Hands on application of systems thinking to clinical practice, family of origin, use of neuro-feedback, and use of the self of the therapist in clinical work. Max. 8 participants

4 days of intensive experiential training in family systems application to clinical work including:

• live clinical role played sessions,
• Experience of neuro-feedback,
• Family of origin explorations
• Workshopping the use of the self of the therapist clinically.

 This training will require each participant to use their own family material in a confidential setting over the course of the week. Each participant understands that they will be actively involved in role plays and discussions and demonstrations of interventions.

Exploring the interplay of culture, societal process and the Family System

Dr Bowen described the family as an emotional system governed by instinctual, emotional forces at a natural systems level; he viewed these as biological forces, transcending cultural differences and even species.

This workshop explores a Family Systems view of the role of culture in the therapy process. It explores how causal explanations based on culture can get in the way of the resolution of dilemmas clients bring to therapy. It looks at the interplay between family emotional process and the bigger picture societal emotional process, within which culture is embedded. It explores the self of the therapist, through their family emotional process and culture and discusses how this insight or lack of may impact the therapy process. Finally it looks at the process of migration from a systems perspective and reviews the nascent cross-cultural research on the differentiation of self construct.

Relationship maturity and how it can grow at each phase of the life cycle

“Each stage of the life cycle, from leaving home to facing death, provides distinctive opportunities to work on being a bit more differentiated — to be real people in our important relationships. P 5-6

“Life stages help us appreciate how we’re never operating in an individual vacuum but always within a system of relationships. In the space between people, where anxieties flow back and forth, we can find clues as to how we relate that go well beyond explanations based on genetic make-up and temperament.” P 7-8

Growing Yourself Up. Jenny Brown, Exisle pub, 2012.

This 2 day workshop will explore the particular challenges and growth opportunities at each key family life transition.  Each life transition presents unique challenges to a person’s and a family’s capacity to adapt to change. The degree of relational maturity, or differentiation of self, impacts the way that an individual and a family system is able to negotiate important developmental tasks of the life cycle.

Testimonial:  "Thanks for an insightful & thought/change provoking presentation."Workshop Participant May 2011

Inviting each partner out of the fusion

This workshop covers the central dilemmas to conducting couple therapy including:

• engaging clients in a goal focused therapy;
• drawing out the process from the content of complaints;
• dealing with power issues;
• avoiding side taking; and
• expanding the therapy lens to the previous generations.

This will be a hands-on workshop that balances presentation of theory with essential skills for the therapist.

This workshop addresses how trauma symptoms can be understood as part of the family emotional process as a whole even as events that have overwhelmed the individual may have emanated from outside the family system itself. A Bowen family systems approach for working with people impacted by trauma will be presented taking into account the neurobiology of trauma and post trauma symptoms such as anxiety and depression.