Outline the Primary Skills Used in Counselling Relationships

In this essay I will be exploring the various issues raised when a therapist initially meets a new client, including ascertaining personal circumstances and applying ethical and safe practise. I will also be looking at the importance of communication and understanding between client and practitioner.

In the humanistic approach in counselling there is a vital importance that the core conditions between client and counselling are present from

In counselling and psychotherapy, it is fundamental aspect for practitioners to use theory as a way of informing the way the work with a client.(McLeod). The goal of this essay is to explore the humanistic personality theory of Carl Rogers. The essay will begin by giving a summary

Rogers worked with many others in developing the idea that clients could heal themselves, if only the therapist provided ‘facilitative’ or core conditions of, ‘empathy, congruence and unconditional positive regard.’

The relationship between the therapist and the client is non-directive. The therapist is supportive, non-judgmental and does not work out what the client's problem is; this is the client's work. In other words, the therapist merely facilitates self-actualization by providing a climate in which clients can freely engage in focused, in-depth self-exploration (Person Centered Therapy, 2007).

By offering warmth and unconditional positive regard, the therapist provides a partial antidote to the client’s previous experiences, in which most likely authority figures like his parents or teachers acted towards him as if he had no value as a person. Thus, within this nonthreatening context, the individual feels free to explore and share painful and abnormal feelings with his therapist, without worrying about being rejected or judged by him.

Carl Rogers introduced client-centred counselling; this approach is part of the humanistic movement. Client-centred counselling is a non-directive type of therapy, meaning that the counsellor does not set the goals, focus or direction of therapy. Rogers believed that with the three core conditions, empathy, congruence and unconditional positive regard, therapeutic change occurs allowing each individual to move towards a position of growth. As the counselling goes on, it can lead to the client’s increasing awareness of their conditions of worth allowing them to achieve self-actualisation. (Reeves, 2013).

The aim of this essay is to critically evaluate the effectiveness of the Client Centred approach to working with psychological distress such as depression, anxiety and stress. I will be exploring the strengths and limitations of this approach, comparing with an alternative theoretical approach to counselling and see if the core conditions are sufficient and the ethical framework. The Client Centred approach is part of the humanistic approach, which focuses on the client finding his/her own way forward of self acceptance. Carl Rodgers is a main figure and supports the idea of the client defines and clarifies their own goals instead the therapist doing it for them.

Throughout recent years, the emphasis placed on the importance of the therapeutic relationship in counselling, coaching and mentoring has dramatically increased. The therapeutic relationship between practitioner and client during the treatment is one of trust, due to a reciprocal understanding, where practitioners and clients must actively work together to make it succeed (Ackerman and Hilsenroth, 2003). The relationship between the practitioner and client is important because it is crucial to analysing the client and their objectives, without it, the client may not feel comfortable enough to discuss themselves in the detail required for the practitioner to understand their behaviour. If there is a poor relationship from the beginning, then many clients will prematurely terminate their sessions (Horvath and Luborsky, 1993). Therefore, it is no surprise that the quality of the therapeutic relationship is a consistent predictor of intervention success (McCabe and Priebe, 2004), correlating even more highly than specialised therapies (Lambert and Barley, 2001). Overall, without a strong therapeutic relationship, the client may fail to engage in treatment, as they will unwilling to work with someone they have no rapport with.

The second school of counselling to be discussed is the Humanistic school. This school of counselling evolved in the USA during the 1950’s (McLeod, 2015) and includes a large number of related approaches such as the Person-Centered approach, Existential and Gestalt. Although different in ways, these approaches share a number of goals and core beliefs, key to the humanistic school. Approaches within the humanistic school share the acknowledgement of the counsellor-client relationship and client autonomy. Although the counsellor adopts a helping role, the sessions encourage the client’s self-determination and self-awareness. Exploration of problems in this school should demonstrate authenticity and the client should have an input on their goals and expectations of the treatment (Bugental, 1965).

I realize that without these conditions whatever time I spend with clients will be of little use or benefit to them. If I can establish a relationship based around these three values, or even just one, my clients should make progress. Understanding this concept has taken my vision of myself as a therapist far from the problem solver and advice giver I first had and much closer to a counsellor I’d like to be. Realising that just one of these values adhered to can in time achieve progress, has gone a long way to allaying some fears I have of not being able to help.

When working with all clients there is a need as a counsellor to use techniques that incorporate, promote a therapeutic relationship. While these may be presented differently with each client the counsellors need to be using three main skills. These are using Unconditional positive regard, being genuine with clients always and while you may not have waked in a similar situation as your client, the use of empathy supports the therapeutic relationship (Duncan, 2010).

The ‘principle of non-action’ (Carl Rogers 1961 p.8), as the Actualising theory suggests, shows that change happens anyway, given the right conditions to promote growth and understanding. The Person-Centred approach is all about the therapeutic relationship and its importance above all else. The emphasis is that it is the client who ‘knows what hurts, what direction to go.’ (Carl Rogers. Becoming a person p12). Meaning that the practitioner need only embody certain conditions, to promote growth and actualisation within their client. There is a focus on ‘meeting’ the client in their process and facilitating the Actualising Tendency (Carl Rogers. 1961), without appropriating the content to the counsellor. In order for this to be achievable Carl Rogers says the counsellor must embody what he calls the three ‘Core Conditions’. The first of these is Unconditional Positive Regard (‘UPR’); this is somewhat elusive as it depends on the attitude of the therapist and is somewhat immeasurable but if present has huge therapeutic qualities on its own. The

Psychotherapy and counselling are inseparable. The effectiveness of a counselling program is not just based on the connectedness and interaction between a therapist and a client, but also the framework of the counselling approach in helping the client improving his mental health or overcoming personal problems. There are an extensive number of psychotherapies developed by past researchers, with each therapeutic concept offering unique contributions in understanding human behaviour and useful implications for counselling practice (Bedi et al., 2011).

The final core condition is congruence or genuineness, this trait has to do with the person-to-person nature of the helping relationship and it is only through maintaining an absence of façade and sustaining a consistency between what I as a counselor say and present in non-verbal terms in response to the what the client verbalizes. Genuineness is key to the helping relationship as Roger’s says “It is only by providing the genuine reality which is in me, that the other person can successfully seek for the reality in him” . I agree with Roger’s core conditions as an aid to developing a safe environment and trust within the helping relationship that will encourage the client to delve deeper and truly work with their problems; without these characteristics the client may feel reluctant to truly expose themselves and may only work superficially with their difficulties preventing long term growth and healing.