Page 180 - DEDU502_GUIDANCE_AND_COUNSELING_ENGLISH

Guidance and Counseling

Notes tests and interpret the results. While the counselor may do what the clients expect him to do,
if found necessary, it does not mean that the counselor will always have to do what the client
asks for. Thus structuring the interview dispels some of the misconceptions. It also provides
the counselee with the necessary orientation to the counseling situation.
• Silence perhaps is the most difficult technique to master for most counselors who are teachers.
More often than not, they are prone to think client-silence as synonymous with counselor
failure. Naturally they feel embarrassed and get annoyed with the situation.
• The goal of the counselor is to bring about the desirable change in the client’s behaviour. The
behaviour exhibited by the client as a result of counseling is the proof of his acceptance and
action as influenced by the techniques designed by the counselor.
• This method serves as a defense mechanism. The counselor, by trying to make the client
reflect on his own feelings, directs the attention of the client to himself. He makes the client see
that the feelings are part of the subjective self, and when once understood and appreciated,
they cease to be bothersome.
• The second relationship between the counselor and the client is the conveying of experience
through both verbal and non-verbal means. Clients’ verbal or non-verbal behaviour conveys
feelings. The counselor, on his part, may also communicate by reflecting his experience,
employing the same means.
• The relationship between the counselor and the client is central to the therapeutic process. This
relationship may be conceived as a continuum with personal responsiveness and reflection of
feeling at one end and sharing of experience at the other end.
• Negative feelings, in contrast, are ego-destructive. Ambivalent feelings usually are conflicting
feelings expressed at the same time towards the same subject. They correspond to the love-
hate relationship.
• Stereotype: This is a type of mannerism that individuals employ and a counselor could
innocently acquire a mannerism of his own in using the same phrase, such as “yon feel” or “I
see”. These kinds of stereotyped expressions may not help to arouse the feelings of the clients.
They may, on the contrary, make the client more rigid.
• Timing: Timing has a unique place, in the order of things. When something is done at the
appropriate time it yields optimal results. However, it is not always easy to judge the proper
timing. In counseling this is of paramount importance.
• Selection of Feelings: The client may express several feelings of varying importance. The
counselor exercises his subjective judgement in choosing to reflect one feeling rather than
another. In this way, the counselor actually is directing the client along certain channels which
he deems important.
• Content: The material expressed by the client could be of different degrees of significance from
the point of view of the counselor.
• Depth: This connotes the obvious experience of our day-to-day life. We experience some feelings
deeply while many feelings may be experienced superficially.
• Meaning: Perhaps this is one of the common ways of secondary elaboration indulged in by all
of us frequently.
• Language: The importance of language is easily appreciated. It is through language that the
nuances of feelings are expressed.
• Thinking: The reflection of feeling or experience could vary in timing. The counselor may
employ immediate reflection or may use the technique of summary reflection.
• The second relationship technique is acceptance. Rogers (1951) places great Importance on the
unconditional acceptance of the client by the counselor. The other approaches of counseling
have not made this one of the basic issues. Acceptance is based on the belief that the client has
dignity and worth.

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