Often, within the therapeutic context there are people who, without being affected by a specific pathology and identified as such, are immersed in a situation of discomfort and worry that alters their normal rhythm of life, prevents them from making decisions or are unable to cope. Within this profile would fit what is known as Counseling: the intervention model that facilitates the processes of change and transformation of people through self-knowledge and the deployment of their potential. It consists of a position of empathy, maximum understanding and non-judgment, guiding the client towards the best expression of himself/herself.
Counseling evaluates, identifies and orients towards the solution and decision making in a process of continuous interaction between the professional and the client, with the objective of helping the individual to redirect the problem in any area of life (personal, work, family, love, sexual) and achieve a fuller and more satisfactory life.
Counseling evaluates, identifies, orients and solves the problem.
Psychological distress does not always surface outwardly in the form of clinical pictures defined and classified by modern psychiatry. Often they are behaviors and feelings that are maintained with an apparent normality, they are not signs of a specific pathology but nevertheless, they seriously hinder the well-being of individuals and generate a great deal of stress that prevent the development and realization of the person.
Symptoms of discomfort to be treated through Counseling
Psychology offices are saturated with consultations that raise problems related to loss of self-esteem, general dissatisfaction, emotional maladjustment, lack of motivation, lack of ideals, job dissatisfaction, low performance or loss of control, whose explanation lies in the inability to make decisions and create new experiences that lead to a change in their current state.
Psychological Counseling Treatment
In order to initiate a Counseling process, the client’s predisposition towards change is necessary. It is essential that the client takes an active part in the counseling process and accepts responsibility for the problematic situation.
Counseling goes beyond facilitating understanding or finding the causes that justify the problem to be solved. The aim is that the client learns and acquires response skills to face and cope with problematic or adverse situations in the best possible way. The aim is for the client to acquire the necessary tools and incorporate them as useful response patterns in future situations.
Stages of Counseling
The Counseling process consists of several stages:
- In the first stage, the type of relationship to be established between the professional Counseling psychologist (counselor) and the client is built. It is a time to gather information and determine the objectives to be achieved.
- Once relevant information has been gathered, there is a stage of exploration, aimed at self-knowledge and awareness. The starting point is an exhaustive evaluation that provides information on how the person feels at the time of the consultation and allows identifying those variables of his personality that may be altered due to his particular history in order to know the basis of the structure of his personality and his style of thinking.
- Then, the results are contrasted with the previous information and an action plan is made to achieve the desired change. In the subsequent stages, the success achieved and the degree of internalization of the new response skills are evaluated. The important thing is that the consultant can reach the transformational change from the learning provided by the experience itself.
- Finally, in the last stage, the closing of the Counseling process is determined, although it is always open to a follow-up to consolidate the learning process.
Main objectives of Counseling
The main objective of Counseling is psychological counseling in those situations where a person, family, group or organization has to face a problematic situation and needs to learn new response resources or acquire a different perspective of the situation that allows them to take action and bring about change. Counseling seeks to improve people’s well-being and promote personal success and satisfaction.
Often we are trapped in situations that even if we want to get out of them we cannot because of a particular way of thinking and feeling. The mind is trapped in the same state of being, subordinated to what was, what happened, what we learned in our environment and in our relationships with others. Somehow, all that past information becomes the raw material to build our future reality. Fulfilling the sentence that states that we are what we were and what we will be. By changing the way we think, it is likely to change the way we act and consequently the way we are.
When you need a Counseling treatment
Self-knowledge is fundamental to initiate any process of change or transformation. Much of the current psychological discomfort finds its origin in a gap between where the person is at the present moment and where he/she would like to be. When one manages to find out who he/she is, connecting with his/her inner reality, it is very likely that he/she will find answers to many of his/her questions.
Counseling Treatment Outcomes
Counseling does not treat patients, or people with psychic pathology, that is why the term consultant is used. Counseling advises and orients in those situations where the person may feel blocked or lacking resources to face adverse situations or difficulties of daily life that prevent or hinder decision making and action. The number of sessions necessary to achieve the objectives set depends on the type of problem and its severity and the degree of participation of the client.