I am back teaching Level 1 counselling courses. As I reflect on my experience of doing this I am aware of two contradictory things. One is how each of the courses over the past 20 years has been completely different, but also how many aspects seem to be present again and again.
The discussion on the role of a counsellor seemed, as it often does, to be drawn towards various nightmare scenarios a counsellor might encounter – usually termed in the form of a question “What would you do if……” the sentence seeming to be completed by evermore alarming possibilities.
My answer is often the same – essentially, “I don’t know, I have never encountered that” and I imagine I won’t really know until I do, which my experience of client work informs me, will probably be highly unlikely.
This all seems to be part of the bigger process of counselling training seeming to be a fearful and, in some ways, potentially dangerous undertaking. It makes me wonder how we are going to help develop effective practitioners if they are too fearful to risk making, and maintaining, therapeutic relationships with their clients
