Person-Centred Counselling

Person Centred Counselling

Person-centred counselling is a non-directive approach to therapy. A non-directive approach enables the client to keep control over the content and pace of the therapy. The therapist does not attempt to evaluate the client.

The fundamental belief of the person-centred approach is that clients have the capacity to find their own answers. The client is able to become the person they really are. To enable this to happen the person-centred therapist provides an accepting and understanding climate. The following skills are employed by the person-centred therapist to enable this to happen:

Listen and try to understand how things are from the client's point of view

Check that understanding with the client if unsure

Treat the client with the utmost respect and regard

There is also a mandate for the therapist to be 'congruent' or 'transparent' - which means being self-aware, self-accepting and having no mask between oneself and the client. The therapist knows himself and is willing to be known.

Person centred counselling may sound simple or limited, because there is no particular structure that the therapist is trying to apply, however, it is a very rich and complicated process. The person-centred therapist strives to understand and accept the client, which is no simple feat. Over time the client increasingly seeks to understand and accept himself as well.

Wikipedia provides more thoughts about person-centred counselling. This link does not imply CTPDC's endorsement of what is found on that webpage.

We are training the counsellors of tomorrow