Living with chronic pain can be a long journey. Over time, people may have tried different treatments, learned a great deal about pain and about themselves, and found ways of doing things that once seemed impossible. And yet there can still be a quiet question: is there anything else that might help?

That question is one of the reasons I continue to develop my work using EMDR with chronic pain. What particularly interests me is that EMDR gives us additional ways of working not only with pain itself, but with the sensations, emotions, memories and experiences that can become connected with living in pain.

Sometimes the therapeutic work may involve a particular memory or experience. At other times the starting point may be the pain itself, a bodily sensation, fear associated with the pain, or the effect that living with pain has had on someone's life. And sometimes something new emerges during therapy — a change in sensation, an unexpected association, a different understanding or a new felt sense of oneself — which we can stay with and work with further.

I recently had the opportunity to attend the second part of Australian psychologist Mark Grant's training on using EMDR with chronic pain. What I particularly valued was the breadth and flexibility of the approach. Rather than treating EMDR as a single technique to be applied in the same way to everybody, the training explored different ways of working according to the person, their pain and what is happening for them at that moment.

The training has broadened the range of approaches and techniques I can draw upon in my existing work with chronic pain. It has also left me wanting to explore further. Mark brings considerable experience to this field, together with a strong sense of what may be possible. I found that genuinely energising — not simply learning more but coming away feeling increasingly confident about putting that learning into practice.

One of the things I value about being a therapist is that the learning never really stops. Our understanding of the brain, trauma, pain and psychological therapy continues to develop, creating new possibilities not only for therapists, but ultimately for the people who come to us for help.

I first had the opportunity to learn from Australian psychologist Mark Grant when he came to London in 2012. Mark has specialised for many years in the use of EMDR with chronic pain, and I am delighted that, fourteen years later, I have the opportunity to learn from him again. This time, rather than Mark travelling to London, I am joining a series of live webinars he is delivering from Australia, timed to enable therapists in Europe to participate.

My own learning about pain, trauma and their treatment has continued throughout those intervening years, through different areas of training and clinical practice. What feels particularly valuable now is the opportunity to return to Mark's work and discover how his own thinking and clinical approach have evolved. It allows me to look again at chronic pain specifically through his perspective, while bringing to that learning the knowledge and experience I have developed since we first met in 2012.

For me, continuing professional development is about remaining curious. However experienced we become, there is always more to understand and another perspective from which to look at something familiar. I feel very fortunate to have this opportunity to deepen my understanding of chronic pain from Mark's particular perspective and to consider how his developing work may further inform my own.