Interoception (roughly, internal awareness of the body) is introduced as a field of human experience that is potentially pivotal to psychotherapeutic processes.  Though accessible by “common grace,” it can be used and enhanced by the indwelling Spirit.  C. S. Lewis warned of the cultivation of people whose organs of perception are underdeveloped—of “men without chests.”  More than metaphor, this means that we are viscerally designed for relationship. How does understanding this shape how we love and counsel others? 

Find more great talks like this at https://www.FOCLonline.org.
Remember to like and subscribe to see all of our talks!

V. Ellsworth Lewis, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist who is currently writing, teaching, and consulting. He began his career as Chief of Psychology Service at a U.S. Army Hospital. He then worked with severely emotionally disturbed children for Monterey County (California) Children's Services, before becoming Clinical Director of programs in eating disorders, sexual abuse treatment, and crime victim services at Gundersen Health (Wisconsin). He later became Psychology Supervisor at Lovelock Correctional Center, where he was also Sex Offender Treatment Coordinator for northern Nevada. He transferred to Northern Nevada Adult Mental Health Service, where he provided psychological assessment and treatment for the Second District Court (Nevada) Mental Health Court. His current writing projects include focus on a phenomenological psychology that is distinguishably Christian while remaining planted in bodily experience and human longings. In Visceribus Christi (In the Bowels of Christ) was presented for the 2023 CAPS conference (the Christian Association for Psychological Science). He is married, with five adult children and three grandchildren.

23PRCN22