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WHAT FOCUSING IS
AND WHAT IT IS NOT
Focusing is a very special way of listening to oneself. It is listening to the body, not
the mind. It is listening to the flow of felt experience in the body. It is listening to the
way people, objects, situations are being carried in one's felt experiencing. Focusing
is a special way of using concepts. It is a linking of concepts with felt experience. Let
me elaborate and clarify what it is by talking about what it is not.
Stop reading for a moment. . .
Listen to yourself...
Go on, take a minute or so. I'll wait. . .
Now, what did you do? What happened?
If you don't already know focusing or naturally focus, probably you "heard"
or "saw" or "heard and saw" words or images "in your head." The words could have
been of several different kinds:
1. Alvin Adams is a professional basketball player who has just learned that
his teammate, Walter Davis, has entered a drug rehabilitation center for the second
time. Adams reports:

I look at Walter Davis from many angles as I think about

what's happening around me. My thoughts concerning Walter flow:
"Man, he could hit the big basket when we needed it." "He sure
made a stupid decision the first time he did coke." "It's fun playing on
his team because Walter sure wants to win." "I wish I'd gotten to
know him better." ''I'm glad 1didn't know him better." "I guess cocaine
addiction is a disease with Walter." "Walter should be strong enough
to say No to drugs." "Walter needs my support now." "Did Walter
testify against his friends and teammates?" (New York Times,
4/26/87)

This is Alvin Adams listening to himself. His is an example of what I will call
"mind-associating." In mind-associating one lets one's mind wander over a particular
topic or over several. One free associates. Alvin Adams is listening to his mind-
associating.
Listening to mind-associating is mostly harmless. It can be distracting. It can be
amusing. It can be creative. One can enjoy the play of concepts and ideas as mind
joins and rejoins them. It is one kind of listening to the mind, to one's thoughts and
ideas.1t is not focusing-not listening to bodily felt experiencing.

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2. Here is another example of the kinds of words that people sometimes hear
and/or see "in their heads." This example comes from a time in my life when I was
deeply troubled. I was at a workshop and I "heard" the following:

My neck hurts; I've injured myself; maybe it's serious; my body

won't survive this weekend; this will do no good; what do 1have to
go home to anyway, I'll never ever meet anyone again. . . what will I
do when I leave. . . what will 1do In San Francisco. . . if I feel like this
I'll be miserable. . . I'll always feel like this. . . I was right, the
vacation won't change anything . . . what else can 1do? what should I
try? . . it's such a long ride home. .. I'm scared. .. 1'11get sick out
West. . . I'm spending too much money . . . and besides. . .

This is "mind-obsessing." The main characteristic of mind obsessing is the

repetition of words, ideas, and thoughts that make one feel bad. It is as if a needle is
stuck in the groove of a record one does not like. One goes round and round and
gets nowhere and feels down. One is listening too much to the blues.
Most of us know how to obsess. We do not need lessons. It is one of the
characteristic things that mind does-almost like that is part of its job.
At times mind-obsessing gets way out of control. It becomes dangerous and
unhealthy to listen to mind-obsessing. At its extreme, it can kill you. People commit
suicide sometimes as a way of turning off mind-obsessing.

3. Here is another example of the kinds of words I sometimes hear and see
when I listen to myself. This example comes from a Friday morning sitting in the
Algiers Café in Harvard Square, getting prepared to lead a weekend Opening the
Heart workshop:

When I leave here I'll go to the bank, the photocopy place, and the post
office. Then I have to plan the workshop. What do I need to do for the workshop? I
need to talk with Rodney, buy some Kleenex, decide on the afternoon part of the
designo. Oops--don't forget to tell the church about the alarm.

This is an example of "mind-planning." Notice that the thoughts are very focused.
They do not wander all over the map. In this example, the ordering principle is
sequential. The thinking is a rehearsal for action and steps to follow.
Within limits, this kind of mind-planning is useful. It can help to think ahead.
Making lists of things "to do" does help people. It is a useful use of mind-to a point.
Mostly we overplan. We listen to ourselves in this way more than is really necessary.
As theorists such as Fritz Perls, Claudio Naranjo, and Krishnamurti have pointed out,
we're motivated by fear of the future. What we are doing is trying to control our
experience.

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What do these three examples have in common? They are examples of listening to
the mind. As we have seen, the very special way of listening called focusing is
listening to the body.
Here is one more example of a kind of listening to oneself that focusing is not.
Bob Beamon held the world record in the long jump in track and field.
Remembering his record-breaking jump, Beamon says:

When 1 went to me top of the runway to begin the approach

for my jump, my frame of mind was awesome. . . I was positively
motivated and disciplined; I was existing some where between time
and space. I heard me cheering and me roars a while and men no
outside sounds at all, only an inner voice telling me to heighten that
thing within myself that had been acquired from all the training and
practice. The effort
had to be natural and perfect. (italics mine, New York Times,
5/26/89)

I will call this kind of self-listening, following Beamon and Robert Gass' nice
phrase, "listening to the inner voice." It is listening to one's disembodied intuition.
Often what comes to one from this place seems deeper, more profound, and more
surprising than what comes from listening to the mind. It is here that c1airvoyance and
other phenomena called "psychic" come in.
What attitude ought we take towards listening to intuition?
The matter is complex. On the other hand, the experience of listening to the
disembodied inner voice can be quite startling. A woman reports:

At the end of our first date, when he left the house, I was in an
interesting state. I found myself unaccountably humming a tune--out of
nowhere. When I listened to the words I heard, "Oh, sweet mama
treetop-tall, won't you kindly turn your damper down. . . " I was
amused, and listening further very distinctly heard me lyric from that
song, "I may not be me best in town. . . but let me be the best till the
best comes around.. . " I noted this in my journal and did not think of it
further.
We entered a rather ambivalent relationship which ended suddenly
one year later when, standing with him in a movie line, another man in
line introduced himself and soon proceeded to sweep me off my feet-
and out of that other penultimate relationship. On our wedding day I
re-read my journal and found the prophetic lyric. The best had come
around.

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In some circ1es nowadays, disembodied intuition is very "in." Much New Age
literature champions it. Intuition is very useful. It also has its drawbacks. First, one has
to know where to use it and where not to use it. It is probably best not to do one's
income tax intuitively. Second, it is difficult to distinguish intuition from other
phenomena-such as projection, wish-fulfillment, and fear. Paul Goodman once wrote,
"Some of our intuitions about the world are true and some are not. It is important to
learn to tell the difference" (1963, p. 21).
In particular, it can be very difficult to differentiate true intuition from fear or
anger projection. Listening to the disembodied inner voice is still not listening in the
special way that focusing is. Here are some introductory focusing instructions:

Close your eyes. .. sit comfortably. .. take a few deep breaths.

. . now let your attention follow your breath down into your body
and just see what is there. . . imagine your attention is like a
searchlight, and turn mat searchlight on and shine it down into your
body-in your chest, belly, shoulders, wherever-and let it roam around,
scan around, and just see what is mere. . . And now see if there is a
word, phrase, image, sound, or gesture mat matches me sensations
inside. . .

When I do this just now, I find a kind-of-heaviness in my chest and a tendency for my
shoulders to droop and my chest to drop. The direction of the pull of my energy is
down. I try the word "tired" and it does not quite fit the feeling. I discard it and try
"weary." That feels more like it. The felt sense is weary. When I say "weary" back to
myself feel a little lighter, a little more lively.
I straighten up a bit and my energy feels pulled upward. This is the felt shift. I feel a
slight bit better. I simultaneously know that I was feeling weary and I feel less weary
now that I know it.
I feel more grounded knowing what I feel and more attuned to myself. I could
go further if I needed to, but instead, I stop and return to my writing.
In sum: why listen to the felt experiencing in the body rather than listen to the
mind?
The problem with listening to mind is that mind does not always tell the truth. It
tells stories. It lies. Mind can think anything. For example, right now my mind is telling
me that I will live forever and inherit a great fortune. This sounds nice, but I don't
think I ought to listen. It doesn't have the ring (or feel) of truth.
Conversely, the body tells the truth. When I listen to my felt sense of now, I
find how I really feel about now. There is no question and no debate. Right now, I
have a warm, light feeling in my chest. I'm feeling good. Yes, I am, and there's no
doubt.

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Listening to oneself in this way grounds a person. It harmonizes mind and

body. Symbols match my felt experience. I know who and where I am and what the
feeling is about. That's focusing: a special way of listening to oneself.

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Friedman, N. (2000). What Focusing Is and what it is not. En Friedman, N. Focusing:

Selected Essays. (pp. 95-100). United States of America