Focusing oriented therapy is the branch of focusing dedicated to psychotherapeutic work such as rising out of depression, stilling anxious energies, trauma recovery, reconciling relationships, working with chronic pain, and many more emotional and physio-emotional challenges. The discovery of Focusing came originally through the fields of philosophy and psychotherapy.

Gendlin, a philosophy student, joined Carl Rogers in the psychology department at the University of Chicago. Gendlin set out to research what makes psychotherapy work. The discovery was shocking. After reviewing hundreds of recorded therapy sessions and analyzing post-interviews of both therapist and client, the study found that with a high degree of accuracy independent observers could predict within the first 1-2 sessions which patients would ultimate succeed in therapy and which would not. How?

Was it the type of therapy being performed? No, this progress was agnostic to the gender, training, or therapeutic orientation of the therapist. The predictive factor came from the client's themselves. Client's who truly experienced, in their bodies, what they were saying as they said it had significantly better outcomes. This type of experiencing was evidenced by inarticulate pauses in the client's responding, a sort of humming and hawing or grasping for words. Later this kind of pausing and sensing would become known as forming a felt sense, which is the basis of Focusing. (adapted from this link)

Focusing oriented therapy is the fusion of empathic attunement, secure relationship, and the experiential process of focusing.