Person-Centered Theoretional Approach

Person-Centered Theoretical Approach
In this first counseling session, I attempted to practice person-centered therapy as envisioned by Carl Rogers (as cited in Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2012, pp. 160-161), who believed the following six conditions were necessary and sufficient to create change in a client: 1) two people (client and therapist) in psychological contact; 2) the client in a state of incongruence, or mismatch between the client’s self, feelings, and behaviors, and his or her overall experience of the world, of which he or she may not be aware (Corsini & Wedding, 2011, p. 140); 3) the therapist in a state of congruence—authentic, open, and self-aware—in the therapeutic relationship; 4) the therapist experiencing unconditional positive regard, with which the client is accepted, respected, and valued without judgment; 5) the therapist experiencing accurate empathic understanding of the client’s internal perspective, and reflecting this understanding back to the client; 6) empathic understanding and unconditional positive regard, to some degree at least, communicated to the client (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2012, pp. 160-161). Rogers assumed that, when individuals are

180). I began by asking, “What would you like to talk about?” to welcome the client’s story in whatever form he presented it. I demonstrated congruence by sharing my insights; for example, when the client spoke about his role as advocate, I said, “In work settings supervisors often do that…but it’s not often required,” to bring my knowledge of the business world into our conversation. Finally, I communicated empathic understanding, as demonstrated in the following interaction when the client talked about being an advocate for his