AEDP®Advanced Skills September 2025
Portrayals: Harness the power of the imagination
Presented by Ben Medley, LCSW
Choose from two live online options:
Full Course: Fri thru Mon | September 5 – 8, 2025
Seminar Only: Fri & Sun | September 5 + 7, 2025
Deepening Emotional Processing with AEDP
Description
Portrayals have been described by Diana Fosha as “the pinnacle of experiential dynamic-affect work.’ Using the power of the imagination, they can help the client access, heighten and deepen the visceral experience of core affect and then process it to a satisfying completion. Portrayals are real or imagined scenes and/or conversations from the past, present or future in which the patient is invited to have a reparative, feared or longed-for experience. Simply put, they help clients get unstuck.
In this course, participants will deepen their understanding of how to use portrayals to promote healing and transformation. Ben will emphasize practical application, techniques, and tools for introducing portrayals into participants’ clinical work, including an exploration of the different kinds of portrayals, when to use them, and how to use them to maximum effect.
Extensive video of clinical work with portrayals will be reviewed and discussed. Experiential exercises for skill-building with portrayal work are available for Level 2 AEDP practitioners.
Seminar Only
2 Half-days:
—2 half-days
—didactic seminar
Open to AEDP Level 1+ (Immersion graduates)
does not count towards certification
Full Course
4 Half-days:
—2 half-days didactic seminar
—2 half-days small group experiential work
Open to AEDP Level 2+ (Essential Skills graduates)
Counts towards certification
About Advanced Skills Training
Full Course: Offers a rich blend of specialized learning through expert-led instruction and extensive experiential practice with peers to master interventions. Completing five courses advances you toward Level 3 certification.
Seminar: Offers a rich blend of specialized learning through expert-led instruction strengthening your therapeutic skills while connecting with our vibrant community. This format is ideal for clinicians who are interested in the didactic only — without the experiential practice.
Learning Objectives & Agendas
In this course participants can their deepen understanding on how to use portrayals to help clients process their emotions to completion and deepen healing and transformation with AEDP. Ben will emphasize practical application, techniques, and tools for introducing portrayal methods within the AEDP framework to help clients process their emotions to completion and deepen healing and transformation.
- Define what portrayals are and how they are utilized in AEDP
- Identify and describe 4 different types of portrayals used in AEDP
- Identify techniques and skills for using portrayals to process emotion to completion
- Utilize portrayals to increase self compassion and shift internal working models
- Use portrayals to access and process thwarted and blocked adaptive action tendencies and see them through to their natural conclusion
- Identify and track clients’ affective experiences to help guide interventions
- Demonstrate ability to process clients’ experiences of change and expand positive affect following a portrayal
All Times are Eastern Standard US
Day 1
- 11:00 – 11:30 AM
- Course Overview
- 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM
- Portrayals and Emotion
- Introduction to portrayals and how they are used in AEDP
- The neuroscience of portrayals and the lived imagination
- Review of emotion theory
- Review of the AEDP 4-State model of transformation
- Processing State 2 Affective Experiences
- State 2 transformation and the emergence of resilience
- Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
- 1:00 -1:15 PM
- Break
- 1:15-3:00 PM
- The different types of portrayals: Emotion to Completion, Rescue, Reunion and Reparative portrayals
- Defining the different types of portrayals
- Distinctive characteristics of each type and when to use in sessions
- Shifting Internal Working Models and Memory Reconsolidation with different types of portrayals
- Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
- 3:00-3:30 PM
- Large Group Discussion
- Day 2
- 11:00-11:30 AM
- Day Overview, Introduction to Experiential Exercises and Participant Roles
- 11:30-11:45 AM
- Instructions for Experiential Exercises
- 11:45 A. – 1:15 PM
- Experiential Exercises: Finding Entry Points for Portrayals and using them to access and process emotion
- 1:15-1:30 PM
- Break
- 1:30-3:00 PM
- Experiential Exercises Continued
- 3:00-3:30 PM
- Group Discussion
- Day 3
- 11:00 – 11:30 AM
- Review of Days 1 & 2, Group Discussion, Day Overview
- 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM
- Tools, Techniques and Skills for Portrayals
- Finding an entry point for a portrayal
- Setting up a portrayal
- The necessity of moment to moment tracking to guide interventions
- AEDP Representational Schemas: Triangle of Experience, Self-Other Triangle and the Triangle of Social Experience
- The role of relational experience inter-relationally and intra-relationally
- Bringing portrayals to a close
- The role of metaprocessing throughout a portrayal and at the end of a portrayal
- Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
- 1:00 – 1:15 PM
- Break
- 1:15 – 3:00 PM
- Integrating Portrayals into Clinical Practice
- When to reconsider and when to proceed
- The importance of flexibility in practice: when one portrayal leads to another
- Portrayals over time: creating new possibilities with each portrayal
- Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
- 3:00 – 3:30 PM
- Large Group Discussion, Q & A
- Day 4
- 11:00 – 11:30 AM
- Day Overview, Introduction to Experiential Exercises and Participant Roles
- 11:30 – 11:45 AM
- Instructions for Experiential Exercises
- 11:45 AM – 1:15 PM
- Experiential Exercises: Finding Entry Points for Portrayals and using them to access and process emotion
- 1:15 – 1:30 PM
- Break
- 1:30 – 3:00 PM
- Experiential Exercises Continued
- 3:00 – 3:30 PM
- Small Group processing and Large Group Discussion
Day 1
Small Group processing and Large Group Discussion
11:00 – 11:30 AM
Course Overview
11:30 AM – 1:00 PM
Portrayals and Emotion
Introduction to portrayals and how they are used in AEDP
The neuroscience of portrayals and the lived imagination
Review of emotion theory
Review of the AEDP 4-State model of transformation
Processing State 2 Affective Experiences
State 2 transformation and the emergence of resilience
Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
1:00 -1:15 PM
Break
1:15-3:00 PM
The different types of portrayals: Emotion to Completion, Rescue, Reunion and Reparative portrayals
Defining the different types of portrayals
Distinctive characteristics of each type and when to use in sessions
Shifting Internal Working Models and Memory Reconsolidation with different types of portrayals
Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
3:00-3:30 PM
Large Group Discussion
Day 2
11:00 – 11:30 AM
Review of Days 1 & 2, Group Discussion, Day Overview
11:30 AM – 1:00 PM
Tools, Techniques and Skills for Portrayals
Finding an entry point for a portrayal
Setting up a portrayal
The necessity of moment to moment tracking to guide interventions
AEDP Representational Schemas: Triangle of Experience, Self-Other Triangle and the Triangle of Social Experience
The role of relational experience inter-relationally and intra-relationally
Bringing portrayals to a close
The role of metaprocessing throughout a portrayal and at the end of a portrayal
Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
1:00 – 1:15 PM
Break
1:15 – 3:00 PM
Integrating Portrayals into Clinical Practice
When to reconsider and when to proceed
The importance of flexibility in practice: when one portrayal leads to another
Portrayals over time: creating new possibilities with each portrayal
Examples of clinical case studies: video recorded illustrations
3:00 – 3:30 PM
Large Group Discussion, Q & A
AEDP Works, LLC offers continuing education (CE) credits upon completion of the following requirements: (a) completion of administrative processing (processing fee applies except where prohibited by state regulations), (b) perfect attendance, and (c) submission of the online program evaluation.
4-Day Course: 17 CE | 2-Day Course: 8.5 CE
Please note that it is the responsibility of the licensee to check with their individual state board to verify CE requirements for their state and reciprocal approvals.
Continuing education applications may be underway for various national and state-level boards and agencies. Please email admin@aedpinstitute.orgwith questions.
PSYCHOLOGISTS
New York
AEDP Works, LLC is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s
State Board for Psychology as an approved provider of continuing education for
licensed psychologists #PSY-0256.
SOCIAL WORKERS:
New York LMSWs and LCSWs
AEDP Works, LLC is recognized by the New York State Education department’s State Board for Social Work as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed social workers
#SW-0805.
PROFESSIONAL COUNSELORS & MENTAL HEALTH COUNSELORS:
Counselors and MFTs in all states except NY and MA
Meet the Presenter: Ben Medley, LCSW
Ben Medley, LCSW is an AEDP senior faculty member and has taught AEDP internationally with the AEDP Institute, the National Institute of Psychotherapy, the Cape Cod Institute, NASW and in mental health organizations and clinical practices. In addition to teaching, he enjoys supervising AEDP clinicians individually and in groups. Ben has a private practice in New York City and specializes in working with the LGBTQ+ community. He earned his degree in Clinical Social Work with the NYU Silver School of Social Work. Before private practice, Ben worked in Greenwich House’s HIV mental health program and the Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services’ LGBTQ+ mental health treatment unit. His paper “Recovering the True Self: Affirmative Therapy, Attachment and AEDP in Psychotherapy with Gay Men” is published with the SEPI Journal: the Journal of Psychotherapy Integration and he has written a chapter on using portrayals to process core affective experience for the most recent AEDP book Undoing Aloneness and the Transformation of Suffering Into Flourishing: AEDP 2.0, Washington D.C.: APA.
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Dates, Times & Setting
Please check all dates and times closely for conflicts with local holidays, religious holidays, etc.
All time are Eastern Standard Time (New York)
Dates
Full Course: Friday – Monday | September 5-8, 2025
Didactic Seminar: Friday + Sunday | September 5 + 7, 2025
Times
11:00- 3:30 PM EST
11:00- 3:30 PM EST
Registration, Fees & Scholarships
Non-Member
Registration
Full Course
$679
Non-Member
Registration
Seminar
$399
Scholarships
Limited Scholarships are available
To be Eligible to Attend
Full Course : Must be Level 2: a graduate of Essential Skills with the licensing credentials listed below.
Seminar: Must be Level 1: a graduate of Immersion with the licensing credentials listed below. Note that those who have also completed Essential Skills may find it easier to grasp the more advanced AEDP content.
Licensing Credentials
North America: Licensed mental health practitioners as well as therapists practicing under the license of a supervising professional.
Beyond North America: Mental health professionals who hold licensure equivalent to North American standards including ongoing affiliation with an organization responsible for issuing and overseeing mental health credentials in their country or region.
Important Notes:
Coaching and other non-psychotherapy specific licenses are not eligible.
If you’re unsure about the relevance of this course for you, or your eligibility, please contact admin@aedpinstitute.org with your credentials before registering.
Attendance and Make up Policy
Institute Sponsored Courses Including Immersion, Essential Skills, Advanced Skill Modules, Seminars/Webinars and Institute Sponsored Core Trainings
The AEDP Institute does not offer make-ups for missed course days. In the rare case where someone joins a course late, or misses a session in the middle of a course, the hour(s) or day(s) that person misses cannot be made up. Why? Group dynamics developed during a course are essential to the course’s success; so someone coming into a course for a short period of time is – regardless of their best intentions – disruptive to other participants and the course’s overall success. The Institute will, however, provide handouts from missed hours or days but will not allow a person to make up the hours or days they miss in another course.
AEDP Level credit: if a participant attends 80% or more of a course, the Institute will apply the course towards AEDP Level advancement
Refunds and Cancellations
Program Cancellation/Changes
The AEDP Institute reserves the right to cancel a training/ program prior to its start, in which case full refunds will be issued to participants for any tuition fees paid for the program. The AEDP Institute is not responsible for participant expenses including travel, childcare, missed practice sessions, etc.
In the rare situation that the AEDP Institute makes changes to advertised presenter(s), tuition fees will not be refunded.
By adhering to these policies, we aim to ensure a fair and consistent approach to cancellations, refunds, and transfer requests.
Canceling 16 or More Days Before a Course or Seminar:
- Refund: 85% of your course fee.
Canceling 1-15 Days Before a Course or Seminar:
- No Refund
- An Institute credit of 85% of your course fee will be provided for use towards a future course.
Canceling / Withdrawing / No Show on the 1st Day or During a Course or Seminar:
- No refund
- No credit
Transfer Requests Made 45+ Days Before Course Start:
- Requests will be accommodated wherever possible without financial penalty.
Transfer Requests Made 44-1 Days Before Course Start:
- $200 Transfer fee Applied to new course
Participants in Multi-Module Essential Skills (ES1) Courses:
- Requests to transfer from one ES1 course series to another are highly disruptive and rarely possible.
- Exception: In rare and extreme circumstances where an exception is made, a $200 transfer fee will be charged
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If for any reason you are unsatisfied with an Institute sponsored (recorded) On Demand Seminar, please email admin@aedpinstitute.org with an explanation of why you are dissatisfied. We will offer, one time per person, a credit for your payment, less a 15% banking and administrative fee that you may apply to a different (recorded) On Demand seminar.
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