Mastering the Art of Counselling Relationships

Viktor implied that the clients are the ones possessing power for transformative change and usually it is that period where one is faced with a problem and prompted to act. Counselling aims at helping the individual overcome his/her problem, not just about advise. However, the client is the one who possess the power to overcome the challenge. Forming excellent counselling relationships with clients as a counsellor is essential because it helps to increase enthusiasm and expectation for the client that he/ she will get help. The counsellor will also be able to provide new learning experiences for a client when there is good rapport between them. Treating clients the same way a counsellor would like to be treated in a particular situation encourages the client to be more active and involved because they will feel they valued and most likely will be satisfied with the services offered to them.

The best way a counsellor can show respect to a client is through understanding that each client is unique and showing value to them. Secondly, the counsellor should work on protecting the client’s information as private and confidential and ensure that they have an agreement with the client on how they can work together in partnership (Reamer, 2013). The therapist may need to encourage the client to be specific to avoid vagueness and be discrete about it. This is what is referred to as concreteness. The therapist will thereby provide a more comfortable environment for the client to engage in in-depth self-exploration freely. Congruence is usually all about breaking the wall that might exist between client and the therapist. It is important therefore, according to Rogers that the therapist conveys that they are human beings and a real person is portrayed behind the role of being a counsellor.

This is because most clients will feel more attracted to simple therapists who they can easily associate with and hence will be more comfortable. Unconditional Positive Regard Unconditional positive regard is essential in forming and maintaining good relationships with the client. When attending skills are used effectively, the client will feel reassured that the therapist is with them and become more open and the therapist will be in a better position to listen to the client carefully. The therapist may do this by adopting a bodily posture that shows more involvement with the client, more angled position may work. There might be a psychological barrier between the therapist and the client if there is a desk put between a client and the counsellor.

In addition, the therapist may adopt an open posture which portrays openness to client needs rather than sitting with arms or legs crossed, it can be interpreted to be a sign of unavailability or diminished involvement. The therapist can lean towards the client, maintain eye contact and try as much as possible to be relaxed when with the client. First of all, we have the situation whereby the therapist is listening to understand the verbal messages from the client. Then there is listening and interpreting of non-verbal cues or messages such as the facial expression of the client, gestures and posture. This involves being keen to behavior and the tone. Third, listening to the client and understanding in context of the person or the social setting of the person.

Finally, there is listening empathetically which involves attending the therapy session, observing and listening to the client. The therapist may come in to reveal that he/ she survived a divorce as well and through this the therapist would have a deeper understanding of the client’s situation and offer insights as well. However, therapists should be very careful with this technique because the session may end up being about a counsellor than a client and this will not be beneficial to the client (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2018). The skill may be quite challenging, this is because self-disclosure may make the client feel too comfortable with the therapist and bring in the element of a friend rather than a helper. The client may also find the therapist to be impaired or being too much involved in their lives.

It is therefore advisable that the therapist is clear when refereeing to personal experiences by using “I” statements and make wise decisions based on the client type and the effect of the disclosure on the client. Therefore, self-awareness is important because it is only after a therapist understands his/her own feelings is when the therapist can have the patience to understand other people and feel the clients accordingly (Dimaggio, Lysaker, Carcione, Nicolo, & Semerari, 2008). Reflection Skills In addition, self-awareness makes it possible for therapists to use the reflection technique on their clients. Reflections are employed in the counselling process to describe the state of the client accurately in both their verbal and non-verbal cues. There are three types of reflections which include Feelings reflection, Rephrasing and Affirmation.

Feeling reflections allow the client to get to hear feelings just expressed by them (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2018). When all these is done, the counsellor at the end of the session will summarize by highlighting areas that were most important during the session, feelings or the main theme that the client was talking about (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2018). For Example, a counsellor talking to a woman in maternal care end by saying, “Today you talked about the responsibility of having extended and a new born baby in the family to be overwhelming for you. We have touched on the aspect of letting things beyond our control over and looked at the different options in which we can respond to this which you did not consider as a choice before.

In our next session, we could look at the effect of those new thoughts and the difference they can make to you feeling overwhelmed. ” From this summary, we find the therapist can draw important points and make them clear as well as revise the session and introduce briefly what would be covered in the next session. Clients are very important and their needs come first, I should ensure that the relationship between my clients and I is very warm and genuine to make the counselling sessions more real. This is because it is through congruence that empathy can be achieved fully for me to be able to understand the client from his/her own point of view so that we can find a solution to issues affecting the clients.