- Reflection of the client’s content and feeling during a counselling session is essential if the client is to feel heard and understood by their Psychotherapist. A new awareness can be facilitated when a client hears their thoughts spoken back to them via their therapist.
- Empathy is achieved when the Psychotherapist is able to enter a client’s world and understand how it is for the client to feel and encounter their situation. Empathy is empowering and should not be confused with sympathy, which can be potentially disempowering by encouraging a client to feel powerless about their situation.
- Congruence in the counselling session is evident when the Psychotherapist is able to be genuine and authentic with the client. This may enable the client to experience a non-judgmental and open rapport, perhaps previously unfamiliar to them.
- Unconditional Positive Regard is possible when the Psychotherapist can accept the client for their uniqueness and is able to see that a client should not be defined by their actions or choices because ‘the problem is the problem’, rather than the notion of the client being the ‘problem’. It is important for the therapist to have an awareness of his or her own personal value and belief system so as not to place these onto the client.
- Meaning Making is important for healing to occur. Every client will have their own unique response and wounding around situations they present with. Often the presenting ‘problem’ is not the core issue. It is the job of the Psychotherapist to create an environment where the client’s layers of trauma, pain and wounding can be understood and interpreted, then linked to how the client is being affected in their current life experience.
- Images are vital clues that represent what may be contained within the unconscious of the client. As a Psychotherapist, it is important to listen carefully to what a client describes and expresses because such detail may enable the illumination and unlocking of unconscious blocks and wounds.
- Non-Verbal Communication relates to the therapist’s ability to notice what is happening to the client on a somatic level because what is not being said, combined with physical gestures can be very important information. It is good counselling practice to discern when it is appropriate to moderate the balance of verbal and non-verbal communication during a session, in order for the client to feel heard and understood on both levels.
