What an honor to be part of the life forward human potential that makes up The International Focusing Community (TIFI)! Learning Community Focusers are encouraged to visit here to explore potential ways of bringing Focusing into the world. The Focusing Professionals, FOT’s and Trainers listed here truly enjoy the mentoring process. A mentor is someone who has traveled the path of certification in their own way and now holds space for another person to find their own way toward a sense of completion. This commitment involves a minimum of six 1-hour sessions and may blossom beyond this in a variety of ways. Suggestions for potential ways to interact with each mentor are in their description below. Keep in mind, since we all practice Focusing here, new fresh ideas may emerge once you connect as well. Please consider visiting a mentor’s website for more information before you reach out to them. A lot of your questions might be answered there.
Learning Community Focusers: you can develop relationships with more than one mentor here; however, only one will be your Companion for your six required sessions, three of which are your self-assessment milestones. To hire a mentor for the six sessions, I suggest you reach out to a few for initial 20-30 min chats. There is no charge for these. The mentor will let you know if this feels like a good fit on their end either during the chat or within a few days. Ultimately, it is your decision. If you have interviewed someone, be sure to let them know your decision. Mentor relationships are precious. Do not leave any hanging in the air as unknowns. The mentoring journey often takes 1 – 2 years, sometimes longer.
May this Relationship you find be the Ground upon which New Growth Springs for ALL!
**Please contact mentors through their website or ask me for their email.**
Annette Dubreuil, 'Embodied Creativity for a Better World'
Access Annette’s Website
Annette Dubreuil is a Focusing Teacher (Certified Focusing Professional and Coordinator-in-Training), Embodied Creativity Facilitator, and environmentalist living in Toronto, Canada. She teaches Focusing—and felt-sensing/listening to our embodied intuition more broadly—to catalyze creativity and sustainable change. With individuals, Annette teaches Focusing in groups and does Focusing coaching one-on-one. With organizations and teams she uses a host of embodied creativity facilitation tools, including Theory U/Social Presencing Theatre, Dynamic Facilitation, and Open Space Technology—to create change for their organizations, communities and the planet.
Annette loves working with mentees to gain clarity about their unique gifts and to cross them with Focusing. She uses her PUPA process to help students move from inner knowing to action.
David Battistella, ‘Faith and The Focusing Way’
Access David’s Website or Focusing Podcasts
David Battistella has been evolving in Inner Relationship Focusing since 2009. He is a certified Focusing Professional and Trainer and was mentored by Ann Weiser Cornell and Barbara McGavin. He is also a documentary filmmaker. David’s focusing has led him to profound discovery in his personal faith and he has a particular interest in developing Focusing with internal and mental prayer. He also has created The Focusing Way Podcast which features Focusers from all walks of life. He has used Focusing to facilitate both big life decisions and the small ones in daily life.
Frank O'Neill, 'Discover Your Style of Sharing Focusing'
Access Frank's Website
Since 2013, I’ve wanted to have all of my friends to practice Focusing presence, all the time! Well, that didn’t quite work out, but I’ve been sharing it ever since. I love the way Focusing supports me to presence another with reverence and celebration, which liberates innocence and brilliance!
Certified in 2016, I’ve been mentoring new Focusers, and crossing Focusing with Nonviolent Communication, and Joanna Macy’s ecological work. I’ve spent 3-1/2 years living at a residential zen center in New Mexico where I introduced Focusing to improve our off-the-cushion communication. I’m also a certified yoga teacher and have woven the friendly curiosity and cushioning language of Focusing into postural instructions. I would love to accompany you in discovering your own style of Focusing and to explore ways to cross Focusing with other practices.
Joe Colletti, 'It’s Holy Ground'
I believe that life was meant to be lived abundantly. I believe that there is within each of us an Inner Wisdom that arises out of our immersion in the Divine (“the More”) that implicitly calls us to set our burdens down and find ways to free ourselves from those things in our lives that keep us from living more fully. Focusing provides one way to interact with this Inner Wisdom and I consider my focusing as a spiritual practice … a daily movement toward personal wholeness and “living in the now”. Accordingly, I consider teaching and coaching individuals in the skill and art of focusing to be an honor and a holy work.
On a different note, I have been focusing for more than 12 years and have been a CFP for nine years. I am the Board of Directors President of the BioSpiritual Institute and serve as one of its Master instructors, education program developers and website webmaster. I have also been a spiritual director for more than 15 years.
Katarina Halm, ‘With Devotion to Learning’
Access Katarina’s Website
As a mentor, I support your discovery and autonomy in a collaborative learning approach. My love for teaching began while giving dance lessons as a ballet dancer and a performer in musical theatre. A Practicum in Focusing and Phenomenology with R.D. Laing and John Heaton at the Philadelphia Association in London, England, led me to complete an M.A. degree at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology in 1994, with a thesis on Resonance and Dissonance in the Learning Process. I certified in Focusing in 2006.
The foundation of my teaching Focusing includes training with Ann Weiser Cornell, Rob Parker on Gendlin’s writings, Janet Pfunder on Dream Appreciation, and Jan Winhall on “The Felt Sense Polyvagal Model™ of Emotion Regulation”. Complementary practices from Feldenkrais® and Sounder Sleep System™provide additional depth to the modules I offer in supporting you on the way to developing your very own path as a Focusing Professional.
Kay Hoffmann, 'Wholebody Focusing'
Visit Kay at the British Focusing Association
Since training in both Inner Relationship and Wholebody Focusing more than 20 years ago I have enjoyed weaving the treasures of different approaches together – being guided more by the focuser’s natural inclinations than by process steps. I love creating a relational space in which movement, rest, silence and an awareness of the outer environment are all welcome. Ensuring that our Focusing connects fluidly with life issues and outward action is also important to me.
As a mentor I delight in the adventure of supporting each trainee to identify their unique gifts and strengths and their own way of sharing Focusing with others.
Martin Schaeffner, 'On the Edge Between Implicit and Explicit'
I studied Focusing for 6 years in Germany with Klaus Renn and Johannes Wiltschko, who have been close students of Gendlin, became a Focusing Therapist and Trainer there and am happy to also be part of the International Focusing Community at TIFI.
Having been a singer and actor in my first career the speaking and the singing voice is still my biggest passion. From singing to sounding, making noises or being silent – for me there is hardly a better symbol for the amazing creation that happens on the edge of the implicit to the explicit than the voice. I teach singing in a focusing way and am very passionate about teaching the voice as a doorway to the inside.
Focusing is different with every person. “You and I are happening together.” I am happy to join you in short strolls, long hikes or intense journeys on your way of learning, living, teaching and breathing Focusing into life.
Mary Elaine Kiener, ‘Pause. Turn. Listen.’
Access Mary Elaine’s Website
While I was growing up, no one knew to nurture this exquisite natural capacity for embodied, experiential felt-sensing. When I was formally introduced to Focusing (in 2008), I felt I had finally “come home” – to myself. Even now, it serves as an integral component for my signature work: “Choosing Courageous Well-Being: Inside me, with you, among us”.
My greatest joy lies in facilitating others’ discovery and nurturing of their own felt-sensing abilities. For more than a decade, I have hosted twice-monthly regular Virtual Changes gatherings – initially by phone, more recently via Zoom.
I view my role as your “mentern”. Knowing there will be times when I can offer embodied wisdom to help light your experiential path, and others when I’ll eagerly learn as much or more from you!
Pat Omidian, 'Promoting Healthy, Peaceful Communities'
Access Pat's Website
I have a PhD in Applied Medical Anthropology and teach Community Wellness Focusing globally. With Melinda Darer, I co-direct Focusing Initiatives International, a not for profit organization that promotes positive emotional and social resilience to underserved populations.
I will be honest here. If you are wanting to move into the realm of therapy and one on one work, I am not the right mentor for you. For me, Focusing has a critical role in promoting healthy, peaceful communities. I like mentoring others in how to work in communities so that the communities help themselves. If you want to adapt Focusing so that it is an integral part of the work you do, I can help.
Renee La Roi, 'Letting Your Body Be Your Guide'
Access Renee's Website
I am a long time Focuser – with 20+ years of study, practice, teaching and living Focusing. Within day-to-day life, yoga, art, design, Focusing partnerships, and while teaching Focusing itself, I will continue to be a student of Focusing and the body forever.
I love being in the role of mentor, supporting students to find their own Focusing voice and a way to live Focusing in their lives. It is an honor to be part of this growth process as we live through loving self in presence.
I encourage curiosity and unconditional acceptance in your own Focusing practice and what you teach. I enjoy helping you find life forward steps on your certification journey. I will help strengthen your own relationship with Focusing and assist enabling you to model this beautiful process to your students.
Suzanne Noel, 'Healing Through We-ing'
Access Suzanne's Website
Hello! I am a Certifying Coordinator. For many years I certified Focusing Trainers in Domain Focusing. We highlight 3 realms of growth: thinking, felt-sensing and loving. I developed Recovery Focusing (the crossing of the 12 Steps for addictive process with Felt Sensing), out of which I developed her H.O.W. We Heal model for groups. Groups are my specialty! I am happy to consult with you about applying H.O.W. We Heal to groups you interact with. You may also find these helpful: articles I’ve published at focusing.org and 4 pdf books you can find at my website.
I enjoy dabbling in poetry and different kinds of art. My passion is riding my motorcycle in beautiful Costa Rica. It will be an honor and pleasure to accompany you on your Focusing journey.
Yehudit First, ‘Social-Oriented Focusing’
Access Yehudit’s Website
I believe that within every human being there is an inner personal essence that knows the path to a better life, a life of love, growth and fulfillment. Focusing enables us to develop a deep intrapersonal relationship with ourselves. As a Focusing Coordinator, Psychotherapist and Group Facilitator for Somatic Experiencing, I explored expanding the Focusing process to our interpersonal relationships. These experiences led me to develop Social Oriented Focusing (SOF), an organic and authentic way to be whole in all our parts while interacting with ourselves and others simultaneously. I teach SOF all over the globe, and use it to facilitate individual, group and couple therapy processes in my clinic and via Zoom. Experiencing my work as a calling that excites me time and again, I believe wholeheartedly in what I do and teach. I will be more than happy to accompany you as a mentor on your path of growth and development.