Caption: Waterfall in Crab Tree Falls Mountain Range,
Virginia
Photographer: Me (Camille Piccirillo)
This picture reminds me of the perfect balance of
exploration and rest. Our exploration as we learn and discover counseling
techniques, yet resting in the power of Christ.
Throughout the
reading, the first topic that stood out to me was how Thomas and Sosin (2011)
use a house illustration on page eight to describe the importance of the world
view a counselor holds. The concept of a one’s worldview being a vital part to
one’s counseling is backed up in the following chapter when the authors express
the equality of different counseling techniques as a whole. This idea was made
due to one of their final statements being “… as a Christian counselor, the ultimate
source of help rests not with you but with the Holy Spirit.” (p. 64). It
relieves pressure knowing the Lord is doing the work!
While our
intention as counselors is to help our clients, Thomas and Sosin (2011) caution
their readers to remain conscious of their own health. The authors state that “Ironically
counselors are often unaware that their counseling work is hurting them.” (p.
78). Fortunately, the authors encourage one to counteract burnout and
countertransference with personal counseling.
Lastly, I
was challenged by the statement “As a counselor, you cannot help what you do
not see, and you cannot see what you do not understand.” (Thomas and Sosin,
2011, p. 60). For me, this will be a vital part of my counseling career. This
topic relates to the different techniques or theories one would implement, but
it also challenges one to think outside of one’s normal thought process.
Instead of getting frustrated or failing to understand a client, I will be
reminded to try to see what my client is seeing and then attempt to open up my
understanding of the situation.
Reference
Thomas, J. C., & Sosin, L. (2011).Therapeutic expedition: Equipping the
Christian counselor for the journey. B&H Publishing.
Awesome picture! Reminds me of my childhood when I went to my relatives and caught crayfish in their creeks.
ReplyDeleteI love the picture you painted of balancing exploration and rest in counseling. From that perspective, it certainly makes this expedition seem thrilling.
Glad to see you touched up on the self-care of ourselves as counselors. It seems like in every class, I'm reminded of the statistics of how many counselors burnout in 3-4 years of counseling. I'm sure there are counseling students who come in saying, "Nope, that will not be me!" In reality tho, we are to take care of ourselves. I definitely believe counseling for yourself, exercise, good community outside of work, and not bringing your "work home with you" are important disciplines to help maintain yourself physically, mentally and spiritually. Despite those disciplines, I believe "faith" is the one that needs to be relied on the most. I believe if God guided you to be a counselor, then He will provide you the strength and resiliency to bear you through anything that comes against you. But one needs faith.
Camille,
ReplyDeleteI thoroughly enjoyed reading your blog. I love that you highlighted how important it is for us counselors to beware of our own health. Physically and spiritually if we are not well how can we serve our counselees but most of all serve God. Even though we want to do everything to help everyone we must also help ourselves. I also really loved how you touched on counseling an issue we may not see or understand. I never really considered that as an upcoming situation. I am sure we will encounter a situation that our counselee me see as a problem but we may be blind and not understand where the problem exists. As you said before our source comes from the Lord who works within us to reach his people. In that type of situation all we can do is prayer and open up our minds to better see what our counselee is trying to portray to us. Loved you blog!!
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ReplyDeleteCamille,
ReplyDeleteI appreciate your comments regarding burnout since that is a concern in the mental health field. Our research team is working on creating a curriculum using evidence based techniques for increasing emotional intelligence and preventing burnout. We plan to run a group for counselors in training. If this is a topic that interests you then you may enjoy the group. Check back in with me about this group later this term.