Core Process Psychotherapy

Domain VII · Transpersonal, psychedelic & altered states · Maura Sills, Franklyn Sills · 1982 · Devon, UK

What it is

The ACPP calls CPP a synthesis of Buddhist psychology and mindfulness practice with Western psychotherapeutic techniques. Sills calls it a "dharmic psychotherapy" rather than a Buddhist one. It is a whole psycho-spiritual psychotherapy (transpersonal, relational, body-aware), not a protocol. Its…

Format

• No staged protocol is published. None of the sources describe formal phases, session counts or criteria for moving between phases. A further search (Oct 2026) of publisher pages, a 2015 Karuna trainee account and GoodTherapy found none either. Sills describes the method as "a following of process"…
• Format and length. Individual, open-ended psychotherapy. GoodTherapy, a secondary source, calls it medium- to long-term, possibly "a year or more", and not suited to acute crisis needing quick symptom relief. It gives no session length or frequency. Weekly sessions are assumed.

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• Session arc:
• Training context. Sills says the original training grew from weekends into a nine-month course and is "nearly one hundred per cent" about cultivating the psychotherapist. Current routes (per GoodTherapy) are a four-year MA in Mindfulness-Based Core Process Psychotherapy and a three-year post-qualification MA, both with Middlesex University, plus short foundation courses (van Ooijen did six months). Practitioner…
• Version followed: Core Process Psychotherapy (CPP) as taught at the Karuna Institute, Devon, UK, founded by Maura Sills with Franklyn Sills. It is now trained as "Mindfulness-Based Core Process Psychotherapy" (MA routes validated by Middlesex University). No public treatment manual exists. This guide rebuilds practice from Maura Sills' own account (1995 interview, reprinted 1996), two practitioner accounts of Karuna…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is there physical contact? Was it explained beforehand, and do you feel free to say no or stop at any point?
• Does it involve intense or unusual breathing? Have you been told about the medical conditions for which that is not advised?
• Does it involve fasting, a special diet or 'detox'? Have you discussed this with your doctor?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• Shutting down, dissociation or terror. Stabilise before going further.
• Overburdening the client with your material. Supervision is essential.
• Silence felt as abandonment or as a test. Explain it and check how it was.
• Using the map to label clients. It is working when the client can recognise their own layers.
• Slipping into advice or theory. It is working when the client starts to notice their own process unprompted.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.