Thank you @jordanfstephens for sharing about how AEDP has impacted your life and @hilaryjacobshendel for sharing the Change Triangle with him. We love hearing stories of how AEDP is working for people. Keep sharing and telling us how!
For the past five years, the AEDP Institute’s Director of Research, Shigeru Iwakabe, PhD, has served as president of the world’s most prominent psychotherapy research organization: the Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR).
Shigeru capped off his tenure by hosting SPR’s 57th annual international conference in Osaka, Japan, where he and his team of graduate students welcomed over 730 researchers from 48 countries. They came together to share leading-edge psychotherapy process research findings, discuss new ideas and challenges in the field, and network and enjoy each other!
Because Shigeru and his team at Ritsumeikan University are deeply involved and invested in the ongoing AEDP psychotherapy research project, there was a lot of excitement about AEDP at the conference. Below are the titles of the panel, presentations, and posters presented by Shigeru and his team.
Positive Experiences and Transformational Processes in Psychotherapy: Measuring In-Session Pathways of Change in AEDP
Wakako Yamazaki, iEFT Japan, Tokyo, Japan
The Role of Positive Emotions in Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy
Niv Gross, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel; Eran Bar-Kalifa, Ben Gurion University, Beer Sheva, Israel; and Ben Shahar, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel
Development of a Coding System of Affirmation in Psychotherapy
Ayumi Noda, Taisho University, Tokyo, Japan; Shigeru Iwakabe, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan; Marina DiCorcia, Ochanomizu University, Tokyo, Japan; Akira Matsumoto, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan; Fumika Nishikawa, Ritsumeikan University, Japan; Cheng Liu, Ritsumeikan University; Chen Liang, Ritsumeikan University; Junzhe Zhang, Ritsumeikan University, Japan; Toki Ozaki, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan; and Kenshin Shigemura, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan
Flourishing Experiences in AEDP: Client Flourishing Experiences and Subsequent Improvement in a Lagged Model
Wakako Yamazaki, iEFT Japan, Tokyo, Japan; Marina DiCorcia, Ochanomizu University, Tokyo, Japan; Kaori Nakamura, Bunkyo Gakuin University; Shigeru Iwakabe, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan; Diana Fosha, AEDP Institute; Andrew Joseph, AEDP Institute; Richard Harrison, AEDP Institute; and Lauren Lepow, Parsons Research Center for Psychedelic Healing at Mount Sinai
Effective Moment-to-Moment Interventions for Working with Complex PTSD: Findings from a Multiple-Case Comparison in Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy
Akira Matsumoto, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan; Marina DiCorcia, Ochanomizu University, Tokyo, Japan; Richard Harrison, AEDP Institute; Cheng Liu, Ritsumeikan University; Chen Liang, Ritsumeikan University; Andrew Joseph, AEDP Institute; Diana Fosha, AEDP Institute; and Shigeru Iwakabe, Ritsumeikan University, Osaka, Japan
Examining Therapeutic Change: Emotional and Relational Processes in Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy (AEDP): A Multilevel Analysis
Junzhe Zhang, Ritsumeikan University, Japan; and Shigeru Iwakabe, Ritsumeikan University
Congratulations to Shigeru Iwakabe, Wakako Yamazaki, Ayumi Noda, Akira Matsumoto, Niv Gross, and Marina DiCorcia on this incredible achievement, and thank you for continuing to be the academic backbone of AEDP psychotherapy research!
Learn more about the Society for Psychotherapy Research at psychotherapyresearch.org.
We are thrilled to celebrate three members of our community who have achieved AEDP Supervisor certification, a milestone that reflects not only clinical mastery but also a deep capacity to hold, guide, and delight in the growth of other therapists.
Supervision in AEDP is more than case consultation. It is experiential and relational at its core. Supervisors work to undo the aloneness of the therapist, meet clinical struggles with affirmation rather than judgment, and help supervisees metabolize the moment-to-moment work of transformation, so they can offer their clients the same secure, healing-centred presence.
Becoming an AEDP Supervisor asks for years of dedicated practice, immersion in the model, and a genuine gift for accompanying others. These three clinicians embody all of that.
Please join us in congratulating:
So-Yeon (Yeony) Kim
Mimi Steele
Shelley Carr
Click on each name to learn more about their work and how to connect with them.
We are grateful for the wisdom, warmth, and dedication they bring to this community, to the supervisees they accompany, and through them, to countless clients on their healing journeys.
Visit our Supervisor Directory to connect with a certified AEDP Supervisor. Learn more about the path to AEDP Supervisor certification.
Dear AEDP community,
We are happy to share and celebrate a meaningful professional milestone:
Shelley Carr is now a new AEDP Certified supervisor and has received formal recognition following a rigorous review of her clinical practice, professional capabilities, and command of the theoretical framework!
After a thoughtful and detailed consideration of the submitted materials, the review panel reached a unanimous decision to confer this certification — reflecting both high standards of excellence and clear readiness for this role. Shelley has mastered AEDP theory, skill sets and its basic orientation of supporting dignity, kindness, sensitivity and personal integrity. She modeled it in her attitude and implicit and explicit communications. Congratulations, Shelley! We deeply appreciate your continued commitment to growth and development. Your achievement will undoubtedly enhance and benefit our community as a whole.
We would also like to extend our sincere gratitude to Shelley supervisors, Kate Halliday and Ben Medley, who accompanied this journey. Your attentive mentorship and steady support helped nurture Shelley’s progression and made this accomplishment possible.
This is truly a shared success for all three of you!
Please join us in warmly congratulating Shelley.
With much joy for this news,
The Supervisory Review Board.
Please view Shelley’s Supervisor Bio here
Dear AEDP community,
We are delighted to share and honor an important professional achievement: Mimi Steele is now an AEDP Certified Supervisor and has been officially acknowledged as such after an assessment of her clinical work, competencies, and depth of theoretical understanding!
Following an examination of the submitted materials, the review board reached a unanimous decision to award this certification.
Congratulations, Mimi, and thank you for continuing to grow and evolve in your professional journey. Your accomplishment will strengthen and inspire our entire community.
We also wish to express our heartfelt appreciation to Jeanne Newhouse and Wendy Summer, who served as Mimi’s supervisors throughout this process. Your mentorship and thoughtful guidance supported Mimi’s ongoing learning and success. Together, the three of you have made this possible!
Please join us in recognizing and celebrating Mimi Steele for this meaningful and well-earned milestone.
With much cheerfulness and warmth, The Supervisory Review Board.
Please view Mimi’s Supervisor Bio here
Dear AEDP community,
The AEDP Supervisory Review Board is delighted to share wonderful news and celebrate an important milestone!
Yeony Kim has officially been recognized as a Certified AEDP Supervisor. This distinction follows a thorough and thoughtful review of their clinical work, supervisory skills, and theoretical understanding. The review board unanimously affirmed both the quality of Yeony’s work and their readiness to step fully into this role.
Congratulations, Yeony! Your dedication to ongoing growth and deepening practice is evident, and your achievement will surely enrich our AEDP community.
We also extend our heartfelt appreciation to Yuko Hanakawa and Danny Yeung, whose supervision and mentorship were integral to Yeony’s journey. Your collaboration and guidance played a vital role in this accomplishment.
Please join us in celebrating Yeony and this significant achievement. Those who wish to share congratulations or connect personally are warmly invited to do so via backchannel at @soykim68@hanmail.net.
Warmly,
The Supervisory Review Board
Idit Ronen-Setter, Jeanne Newhouse, Matt Fried, Natasha Prenn, Carolyn Fitzgerald, and Wendy Summer
Please view Yeony’s Supervisor bio here
There is a particular joy in witnessing a clinician grow into the fullness of their craft. AEDP certification marks a deepening capacity to sit with another person in their most vulnerable moments and to help transform suffering into healing through genuine connection.
AEDP rests on a simple but profound conviction: that human beings are wired for healing and that transformation becomes possible when we no longer have to face our pain alone. To become certified is to commit deeply to that vision, through many hours of practice, close consultation, and the willingness to stay present with both the struggle and the flourishing of those we serve.
The clinicians we celebrate today have walked this path with dedication and heart. Certification is both an arrival and a beginning, honoring what they have already accomplished while opening the door to all the lives they will continue to touch.
We are so proud to celebrate these members of our community who have recently achieved AEDP Certification. Each of these clinicians has demonstrated deep commitment to the healing-oriented, relationally embedded work at the heart of AEDP, and we are honored to mark this milestone with them.
Click on each name to learn more about their work and how to connect with them.
We are grateful for the dedication each of them brings to this community and to the clients they serve!
Visit our Therapist Directory to connect with a certified AEDP® therapist.
Learn more about the AEDP® Certification Pathway.
Dear all,
I am delighted to announce that Alessandra Lassen, from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, has become a certified AEDP therapist!
Alessandra is deeply invested in her development as an AEDP therapist.
She is available, attuned, and responsive, with a loving yet firm presence that provides the sense of safety her clients need to facilitate transformance. She embodies the AEDP relational stance, bringing authenticity, emotional availability, and attunement to the therapeutic relationship as central agents of change. Her work has been very inspiring to the entire Brazilian AEDP community.
Ale’s reviewers wrote about her work:
“What a privilege it was to review Alessandra’s beautiful work. She demonstrates, with remarkable precision, all of the skills of a very seasoned AEDP therapist.
I was especially struck by Alessandra’s relational work in both recordings. It was so warm and loving, yet also persistent and firm. Her relational work creates an environment of safety and bravery, building a clear bridge to transformance. It is very clear how deeply Alessandra carries the scaffolding of AEDP in her bones.
I found myself smiling at the coordinated relational experiences between Alessandra and her patients, the obvious pleasure and delight they took in one another, and the ways Alessandra helped her patients access and love these younger and disowned parts of themselves.
Sublime work from a very skillful clinician!”
Please join me in congratulating and celebrating Ale’s accomplishment.
Warmly,
Gabi Mendes
Dear AEDP community,
It is with great joy that I announce that Yael Stiles, a therapist practicing in the San Francisco Bay Area (Berkeley) is now certified as an AEDP therapist. It has been such a pleasure getting to know Yael and her work better over the past couple of years. She truly embodies the spirit of AEDP: relationally engaged, emotionally courageous, and deeply committed to facilitating transformation.
Here is what Yael shared about her AEDP journey to date:
My first exposure to AEDP came in 2016 viewing Diana Fosha’s talk “Dopamine and Being Seen.” Hearing Diana describe the phenomenon of the “click of recognition” felt like a revelation. I was learning that, as a beloved mentor taught me, “therapy isn’t just about something, it IS something.” In delving into AEDP’s uniquely experiential offerings, I myself experienced a click of recognition. The bravery it required of the therapist was a challenge I intuitively knew would yield some of the most transformative moments for both me and my clients. It was a challenge I wanted to take on with all my being. My right brain was moved by the heart and humanity in how Diana spoke about transformance. My left brain lit up at the attention she gave to the anatomy and mechanics of transformation itself. The combination of scientific rigor and deep heart, the fact that Diana quoted rock lyrics as freely as she quoted the great intellects of our field, the fact that the word “love” was ok to use in the AEDP clinical discourse… it all added up to a deep sense of rightness as AEDP became my clinical “home.”
Throughout the long and often challenging process of working toward certification while raising a family and running a full-time practice, I felt free to engage with AEDP at my own pace, warmly accompanied and encouraged by the community. In the company of brave and loving colleagues and mentors, I felt safe to try new things and take risks. Along with the rich trainings and experientials, I had the privilege of receiving supervision from Natasha Prenn, who taught me the mechanics of deepening with clients and making the implicit explicit. Later in my process, Monica Bradley’s supervision indelibly informed and enriched my work. She offered gentle but incisive feedback as we watched tapes together, and she taught me how to detect and “glue” glimmers, affirm and dyadically regulate, “slow down,” and “stay with.” I learned immensely from her practice wisdom.
Finally, I was lucky enough to join a group of certification-track colleagues facilitated by Jenn Edlin. Jenn not only got me across the certification finish line with her fierce belief in me and the permission she gave me to make AEDP my own, but in the process, she taught me how to track both myself and my clients with even greater specificity and skill. I emerged from the experience with a sense of precision and clarity that has increased my confidence in both the transformative capacity of the model and in myself to practice it with greater fidelity, to really “trust the process.” Together with my dear and brilliant colleagues in this group, we became a cohesive and gritty team that thoroughly undid each other’s aloneness in the certification process as we all got to support each other all the way through to submission, a gift for which I am profoundly grateful.
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Her first reviewer commented the following about Yael and her work:
From the get go Yael’s manner and approach exuded safety and expertise in her clinical interventions. Backed by a solid and coherent theoretical foundation, I could see that her Presence and ways with clients would have to be profoundly effective and full of deep caring and love. And so it is!
Every element of the cert package was executed with such care and precision which made reviewing it a pleasure, not to mention the exquisite quality of Yael’s work. These sessions are beautiful, powerful, transformational, and chock full of as much right brain experience and left brain knowledge as can be packed into one cert submission. I am awed at the care and supremely high caliber of her work and this package!… Truly exceptional work. As one of her client’s says “you’ve started to occupy a different space in my heart”…and “i’ve integrated you into my being…that’s the transformation” Wow!! And yes. I feel all that too just viewing Yael’s work! She is so genuine. present, skilled and caring. Her Presence is Healing and words are balm.
Her second reviewer adds:
Yael beautifully employs the AEDP stance in both sessions. She meets her clients with compassion and empathy, inviting them to pay attention to their internal and relational experiences as they unfold moment by moment. I could feel her warmth, interest and concern as I watched each video and, although I could not see her, I could tell that she was tracking her clients closely based on her attuned responses. Yael beautifully utilizes her tone, pace and words to help each client slow down during significant moments, whether that be the emergence of state 2 phenomena or new experiences of transformation and change.
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What has been especially notable during the certification process is Yael’s intellectual and clinical curiosity. She has engaged AEDP theory with remarkable depth, continually seeking to understand the nuances of what is occurring in each therapeutic moment—both theoretically and experientially. Her dedication to learning is evident in the care and rigor she brought to preparing her transcripts.
Yael is highly adept with understanding and applying the AEDP model. She demonstrates a sophisticated capacity to shift her therapeutic stance moment-to-moment as the client’s experience evolves and to know theoretically what is happening and what intervention is called for next. She is attentive to transformance, skillfully detecting and amplifying it, and she celebrates moments of transformation with authenticity and warmth. As a result, her clients consistently have the experience of feeling deeply felt and accompanied in their emotional work and her sessions demonstrate an appetitive process unfolding. And even more importantly her deep authenticity and joy in other humans and the model shine through in every interaction with her.
Please join me in celebrating this achievement, and if you wish to congratulate Yael her email is therapy@yaelstiles.com.
Congratulations Yael!
With great warmth,
Jenn Edlin
Jennifer Edlin, MFT
On 9 and 11 July 2026, the AEDP Institute will host Feeling Felt: Expanding Receptive Affective Capacity, an Intermediate seminar presented live online by Senior Faculty member Kate Halliday, LCSW.
At the heart of the seminar is a simple but powerful premise: expanding and deepening Receptive Affective Capacity, the experience of “feeling felt,” turbo-charges AEDP’s consolidation of brain growth and neural integration. Many clinicians notice that after a full day of intense AEDP sessions they emerge not depleted but invigorated, and that the transformative qualities of authentic relational experience begin to find their way into everyday life with friends, family, and colleagues.
This seminar offers an opportunity to integrate theoretical knowledge of AEDP and to deepen understanding of how the model works from the bottom up and inside out, beginning with the clinician’s own experience. Through didactic and video presentations, participants strengthen their clinical application of AEDP principles and build confidence and effectiveness in practice, while connecting with a wider AEDP community.
Offered across two half-days of seminar instruction, this track is ideal for those who prefer focused learning without experiential practice. It is open to AEDP Level 1 graduates of Immersion, and those who have also completed Essential Skills may find it easier to grasp the more advanced AEDP content.
For therapists who want to deepen their understanding of AEDP and their capacity for authentic relational connection, this is a rich invitation to learn from one of the model’s most experienced teachers.
Dear AEDP community,
As Cici’s two primary supervisors, it’s our deep pleasure to announce that Cici Kinsman, a licensed therapist practicing in California, is now certified as an AEDP therapist. I (Jenn) had the pleasure to get to know Cici and witness her attuned and skillful work through the certification process. I’m going to begin this announcement by letting you get to know Cici through her AEDP journey– in her own words. Cici writes:
“I’m thrilled and a bit in awe that this day has come. I’m grateful to Jenn Edlin for her tremendous supervisory skill and generosity, and her stealth way of helping melt self-doubt. I’m also grateful to Ilene Yasemsky for seeing me and helping me get over the finish line with her playful warmth and steady confidence in my work.
“AEDP, and Diana, made an indelible imprint on me when I heard her present while I was in graduate school. I was blown away and felt an immediate sense of resonance, a clear “yes!” My worries that I was going to have to make some big change in my personality in order to become an adequately reserved and detached therapist melted away—Diana laid out so clearly how the opposite was true.
“As I pursued post-graduate training in relational and psychodynamic therapy, I always kept AEDP in my sights as a beacon of what “relational” really felt like. I attended Immersion in 2014 in New York City, at the once-regal Pennsylvania Hotel, where I felt welcomed and at home with others drawn to the model. I had found my people.
“Over the years of training, my work became more grounded in AEDP practice, though I hadn’t yet committed to the certification process. In early 2024, I decided to finally make the ascent.
“Immersing myself in individual and group supervision has profoundly deepened my work with clients. Being met with steadiness, curiosity, and relational support has helped me feel more confident and less alone as a therapist (and a human). In the background, there’s been a quiet but huge impact on my own growth, healing, and my ability to trust myself.
“I’m deeply grateful for AEDP as a living and evolving model, and for the teachers, mentors, colleagues, and supervisors without whose accompaniment and support I would have stayed at the bottom of the mountain—at the gift shop.
“This journey has led me to a “this is me” truth sense—a State Four experience of myself as both a person and a therapist, and I’m full of excitement for what comes next.”
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Cici’s first reviewer wrote the following of her work:
CiCi’s work was brave. What struck me most was her presence and steadfast capacity
to connect deeply to her patients – giving them an experience of secure attachment at
the level each needed. CiCi was skillfull when doing intra-parts work, really helping her patient connect and stay with young and wounded parts…. In particular, her use of self to undo aloneness and privilege emergence was notable.
The second reviewer added: The therapist is deeply tuned in and ready to provide what is needed…. The deep attunement was present in a way that was not theoretical but extremely honest.
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Cici struck us both as someone who has made AEDP their own. From the moment I (Jenn) saw her work her undoing of aloneness and use of self stood out to me. She allows AEDP to flow through her in her unique way that makes me want to find the best in myself and embody that even more (and I think calls this forth in her clients as well).
Cici shows a remarkable ability to meet clients where they are and then disarm their defenses. Using curiosity, her self and attuned pacing, she slows clients down into an experience. Her energy, genuine interest in her clients and her care for them shines through. I’m so delighted for our community that her skill and heart get to now be known more broadly.
I (Ilene) had the pleasure of being Cici’s second certification supervisor. Her tapes were beautiful, deep, and real. What I love most about Cici, in addition to all of what has already been said, is how she would discover something new each time she watched her certification tapes or reviewed her annotated transcripts. And, with each new discovery, observation, or question, I felt the aliveness in her relationships with her clients, with herself, and with AEDP. If you watched her tapes, you too would feel this aliveness in her very-present presence, in the genuine care that comes through in her face and her words, and in her obvious devotion to truly helping. It is very AEDP to always see or feel something else, to imagine other ways of being or intervening, to stay open to all corners of transformance—when I think of Cici, I think of how well she represents this heart of AEDP. I celebrate her certification with much joy and applause.
Should you wish to congratulate Cici, please write to her at cicikinsmanmft@gmail.com.
With warmth and excitement,
Jenn and Ilene
Cici Kinsman’s directory listing- here