Ian Rory Owen was born with the Dutch family name 'van Loo' in Wellington, New Zealand in 1960. He is of mixed European descent being part English, Welsh, Dutch and Czech.

He received his BTech in Mechanical Engineering in 1982 and worked briefly in technical journalism and business during the 1980s. After taking up training in counselling, hypnotherapy and psychotherapy during the 1980s, Ian began his therapeutic career in 1987 by working on an acute psychiatric admissions ward. He later gained an MA in Counselling and Psychotherapy (Regents College, London) in 1991. Additionally, Ian pursued further qualifications in Medical Anthropology and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, and became a UKCP registered psychotherapist in 1995 and a Graduate Member of the British Psychological Society in 1999.

Dr Owen was a Senior Lecturer, leading the MA/MSc in Counselling Psychology, at the University of Wolverhampton, UK, where he also taught phenomenology and philosophy of science and psychology together with a range of therapeutic theories and skills on a doctoral programme in Counselling Psychology until 2001, when he took up employment with the Leeds and York Partnerships NHS Foundation Trust where he is currently a Principal Integrative Psychotherapist providing individual brief therapy for adults. Ian received his PhD in Counselling and Psychotherapy in 2005 from Regents College (part of the University of London).

Ian is the author of 76 refereed papers and three books on the original writings of Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, attachment and phenomenological theory of mind as they apply to the theory and practice of individual psychotherapy. He draws on the common influences between Husserl and Heidegger and the work of Aron Gurwitsch, Jean-Paul Sartre, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Simone de Beauvoir, Alfred Schütz and Paul Ricoeur in producing the intentionality model, a theoretical integration, to support therapy practice.

In his spare time, Ian is interested in African, Brazilian and Afro-Caribbean dance and music and has a number of artistic hobbies.