Learn to listen to your true self

More powerful than letting words come from a felt sense may be letting body movement come.
–Eugene Gendlin

Join us this January for our first PUPA Retreat: Focusing and Movement. Over the course of one weekend, PUPA Trainees and Trainers, who have been exploring parallel movement and embodiment practices for years, will share how these practices can be crossed with Focusing to help deepen our processes.

Our connection to our body and our ability to listen to it is fundamental to Focusing. Learning to listen while in movement, or to learn from our movement can add a new dimension to our felt experiences. 

Movement can be a great way to settle the body, to bring a sense of calm and groundedness, and to prepare us for traditional still Focusing.

For some people, noticing and describing physical sensations can be a great challenge. Knowing that challenge and witnessing it on a regular basis, we created this retreat to share and explore new ways to get in touch with our body.

When we allow ourselves to move, whether in a very free or a very organized way, whether slowly or rapidly, whether outwardly with our limbs or deep within our belly, we are creating new sensations. We are sending and receiving new information. And it can become much easier to feel and to describe these sensations than those of a still body.

Movement is also a way for great wisdom to come forward. By inviting more intuitive movement, we can break out of our regular ways of being and thinking, deepen our experiencing, and discover new insights. We make our felt meaning visible by inviting movement, and this can further explicate a felt knowing.

Finally, some workshops will dive into moving as social groups, and noticing our responses to these interactions with Focusing.

Our hope with this new offering is that you might find new tools, new pathways, and new perspectives to inspire and support your Focusing journey.

Nothing is more revealing than movement.
-Martha Graham

Weekend Retreat Details

Dates and Times of live retreat: Friday January 15 to Sunday January 17, 2027

Workshops Schedule

Each workshop will be taught by a different PUPA Trainer or Trainee and will be based on a different practice:

Friday, January 15th

• Authentic Movement and Focusing, with Marg Peck
  6:30-8:30 pm Eastern (see your local time)

Saturday, January 16th

• Qi Gong and Focusing, with Anne-Marie Jourdenais
  9:30-11:30 am ET (see your local time)

• Butoh Dance and Focusing: Following the Inner Thread with Vanessa Carrera
  1:30-3:30 pm ET (see your local time)

• Contemplative Focusing: Stillness and Movement, with Jane Cecilia
  6:30-8:30 pm ET  (see your local time) 

Sunday, January 17th

• Focusing Rhythm Flow, with Iren A Merdinyan
  9:30-11:30 am ET (see your local time)

• Voice/Natural Movement and Focusing, with Maya Lieberman
  1:30-3:30 pm ET  (see your local time) 

• Theory U/Social Presencing Theater and Focusing, with Annette Dubreuil
  6:30-8:30 pm ET (see your local time)

During each workshop, you will be invited to experience simple movements from the parallel practice, as well as Focusing exercises and breakout room practice.

For more information, please view the workshop descriptions and teacher bios below.

Format: Online via Zoom
Who can benefit: All levels of Focusers are welcome; however, some experience with Focusing partnerships is ideal, as we will spend time in breakout rooms.

Ways to participate:

• Live participation, including interacting with other participants, asking questions of workshop instructors, and breakout room practice. Our global retreat has teachers spanning three continents and we realize you may not be able to attend all sessions live, depending on your time zone. Recordings will be made available for three months within 48 hours of the event, so that participants can participate in workshops that cannot be attended live.

• Recordings only (go to recording only registration page).

Sliding scale pricing:

This retreat has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make it more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for more details and codes.

• Full fee: Live retreat with breakout room practice: US$199 OR Recording only $129.

• 25% off: US$149.25/96.25

• 50% off: US$99.50/64.50

• 70% off: US$59.70/38.70

• 80% off: US$39.80/25.80

• 90% off: US$19.90/12.90

More powerful than letting words come from a felt sense may be letting body movement come.
–Eugene Gendlin

Join us this January for our first PUPA Retreat: Focusing and Movement. Over the course of one weekend, PUPA Trainees and Trainers, who have been exploring parallel movement and embodiment practices for years, will share how these practices can be crossed with Focusing to help deepen our processes.

Our connection to our body and our ability to listen to it is fundamental to Focusing. Learning to listen while in movement, or to learn from our movement can add a new dimension to our felt experiences. 

Movement can be a great way to settle the body, to bring a sense of calm and groundedness, and to prepare us for traditional still Focusing.

For some people, noticing and describing physical sensations can be a great challenge. Knowing that challenge and witnessing it on a regular basis, we created this retreat to share and explore new ways to get in touch with our body.

When we allow ourselves to move, whether in a very free or a very organized way, whether slowly or rapidly, whether outwardly with our limbs or deep within our belly, we are creating new sensations. We are sending and receiving new information. And it can become much easier to feel and to describe these sensations than those of a still body.

Movement is also a way for great wisdom to come forward. By inviting more intuitive movement, we can break out of our regular ways of being and thinking, deepen our experiencing, and discover new insights. We make our felt meaning visible by inviting movement, and this can further explicate a felt knowing.

Finally, some workshops will dive into moving as social groups, and noticing our responses to these interactions with Focusing.

Our hope with this new offering is that you might find new tools, new pathways, and new perspectives to inspire and support your Focusing journey.

Nothing is more revealing than movement.
-Martha Graham

Weekend Retreat Details

Dates and Times of live retreat: Friday January 15 to Sunday January 17, 2027

Workshops Schedule

Each workshop will be taught by a different PUPA Trainer or Trainee and will be based on a different practice:

Friday, January 15th

• Authentic Movement and Focusing, with Marg Peck
  6:30-8:30 pm Eastern (see your local time)

Saturday, January 16th

• Qi Gong and Focusing, with Anne-Marie Jourdenais
  9:30-11:30 am ET (see your local time)

• Butoh Dance and Focusing: Following the Inner Thread with Vanessa Carrera
  1:30-3:30 pm ET (see your local time)

• Contemplative Focusing: Stillness and Movement, with Jane Cecilia
  6:30-8:30 pm ET  (see your local time) 

Sunday, January 17th

• Focusing Rhythm Flow, with Iren A Merdinyan
  9:30-11:30 am ET (see your local time)

• Voice/Natural Movement and Focusing, with Maya Lieberman
  1:30-3:30 pm ET  (see your local time) 

• Theory U/Social Presencing Theater and Focusing, with Annette Dubreuil
  6:30-8:30 pm ET (see your local time)

During each workshop, you will be invited to experience simple movements from the parallel practice, as well as Focusing exercises and breakout room practice.

For more information, please view the workshop descriptions and teacher bios below.

Format: Online via Zoom
Who can benefit: All levels of Focusers are welcome; however, some experience with Focusing partnerships is ideal, as we will spend time in breakout rooms.

Ways to participate:

• Recordings only (these will be available for three months and be made available within 48 hours of the retreat’s end).

• Live participation, including interacting with other participants, asking questions of workshop instructors, and breakout room practice. Our global retreat has teachers spanning three continents and we realize you may not be able to attend all sessions live, which is why recordings will also be available. Go to live participation registration page.

Sliding scale pricing:

This retreat has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make it more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for more details and codes.

• Full fee: Live retreat with breakout room practice: US$199 OR Recording only $129.

• 25% off: US$149.25/96.25

• 50% off: US$99.50/64.50

• 70% off: US$59.70/38.70

• 80% off: US$39.80/25.80

• 90% off: US$19.90/12.90

In this two-hour workshop, you’ll learn the basic 6 Steps of Eugene Gendlin’s Focusing practice.

The six steps are:

1. Clearing a Space (getting ready to Focus)

2. Getting a Felt Sense (physical sensations, emotions, thoughts and memories)

3. Finding a Handle (a word, phrase or image that gets to the crux of our felt sense)

4. Resonating (ensuring the handle and felt sense match just right)

5. Asking (asking the body a few questions and noticing how it answers)

6. Receiving (welcoming what comes and thanking the body)

This is a group workshop delivered on zoom. There will be a Focusing demo. And you will have the opportunity to experience Focusing for a 20-minute turn, as well as a listening turn in breakout groups. We will delve into the 6 steps of Focusing, different options for listening, and get your Focusing questions answered.

You will receive a handout of the 6 steps of Focusing and body cards to record your experience.

Number of participants: Each workshops has between 6-16 participants

Upcoming Workshops:

• Monday, September 28, 7-9 pm PT (10 pm to 12 am ET) // Tuesday, September 29, 12-2 pm AEST (see your local time) with Marg Peck

• Wednesday, October 21, 10 am to 12 pm ET (see your local time) with Annette Dubreuil

Sliding scale pricing:

This workshop has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make it more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for details and codes.

• Full fee: US$39

• 25% off: US$29.25

• 50% off: US$19.50

• 70% off: US$11.70

• 80% off: US$7.80

• 90% off: US$3.90

Focusing 101 Workshops are held a few times per month. See date and time options in the dropdown.

In this two-hour workshop, you’ll have the opportunity to learn about and use felt sense body cards in your Focusing practice.

Felt sense body cards (body cards for short) are a way of capturing our Focusing experiences—whether a whole session, or we can use multiple body cards to capture sections of a session. This can be how the felt sense was at the beginning, and then how the felt sense was after the felt shift. Or we can capture different parts of our personality with a body card.

The back of the body cards are also used to draw images that come to us in Focusing. The workshop will cover the different ways images, as handles, can carry forward our felt sense.

The workshop will also include some ways we can classify our Focusing experiences using models like Internal Family Systems (Richard Schwartz) or the Felt Sense Polyvagal Model (Jan Winhall).

Finally, the workshop will include two guided Focusing experiences for you to then record with some felt sense body cards, followed by some breakout room practice to further unfold your experiences. The two guided Focusing experiences will be:

1. to connect to a positive memory, to then capture this resourcing energy.

2. to be with an issue, and possibly notice the different parts that are involved in the issue (this could including naming them with a handle and classifying them according to one of the frameworks presented, or you can sense into your own).

You will receive the felt sense body cards to record your experience during the workshop, and the slides afterwards.

Workshop Details

Date and Time live workshop was held: Tuesday, November 21st, 2023, 1-3 pm Eastern Time

Ways to participate:

• Recording only

Who is this workshop for?
This workshop is for Focusers of all levels who would like to grow their practice. You can choose to do the breakout room exercise on your own or with someone you’ll watch the recording with. Previous Focusing practice in partnership is helpful but not required. Instructions will be provided.

Sliding scale pricing:

This workshop has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make it more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for more details and codes.

• Full fee: Recording only $19

• 25% off: US$14.25

• 50% off: US$9.50

• 70% off: US$5.70

• 80% off: US$3.80

• 90% off: US$1.90

In this two-hour workshop, you’ll have the opportunity to connect deeply to your Self. The you that is heart-centered, can connect with others, and feel safe. And importantly, the you that can be there for yourself when a safe other isn’t available to co-regulate with.

One of the most healing experiences can be to learn to more consistently access your Self for yourself. The us that can be compassionate and hold space for others, also being there to hold space for ourselves. And hold space for any of our parts, including those that are hurt, scared, angry, or ashamed.

We can call this Self by many names. Self-compassion, inner self, higher self, stronger self, Self-in-Presence, core state or the Focusing attitude, to name a few. This action of being there for ourselves when a safe other isn’t available is core to self-regulation. This ability can be practiced. We can learn to hold space for what is arising in us—while Focusing with a partner, and then eventually also do so while Focusing alone and even when something arises spontaneously.

In this workshop, we will learn about the Self in a deeper way from three perspectives:

• Focusing: Eugene Gendlin’s Step 6 Receiving and Mia Leijssen and Jim Iberg’s Focusing Attitude.

• Internal Family Systems: Richard Schwartz’s 8Cs of Self-leadership, for the qualities that are often associated with Self (these are calm, connection, curiosity, clarity, creativity, compassion, confidence and courage).

• Neuroscience: the role of the ventral vagus nerve, as conceived by Stephen Porges and polyvagal theory. This will include a look at Jan Winhall’s Felt Sense Polyvagal Model for an integration back to Focusing and the felt sense.

The workshop will include an initial centering and two Focusing experiences to expand your access to your Self:

1. a guided exercise to connect to your Self that can be there for you. You’ll be invited to find a name for his you.

2. in breakout rooms you’ll have an opportunity to have an inner dialogue between your Self and some other part of you using Focusing. Suggested prompt questions will guide the breakout room practice. As always, you can opt to Focus on whatever your felt sense brings you if the dialogue doesn’t resonate when we get to this part of the workshop.

You will receive the felt sense body cards to record your experience during the workshop, and the slides afterwards.

Workshop Details

Date and Time live workshop was held: Wednesday, July 19th, 2023, 1-3 pm Eastern Time

Ways to participate:

• Recording only.

Who is this workshop for? This workshop is for Focusers of all levels who would like to grow their access to their Self. You can choose to do the breakout room exercise on your own or with someone you’ll watch the recording with. Previous Focusing practice in partnership is helpful but not required. Instructions will be provided.

Sliding scale pricing:

This workshop has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make it more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for more details and codes.

• Full fee: Recording only $19

• 25% off: US$14.25

• 50% off: US$9.50

• 70% off: US$5.70

• 80% off: US$3.80

• 90% off: US$1.90

In this eight-week course, we slowly get to know each of the 6 steps of Eugene Gendlin’s Focusing practice.

Each week, we learn about one or two steps and/or a new way of listening in Focusing partnerships. Here is the course overview by week:

1. Clearing a space and the Focusing attitude (receiving) + Holding space

2. Finding a felt sense + Saying back (mirroring)

3. Finding a felt sense about an issue + Felt Sense Polyvagal Model (continue mirroring)

4. Getting a handle and resonating + Reflecting with our own words (active listening)

5. Felt shifts + continue active listening

6. Asking + Helping your Focuser with general prompt questions (experiential peer listening)

7. Asking + Helping your Focuser deepen their experience with specific questions (experiential peer listening continued)

8. Noticing patterns + Helping your Focuser deepen their experience with specific questions (experiential peer listening continued)

As we go, we gradually grow our Focusing and listening skills, by building each week some of these skills.

You’ll learn to know where the Focuser is in the process, and when to ask questions which help the process move along, such as:

• “Where do you carry that in your body?”

• “Can you get a handle for that?”

• “What’s the worst about that?”

• “What would it feel like if it was all better?”

Each class begins with a centering/grounding practice and a check-in. We then have a a teaching piece of a Focusing step or two and/or some listening skills and a small embodied guided exercise (experiential). We’ll then have a short break and come back for a demonstration followed by breakout room practice (groups of two or three). We end back together in the main room for some Q&A, sharing and a brief closing.

To further your practice, it is encouraged to also form a Focusing partnership with another participant. This involves meeting between classes to practice, in an exchange of Focusing and listening. You can also opt to be assessed for the Proficiency in Focusing Partnership Award provided through TIFI in the final few weeks of the course.

Timing and other details

Next Groups—Dates, Times and Course Teachers (see more on teachers below):

• Tuesdays, September 1-October 20 , 10 am to 12 pm Eastern (see your local time) with PUPA Focusing Founder and Coordinator Annette Dubreuil and co-taught by PUPA Focusing Trainee Jane Cecilia

  • Registration deadline: August 28—there are two regular spots left

• Mondays, October 19-December 7, 6-8 pm Pacific (9-11 pm Eastern)/Tuesdays, October 20-December 8, 11 am - 1 pm AEST (see your local time) with PUPA Focusing Trainer Marg Peck

• Registration deadline: October 16

• Note: the time will change part way through the course for some time zones (e.g. after Nov 1 for Australia/New Zealand. See times for November 2/3 class.)

• Upcoming classes - dates to be determined. Please email me at annette@pupa.ca if you cannot make the above course to let me know when you would be available for this training. If you have previous listening experience or are someone who is an intermediate or experienced Focuser, you could also look at the 4-week version of this course.

Group size: each group has between 12-24 participants.

Who is this course for? The course is designed for beginners (both beginners in Focusing and listening). (There is also an intensive 4-week version of this course which may be better suited to you if you are an experienced listener but a beginner Focuser).

Course location: Zoom

Sliding scale pricing: This course has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make the course more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for details and codes.

• Full fee: US$320

• 25% off: US$240

• 50% off: US$160

• 70% off: US$96

• 80% off: US$64

• 90% off: US$32

Notes:

• This course is to learn Focusing in partnership. Breakout room practice and practice in between classes help build that muscle. As such, live attendance is essential. That said, we recognize that sometimes an absence is inevitable. Therefore the classes are recorded and shared with you. This includes the guided exercises, slide teachings, demonstrations and group sharing. Breakout room practice is not recorded.

• You can take this class as a stand alone experience, continue on with the whole PUPA journey, or whatever course or courses resonate with you.

• The journey can be extended to the PUPA Focusing Certification Program, which includes additional requirements to become a Trainer/Certified Focusing Professional with The International Focusing Institute.

In this four-week beginner Focusing course for advanced listeners, we delve into each of the 6 steps of Eugene Gendlin’s practice.

Each week, we learn about one or two steps, as well as an aspect of listening:

1. Clearing a Space and the Focusing Attitude (Receiving) + Presence (Holding Space)

2. Finding the Felt Sense + Saying Back (Mirroring)

3. Getting a Handle and Resonating + Reflecting with Our Own Words (Active Listening)

4. Asking + Helping your Focuser deepen their experience (Experiential Listening)

We gradually grow our Focusing skills while adapting our listening skills for the practice: first by learning to say back the words shared especially the felt/emotional words (week 1), reflecting in our own words when it feels right and asking simple questions such as “Where do you carry that in your body?” (week 2). Then we learn to take our Focuser through most of the steps and ask guiding questions such as “Can you get a handle for that?” (week 3). We finish by learning the variety of ways we can use Asking questions (week 4), to unfold the problem or find solutions with guiding questions like “What’s the worst about that?” or “What would it feel like if it as all better?”

Each class includes a centering, teaching of step(s) and listening skills, a small experiential guided by me, a demonstration and then breakout room practice (groups of two or three).

To further your practice, it is encouraged to also form a Focusing partnership with another participant. This involves meeting between classes to practice, in an exchange of Focusing and listening. You can also opt to be assessed for the Proficiency in Focusing Partnership Award provided through TIFI.

Timing and other details

Next Groups with Annette Dubreuil:

• Wednesdays, 10 am to 12 pm Eastern, November 18 to December 9 (see your local time) with Coordinator Annette Dubreuil

• Upcoming classes - dates to be determined. Please email me at annette@pupa.ca to let me know your interest and when you would be available for this training. You can also join the 8-week version of this course which takes more time to introduce the material, and has more time for practice and demos. Hence while it is designed for the general public/non-practitioners or beginner listeners, it is a wonderful experience for practitioners as well.

Group size: each group has between 8-24 participants.

Who is this course for? The course is best suited to Focusing beginners who have some prior listening experience. This might be listening to yourself introspectively (e.g. via meditation, yoga, Qigong, journalling, in therapy). Or listening to others through various listening practices (e.g. Circling, Authentic Relating, Nonviolent Communications). Perhaps you listen as your profession (e.g. coaches, therapists, other healing practitioners). Finally, the course also welcomes intermediate and experienced Focusers interested in a refresh. If you are new to both Focusing and listening (both yourself and others), then it is recommended you begin with the 8-week beginner course which gives more time for learning and integrating the skills taught in the course.

Course location: Zoom

Sliding scale pricing: This course has sliding scale pricing, offering multiple price points to make the course more accessible and reduce financial barriers for people with different levels of income. Please view the sliding scale fees page for details and codes.

• Full fee: US$240

• 25% off: US$180

• 50% off: US$120

• 70% off: US$72

• 80% off: US$48

• 90% off: US$24

Notes:

• This course is to learn Focusing in partnership. Breakout room practice and practice in between classes help build that muscle. As such, live attendance is essential. That said, we recognize that sometimes an absence is inevitable. Therefore the classes are recorded and shared with you. This includes the guided exercises, slide teachings, demonstrations and group sharing. Breakout room practice is not recorded.

• You can take this class as a stand alone experience, continue on with the whole PUPA journey, or whatever course or courses resonate with you.

• The journey can be extended to the PUPA Focusing Certification Program, which includes additional requirements to become a Trainer/Certified Focusing Professional with The International Focusing Institute.

$799 CAD for Canadians. Two scholarships are also available.

Many of us are struggling. Feelings of anxiety, dread, and even helplessness are at an all-time high. Fire season, catastrophic storms, and the loss of plant and animal species are the new normal. Everywhere we look things seem off the rails. We can no longer escape the impacts of a world in distress and all the intersecting issues of the larger polycrisis.

When it comes to climate change, how can we possibly respond any other way than shutting down. We are both experiencing disasters today and living with the uncertainty or dread about catastrophes to come?

Research corroborates what many cultures have known since time immemorial. In times of crisis, we need practices that move our grief and fear and bring us into connection. It’s only through connection to our bodily wisdom that fosters the clarity to know how best to be of service.

These innate and indigenous practices are largely missing in popular culture – outsourced instead to an overreliance on cognitive reasoning and tools of distraction and dissociation.

Harnessing Gendlin’s embodied Focusing Process, this 8-week course creates a communal gathering place for professionals to learn to hold space for the complex interplay of climate emotions in their work and simultaneously, to also show up as individuals.

Combining current neuroscience, trauma praxis, and embodied practices we will develop an understanding of our patterned threat responses and explore new ways of showing up in the world with the power of our embodied intuition, and a fresh sense of connection to the cosmos and our community.

This course is polyvagal-informed and integrates Jan Winhall's Felt Sense Polyvagal Model™ and elements of Peter Levine's Somatic Experiencing approach. Ancient wisdom practices and current neuroscience findings are woven throughout.

Focusing is an evidence-based, somatic, or embodied mindfulness practice that deepens our connection to our inner knowing which Gendlin termed the “felt sense.” Connecting with our felt sense in a Focusing way is one of the most powerful ways of changing how we experience the world. It is most powerfully practiced in partnership; this can be between peers, in groups like this one, or by being included in professional listening/space holding.

Course outcomes

Each session includes an embodied practice, experiential learning, and opportunities for sharing. There will also be optional peer dyads (Focusing partnerships, see below) and readings to supplement your learning between classes. 

Throughout this course you will have the opportunity to:

• Understand habituated stress responses and survival patterns in yourself and others

• Build your own resilience through somatic practices

• Experience a deeper connection to community care

• Enhance your intuition or inner knowing of how to best be of service

• Honour and explore grief in ways that shift us out of shut down or isolation

• Unpack climate psychology to help place ourselves in this particular moment

Who is this for:

This course welcomes diverse identities and backgrounds. We welcome professionals who hold space for climate emotions (mental health professionals, therapists, coaches, climate cafe facilitators), as well as those working on climate issues or in adjacent fields including, education, community organizing, and journalism. We welcome people who have been in this area for years or those just beginning to feel the magnitude of this existential threat.

This course is not appropriate for anyone experiencing an acute psychological crisis.

Timing and other details

Next Groups:

• Next dates available soon! Email annette@pupa.ca to find out

Group size: For the sake of community building and intimacy each group has a cap of 16 participants.

Fees: $799 US/$799CAD
Canadians can use this discount code to access the course at par: CLIMATECAD

Course location: Zoom

Course teachers: Annette Dubreuil (Certifying Coordinator in Focusing and MBA), Jenn Wesanko (Climate Change Communicator, Somatic Psychotherapist, Somatic Experiencing Practitioner, and Focusing Trainer)

Scholarships: Two needs-based scholarships are available. Please email us to enquire.

Focusing partnerships: involves meeting between classes to practice, in an exchange of Focusing and listening. You can also opt to be assessed for the Proficiency in Focusing Partnership Award provided through The International Focusing Institute (TIFI) in the final few weeks of the course (fees through TIFI apply: you must be a member and there is a processing fee).