Led by Ann Zierler, LICSW and Pam Torre, LICSW

“Can you feel that in your body?” We ask this questions because we know emotions are often felt and expressed as a somatic experience in the body. And we know In EFT that deepening emotional experiencing enables therapeutic change. But do you know what to do with the response. What if it is “everywhere”? Or “not really”? At this Connecting Conversation, we will explore using somatic experiencing, both ours and our clients’, throughout the EFT Tango to help stay focused on emotion. As in all our meetups, we will incorporate didactic information, discussion and experiential learning.

Led by Heidi Bercovici, LMFT

Reflect • Attune • Validate • ask an Evocative question. This is RAVE! Each of these elements help focus the work of coming alongside our clients, helping us get their experience and helping them feel gotten. During this Connecting Conversation, we will explore how using RAVE as an organizing principle of your Move 2 can focus and deepen affect assembly, can help both the sharing the listening partner understand the cycle more clearly, can ward off blocks and can make the transition to Move 3 orchestrating the enactment seamless. We will pack group discussion, video examples and break out groups to practice into our 90 minute meetup.

Led by Ann Zierler, LICSW

The Experiencing Scale describes 7 levels of emotional and cognitive involvement in the therapeutic process. In EFT, we use it to assess for safety and for depth of sharing in Stage 2. Come to this meetup to learn how understanding where your clients are on the experiencing scale can help you understand where you are on the EFT roadmap. Group discussion and break out groups will enhance learning.

Led by Lana Emelyanov, LICSW

If you attended our training by Laurie Watson in November, 2022, this will be a great follow up. If you were unable to attend, this is a terrific opportunity to focus in on your couples’ sexual cycle. As Laurie says, “if you are a couples therapist, you are a sex therapist!”

This meetup will cover sexual assessment in EFT, emotional, physical and spiritual aspects of sexual connection, the interplay between the emotional and the sexual cycle, the dual control model of sexuality, and overcoming shame and sexual stigma. There will be discussion and role play focusing on self-awareness of the therapist and possible blocks related to processing sexual content. Lana will also provide resources for EFT therapists:  podcasts, workshops, educational videos, and books related to sex and sexuality.

Led by Edith Bross Johns, LICSW

The difference between “yeah, I’ve heard all this before,” and “Whoa, that makes so much sense,” providing the attachment frame allows our couples to move from blame and shame to understanding and vulnerability. When and how to seed attachment or to “attachify” is more of an art than a science. Come to this meetup to share your art and hear about how others are seeding this most important awareness in group discussions and break out sessions.

Led by Michelle Avigan, PhD

Are you interested in EFT Certification but find the process overwhelming? or you just don't know how to begin? or you are not sure if it is worthwhile? 

This is the Meetup for you!

During this short presentation, we will demystify the process of certification. You will hear about the requirements and get some tips about getting on the road to certification.

In case you are afraid that your tapes need to be perfect (they DON’T!!!), there will also be some time to watch excerpts of tapes that passed the certification process and to ask questions from Michelle and others who have been through the process.

How many times have you asked, “what was that like to tell him?” and what you hear is “I don’t know”? Move 4 of the Tango is vital in helping our clients to tune into what is happening inside them and between them in that moment. This is where we “catch bullets,” where we make sense of spontaneous responses. Move 5 makes explicit the risk the partner just took, or the block that just emerged. It validates and celebrates. A good Move 5 leads seamlessly into Move 1 with the listening partner. Come to this Connecting Conversation to learn from colleagues how they navigate these two moves while you share your own secrets.

Hosted by Lana Emelyanov

Enactments are what our clients take with them after the session. Effective enactments rewire the way our client’s see their partners: from threat to safety. Effective enactments allow partners to practice their new moves in the development of their positive cycle. Ineffective enactments end up feeling like the same old move in the cycle, can trigger the listening partner and can leave us feeling frustrated and ourselves ineffective helpers. Come to this Connecting Conversation to talk about where our setups go wrong and how we can better set up enactments.

This is the moment when we shift from content to meaning. Where we help our clients see the connection between their distress and the importance of their relationship. Where we heighten the attachment significance. It is the bridge between primary and secondary emotion. Instead of “she never remembers …” we can offer, “you tell yourself you’re not important to her.” Instead of “I blew it again,” we can offer, “he means so much to you, it feels like you are letting him down.” Come to this Connecting Conversation where we will talk all about getting to the reframe, when, how and why it works and, maybe more importantly, when, how and why it doesn’t.

Core Skills is designed to give you a "deeper dive" into each stage, step, and intervention that make up an "Emotionally Focused" approach. Core Skills is typically split up into 4 weekends or 3 3-day trainings.  It is required for certification., Core Skills participants show a clip of their EFT therapy with couples.

We are hoping to bring Core Skills back to Massachusetts in 2024.  Stay tuned.