tPCA’s online conference 2026 – what a glorious day!
by LJ
The 26th April 2026 saw tPCA’s first (annual) online conference. The idea for the conference was borne out of a need to try and create something slightly more accessible for people who can’t necessarily come to an in-person conference, whether for financial reasons, practical reasons, etc. We hope to have an annual winter/spring conference from here, to complement our summer in-person conference.
This year’s conference began with a keynote by Sam Hope titled “What if your therapist doesn’t believe that you exist?”. Sam was talking about the complexities of being trans in a cisgender world, and how that interplay might be navigated by therapists. It was a great talk and well-received. We closed with a keynote from Stephen Joseph who gave us his reflections on freedom, therapy and authenticity, which gave much food for thought.
After Sam's keynote, we split into four streams. We had three streams of presentations across the day, and one stream of encounter that ran for the whole day. It would be too long a post to discuss each presentation here, but each presenter and their title is here, and the majority of these are available in the Online Events library.
Antara Jain - Between autonomy and belonging. A south Asian perspective on freedom in a collectivist context.
LJ Loveys – The experience of trans and non-binary people training to be Person-centred therapists.
James Tolly - An examination of outcome measurement in therapy in relation to person-centred theory.
Ananya Reynolds - Exploring menstrual cycle awareness and clinical living perspectives as a tool to deepen the relationship we have with ourselves as person centred counsellors.
Katie Clancey - Plural identity and the person-centred approach.
Matt Bolton - I wish I knew how it would feel to be free. Neurodivergent musings on freedom and authenticity in an incongruent world.
Fleur Farish-Edwards - Weaving voice, courage and creative resistance in a difficult world: Research, neurodivergence and counsellor training as lived, relational processes.
Karen Pollock - Rejection as an act of resistance. A conversation with prompts around the topic of "rejection as an act of resistance" starting from their decision to step outside the accreditation.
Rachel Sutton - Freedom through therapy. Discussing the concept of gaining freedom as a process of change, but considering multiple parts of self being at different points along the process.
Maria Kontarini - An open discussion around how we meet polarisation in the therapy room with clients.
We love some data, so we asked for feedback after the conference (you can still complete it here if you wish). Out of about 70-80 participants, we have had 24 people give feedback. Everyone rated their day as ‘very good’ or ‘excellent. Everybody felt that the conference met or exceeded their expectations, and everyone thought they were highly or exceedingly likely to come to another conference. High praise indeed and a high bar for us to live up to for next year. We are up for the challenge!
Below are a couple of quotes we have had permission to share:
“All the presentations I was witness to widened and challenged my perspective on what it means to be free and how I can remain free whilst navigating the pressures of (even more!) further education and/or accreditation to be a 'legitimate' counsellor despite the cost of doing so being so much! The cost being the obvious financial barrier as someone who has limited earning potential and the further costs of maybe having to uproot and move my family to 'where the money is' or 'where there is cheaper housing' in order to stay in the career I love and cherish. The cost of having to be less myself and essentially a watered-down version of myself in order to remain palatable and as such, employed. I know it will take many of us making brave choices to rise up and advocate for the good life, the beautiful and authentic life that we all believe is possibly. I know all of this is rippling out into my practice and the conference today has had me re-establishing why I proudly call myself person centred first and foremost in the work I do”.
And
“It's been a long winter of disconnect, just as I needed the sun of spring to help me unfurl, I really needed the conference to renew my sense of connection - "being" with people was just what I needed. Thank you”.
The personal feedback to us has been much the same – people talking about feeling a sense of connection, welcoming the deep discussions across so many different aspects of person-centredness and the lenses that they can be viewed from. It gave people new ways to consider old topics, as well as giving new topics. There was a much-needed sense of community and caring, and that felt deeply valued.
We asked for volunteers for next year. We are currently looking at a new software platform that we hope will give us a more immersive experience into what we hope to continue to achieve. We’d welcome people to volunteer with us – if you didn’t volunteer on the conference feedback form, feel free to contact our
This year’s organisers have our close-down meeting for this week. We’ll be letting anyone who’s contacted us, know about a general volunteering meeting we hope to have next month, very soon. Within that we hope to have a framework, so that you can see clearly from the start, what expectations for your particular role might be, and make any decisions as a result of that.
To all who attended, thank you. You helped make the day the success it was. To those who didn’t attend and who bought the recordings, we hope that you enjoyed them. There are 12 recordings in total for you to view, which is almost all of the conference. Please note that some of the recordings will only be accessible for three months. To access the recordings, you should have had an email on 23/4/26 with a button to click. If you click that and go to the website, you’ll be offered the chance to sign up or log in. Choose ‘sign up’ and then choose ‘magic link’ and enter the email you signed up to the conference with. You’ll then get another email from OE with the link directly to all the recordings.
If you are an Online Events member, we believe that you can find the recordings of the conference in the general library.
It’s well-worth a look. Please come (again!) next year, and if you aren’t a member, join us, and experience being part of our whatsapp community, join a special interest group, or sign up to the in-person conference.