Freshly updated, this contribution to the PCCS Books popular ‘Primer’ series is written by one of the UK’s leading authorities on focusing-oriented counselling. Developed by Eugene Gendlin from Carl Rogers’ pioneering model of person-centred counselling at the University of Chicago Counseling Center in the 1950s, focusing-oriented counselling can be applied to enhance any model of talking therapy. Its primary focus is what the client says, but also, importantly, what they have not yet found the words to express – that is, how we articulate the ‘felt sense’ of our experiences. This revised and extended edition offers a comprehensive but concise description of the history, theory and practice of the approach, how and why it ‘works’, the debates around it, what it brings to the counsellor’s primary mode of practice, and the evidence to support it. This is an invaluable guide and introductory outline both for students and for qualified counsellors seeking to enhance their clients’ therapeutic outcomes.

Campbell Purton has written extensively on focusing and focusing-oriented therapy. He studied philosophy and the history and philosophy of science in London and Alberta, and holds a PhD in philosophy. He was a lecturer in philosophy before training as a person-centred counsellor and becoming interested in Gendlin’s focusing-oriented therapy. He introduced focusing to the University of East Anglia’s counselling diploma course, and was later Director of the UEA postgraduate diploma/MA course in focusing and experiential psychotherapy. He has continued to work in the philosophy of therapy and was involved in setting up the first focusing-oriented therapy training course in China. His books include Person-Centred Counselling: The focusing-oriented approach, The Trouble with Psychotherapy: Counselling and common sense, and Self-Therapy: A focusing-oriented approach. Some of his other publications can be found on his website at www.dwelling.me.uk