Hooked on a Feeling

 Earn 5 CE Contact Hours

Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFCT) is a dynamic, attachment-based model that works with emotion in pivotal ways to understand and transform distressed relationships. In this workshop, participants will learn to identify the reactive emotions that maintain negative cycles between partners and then intervene in ways that access and deepen vulnerable emotions to bring partners together.

Grounded in attachment theory and experiential practice, this training will focus on understanding how reactive emotional patterns (often marked by criticism and withdrawal) obscure underlying attachment needs and fears. Participants will learn how to track these patterns in session and apply core EFT interventions to help partners move from reactivity to shared vulnerability and secure bonding.

Through lecture, case examples (including videos), and guided practice, attendees will strengthen their ability to identify key moments in treatment, respond to emotional cues, and facilitate meaningful corrective emotional experiences that shift the couple’s cycle and deepen connection.

Learning Objectives:

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Distinguish between reactive and vulnerable emotions in couple interactions
• Identify the stages and key change events of EFT treatment
• Practice at least three core EFT interventions to help access attachment needs and restructure negative interactional cycles

Who Should Attend:

Mental health professionals, therapists, social workers, counselors, and clinicians working with individuals, couples, families, and communities impacted by traumatic events, migration, war, climate disasters, health crises, and intergenerational trauma who seek a systemic, resilience-oriented framework for addressing ambiguous loss and prolonged grief.

Meet Elana Katz:

Elana Katz, LCSW, LMFT, is a senior faculty member at the Ackerman Institute for the Family and a founding board member of the New York Center for EFT. One of the first therapists in New York to become certified in Emotionally Focused Therapy, she subsequently became a certified EFT Supervisor and Trainer. In addition, Elana has applied her knowledge of attachment and relationships to help mediation and collaborative law clients, and their professional teams, intercept the recurring patterns that shape high conflict divorce. Elana has published a number of articles and book chapters. She presents locally, nationally and internationally, and her private practice is in Manhattan.