A Short Guide for the Focusing 'Coach' - Focusing Coach and Trainees

Written by Ilan Shalif, Ph.D.

While reviewing the felt sensations and the focusing on them, trainees talk about various topics. The best a coach (who is not integrating focusing with psychotherapy) can do with them is to use them as targets for focusing. The trainee may be advised to focus on the felt sensation of the moment of the narration - the one that was aroused during the talk, or to try to focus on the original ones (of the episodes mentioned) - revived by one of the various available tactics for "recycling" felt sensations of past experiences.

When trainee narrations take up a high portion of the session, it is often wise to go along with them rather than fight this tendency. In these cases it is wise to introduce the allegory about the yacht which cruises on a lake full of fish for pleasure. The narration is like the cruising yacht, which drags a fishing net often hauled on board full of fish. The haulings are the interruptions suggested by the coach at key points of the narration, in order to focus on the concurrent felt sensations.

As the focusing session deals with contents which are not part of the usual daily rapport, it is highly recommended to show the trainee that he is understood. It is also important to assure him time and again that all felt sensations are legitimate topics as all of them are legitimate targets for focusing.

Frequently, especially when training is prolonged, feelings that are not of a "pure" trainee-coach relations emerge. Sometimes, even at the beginning of training intense feelings are aroused. In all of them, the worst tactic is to delve into them or dwell on them. Even if no acting out of yours or the trainee stems from it, trash-programs related to other people and relations will surely emerge into active functioning and hinder the training. The best way of dealing with the irrelevant feelings is to focus on felt sensations of each of them until they fade.

During the first few sessions and even during the advanced stages of the training, the best contribution for morale and diligence in focusing is derived from success. Therefore, it is best to divide the efforts of the coach equally, between the search for new focusing targets (topics and tactics) for the trainee, and the emphasis on the success already achieved.

The tempo of introducing the technique

The first few weeks are dedicated mainly to overcoming the most urgent problems of the trainee. During this period, introduce him to the tactics most needed for this task. If he is reading the text of chapter five, point out to him the sections most relevant at that time.

After the trainee starts to overcome the most stressing problems and the most distressing felt sensations, it is time to look at the more advanced targets to be reached by focusing. The specific targets chosen will dictate the selection of the tactics and techniques from the book (and experience) as well as the order of their introduction.

Usually, during the first two months, the trainee is supposed to experience the use of all the tactics and to have a project or two that goes beyond the alleviation of unpleasant felt sensations. In the following months, the projects selected and the tactics to try in overcoming them represent team work - and they had best be "the most democratic" possible.

In addition to my prejudice against authoritative relations, there are also pragmatic reasons for this recommendation. The coach may suggest projects and even try "to sell them to the trainee". However "the last word" should remain with the trainee, as he is the only one who is in direct unconscious touch with his activation programs and stored memories. Consequently, only he can receive their warnings and recommendations regarding the time to tackle the various problems.

Only by taking these as a dominant part of the considerations about the appropriateness of the decisions, can one refrain from gross mistakes and from arousing the "resistance" of the trainee.

Even if the trainee makes many incorrect decisions while managing his daily focusing programme, too much pressure on him "may win a few battles, but will lose the war". The feeling of being his own master and the only one responsible for his focusing programme is very good for his morale and enthusiasm.

The mutual agreement that the proficiency of the coach and his somewhat more objective point of reference, are only some of the factors to be considered, circumvent most of the "transference" problems so common in psychotherapy. The mutual agreement that the gut feelings of the trainee should decide what, when, for how long, and if at all, to focus on any target or project contributes immensely to the emotional climate in which the focusing training functions.

Only in such an atmosphere will the trainee allocate the maximal share of possible resources to his focusing and his growth.

If the atmosphere of good teamwork is preserved, the coach can motivate, persuade, or coax the trainee to focus on some of the targets which he regards as essential and the trainee initially is reluctant to tackle.

Remember, the coach is only there to help the trainee to learn quickly and more easily the steps of the "do it yourself" manual. You should only supply him with an external point of view and a temporary second mind, to be used while he is contemplating the best ways open to him (for focusing purposes).

Though the trainee will tend to treat you as a parent figure, it is better to evade this. The best you can do for him is to play the role of a fellow traveler and a coach.