Crossing Meditation and Focusing

Crossing Focusing and Meditation

Bi-Weekly meetings on Thursdays
March 5, March 19, April 2, April 16, 2026

12:30pm - 2:00pm New York time
(note that US clocks change after the first session)
check your start time here
 

• Live attendance is recommended as this workshop is experiential in nature.

• In addition to exploring in a full group when we are on Zoom together, this workshop includes the possibility of small group partnership between sessions. Serge and Bill would like this workshop to be the launch of an ongoing group of kindred spirits crossing meditation and Focusing.

• Participants do not need to be regular meditators to register for this workshop. 

• Recording Note: Recordings of the weekly meetings will be available to all registrants as soon as possible after each session whether or not you attend live. Breakout rooms are not recorded.

• All registrants will receive access to a Resource Page where the recordings and other information will be available. The Resource Page will be accessible for three months after the workshop concludes.
   

We hope you can register by the first session but if you miss it, we have registration open until March 19 -- you'll just need to catch up on the recordings.

OVERVIEW

Crossing meditation and Focusing feels a bit like a road not taken, or, at least, not as fully taken as it could have been. It was explicitly present in Gene Gendlin’s mind, when he wrote:

If the word “meditation” is used very broadly, then the process steps I am examining can be said to be a kind of meditation. There are of course many kinds of meditation, why might this not just be called one more kind?

-Eugene T. Gendlin. (1996). Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy: A Manual of the Experiential Method. Guilford, p. 65.

This four-session workshop is an opportunity to deepen the way that Focusing and meditation deepen each other. This workshop is experiential in nature. Space will be made to articulate the meaning that arises from experience, in a way where making sense involves sensing. Serge and Bill hope to share their delight in experiencing the words “meditation” and “Focusing” as organic living changing meaning.

All participants will be encouraged to share their approaches in a spirit where the diversity of practices and experiences is seen as enriching to all. Serge and Bill will present specific ideas, but they do not see them as the one way to do things. They do so as a way of anchoring the exploration, stimulating participants to find their own way and share it with others. 

In addition to exploring in a full group when we are on Zoom together, this workshop includes the possibility of small group partnership between sessions. Serge and Bill would like this workshop to be the launch of an ongoing group of kindred spirits crossing meditation and Focusing. Registrants who opt in to an email list by the end of the first will receive the list of other registrants who also opted in. More about how this will work will be shared at the first session.

Outline of what will be covered during the four sessions:

• Session 1: After meditating, we explore how Focusing gives us a way to express meditative experience while remaining in a fresh mode of exploration.
   
• Session 2: Focusing informed by meditation: we explore practicing Focusing as a sequence of micro meditations.
   
• Session 3: Meditation informed by Focusing: we explore how Focusing allows us to include conceptualization without breaking the experience of meditation, in fact, helping carry it forward in a meditative way.
   
• Session 4: We integrate what we each got from this workshop into our own practice.

Registrants do not need to be regular meditators to participate in this workshop. 

FORMAT

This series will be held in Zoom meeting format where participants can see the facilitator and other participants. You will need to have a computer/mobile device. Calling in by phone is also possible but not preferred. Breakout rooms are not recorded. 

Bios:

Serge Prengel is a therapist, a Focusing coordinator, and a co-founder of the Integrative Focusing Therapy training program. He explores creative approaches to mindfulness at ProactiveMindfulness.com

Bill Gayner is a social worker, a therapist, and a Focusing trainer. He is President of the Board of TIFI and Founding President of Touching the Earth Mindfulness Ontario (TTEMO.com)

Registration Policies

Pricing: Regular price $120  Modified price $90  Lowest price $60

Three tier pricing. We welcome you to select the level right for you, while reminding you that if you have a reliable means of support and live in a country with a strong economy, we ask that you pay the regular price. By choosing the highest amount you are capable of paying you help make the sliding scale possible. Thank you! 

Note: If the lowest price is not affordable, please email [email protected] to check on scholarship funds.

DEI Scholarship. There are DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) Scholarship funds available for anyone in a group under-represented in TIFI's programs, including people aged 30 or younger, those in the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) community and others.  For more about our DEI scholarship, please see focusing.org/board. To apply, email [email protected]. Please write DEI scholarship in the subject line.

Refunds A full refund minus a $25 administrative fee for cancellations 14 days before the start date. Cancellations less than 14 days before the start date are nonrefundable. The International Focusing Institute (TIFI) reserves the right to alter the program, cancel or re-schedule for insufficient enrollment or for other unanticipated reasons. In such cases you will be given a choice of applying your tuition to future programs, or having the full enrollment fee returned to you.

The opinions offered by presenters and participants are their own and do not necessarily represent the opinions of TIFI. Participants authorize TIFI to use their name, statements and likeness without charge, for promotional purposes in publications, advertising, video, web, new media, or other formats.

By registering for this course with the Institute, and in consideration of the right and opportunity to participate in and contribute to the Institute’s classes, for the purposes of its control of all video and/or audio recordings thereof pertaining to uses serving our purposes and goals, in enrolling in this session you acknowledge and agree to the Institute’s ownership of all rights in such classes, including all rights under copyright therein.  In no circumstance shall any portion or clip posted or displayed exceed 3 minutes in duration.  If you plan to use, post or display any portion or clips of these recordings, including posting these to a website or to a social media platform or portal, you agree that you will seek and obtain the prior approval of the Institute. We ask that participants not take screen shots to share on social media. TIFI may opt to take an official screenshot where participants will be given the option to be included or not.

For more information:

Contact Elizabeth at [email protected] or (845) 480-5111.