In February, we spoke with Jim Furrow, who has worked closely with our clinical staff over the last five years as a trainer and consultant. Jim is an internationally recognized leader and contributor to the practice of Emotionally Focused Therapy with couples and families. Together with EFT originator Susan Johnson, he coauthored seminal works on EFT as it is practiced for couples and families. Jim maintains an active research program examining the process and effectiveness of the model.
Interviewer: What was it that drew you to psychotherapy and particularly to therapy with couples and families?
Furrow: I’ve always been a bit of a curious person. I grew up in a family of scientists—a biologist and chemist who were often pursuing a deeper understanding of the nature of things?
Relationship stood out to me in this regard in particular how important relationships are in shaping people’s lives. I found people intriguing. While relationships are significant in shaping our experience of the world, they are also complicated—whether that’s a parent-child relationship or a romantic relationship. People in relationships are often seeking something more and often finding it challenging to get what they most need.
All these factors sort of pushed me in the direction of seeing what I could do to be helpful for others in the relationships that mattered in life.
Interviewer: We appreciate that you’ve engaged your work in a variety of ways: teaching, consulting, clinical practice, research, publishing books and papers. I wonder if you see a certain thread that ties together all those ways of working?
Furrow: Yes, I love the question because the work I do is truly multifaceted. There is a core however and for me that is discovery, whether I am thinking about my teaching, writing, research, or practice I am curious how to foster discovery learning It’s one thing to tell somebody some helpful information. It’s a whole different experience when you can help them find it for themselves.
When they see something new about their relationship, or something new about their partner or about themselves—it’s like a light bulb moment. Whether it’s with a student or a client or another professional, what I find most energizing and what I’m passionate about is this idea that through experience we find new understanding. We see ourselves more clearly, we see the world more vividly, we see those we love more endearingly.
It requires some amount of what I know, but also being invited into what I don’t know, and finding discovery there. This is where the curiosity comes in—I’m always learning. It’s a huge privilege, whether it’s a student in a classroom or a couple in my office, or even a research subject: Somebody shares from their experience, and I see the world in a new way. Those moments are a gift and opportunity.
Interviewer: What has made EFT so central to your work and to your career?
Furrow: What’s been interesting to me, especially in my 30 plus years in the field, is to see emotion move from the background to the foreground. And the more that we learn about the neuroscience , the more we understand that emotion provides an important integrating element between cognition and behavior.
As a model, EFT sees emotion as a resource for change and also as a target to focus on. It gives me a map for the work that I’m doing, but also a means for change– which is a powerful combination. It’s enabled me to be effective in moving toward both transformation and reconciliation in relationships: transformation—how people grow, how they become; and reconciliation—how people are brought together, which is about belonging.
Interviewer: At Samaritan Center, we have a commitment to spirituality as a dimension of therapy. And in working with you, we’ve found that to be a shared commitment. Could you say a bit about how that also informs your work?
Furrow: Absolutely. One way to think about spiritual integration is to talk about soul care, the care for people’s sense of meaning and purpose in the world. For a lot of folks, that has a spiritual or religious expression.
The questions that come up routinely in therapy, whether they relate to parenting or to marriage and couple relationships, are at their heart questions about purpose, about direction. What are we doing here and why are we doing it and what’s the value here? Is it just satisfaction? Is that all I’m looking for, or is there some deeper meaning? I think it’s essential that we have a way to talk about these existential questions in the client’s language and from their perspective—honoring the importance of communities, religious communities, for example.
And for me, there is something more, something that comes from my core, from my own Christian understanding. And that is that there is a promise. It’s not just purpose, it’s not just a direction, but there’s a promise that gives hope.
Of course, one thing I’m quick to say in a conversation around faith is that it can be a resource, but it can also be a risk. There are ways that it’s been hurtful in people’s lives, ways that it’s been constraining. And yet where it brings freedom and hope, I do believe that it can lead to transformation and reconciliation.
Interviewer: Finally, Jim, on this subject of hope, I wonder if you would share a bit more about what gives you hope, professionally and personally?
Furrow: Well, I think it’s twofold. One way is very much from the ground up: The people that I work with give me hope because I see the efforts that they bring to seek something better in their lives, to seek understanding, to seek compassion, to seek caring, to seek repairing, to seek growing. I see courage every day and the work that I do. The risk to be vulnerable in a relationship with another person in marriage, in family life, in friendship. You see and find courage, and you see the human spirit.
And I think you often see the presence of Christ in the midst of these moments, which is a second source of promise and hope that is vitally important, at least for me. It’s not a generic hope, like “hopefully” this is going to get better; there is a confidence that comes in knowing that we’re in this together and ultimately held in the love and mercy of God.
The critical question is, are we alone in our suffering, or can we find others who can walk that journey with us with a sense of hope and promise? That’s where I would like to show up—to provide a sense of presence, holding on to a hope that for me is based in God’s promise.