individual often behaved in ways that were incongruent with the real self.
MODULE 6
HUMANISTIC APPROACH
Lesson 6.1
PERSON CENTERED COUNSELING APPROACH
Proponent: Carl Rogers (1902 – 1987)
He is recognized around the world as the originator and developer of the
humanistic movement in psychotherapy. He applied the person-centered
approach as an approach to world peace, primarily through the
reduction of interracial tensions. Referred to as the “quiet revolutionary,”
he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Person-centered Therapy/Counseling
 Also known as the client-centered therapy
 Provides a supportive environment in which clients can reestablish
their true identity. The ability to re-establish their true identity will help
the individual understand themselves as they truly are; which is
important as people suppress their feelings about issues because they
are not supported, socially acceptable, or lead to unwanted
judgment.
Basic Concepts
 Rogers viewed human nature as basically good.
 He believed that if given the appropriate environment of acceptance,
warmth and empathy, the individual would move toward self-
actualization.
 Self-actualization - the motivation that makes the individual move
toward growth, meaning, and purpose.
 It is considered a phenomenological psychology whereby the
individual’s perception of reality is accepted as reality for the
individual.
Rogers believed that most people were provided conditional
acceptance as children, which lead them to behave in ways that would
assure their acceptance. However, in their need for acceptance, the
Thus, the greater this incongruence between the real self and the ideal
self, the greater isolated and maladjusted the person became.
Role of the Counselor and Relationship to Client
 The person of the counselor is an important instrument of change. This
is rooted in his or her being and attitudes. By maintaining such
attitudes, the goal of counseling may be achieved, which is to create
the conditions that will set clients free and enable them to engage in
meaningful self-exploration.
 The initial stage of the client is a sense of in congruence. There is a
discrepancy between their self-perception and their experience in
reality. Through the person-centered framework, they realize that
through the relationship, they can be free and they can gain greater
self-understanding and acceptance. They can be more real or
congruent in this person-to-person interaction.
Therapy/Counseling Techniques
The counselor is establishes a therapeutic climate that helps the clients
grow and to provide a helping relationship. The following are the three
attributes of a counselor that help the client to move forward and
become what they are capable of becoming.
Congruence/Genuineness
This implies that a counselor is real, integrated and authentic during the
counseling hour. He is a model of a human being struggling towards
greater realness. There is a match between his or her inner experience
and outer expression; moreover, there is an honest, open communication
of feelings and attitudes. As human beings, a counselor cannot be
expected to be fully authentic at all times.
Unconditional Positive Regard and Acceptance
This refers to a deep and genuine caring for the client as a person.
Feelings, thoughts and behaviors of the client are neither judged as good
nor bad; rather, the right of the client to have feelings is also recognized.
Accurate Empathic Understanding
With this attitude, the counselor tries to understand the clients here and
now experience and feelings sensitively and accurately. Accurate
empathy is considered the cornerstone of the person-centered approach
Evaluation
Since it is based more on the therapeutic relationship, it has been
criticized as lacking in challenging techniques with limited range of
responses to reflections. In its non-directive style, it brings no harm to the
clients but it also does not powerfully affect clients since practitioners are
very supportive without being challenging.
In a nutshell: There is a need to balance counselor attitudes with
techniques and skills. The counselor’s attitudes are not sufficient conditions
for client change but they serve as a foundation in which skills of
therapeutic intervention are built.
Lesson 6.2.
EXISTENTIAL COUNSELING
 Proponent: Viktor Emil Frankl (1905 – 1997) & Rollo May (1909 – 1994)
 Victor Frankl’s best-seller book is “Man’s Search for Meaning” which
was inspired by his grim years in the Nazi death camps.
 Rollo May, his book “The Meaning of Anxiety” came from his First-hand
experience with it when he had to stay in a sanitarium for 2 years
because of tuberculosis. His book “Love and Will” reflects his own
personal struggles with love and intimate relationships.
Existentialism and Humanism- are considered the third force in counseling
and psychotherapy (the first being Psychoanalytic and the second being
Behavioral)
Difference:
Existentialist - man is faced with anxiety of choosing an identity in a world
that lacks intrinsic meaning. There is nothing that we are, no internal
nature: Hence, we choose what we make of this condition. Hence,
anxiety is involved when seeking for meaning.
Humanist - holds a less anxiety evoking situation where within us is a
potential to actualize. That we can grow in positive ways given the
appropriate conditions. (Person-centered counseling)
What is common in both are the concepts of phenomenology, choice,
freedom, personal responsibility, autonomy, purpose and meaning.
Basic Concepts
 Existentialists believe that the individual writes their own life story by the
choices that they make.
 Psychopathology is defined by existentialists as neglecting to make
meaningful choices and accentuating one’s potential.
 According to Frankl life’s meaning can be discovered in three ways:
o by doing a deed (accomplishments or achievements)
o by experiencing a value (beauty, love, nature, and arts)
o by suffering (reconciling ourselves to fate).
For an existential practitioner, it is important to understand these six basic
dimensions of the human condition.
Capacity for Self-awareness
 Self-awareness is at the root of most other human capacities, the
decision to expand it is fundamental to human growth.
 As human beings, we can reflect and make choices because we are
capable of self-awareness. The greater our awareness, the greater our
possibilities for freedom. We have the potential to take action or not
to act; inaction is a decision. We choose our actions, and therefore
we can partially create our own destiny.
 Existential anxiety, which is basically a consciousness of our own
freedom, is an essential part of living; as we increase our awareness of
the choices available to us, we also increase our sense of responsibility
for the consequences of these choices.
Freedom and Responsibility
 Even though we have no choice about being thrust into the world,
the manner in which we live and what we become are the results of
our choices.
 People are free to choose among alternatives and have a large role
in shaping their destinies
 Existential guilt is being aware of having evaded a commitment, or  life and death
having chosen not to choose.  success and failure
 freedom and limitations
Striving for Identity and Relationship to Others  certainty and doubt

 Each one likes to discover a self and to find or create our personal Awareness of Death and Nonbeing
identity. As relational beings, we also strive for a connectedness with
others.  Awareness of death is a basic human condition that gives
significance to living.
Search for Meaning  Awareness of death is the source of zest for life and creativity. Death
and life are interdependent, and though physical death destroys us,
 Some of the underlying conflicts that bring people into counseling the idea of death saves us. (Yalom, 1980)
and therapy are centered in existential questions such as:  Those who fear death also fear life, as though they were saying, “I fear
death because I have never really lived.”
 “Why am I here?
 What do I want from life? Role of the Counselor
 What gives my life purpose?
 Where is the source of meaning for me in life?”  Each client is considered a unique relationship with the counselor
focusing on being authentic with the client and entering into a deep
 Existential therapy can provide the conceptual framework for helping personal sharing relationship.
clients challenge the meaning in their lives. Questions that the  The counselor models how to be authentic, to realize personal
therapist might ask are: potential, and to make decisions with emphasis on mutuality,
wholeness and growth.
 “Do you like the direction of your life?
 Are you pleased about whom you are and what you want for yourself, Techniques and Procedures
what are you doing to get some clarity?”
 The quality of counselor-client relationship is of prime importance.
Anxiety as a Condition of Living Counseling may include making the paradoxes of life stand out. These
paradoxes come from major human experiences such as birth, death,
 Existential anxiety is conceptualized as the unavoidable result of being love, anxiety, work and suffering.
confronted with the ‘givens of existence’ - death, freedom, existential  There are no set of techniques. Techniques are borrowed from other
isolation, and meaninglessness. orientations and if these are applied, the purpose is to allow clients
 Existential therapists differentiate between normal and neurotic reflect on their existence and the meaning of their experiences.
anxiety, and they see anxiety as a potential source of growth. Normal
anxiety is an appropriate response to an event being faced. It can be
used as a motivation to change. Neurotic anxiety, in contrast, is out of
proportion to the situation. It is typically out of awareness, and it tends
to immobilize the person.
 Existential therapy helps clients come to terms with the paradoxes of
existence:
 possible in their current position, rather than striving to become what
they “should be”.
Lesson 6.3
Role of a Counselor
GESTALT THERAPY/COUNSELING
Proponent: Frederick “Fritz” Perls (1893-1970)  Counselor is fully with the client in the here-and-now with intense
personal involvement and honesty.
Gestalt Therapy rejects the dualities of mind and body, body and soul,
 Counselor also helps the clients to discern life patterns.
thinking and feeling, and feeling and action. According to Perls, people
 Basic goal is to attain awareness, greater choice and responsibility.
are not made up of separate components, i.e., mind, body and soul;
Focus on client’s feelings, awareness at the moment, body messages,
rather human beings function as a whole. In doing so, one defines who
energy, avoidance, blocks or energy. Assist in the awareness and
one is (sense of self) by choice of responses to environmental interactions
experiencing process and invite clients to adopt an experimental
(boundaries). The word ‘Gestalt’ (German origin) refers to a “whole,
attitude toward life, try out new behaviors and see what happens.
configuration, integration, pattern or form” (Patterson, 1986).
Gestalt Therapy/Counseling Goals of the Therapy/Counseling

 Focuses on the whole of the client’s experience, including feelings,  Emphasis is on the here-and-now of the client’s experience.
thoughts and actions. The client gains self-awareness in the ‘here and  The client is encouraged to make choices based on the now as
now’ (what is happening from one moment to the next) by analyzing opposed to past.
behavior and body language and talking about bottled up feelings.  Help the client resolve the past.
 In gestalt therapy, self-awareness is key to personal growth and  Assist the client to become congruent. v Help the client to reach
developing full potential. By helping an individual to become more maturity intellectually.
aware of how they think, feel and act in the present moment, gestalt
therapy provides insight into ways in which s/he can alleviate their Key Concepts
current issues and distress in order to aspire to their maximum potential.
1. Wholeness and Integration
Basic Philosophy
 Wholeness - refers to the whole person or the individual’s mind and
body as a unit rather than as separate parts (Seligman, 2006).
1) The person strives for wholeness and integration of thinking, feeling,
 Integration - refers to how these parts fit together and how the
and behaving.
individual integrates into the environment.
2) “The HERE and NOW: our “power is in the present”. The only
moment that is significant is the present. For many people the power
2. Awareness
of the present is lost.
3) Gestaltists are anti-deterministic because they believe that people
 One of the most important elements in Gestalt therapy as it is seen as
have the ability to change and become responsible.
a “hallmark of the healthy person and a goal of treatment” (Seligman,
4) Gestaltists believe that thoughts, feelings, and reactions to past
2006). When individuals are “aware”, they are able to self-regulate in
events or situations can impede personal functioning and prevent
their environment.
here-and-now awareness.
5) Gestalt Position: “The more we attempt to be who or what we are
not, the more we remain the same.” It is important to be as fully as 3. Energy and Block to Energy
 Blocked energy is a form of resistance, for example, tension in a part dialogue as if they were speaking with that other person or that other
of the body, not breathing deeply, or avoiding eye contact. part of themselves.

4. Growth Disorders
4. Use of Language
 Refers to emotional problems that are caused by people who lack
 focus on the “what” & “how” of a person without asking the “why”
awareness and do not interact with their environment completely. In
questions
doing so, people are unable to cope with the changes in their lives
successfully and, instead deal with the problems in a defensive
 “What is happening now?
manner (Seligman, 2006).
 “What are you feeling in this moment?”
 “I” statements are used to promote clients ownership of feelings rather
5. Unfinished Business
than placing blame on others.
 Encouraging responsibility for clients of their words, emotions, thoughts,
Refers to people who do not finish things in their lives and is often related
and behaviors so they recognize and accept what they are feeling.
to people with a ‘growth disorder’ (Seligman, 2006). People with
unfinished business often resent the past and because of this are unable
5. Topdog-Underdog Dialogue
to focus on the here and now.
 Used when the therapist notices two opposing opinions/attitudes
Basic Techniques
within the client.
1. Experiments
a) Topdog - the demander-of-perfection, the manifestation of a set of
 Activities which promotes the individual’s self-awareness (Seligman, introjected "shoulds" and "shouldn'ts"
2006).
 I should be on time.
Example: A man who feels insecure in social situations. He has a work  I should keep my house clean and should always do perfect work
function to go to in two weeks’ time so the therapist gives him the  I should study hard and get good grades
experiment of starting a conversation at the function with someone he
does not normally speak to. b) Underdog - plays the victim/rebel and schemes to thwart and avoid
doing as the topdog demands.
2. Role-play

 Help individuals to experience different feelings and emotions and

better understand how they present and organize themselves.

3. Empty Chair

 This is a role-playing exercise that allows a client to imagine and

participate in a conversation with another person or another part of
themselves. Sitting across from the empty chair, the client enters into a