We are exploring different ways in which Focusing lends itself to embracing complexity in group process. This includes conducting groups on difficult issues.
Crossing Meditation and Focusing in a Group Setting
We have been experimenting with ways to be together in a group, sharing a contemplative space that is conducive to individual and collective inquiry. We find that meditation prepares us for Focusing, and Focusing helps us carry forward what comes up in meditation. We invite others who are interested in similar practices to explore together.
Bill Gayner and Serge Prengel
Difficult topics
As part of this project, we have discussion groups dealing with difficult issues so that we can collectively build the skills and attitude to embrace conflict and complexity in a safe and productive way. These groups work at two levels: One is dealing with the topic itself. The other is learning from the experience of dealing collectively with difficult topics.
Dreamweaving: An Embodied Experiential Dream Group Process
Over many years of leading dream groups, I began to wish for a more inclusive method, one that has less of a singular focus on the presenting dreamer and their dream, and one less dependent on the group leader. Dream group processes tend to have a main facilitator guiding one dreamer through their dream, followed by an invitation to group members to offer their sense of the dream. Dreamweaving was conceived as an attempt to make dream group process a more collective one at as many stages as possible. It begins with a group invocation of a dream image, then a collective sharing of these dream snippets or daydreams. Further steps include group experiential exploration and processing of this diverse collection of dream experience and impressions. As the process unfolds, the collective dream begins to take on a life of its own as surprising connections between disparate dream images emerge.
Dr. Leslie Ellis
Dynamic Facilitation for Co-Creating Desired futures
From Focusing practice, we know how much a skilled listener can offer as a Focusing companion; a skilled listener working with emergence-based group facilitation can offer something similar to a group. Janet Klein taught, “When every ‘I’ feels heard, a ‘we’ emerges.” The nonlinear Dynamic Facilitation process is especially helpful in high-conflict situations; the facilitator helps all voices be heard through extensive empathic reflection and by inviting each person to address what matters most to them. In time, shared understandings begin to emerge from the various “puzzle pieces.” While originating in the U.S., this open-source facilitation methodology has spread most in German-speaking countries; in Austria, it has been used extensively since 2006 for facilitating the Vorarlberg Bürgerräte, a very compact form of Citizens’ Assemblies.
Rosa Zubizarreta-Ada, Ph.D.
Focusing with Somatic Abolitionism
Crossing Focusing with Somatic Abolitionism deepens embodied presence, nurturing our capacity to uphold human equality and resist racialized & ethnic violence. Somatic Abolitionism founder Resmaa Menakem calls these embodied resources “toys” because the practice is about playfully inviting bodily supports and gestures to help metabolize felt senses around trauma, grief, anger, and hopelessness often arising when reckoning with racial and ethnic inequities. Without added supports for embodied metabolizing, our bodies can get stuck in fight/flight/freeze/fawn responses.
With repeat practicing of body supports (based on touch, orienting, movement, grounding, and pausing) within our Focusing practice, especially within a community, felt senses related to geo-political crises and societal inequalities may unfold in life-forwarding directions. Then we can better take generative actions aligned with our commitments to peace, equity, and better collective futures.
Bailey Drechsler and Gabrielle Hoffman
Multi-Layered Focusing
We are experimenting with what we call multi-layered Focusing, an expanded Focusing exchange beyond the dyad. It is more complex and prone to misunderstanding: not every strand can be followed or every misunderstanding resolved.
We co-create a safe and stimulating environment in which shared meaning can emerge, as well as the invitation to be fully yourself within the group.
Rather than forcing premature clarity (which is often superficial), we stay at the edge of the unknown between us, open to what emerges. We use Focusing moves such as noticing the body, explicating experience, saying back, staying present while sensing for orientation, and expressing meaning.
We welcome feelings at the margins of awareness and the inevitable differences in how we understand and feel, appreciating the “more” that comes from our diversity.
Sabine Aydt, Bruce Nayowith, Serge Prengel & Andrea Schueller
Socialbody Focusing
I explore how Focusing can be facilitated beyond the dyad: in groups, leadership teams, and organizations within larger institutional fields. I call this Socialbody Focusing (SBF), a multidimensional practice drawing on group dynamics, integral consulting, somatics, consciousness development, and creativity.
Socialbodies are complex, entangled interactional forms, nested in contexts within contexts. SBF aims to transform explosive experiences of conflict, complexity, and uncertainty through Focusing awareness and moves toward generative change.
Examples include reading situations through felt sensing; attending to co-created social reality, including authority, power dynamics, and programs; staying grounded in challenging relationships; resonating in co-presence; holding brave and safe spaces; and sensing what lies beyond opposing positions. Through multimodal and artistic expression, embodied tensions can return to flow beyond linear logic and carry forward into something new.
Dr. Andrea Schueller