Newsletter August 2025
As August gently unfolds, we are delighted to share a mix of new beginnings and deep-rooted continuities across our APPCIOS community.
There is something quietly powerful about the reflective spaces that have been held over many years - the special interest groups that continue to meet, week after week, term after term, offering containers for thought, feeling, and shared exploration. We want to take a moment to honour and celebrate these long-standing spaces, and the people who sustain them with such care, presence, and steadiness.
We are also looking forward to a new season of webinars - a space where we can come together across roles, contexts, and experiences to think about what matters. These sessions are not just about content, but about connection: thinking together in real time, with all the richness and unpredictability that can bring. Details of upcoming webinars are below and would be enriched by your contributions.
Alongside these ongoing rhythms, there are also new developments and invitations beginning to take shape fresh opportunities to connect, reflect, and stay curious as our community continues to grow.
We know August can offer a softer rhythm: a time to pause, rest, or simply catch your breath. Whether you are taking a step back or still in the thick of things, we hope this newsletter brings a moment of connection and perhaps a flicker of inspiration for the months ahead.
With a quiet nod to the steady pulse of our community in the conversations, the pauses, and the way we keep showing up for each other,
The APPCIOS Team
APPCIOS Library
Check out the APPCIOS Library here it is available to all members of the Community Site and we are always updating the shelves with great papers, articles and videos of interest.
Announcements:
New - Community Meetings
Sunday 28th September 10:00–11:30am
A new rhythm is beginning in the Autumn term - a gentle gathering space for the APPCIOS community to come together and think.
These new termly meetings (three a year) offer a place to pause, connect, and reflect. They will be hosted with care by Jenny Sprince and Emma Higgs, and open to anyone within our community who wishes to join.
It is a space where we can bring whatever is stirring, from the personal to the professional, from the organisational to the emotional, and from the wider issues unfolding in the world around us; and think about it together through a psychodynamic lens. A place to wonder aloud, to explore meaning, and to stay curious in good company.
There is no fixed theme; simply an invitation to notice what you are carrying and perhaps give voice to something that has not yet had words. And in that space, there may be moments of difference, even discomfort - but that is okay. As a community we hold these with care, knowing that complexity and conflict can deepen understanding when met with thoughtfulness and where the unthought known, as Bollas describes it, may begin to find form in the presence of others.
A new page will soon be live on the community site, where you’ll find more information and the link to join the meeting: Whether you are new to APPCIOS or long embedded, your presence and perspective are welcome: just click on the link Sunday 28th September 2025.
“The unthought known is that which has never been thought, yet is known in the depths of the self.”
— Christopher Bollas
Bring a cup of something, a flicker of curiosity, and your wondering mind.
Upcoming events:
Our Annual Conference 2025
We are logging expressions of interest in attending our 6th annual conference:
‘How Reality Happens’
This one-day experiential event takes place on Wednesday 19th November. To register please email admin@appcios.info
Appcios Group Relations Conference
Appcios are excited to be running their first Group Relations Conference in February 2026! This will be hosted online. More information to follow on details how to join.
Free Discussion Groups
Our free discussion groups are open to all members who have an account on the community site. To set up an account contact our Admin here.
Gathering Threads a new Senior Associate Member Group is being launched this month to provide support for APPCIOS Senior Associate Members in their training and professional development process with APPCIOS. The group is run by Aly Thompson and Trudy Darien.
Working in Schools Group is a new group currently looking for expressions of interest, run by Simon Goddard and Liz Beal. The aim is to provide a space where members who work in schools or other educational settings can come together and think psychodynamically about their organisation.
A Space to Think convened monthly by Paul Terry for us to come together to think psychodynamically about issues in everyday life.
Film Discussion Group - run by Jackie Horsburgh supported by Susan McIver on the last Wednesday on every month from 7.30 to 8.45. If you are interested in joining send an email to Jackie Horsburgh for more information using the above link.
Psychoanalytic Reading Group run by Annie Pesskin. You can find dates and authors for the next discussions on the group page using the link above.
Reflective Practice group facilitated by Tony Burch runs on alternative Thursdays. For more information contact Tony Burch using the above link.
All discussion groups are listed here.
Member Webinars
APPCIOS CPD webinars are for our paying members and in particular for those looking to gain full membership and to progress on a path to organisational membership with the BPC.
All of the member webinars are considered core webinars as part of the Psychodynamic Organisational Therapy Training provided by APPCIOS and count towards relevant portfolio experience. Information on joining APPCIOS is available here. You can find a full list of our webinars here.
Work Discussion Group run by Emma Higgs and Mark Waddington every Monday in term time between 2.30 - 4pm online. We have space for more members and run a rolling termly entry point, please contact Emma or Mark for an initial discussion if you are interested in joining.
Understanding Race From a Psychodynamic Perspective run by Trudy Darien and Devika Dhar is currently inviting expressions of interest.
Infant Observation run by Devika Dhar and Phil Faulkner webinar is a rolling programme and can be joined at the beginning of each term. Seminars are held on Thursdays 4pm-5.15pm and the process group runs fortnightly on Wednesdays, 6pm-7pm.
Observing Organisations run by Andrew Briggs for 10 weeks starting Tuesday 9th September 2025 until Tuesday 25th November from 8 - 9.15pm. Spaces limited to 8 participants. Sign up here
Introduction To Psychodynamic Supervision a 10-week webinar taking place in Sept-Nov 2025 run by Veronica O’Hare, Psychodynamic Psychotherapist & Psychodynamic Organisational Therapist, and Jeremy Gunson, Child & Adolescent Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist. This training is open for members of APPCIOS with clinical training who are interested in becoming supervisors, and those who are already supervising who would like to take some time to reflect on the psychodynamic theory and practice of supervising. Please contact Veronica O’Hare on vamoh@appcios.info for more information and to sign up.
Mentoring in APPCIOS
The role of mentor is central to the supportive and developmental ethos at the heart of APPCIOS. All new members who enter at Associate Member and Senior Associate level are offered a mentor, often an experienced full or senior associate member. Our mentors offer their mentees a termly meeting; a reflective space to share experiences and explore ideas and possibilities for connection and development. If you think you would like to join the mentoring team, get in touch with Veronica O'Hare on vamoh@appcios.info for a conversation. Finaly, thank you to the team of mentors who support our newer members.
APPCIOS Top-Up Training
The APPCIOS top-up training leads to BPC registration as a psychodynamic psychotherapist. We are currently collecting expressions of interest for the new cohort of trainees. If you are an experienced psychoanalytic or psychotherapeutic practitioner who wishes to deepen and develop your clinical practice, broaden your client group and develop your capacity to work in a range of settings, in particular via Zoom, follow this link.
TAX - Claiming the APPCIOS subscription as an expense.
APPCIOS is now registered as an approved organisation with HMRC so that our paying members may claim their subscriptions as an expense.
Professional fees and subscriptions
You can claim tax relief on the following:
- professional membership fees, if you must pay the fees to be able to do your job
- annual subscriptions you pay to approved professional bodies or learned societies if being a member of that body or society is relevant to your job
- You cannot claim tax relief on life membership subscriptions, or for professional membership fees or annual subscriptions which you:
- have not paid yourself (for example if your employer has paid for them)
- have paid to professional organisations that are not approved by HMRC
- You can claim for this tax year and the 4 previous tax years