Six Steps Determining Counselor Strength

Carl Rogers, Born in Chicago in 1902 as the 4th of 6 children in a strict Fundamentalist Christian household.

For this part of the assignment I am using examples from a 50 minute session recorded within the learning environment. I play the role of the counsellor, and another student plays the role of the client. In order for me to answer the learning outcomes, I have watched the DVD recording.

This essay is to illustrate my understanding of the skills of counselling. Evaluate and analyse the value of counselling skill used throughout the recording of the DVD. Furthermore, I will talk about my improvement that I have accomplished during completing this module and lastly I will demonstrate exactly how I can incorporate theories and approaches to support different skills used in the recording of the DVD.

I have wanted to be a counselor since my freshmen year of high school and in the counseling field there are many specialties that I can focus on. I am fairly certain that I want to specialize in helping people with substance abuse and their families. I have always focused my studies, interests, and work on things that will help me in this field and I have a lot of qualities that help to enhance me in my eventual career. There are difficulties when I get to practice also like what people perceive as correct counseling style, challenges with my gender and race, and finally creating my own counseling style and plans.

This paper will discuss the following 4 Core Functions of a Counselor: Case Management, Client Education, Crisis Intervention, Referral and their primary purposes.

I believe counseling is a collaborative partnership between client and counselor. Furthermore, this collaborative partnership is built from trust and acceptance of both client and counselor. I hope in conjunction with clients to understand the issues and concerns so to help them tap into their wisdom, creativity, and strengths to meet their current challenges. I believe in a comprehensive perspective through which clients can better comprehend themselves in the framework that our thinking about events can lead to emotional and behavioral upset. Moreover, counselors are to provide a safe environment for clients to explore their challenges and identify ways to move differently in overcoming these challenges.

The career path of vocational rehabilitation counselor has come to me later in my professional career and it is not a path I would have anticipated taking. I do not recall taking interest assessments in high school, but if I had I would have probably fallen into the category of conventional personality type on John Holland’s personality scale. My early educational pursuits leaned toward administrative and business type positions. Most of my career I have worked in positions that were structured, predictable and very routine. Even though I worked in positions such as these I was often called upon to teach, train and instruct new employees. I found the most satisfaction in my job when I would work with individuals helping them to learn new tasks and obtain new skills.

Values, Morals, and Beliefs are components that play a role in an individual’s self-identity. The establishment of these components shape human nature, behavior, and the development of an individual’s purpose. The basis of these fundamentals has contributed to my desire to become a counselor. This paper will discuss my views of human nature, factors of behavior changes, goals of therapy, the roles of a therapist, and the counseling approaches that I chose to incorporate in a practice.

To ensure that all possible clients of all walks of life are successfully benefiting from the counseling profession, advancement in the assessment field should be of a primary concern for present and future counselors. It is understood and respected that a multitude of counselors vary in the foundations of their theoretical framework and collectively not all counselors participate in assessment with their clients, but as the counseling profession continues to grow the demand of expansion is critical.

As a potential counselor, there are many areas that I need to grow in to be an effective therapist. Being in a graduate program learning about different theoretical orientations, and participating in mock interviews has really been an eye opener for me. Not only am I recognizing my own personal style in therapy, but I feel I am identifying my strengths and weaknesses as well. Acknowledging that there is always room for improvement, I am also sensing which population I prefer to work with. Amongst the different types of populations (gender, ethnic background, religion, age), I understand there are various clinical issues that affect each group differently and would need a specific type of therapy or a treatment with combined therapeutic elements

Use your work from P3 and analyse (consider in detail) it e.g. what are your strengths in counselling skills, why you think they are your strengths and where do you use them. What are your weaknesses, why do you think they are your weaknesses and what can you do to turn them into strengths.

As an effective counselor one of the main qualities needed is patience. Go to the next step of explanation only when the patient has clearly understood the content of the information you have provided. Therefore the counselor needs to have enough sufficient time for the patient, and should also be a good listener. Let the patient express everything he/she has to say, and give your inputs once when the patient has finished talking.

The three concepts I have chosen to identify for this book report assignment are, basic empathy, motivation, and reframing. I feel that those concepts are important for counsellors to have as skils.

Cooper, J. B. (2010). Counseling microskills. In B. T. Erford (Ed.), Orientation to the counseling profession: Advocacy, ethics, and essential professional foundations (pp. 148–162). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.

As a potential counselor, there are different reasons why I choose this journey to be a helper, servant and a leader. Not only was my early experiences in life a stepping stone towards this path, but my faith in God and the realities of life led me as well. Even though I am still creating my future towards this goal, there is no doubt that I am called to be in servitude to others. In this journey, I am appreciating the learning fundamentals I have gained from the academic coursework, professionals/teachers and experience that I have encountered to be molded into a multicultural competent counselor. By taking advantage of this opportunity of learning, I have chosen a theoretical orientation that best suits me as a potential clinician according to my beliefs, values and logical thinking. It is also noteworthy to indicate that the self-awareness of my beliefs, values, interests and thought process has been further explored due to the assessments and activities of the Life Story Board, Meyer-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), Strong Interest Inventory (SII), My Career Story, and Career Genogram, including a reflection of my spiritual walk with Christ.