Having established the aims of counselling, and identified what counselling is and is not, we move on to examine three counsellor qualities or attitudes considered by Carl Rogers as vital for therapeutic change: genuineness, unconditional regard and empathic understanding. Also referred to as the core conditions, these qualities are essential to building a therapeutic alliance (a collaborative client-counsellor relationship – strong bond – growth-promoting environment).

These key characteristics are summarised in Figure 2.Developing self-awareness is also a crucial aspect in the personal development of a counsellor. In this and subsequent chapters, exercises designed to increase your self-awareness are included, so make sure you have a notebook handy from here on.

Elaborating On Essential Counsellor Qualities

Fundamentally, the counsellor qualities mentioned are relationship qualities that are embraced in most therapies, and deemed crucial in person-centred counselling. Briefly, they include the counsellor’s ability to:

• demonstrate genuineness: being oneself (open, transparent) in the relationship, not hiding behind a mask of professionalism (also known as congruence, realness or authenticity)

 

• show unconditional positive regard: acceptance of the client without judgment or conditions attached (also referred to as caring, valuing, prizing, respect)

 

• convey a deep level of empathic understanding: the ability to step into the client’s world – as if you are in their shoes and without losing the as if quality.

 

We will take a closer look at the qualities outlined above.

Genuineness

This is the degree to which we are freely and deeply ourselves, and are able to relate to people in a sincere and non-defensive manner. For example, we may not approve of an aspect of the client’s behaviour, and may aim to find a way to sensitively point this out to the client. Genuineness is the precondition for empathy and unconditional positive regard. Effective counselling depends wholly on the degree to which the counsellor is integrated and genuine.

Genuineness encourages client self-disclosure. Appropriate counsellor disclosure enhances genuineness. The genuine counsellor does not feel under any compulsion to disclose, either about events, situations, or feelings aroused within the counselling relationship.

Showing Non-Possessive Warmth

Non-possessive warmth is genuine. It springs from an attitude of friendliness towards others. A relationship in which friendliness is absent will not flourish. Showing non-possessive warmth makes the client feel comfortable. It is liberating, non-demanding, and melts the coldness and hardness within people’s hearts.

Conveying Warmth

We convey warmth by:

• body language – posture, proximity, personal space, facial expressions, eye contact

 

• words and the way we speak: tone of voice, delivery, rate of speech

 

• all the indicators of warmth – the non-verbal parts of speech and body language must be in agreement with the words used; any discrepancy between the words and how we deliver them will cause confusion in the other person.

 

Warmth, like a hot water bottle, must be used with great care. Someone who is very cold, distant, cynical, mistrustful, could feel very threatened by someone else’s depth of warmth. A useful analogy would be to think how an iceberg would react in the presence of sun.

Unconditional Positive Regard

Unconditional positive regard is about valuing and respecting the client as a unique human being. It’s about conveying a non-possessive caring and acceptance of the client, irrespective of how offensive the client’s behaviour might be. Demonstrating unconditional positive regard facilitates change. It is where we communicate a deep and genuine caring, not filtered through our own feelings, thoughts and behaviours. Conditional regard implies enforced control, and compliance with behaviour dictated by someone else.

Demonstrating Acceptance

Inherent in the idea of demonstrating acceptance is that the counsellor does not judge the client by some set of rules or standards. This means that counsellors have to be able to suspend their own judgments. Acceptance is a special kind of loving which moves out toward people as they are, and maintains their dignity and personal worth. It means accepting their strengths and weaknesses; their favourable and unfavourable qualities; their positive and negative attitudes; their constructive and destructive wishes, and their thoughts, feelings, and behaviours.