FREDA BLOB

© Photo Studio Gudrun Th. de Maddalena, Tübingen

Freda Blob CP (GRAD), Ed (GRAD), AT, PCT

Freda is a Clinician, Creative Arts Educator and Art Therapist, and the Founding Director of FOCUSZARt The Focusing Studio. She is a European certified Person-centered and Experiential Psychotherapist/Counselor, and a Certifying Focusing Teacher with the International Focusing Institute TIFI

Our Story

When the arts found us again, we were in the midst of certifying as a FWB practitioner (Focusing with the Whole Body). A dream depicted that we were taking the wrong direction train. The call of hour was immediate change of direction

We enrolled in the 2017 FOAT® training program with Dr. Laury Rappaport (FOAT®: Focusing Oriented Expressive Arts), took additional trainings in trauma-informed Expressive Arts and Person-centred Creative Arts, and suscribed to practical art couses. This training bundle turned out to set us on the right track

 

In 2011 we had been visiting the Saintbury Center (art gallery and museum) at the campus of University of East Anglia UEA/UK during the UEA Focusing and Philosophy Conference

The center's art shop layed out a picture depicting a full circle next to four circle parts placed around like puzzle pieces waiting to be put together. Finding this picture we knew that our efforts to bring our professional Focusing journey to completion were still in a puzzle state

A PhD at UEA on models of intermodal experiential learning looked the perfect match to make our contribution

We had witnessed how intermodal teaching of Focusing was fading away in our Focusing community. Experimenting with intermodal didactics had been natural to our Focusing teachers of the pioneer generation. A new generation of Focusing teachers wanted to teach in more standardized ways, and intermodal experimenting was left behind

We were unwilling to follow this trend as the Felt Sense is intermodal by nature (Eugene Gendlin) and the body a living laboratory for finding new truths

We prepared to study with Judy Moore and Campbell Purton as UEA supervisors. Life turned into other direction than expected, and a PhD at UEA came out of reach

We could not find the missing piece of our professional puzzle in a doctorate program in Germany (Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz 2014-2016), and left the German program with unfinished PhD work

The missing piece seemed to be found outside of our own culture only

 

To our surprize, the art training bundle we compiled years later was revealing that the outside culture place was to be found in the aesthetics

We could identify the missing piece. It was experimenting practically with intermodal felt sensing along circular loops of experiential slow art (art making containing the one move of creating and re-experiencing what we were creating)

We found that experiential artmaking calls on all the senses to serve the body's next right step, and studied the theory of polyaesthetics

We discovered that artmaking in itself is not a safe place (the setting of arts fascilitation is the safe place)

We did not expect artmaking being risky (but it was) and were surprized by its energizing power once risks were taken

We realized that arts are using a language of deconstruction and reconstruction that leads to no right nor wrong

We learned that art is culture-bound and found out that artmaking can bypass cultural structure-boundness the moment we get connected to our creative instincts

What we found in felt arts experimenting as essence were new grounds for living a creative Focusing life to the full

Credentials

Art Therapist AT (DAS) | Certified Person-Centred Creative Arts Practitioner | Certified Guided Drawing® Practitioner Focusing Oriented Expressive Arts FOAT® Practitioner

TIFI Certifying Coordinator | TIFI Focusing Oriented Therapist FOT | TIFI Focusing Trainer | TIFI Focusing Professional FOAT® 

PCE Person-centred and Experiential Psychotherapist/Counselor PCT with Diploma in Existential Wellbeing Counseling

Clinical Psychologist CP (GRAD) (BA, MA) | Registered non-medical Practitioner for Psychotherapy

Adult Educator Ed (GRAD) (MA) with undergraduate degree in Design Techniques

Freda has 30 years of experience as a Focuser, clinician and educator. She teaches Focusing with the arts nationally and internationally both online and in person. Freda works in private practice and at her art studio, and at community art centers and institutions of continuing education.

Freda is senior teacher of the German-Swiss Focusing Network FN and member of the FN Leading Team. She served the network for more than two decades (2001 - 2023)

Freda teaches Focusing certification training progams at all levels with the German Focusing Association DFG. She volonteers for the DFG on regular basis since 2019 


Freda is co-founder of the Focusing teachers group of the European Focusing Association EFA (2018)

In 2016 she hosted the European Focusing Association's meeting in Tübingen offering a forum for Community Wellness Focusing

FOCUSZART The Focusing Studio - Freda Blob, European Focusing Association meeting 2016, Focusing Center Tübingen ©Nikolaos Kypriotakis

Voices from EFA Tübingen

Teresa
We worked through a quite tough topic list and yet there was plenty of warm hearted and joyful friendship time

Pavlos
Our meeting in Tübingen was for me, once again, a unique experience. That which I valued most was the quality of this meeting. Somehow we managed to create a warm, open, respectful and accepting atmosphere, in which everyone could find his/her place, his/her time, his/her rhythm; everyone could be him/herself. ( ... ... ) And of course there was the friendly, kind, caring, unforgettable quality of presence of Freda

Fiona

We all had a chance to settle into the body felt sense, and we listened and related from our body felt sense. It deepened the quality of our relationships. Together, we created a deep open listening space where each person could be held

Heidrun

I liked the easiness of collaborating and our trust in the group process. Having been at quite some meetings before I will recall this time for sure, especially some of the incidential things that make such a difference and make experiencing complete

Akmal and Annika

It is always inspiring and enriching meeting with Focusing community friends! (... ...) Thank you Freda, thank you everyone for providing such a home atmosphere

Ria

I sensed a warm appreciation for all the preparations done by Friedgard to get us together in beautiful Tübingen in Germany. I experienced very positively the cultural history the European Focusing community is based upon and how it is growing forward


FOCUSZART The Focusing Studio - Freda Blob ©NIR HIMI/Unsplash

Make space for arts. Create your world

ARTS FROM THE BODY SENSE

We operate online from GER

FOCUSZART The Focusing Studio

Hirschauer Str. 50 | D-72070 Tübingen | 0049 1757228458

focuszart@email.de | https://artsfocusing.com

International Memberships TIFI, IAFOTs, IEATA, APCCA, PCE, EFA, BFA