Commentary: Finding Purpose and Community in CBT for Psychosis

Reflections on Dr. Emily Owens’ Journey and the Role of the North American CBTp Network

Author: Sarah L. Kopelovich, PhD, ABPP. NACBTp Founding Member and Current President

Dr. Emily Owens, NACBTp member and current Co-Communications Officer, offers a vulnerable and stirring account of her professional journey to CBTp in a personal account piece published in Psychiatric Services on June 25, 2025. Dr. Owens's path begins with quiet disillusionment and evolves into purpose, clarity, and commitment. Her article, “How I Found My Way to Providing Psychological Care to People With Psychosis,” recounts a formative training experience in which she was implicitly taught that psychosis was an illness to be referred out, not understood, and for which medication is a prerequisite.

Dr. Owens's story is not one of resignation. It is a story of how one clinician—a trainee at the time--had the moral clarity to extend her discipline's core values of curiosity, empathy, and evidence-based care to individuals with psychosis. In doing so, she resisted being shaped--as all too many students, trainees, and clinicians have over the years--by a systemic culture ruled by antiquated and biomedically-dominated beliefs. Instead, she chose to shape our field into one that sees psychotherapy for psychosis as normative and regards psychotic experiences as something to be understood rather than dismissed.

Dr. Owens credits her redirection to two experiences: her role as a research assessor in the North American Prodrome Longitudinal Study (NAPLS), where she learned how to ask questions about unusual beliefs with compassion and clinical rigor; and the North American CBT for Psychosis (CBTp) Network, which helped her extend her assessment skillset into a finely-tuned CBTp skillset. More than just training, though, the NACBTp Network offered her a professional home—a place where practitioners share the same fierce belief that individuals with psychosis deserve access to skilled, affirming, and effective psychological care. Through workshops, community, and a growing collective voice, the Network helped transform what began as a sense of frustration and helplessness into therapeutic confidence and a renewed sense of direction.

Her reflection is a powerful reminder of the role communities like the NACBTp Network can play—not only in expanding access to care for underserved populations, but also in shaping the clinicians who provide that care. As Dr. Owens writes, "Perhaps all we need to do is care." The NACBTp Network embodies that ethos—and helps clinicians turn caring into competent, evidence-informed action.