Breaking Barriers in EMDR Therapy

What happens when a visionary academic, a few decades of lived EMDR experience, and a global perspective meet a pair of U.S.-based EMDR trainers hungry for evolution?

You get a conversation that challenges everything we take for granted about training, research, and the future of trauma therapy.

In a recent episode of Notice That: An EMDR Podcast, we had the immense honor of sitting down with Dr. Derek Farrell—clinical psychologist, international EMDR leader, Trauma Aid Europe president, and editor of the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of EMDR. His voice is rare in our community: one that spans the trenches of EMDR practice, the architecture of academic programs, and the politics of international research.

And he’s not afraid to say what others only whisper.

“EMDR is very, very good at talking to itself,” Farrell told us. “But it would be very useful to be more friendly with other organizations.”

Farrell sees the echo chamber. He names the structural gaps. And he points toward the opportunities we’re missing if we don’t open up.

The Missed Opportunities of a Siloed Model

Since his first training with Francine Shapiro in the 1990s, Farrell has witnessed the evolution of EMDR from fringe to globally recognized treatment. But he’s also watched how the field’s franchise-style model has limited its ability to join the larger scientific conversation.

“If you look at the ISTSS annual conference, how many papers are based on EMDR? Very few,” he noted. “And that’s a missed opportunity, because they’re one of the major political players in informing health policy.”

Farrell urges the EMDR community to step out of self-reinforcing training cycles and into more robust, interdisciplinary partnerships—particularly with academic institutions and trauma researchers in CBT and related fields.

“We have to stop being so insular. If we don’t, we’ll lose space to something else. The future won’t be in our hands—it’ll move on.”

The Case for Academic Integration

Farrell isn’t calling for the abolition of professional trainings—but he’s asking us to see their limits. Especially in countries where trauma prevalence is high and mental health infrastructure is limited, the standard credentialing pipeline simply isn’t realistic—or ethical.

“You can’t make decisions in first-world economies about how third-world health systems should deliver care,” he said, referencing his trauma capacity work in Iraq. “They don’t have 10 years to wait for an indigenous EMDR trainer.”

In one particularly poignant story, Farrell described how a UK university removed EMDR from its trauma curriculum entirely because their two course leaders—both widely published psychologists—weren’t credentialed EMDR trainers. The credentialing system, he argued, had failed the field.

“That would’ve been an amazing opportunity to bring EMDR into mainstream trauma psychology. And we missed it.”

Credentialing Is Not the Enemy—But It Can’t Be the Only Path

Despite his critiques, Farrell is no enemy of credentialing. In fact, he sees it as critical for clinician protection and client safety.

“If a client is choosing between two EMDR therapists—one credentialed and one not—they will always choose the credentialed one,” he said. “And they should.”

But he’s clear: our current model doesn’t serve the spectrum of learners, educators, and clients. We need both professional and academic pathways. We need to distinguish between basic attendance and demonstrated competence. And we need to stop pretending that a seven-day training is equivalent to a psychotherapy education.

“The contradiction is we call it a basic training, but we also say EMDR is a powerful therapy,” he told us. “Those two things don’t go together.”

What About the Protocol? Isn’t That Enough?

In the trenches, EMDR therapists often cling to the eight-phase protocol as a kind of life raft. But Farrell challenged us to see it differently.

“The protocol is highly forgiving,” he said. “We miss bits out, we forget the VOC or the negative cognition, and the client still processes. That’s the magic of it. But we need to teach people not just the steps—but why and how to break the rules wisely.”

Farrell encourages trainers and educators to move beyond memorization and into meaning—especially when the bulk of clients are not single-incident trauma survivors.

“We’re teaching to a model that doesn’t reflect the reality of most people’s caseloads,” he said. “It’s no wonder there’s burnout and drop-out after level one.”

So… Where Do We Go From Here?

Farrell’s parting thoughts were both sobering and deeply hopeful.

“We need to get the AIP model into undergrad. Into graduate programs. Into social work and psychology and counseling degrees. Because when students understand that model, EMDR is no longer a leap. It’s a natural next step.”

He’s also spearheading a massive academic effort to support that very integration: The Oxford Handbook of EMDR, set to release later this year.

“We’ve built it as a robust, evidence-based academic text,” he shared. “Forty-five chapters. Past, present, and future. It will be the most definitive handbook we’ve had.”

Farrell’s message to the EMDR community? The time is now. To break out of silos. To let go of professional tribalism. To prioritize accessibility and integrity over exclusivity.

“Francine always said the future is in our hands. But if we’re not careful, it won’t be.”

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