TCT experiential Skills Course

Monthly SESSIONS BEGIN Tuesday February 27, 2024

The first hour of each session of this exciting new monthly series will feature teaching about the theory and practice of Transformative Couples Therapy® (TCT). Clinical training videos of “unlikely transformations” with couples moving through complex issues, such as infidelity and other sources of trauma re-activation will follow in the second hour.

As a clinician, I imagine you know the experience of asking yourself: “How can I possibly help this couple to find a stable and loving contrast to how they have been living and suffering?” Productively answering this compelling question is at the heart of our motivation for this new series.

The third hour of each training session will focus on applying the skills you just learned into meaningful application with a live role-play couple. This “couple” will emerge from within each group of four participants in a Zoom breakout room with a TCT Experiential Assistant.

Topics will include treating infidelity, gaslighting, subtle and overt aspects of misogyny, polyamory, emotional abuse and the healing portrayals that empower us to help our couples transform.

Clinicians often come into TCT training with experience in AEDP, Somatic Experiencing, EMDR, EFT or other attachment-based therapy models. 

To register for the course, or to follow up with any questions, please schedule a 20 minute conversation on Zoom.

session calendar

Sessions begin February 27th, 2024
Eight monthly three-hour sessions
Tuesdays 8am-11am PST

  • February 27

    March 26

    April 30

    May 28

    June 25

    Summer Break

    September 24

    October 22

    November 19

cost

$100 per three-hour session, total cost $800
$750 paid in advance

Objectives:

  1. Identify three ways to help establish a secure base in treatment.

  2. Describe two ways to regulate emotional reactivity in both couple members.

  3. Detect the healthiest aspects of each couple member.

  4. Utilize two methods for couple members to process emotional experience.

  5. Design healing a portrayal to treat relational trauma.

  6. Define why affirmation of the self is important.

  7. Explain how clients can melt defense of intellectualization.

  8. Find shared matching values in couple members.

  9. Describe how to process warded-off emotional experience.

  10. Conduct meta-therapeutic processing when couples experience reparative experiences.

  11. Define the value of the core emotion of surprise in treatment.

  12. Integrate core affect through slowing down.

  13. Locate two ways to tailor treatment to a couple member’s attachment style.

  14. Select opportunities to help couple members to feel and show more positivity.

  15. Utilize openings to soften defenses.

  16. Define three early signs of dorsal vagal response.

  17. Demonstrate knowledge of two ways to regulate dorsal vagal response.

  18. Specify how the frequency of dorsal vagal response can be reduced in treatment.

  19. Distinguish methods for engaging avoidantly attached patients in treatment.

  20. Detect an example of a tough case in which an unexpected breakthrough occurred.

  21. Explain how a meditative state of mindfulness helps in treatment.

  22. Conduct a role play of meta-therapeutic processing.

  23. Explain the value of increased awareness in couple members. (*Iwakabe, S., Edlin, J., Fosha, D., Gretton, H., Joseph, A. J., Nunnink, S. E., Nakamura, K., & Thoma, N. C., 2020)

  24. Identify transformance striving in a session. (*Iwakabe, S., Edlin, J., Fosha, D., Gretton, H., Joseph, A. J., Nunnink, S. E., Nakamura, K., & Thoma, N. C., 2020)

Additional Information

This course is designed for intermediate to advanced learners.
Our target audience is Psychologists, MFTs, Licensed Professional Counselors, Psychiatrists, Licensed Social Workers and Pastoral Counselors.


Cancellation policy: You may end your enrollment at any time and receive a refund for the remaining sessions of the course. Questions or concerns may be communicated to David Mars, PhD by email at davidmarsphd@gmail.com or by phone at 415-234-3821.


David Mars, PhD, the presenter for this course, holds a PhD in Psychology, is licensed as an MFT, and has taught Transformative Couples Therapy® (TCT) to psychotherapists since 2008. He is the developer of the TCT method and taught the method as a faculty member of the AEDP Institute for eleven years. He is the director of the Center for Transformative Therapy has been treating couples in private practice for over forty years. For a more complete bio, see https://cfttsite.com/david-mars-phd-mft


There are no conflicts of interest or external commercial support related to this course or any course offered by the Center for Transformative Therapy.

Meeting schedule - All times PST

8:00-8:10am: Orientation and opening eight-minute Channels of Experience meditation.

8:10-8:20am: Check-in and discussion of each participant’s response to the meditation and any breakthroughs or problems in treating their clients with Transformative Couples Therapy®.

8:20-9:00am: Presentation and discussion of a slide deck by David Mars.

9:10-9:50am: Presentation and discussion of captioned clinical video.

9:50-10:05am: Break

10:05-10:55am: Preparation and transition into Breakout rooms for Experiential Exercise.

10:55-11am: Regathering, closing discussion.