The Relationship Between Spending Time On Nature And The Stress Reducing Qualities Found Therein

The American Counselor’s Association task force was developed to raise the awareness of counselor impairments during their career in the helping profession (n.d.). This allows the counselor to discover where their own abilities are on a spectrum that ranges from wellness to impairment. Strategies for monitoring such ranges have been implemented and available to counselors to assist them in self-care (Lawson, 2007). Lawson (2007) states counselors must take initiative to take care of themselves in order to be able to serve others in the counseling profession.

Regarding the connection between resilience and burnout, there have been studies conducted in multi-occupational populations (Edward, 2005; García-Izquierdo, Ramos, & García-Izquierdo, 2009; Menezes, Fernández, Hernández, Ramos, & Contador, 2006) that have shown a negative relationship between the two variables, reflecting the moderating potential that resilience has in terms of the emergence of elements of burnout. Therefore, it makes sense to insist on the relevance of encouraging this psychological capacity from the educational sphere in order to prevent the appearance of burnout and to promote maintenance of psychological health in this population of future professionals (McAllister & McKinnon, 2009). As described above, studies with various

Counseling is defined as ”the use of therapeutic strategies to help clients address personal concerns and mental health issues” (Nystul, 2016). Pursuing counseling as a career involves many years of formal study and certification or licensure. After receiving licensure to practice as a professional counselors it is a requirement to maintain involvement and certification in certain associations in order to hold your license. These association often require further education and/or professional practice in order to maintain membership in these associations. It is quite obvious that counseling requires a large amount of commitment and passion in order to pursue it as a career and maintain a title as a counselor. I have conducted an interview with a professional counselor in order to further understand the experience of being a counselor. The interview that I conducted explores the requirements of maintaining and receiving a counselling career, the experience of being a counselor, and what characteristics or skills a professional may have. The Individual who agreed to the interview was a counselor by the name of Susie Facio. Susie Facio, through this interview, will be giving us a look at what influenced her to become a counselor, what her work entails on a day to day basis, and what qualities and skills she has acquired in order to become a successful counselor.

Burnout is defined as an internal psychological experience that involves feelings, attitudes, motives and expectations. Burnout means the energy of an individual has been consumed by helping others. Energy crisis occurs when the psychic demand exceeds the supply. Burnout is often experienced with a state of physical, mental and emotional exhaustion caused by a long-term involvement within an emotionally demanding situation. Burnout is often accompanied by physical depletion, feelings of helplessness, disillusionment, negative self-concept and negative attitudes toward employment, people and life in itself. Burnout represents a breaking point where it’s hard for an individual to cope with the environment surrounding them. Compassion fatigue is often caused by a work related stress and it is also an increase of loss in compassion over a period of time. Compassion fatigue can share similar

Burnout is a gradual onset with symptoms coming on over time slowly. Burnout symptoms may include physical exhaustion, hopelessness, negative self-concept, having difficulty leaving home, and inability to concentrate are just some of the symptoms. Due to the gradual onset of symptoms, it is often hard to detect early (Dass-Brailsford, 2007). In McCann and Pearlman’s article they discuss burnout as a, “psychological strain from working with difficult populations” (McCann & Pearlman, 1990).

According to Wester, Trepal, and Myers (2009, p. 91), “well counselors are more likely to produce well clients.” Thus, the mental, physical, and emotional health of the counselors has the ability to affect their clients. ACA (2005) states that “Counselors act to avoid harming their clients”. Moreover, counselors have an ethical obligation to evaluate, address, and improve their wellness when necessary (Wolf, Thompson, Thompson, & Smith-Adcock, 2014). Research shows that higher organizational stress was associated with lower client participation in the treatment program (Landrum, Knight, & Flynn, 2012). In addition, the working alliance between the counselor and the client is diminished due to high stress and burnout (O’Sullivan, 2012). A counselor who experiences burnout may lack empathy, respect, positive feeling, therapeutic gridlock, and or boundary violations (Wallace, Lee, & Lee, 2010). Therefore, it is vital for counselors to remediate their impairments when they occur. Counselors have to be aware of the signs and symptoms related to their own mental or emotional problems (ACA, 2005). Likewise, counselors should build resiliency against burnout. Resiliency is built by a continuation of healthy decision making (Wester, Trepal, & Myers, 2009). Counselors should seek help or assistance when they observe warning signs of personal impairment, not just for themselves, but for the wellbeing of

should be able to present a couple of solutions to try. This can be delegating

The phenomena under investigation is the range of stress that harm reduction, health care, and human services workers deal with on a day to day basis within the field of their work. For instance, Shepard (2013) reviews the various types of stress, such as post traumatic stress, vicarious stress, and burnout. This study tapes into these workers lives who coped with this

Studies have shown that the development of compassion satisfaction can effectively decrease the occurrences of compassion fatigue and burnout (Collins & Long, 2003). Eastwood & Ecklund (2008) found that compassion satisfaction was negatively correlated with burnout among residential treatment childcare workers. Melamed, Szor, & Bernstein (2001) determined that compassion satisfaction for mental health professionals at outpatient facilities was not only inversely correlated with burnout, but also to feelings of loneliness. Compassion satisfaction was similarly found to decrease the effects of burnout for clinicians working with adolescent sex-offenders (Kraus, 2005). Another study, which examined child welfare workers, showed that compassion satisfaction was correlated with lower reports of burnout and compassion fatigue (Van Hook & Rothenberg, 2009). Overall, compassion satisfaction is a promising idea for nurses to strive for in order to protect against compassion fatigue and burnout.

summary, a fair amount of research has been conducted on burnout and compassion fatigue. it is important to understand the individual factors that lead to the development of burnout and compassion fatigue. Another purpose is to understand whether or not the experience of STS is limited only to those who have direct contact with individuals who are experiencing trauma symptoms. Additionally, most literature that discusses coping with compassion fatigue focuses on self-care techniques rather than on an effective style of cognitive appraisal. Common assumptions are that effective coping styles for healthcare workers will generalize to the mental health field. The present study also aims to identify a coping profile indicating whether or not a

Counseling is helpful when nurses have emotions that seem out of control and need space to reflect on them. Milliken et al. (2007) writes “Individuals experiencing high levels of work-related stress and burnout may also benefit from professional counseling”. A counselor may be able to help with relaxation, assertion, and time management skills. Because of the

This study conducted at Women In Need Inc. was important because domestic violence workers and advocates have a high burnout rate and high turnover rate. This job burnout has alternatively been described as compassion fatigue. On the opposite

Illness, disease, and trauma constantly and continuously affect people all over the world. Everyday, people are placed in hospitals, diagnosed with cancer, injured in war, devastated by a natural disaster, involved in a car wreck, and lose loved ones. People in these circumstances require help. They have to have someone caring for them in this difficult and stressful time in their lives. Those who are involved in patient care include doctors, nurses, therapists, rescue workers, and family members. Providing care for people is by no means an easy job. It requires mental and physical strength, intelligence, compassion, empathy, and organizational and time management skills. These are necessary qualities for caregivers to have in order to cope with caring for people who are suffering. Caregivers are confronted with anguish, negativity, depression, and defiance on a daily basis. This places copious amounts of physical and emotional stress on them, and caregivers also have the added stress of their personal life and family (Portnoy 2011). Those who are involved in patient care suffer as much as the patients do. The “cost of caring” is that these caregivers end up experiencing burnout. In medical terms, burnout is defined as the “emotional and physical exhaustion resulting from a combination of exposure to environmental and internal stressors and inadequate coping and adaptive skills” (Burnout). Along with exhaustion, “the person with burnout exhibits an increasingly

Licensed professional counselors have a unique occupation in that not only do they interact with their clients on a highly personal level, but they also momentarily share their client’s burdens, worries, and concerns. This vicarious aspect of counseling creates the possibility for a counselor to continue sharing the client’s troubles long after the session has ended. According to Norcross and Guy (2007), “The person of the psychotherapist is inextricably intertwined with treatment success” (p. 2) meaning that if we desire more positive outcomes than negative ones we must figuratively become one with our clients. Due to this fact, “self-care is not simply a personal matter but also an ethical necessity, a moral imperative” (p. 6). If we fail to leave work at work at the day’s end, then other facets of our lives are in jeopardy of becoming tainted.

Factors included that of emotional intelligence, empathy, self-compassion, and mindfulness. Instruments used in the study were the Emotional Social Competency Inventory, the Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy, Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, Neff’s Self-Compassion Scale (short-form), Smith’s Brief Resilience Scale and the Maslach Burnout Inventory Human Services Survey. Results showed a minority (40%) of residents fulfilling one or more of the standards for burnout. Physician empathy and emotional intelligence were not significantly correlated with burnout or resilience whereas self-compassion and mindfulness were positively related with resilience and negatively linked with burnout. It was found that many residents endorsed burnout and mindfulness and self-compassion were associated with resilience and may promote resilience as well as protect these trainees against burnout. Furthermore, results indicated that both mindfulness and self-compassion were positively associated with higher resilience and less emotional exhaustion (a dimension of burnout); thus indicating mindfulness and self-compassion may be attractive factors for training these residents. This investigation suggests that both mindfulness and self-compassion may be the shields in protecting professionals’ personal health and well-being against such predicaments as