
may help us, it may not. I'd like to try it with
you, and then we can talk about how it seems
to you." With this open approach and primary
interest in the patient's own feelings, one will
never inhumanly impose something wrong.
Rather one will hear about what is going
wrong, and in working on that, the method will
have helped, at least indirectly.
Synthesizing is not the same as eclecticism.
To put different methods together, one must
first see exactly what specific therapeutic pro-
cesses each engenders in the patient. Methods
may sound very different, yet engender the
same patient processes. Conversely, two thera-
pists may say and think they practice alike, yet
engender very different patient processes. This
shows that current methods are not yet spe-
cifically defined in terms of the consequences
 FOCUSING
they produce. We must define each method by
the specific experiential steps and momentary
effects in the patient, which they produce. To
do so, we must define much more exactly what
the therapist actually does, which has these
experiential effects. Such a specific redefinition
is what I call "experientializing" a method.
Once we have done that, we can see what spe-
cific procedures from one method we might
want to use, what these can do, what they lack,
and consequently what specific procedures
from other methods we might need to put to-
gether with them.
In the following I will briefly "experien-
tialize" several methods, just sufficiently to
show what aspects of them are included in the
focusing procedure. In each case, please notice
that what I specify experientially is something
many practitioners of the given method do, but
also something many of them don't do. The
older conceptualizations lack a way of pin-
pointing the essential process of experiential
focusing.
I view focusing as one essential of psycho-
therapy, desensitization, Jungian imagery, hyp-
notherapy, free association, and other methods.
In most cases I believe the focusing procedure
has specified what is valuable and eliminated
what makes for failure in this essential process.
For example, free association is like focusing
only when it is done experientially. Most often
it isn't. Most often, free association is a means
for informing the analyst about the patient.
The patient's associating may be only mind-
wandering. The analyst's inferences may be
correct but generate no immediate body proc-
ess in the patient. On the other hand, free as-
sociation in Freud's original mode was intended
to let the patient arrive at directly encountered
blockage. Then the analyst's interpretations
are aimed at that concrete blockage, and are
called effective only if they succeed in dissolv-
ing that blockage and engendering a concrete
change process (in analytic language, a "dy-
namic shift.")
Just as I have specified two sorts of "free
association" above, so also one can be more
specific about the Jungian daydream tech-
nique: Does the patient freshly re-imagine, or
does the therapy get itself stuck in analyzing
a given image however fascinating it may be?
Does the therapist focus the patient's atten-
9
tion on his concrete feeling so that images
change in interplay with the body sense of the
problem, or do images march independently as
mind-wandering does in free association? (Jung
emphasized that the patient must be "active"
with the imagery, and must not just observe.)
Many patients have frightening run-away im-
agery because they are not sufficiently focused
on their concrete feelings. Imagery therapy
without such a focus can reinforce patients'
tendencies to push feelings back, and lead
them toward psychotic-like experiences.
Experiential focusing (as Weitzman, 1967,
has commented) is very like systematic desen-
sitization. However, the behavior therapist
picks the scenes to be imagined, the steps and
the pacing. In focusing, the patient lets these
develop. He usually holds himself to a prob-
lem rather than a single situation (because,
quite often, as focusing proceeds, what the
trouble is becomes transformed.)
Focusing also differs from desensitization in
that the patient isn't given a "hierarchy" of
images to feel, but lets the next specific trou-
blesome feeling arise directly from his body
sense of the trouble. However, the content
flow in focusing (when later described) is
often similar to reports after desensitization.
The distinct experiential shift one feels when
there is an "experiential effect" is very like
what desensitization aims at.
When one attempts to focus, one relaxes.
This is quite natural (one shuts out externals,
takes a deep breath, and one says "now let me
see . . ."). Focusing is helped by introducing
relaxation instructions just before, an innova-
tion contributed by Weitzman (1967.) How-
ever, these relaxation instructions must be
brief, ("just tense your arms and then let
them drop. That's right. Now your legs, tense
them, now let them drop.") otherwise relaxa-
tion is too deep and focusing doesn't occur.
Focusing oscillates across the line (if we may
draw one) between full waking and slight re-
laxation. It requires enough relaxation to
focus on felt meaning, but immediately again
full awakeness in response to what comes,
then again a fresh descent into the body feel-
ing of the problem and again a fully awake
coping with what has come. If relaxation is
too deep, there is content flow but no concrete
experiential shifts.
10 EUGENE T. GENDLIN
Many other methods—when they work—
involve the same experiential process as focus-
ing. This is because therapy must involve a
body process of experiencing.
The body change process we seek is becom-
ing clearer to us, and seems to be the same
one, whether with words, images, or role-play-
ing, whether by imagining the situations the
therapist assigns, or by direct bodily sensing
as a source of words and images.
We are just beginning to define precise steps
of instruction. Without more precise steps and
definitions, therapy methods are vague and the
differences between methods are less than the
differences among practitioners of the same
method.
There are surely other specific steps which
other therapists are finding, and which the
method of focusing so far fails to include.
These can and should be added if they can be
made specific and instructable. Experiential
focusing makes specific and synthesizes the
steps of those therapeutic methods which sys-
tematically seek to engender body change pro-
cess. But this is only one main dimension of
therapy. The other main dimension is inter-
personal interaction.
Therapist Interaction
Focusing, as deliberate silent instructed ef-
fort, must occur in the wider context of a
therapeutic relationship. In presenting focus-
ing I would not like to give rise to its being
practiced exclusively, but only in the context
of one's preferred broader method of therapy.
However, currently most methods that sys-
tematically engender concrete body process ig-
nore the interpersonal relationship (although
this is less and less the case in behavior ther-
apy, Levin et al, 1968; D'Alessio, 1968;
Lazarus, 1968.) Conversely, relationship ther-
apies tend to have no systematic way to make
therapy a bodily concerete process, in cases
where that is not so for the patient already.
Why not use both these dimensions of ther-
apy?
For too long, each therapeutic method ad-
vertised itself as the only effective one, and as
all that one needs. Where experiential specific-
ity reveals that two methods do not make for
the same process steps, anything of value that
they offer should be put together. We know
that interpersonal interaction provides the pa-
tient with processes of reliving and new living
which he cannot have alone.
How can a specific deliberate instruction
method be put together with a therapeutic in-
teraction method? As I have already indi-
cated, the therapist should make responsive-
ness to the patient his overriding rule. That
alone guarantees that there won't be a me-
chanical and exclusive application of focusing.
There will be many periods of more ordinary
therapeutic interaction, into which focusing
can fit, often or rarely, as seems best.
We must now turn to this other major di-
mension of the therapies, the interaction be-
tween two people. I will indicate only briefly
some aspects of interaction which, along with
focusing, go to make up experiential psycho-
therapy.
The therapist responses (both verbal and in
the way in which he interacts, expresses him-
self, interprets, and argues, or lives toward the
patient, . . .) are also a type of objectification,
just as words, images, and actions are. Thera-
pist responses can carry the patient's experi-
encing forward, into experiential effects and
bodily release, or they can leave his experien-
tial body process stuck where it was stuck.
(Of course, it is easy to arouse all sorts of
other reactions in the patient, but "carrying
forward" is that very special reaction Of find-
ing his experiential process living further from
just how it was stuck.)
Focusing and interaction are both effective
via the same basic experiential carrying for-
ward, which in focusing is provided by bodily
attention and words, or images. The only
difference is that we know, in the case of in-
terpersonal responses, that they have effects
no other sort of feedback can have.
While I cannot discuss it in detail in this
article, fresh self-expressive relating by the
therapist, is one of the best ways to assure car-
rying forward. However, such relating must
consistently leave room for focusing, and wel-
come and prize the patient's side of whatever
interaction patient and therapist engender.
Without this overriding rule, much current ex-
pressive relating by therapists fails. Thera-
pists are not superior human beings. When
they relate spontaneously, it is often not bet-
ter than when the others in the patient's life
 FOCUSING
do so. What makes it better is the fact that the
therapist has an overriding interest in welcom-
ing and making room for whatever experienc-
ing he has engendered in his patient. If he
teaches his patient to focus, and makes room
for that process, then even seemingly bad pa-
tient-therapist interactions will have therapeu-
tic results. This is again the rule that what
happens in the patient always takes prece-
dence over anything else.
The rule means that I may spontaneously
express myself regarding him—but then, soon,
I will want him to focus and speak from what
has happened in him. Just as the patient
should not get "stuck" with the one set of
words, or one image, he also shouldn't get
stuck with one way I am toward him. Rather,
a fresh start from his feelings is always again
necessary.
Experiential interaction comes sponta-
neously from both persons. As therapist I
often don't teach or help with focusing, I
often express myself instead of responding re-
ceptively. But very soon, I will do just that
latter, and only because I will, am I free to
believe that my spontaneous interacting can
be therapeutic. Whatever I create or stir,
there will be room for the patient to live that
forward in ways most people won't help or
let him do.
The repetitive self-defeating patterns some
patients bring to therapy are the most difficult
obstacles to progress. Every major writer in
the field has cited them, whether called trans-
ference, counter-will, opposite, etc. With fo-
cusing they are discovered to be positive ef-
forts at completing what I call ego-formation.
Of course such modes disrupt adult interper-
sonal relations, and of course they don't fit
adult situations which presuppose finished
egos, persons, or selves (use any word for it.)
In those respects in which each of us is still
struggling to become a person, in those
respects he cannot respond well to other per-
sons. What I am asserting is no more than an
experiential reformulation of the Oedipus
Complex, Separation Anxiety, the Great
Mother, or generally, the "family drama" one
reenacts. Focusing reveals that the imminent
felt meaning of these patterns is positive. One
attempts to express or assert oneself, to iden-
tify with a figure of one's own sex, to have
11
one's sexuality established and valued, to be
really loved or close, etc. On the other hand,
one is still forming oneself and one is still at
issue in such repetitive patterns. In real situa-
tions these positive ego-forming needs make
for behavior which alienates others and de-
feats the felt aim. Experiential interaction
(both in focusing, and in personally sponta-
neous interaction) must intensely involve, and
carry forward, such felt aims. This often can-
not be done without periods of battle, but it
requires as well, periods of welcoming, and
responding so as to complete the positive aim
positively, even though the behavior would
not, in the world, lead to positive results. The
patient must be able to perceive the re-
sponse as carrying forward, that is, as em-
bodying just that which he just then is and
feels. If his obnoxious behavior is a self-asser-
tion, the therapist's response (whether it is
blowing up or giving in) must visibly com-
plete the patient's having asserted himself. If
the patient's behavior is passive, he must
sometimes live passively successfully with the
therapist, in a peaceful togetherness, in an
identifying identity-building way. The ego-
forming pattern must succeed, and yet it must
also be expanded and elaborated and intruded
upon by the real other person of the therapist.
To put it in reverse order, first the therapist
responds spontaneously as a real person, then
moments later, he helps the patient success-
fully form himself to meet, tolerate, and live
in the adult relationship he was as yet unable
to live in.
Theoretically, we can summarize: words,
imagery, actions, and other people's responses
can carry forward an individual's bodily ex-
periential process. When that happens, there
is experienced feedback. What objectively
feeds back is experienced as continuous with
the previous moment—yet always, such expe-
riencing is more, it carries further. While fo-
cusing attention and words are very powerful
in being both continuous and carrying the
body process further, interpersonal interac-
tions are even more powerful. Another per-
son's living toward me is "feedback" of a kind
that can constitute much more further living
than focusing alone can do. But the principle
is the same: words, images, and interactions
do not have the purpose of saying what the
12 EUGENE T. GENDLIN

patient feels or is, but to provide a further ex- However, the experiential indices were derived
periencing continuous with, but carrying for- from a theory of experiential change process.
ward, where he has been concretely blocked, The scale was intended to define the sorts
autistic, or self-defeating. of verbal behavior occurring in therapy inter-
By putting together our methods for engen- views when a patient uses his freshly ongoing
dering body process with our methods for spon- experiential process as a basis for what he
taneous human interaction we can provide the says, thinks, and does in the interview (Gend-
needed further bodily experiencing. lin, 1956, 1961, 1962). The kind of references
he makes, how he comes from one thing he
T H E RESEARCH BACKGROUND says to the next, is quite different in a directly
In a sequence of studies (van der Veen & referred to feeling process, than when he is
Stoler 1965; Tomlinson & Hart 1962; Rogers merely intellectualizing, moving from concept
1967; Gendlin 1966, 1967, 1968) we have to concept, or merely reporting on situations,
now found that successful outcomes measured or merely emoting.
on psychometric tests before and after ther- Psychotherapists have always held what
apy correlate with the "experiential level." In- these findings show: intellectualizing, event-
terviews are tape-recorded and analyzed on reporting, or mere catharting makes for fail-
the Experiencing Scale (Gendlin and Tomlin- ure, while concrete "working through" makes
son, 1963). Failure on the outcome measures for success. But what successful "working
is highly correlated with a low experiential through" really is has never been well defined,
level during interviews. Therapists' outcome or measured before.
ratings and patients' own ratings parallel We now have a measurable index applicable
these findings on the psychometric instru- to any given interview or bits from interviews,
ments. The relation of outcome measures to telling us validly whether psychotherapy is
each other is somewhat irregular, but the going on therein or not (if we mean by psy-
main finding consistently stands out in these chotherapy the here measured process).
studies. High experiential level (during inter- Of course all of this is still a bit new, but
views) is significantly correlated with positive assuming further consistency, this measure al-
outcome (before and after measures). lows us, at last, to begin the sort of research
The Experiencing Scale is used by indepen- we have always looked forward to: to measure
dent raters listening to randomly selected and the differential effects of specific techniques,
re-recorded bits of psychotherapy interviews. (or of anything else you think might improve
The Scale has many detailed descriptions of therapy.) You can now institute any experi-
what a rater must hear on the tape in order to mental factor and then measure whether it has
score that bit of tape in any one of the seven raised or lowered the experiential level in the
scores. While these descriptions are not so subsequent interviews.
specific as to preclude all doubt whether they You might want to test what you do, that
apply or not, the scale is close to that aim. It you consider crucially effective. The same re-
does not use subjective impressions of the search paradigm can say whether, after you
rater. Undergraduates as raters are more reli- do that, the experiential level increases, or
able at using the scale than sensitive clinicians not, (and, separately, whether the outcomes
—because the latter refuse to go by the scale again correlate with that level).
and use their subjective judgment instead. We have chosen to test the effect of "focus-
This shows that the scale descriptions, not the ing instructions." We now teach patients how
bias of the rater, does at least some of the dis- to focus, and then measure whether, indeed,
criminating. the teaching has raised the experiential levels
From research one can conclude only that of the subsequent interviews. The reason we
two variables are associated, not that one is the chose to devise such teaching (the focusing
result of the other. Outcome, and experiential instructions) and to test its effects on the ex-
manner during interviews may both be the re- periential level is as follows:
sults of some third, as yet unknown variable. In the earlier research there was not only
 FOCUSING
the good finding that the experiential level
correlates with eventual success. Unfortunately
there was also, in the same sequence of studies,
a very unwelcome and unpredicted finding:
the experiential level predicts success and fail-
ure significantly, whether you analyze inter-
views from the end of therapy, the middle, or
the beginning! One can predict success or fail-
ure quite significantly even from very early
interviews. If the experiential level in the early
interviews is low, it does not usually rise. Fail-
ure results. In only five out of one group of
38 cases (Gendlin, et al., 1968) was there a
sufficient increase during therapy to make for
a success in initially low cases. Perhaps today
it happens more often, as hopefully our current
research will show.
We had predicted that over the course of
therapy, the experiential level would rise. Pa-
tients would begin low, closed, defensive, and
therapy would make them more able to focus
on their directly experienced felt meanings.
We were mistaken. Therapy as usually prac-
ticed does not teach the patient how to do
therapy. Our earlier prediction was circular.
By not doing anything therapeutic, we
thought, a patient could learn to do something
therapeutic. (Of course, we wouldn't have put
it that way at that time.) We thought that
therapists could make the process happen
even when it isn't happening initially. The ex-
periental level can be viewed as the "motor"
of therapy. No matter how much time is spent
with the motor off, that doesn't turn it on. If
it is sufficiently on, progress is made. If it is off,
nothing change-effective happens. But we
still think that therapists should turn this
"motor" on, and that is what our use of focus-
ing attempts.
The motor need not be on at extremely high
levels, 3.5 on the scale is sufficient. But at 2
no therapy happens, as defined by our process
and outcome measures.
We had predicted that successful patients
would move up the scale over the course of
therapy. It happens, but minimally. Successful
patients move half a scale position, a change
which is statistically, but not psychologically,
significant. If the motor is on, the patient
moves successfully, and doesn't necessarily in-
crease in how "on" the motor is. Using this
13
analogy, say you drive from Chicago to New
York, you don't necessarily go faster and
faster as you get closer to the end. You might
go only 40 mph all the way but you still get
there. If the motor is off, you are sitting in the
parking lot and no matter how long you sit,
you will still be there.
This finding says simply that much of what
we call "psychotherapy" is not psychotherapy.
It says also, that when therapists are con-
fronted by a patient who does not focus ex-
perientially, does not concretely work at any-
thing, therapists have not been effective (in
our data at least) at making something thera-
peutic happen.
There are research implications to this find-
ing: let us stop testing a "therapy" group
against a "control" group, by defining "ther-
apy" as nothing more than the wishful intent
of the therapist. With our still weak measures,
a control group that does no therapy should
not be compared to a "therapy" group more
than half of whom are not doing therapy ei-
ther! Whenever we have first used our experi-
encing measure to define those who are en-
gaged in therapy process, (a high level on
that scale) we then always found significant
differences in outcome between them and the
control group.
The question for clinical practice posed by
these findings is, of course: Is it responsible to
let the failure-predicted patients simply con-
tinue for some years to their predicted fail-
ures? When we can measure now that the in-
terviews are not of the change-effective sort,
should we let them go on and on that way? Or
shall we teach the effective therapy process?
And does success then result from such taught
behavior, as it has in these studies resulted
from such behavior when not taught?
Of course we can argue that psychotherapy
is indicated for some types of people and not
for others. But the history of psychotherapy is
one of adapting and extending it to popula-
tions that were at first held untreatable. What
is more, psychotherapy was improved by these
adaptations and extensions. For example,
some of the main developments of all psycho-
therapy have come from work with children
and with psychotics. Each time the untreata-
ble population is one which isn't good at using
14 EUGENE T. GENDLIN
words and thoughts as therapeutic tools, and
each time psychotherapy as a whole became
more interactional and experiential as a result
of being adapted to these populations. Per-
haps a step of this sort is happening again, as
we attempt to learn how to make an experien-
tial process begin, how to make overly verbal
therapy bodily and experiential.
Rather than thinking of focusing ability as
associated with a personality type, I prefer to
think of it as a skill. Perhaps some types of
people have this skill naturally, while others
must learn it. But if it is a skill basic to per-
sonal problem-solving and health, we would
want to teach it to those who don't generally
have it. For example, some are natural ath-
letes, others not, but some calisthenics are im-
portant for everyone's health, not only for
athletic types.
We do have some beginnings of research
which show that those who are initially good
at focusing are a type. Some Cattell variables
correlate with focusing ability as measured by
a questionnaire taken after focusing instruc-
tions (Gendlin, et al., 1968). Interesting ques-
tions open: at what age do children develop
focusing ability? At what age is it lost again
by many of them? Or do some never have it?
Does it vary with cultures and our sub-cul-
tures? Does it vary with economic class? Fo-
cusing instructions take ten minutes, and the
introductory discussion need not be long. It is
best administered twice, with clarifying dis-
cussion between. We have administered it to
groups at one time. The questions asked by a
group between the two administrations often
clarify a great deal. The questionnaire still
leaves much to be desired, but is a reliable
measure.
Independent scorers reliably score the ques-
POST-FOCUSING QUESTIONNAIRE :
1. Without saying what you thought about, describe
in two or three sentences what was happening for
you during this time.
2. How is this different from what you normally do?
3. What about this was the best thing for you?
4. What was the worst thing about it ?
5. What surprised you most about doing this?
6. Did the feeling change or move?
7. Describe what happened for you when I said:
"Try to get a sense of what all the problem feels
like. Let yourself feel all of that."
8. What happened for you when I said: "As you pay
attention to the whole feeling you may find that
one special feeling comes up" ?
9. Describe what happened when I said: "Wait and
let words or pictures come from the feeling."
tionnaire on a four point scale: (1) did not
focus; (2) did stay with the problem, but it is
not clear that he focused on a felt meaning;
(3) did focus on a specific felt meaning but
with no reported effects; (4) focused with an
experiential effect of some kind.
Of course, one can argue that those who
cannot focus are a type. But, as therapists in
such cases we have failed at something that
we have not even fairly tried: to show the
patient how to do therapy. Most therapists
were trained in the view that showing the pa-
tient how to do therapy is impossible. Thera-
pists hint, they say "have you thought why
that might be . . . ?" or "perhaps you f e e l . . . , "
and then they are often patiently dismayed
week after week, when there is never any con-
crete, bodily, experiential, live, physically felt
change.
Therefore we embarked on the direct teach-
ing and working with focusing.
Focusing is not a matter of degree, as was
the experiential level we measured in therapy
interviews. Rather, it is a direct and abrupt
turn from talking and thinking to the felt
body version of a problem.
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