PERSONAL THEORY OF COUNSELING OR PSYCHOTHERAPY

Personal Theory of Counseling or Psychotherapy

Personal Theory of Counseling or Psychotherapy

Introduction

Throughout my life, I have found myself trying to decipher the facet of the “who am I” question? I ask myself, what are my strengths/weaknesses? How do I define beauty/suffering in the world? Where do I find meaning in life? Recurrently wondering who are you and what defines you. In order to identify my own way of navigating and making meaning out of the world I have reached inside and dug deeply in these past months. In this paper I delve into my recent introspective and reflective explorations as well as the experiences and lessons I have learned throughout my life which have led me to embrace and adopt the particular theory of counseling that I believe suits me the most. Of all the theories I have learned, none has resonated with me as much as Existentialism (Thompson, 2006). The recognition and respect for the client's subjective world trust in the capacity of the client to make positive decisions. The concepts focuses in counseling such as meaning, purpose, freedom, responsibility, choice, isolation, death concepts that relate to our mere existing in the world and the larger scheme of life.

I tend to shy away from the theories such as cognitive-behavioral therapy, feminist therapy and gestalt therapy, which are very technique-oriented, exercise-driven, directive in approach, and simply require too much action on the therapist's behalf. I feel these theories do not allow much of the client's pursuits and search for meaning in life to come through or at least, it is not the major focus of therapy. I do recognize that for some clients these other therapies may be useful, that is why I do not discredit nor dislike them; I just feel that they do not mesh with who I am personally and are not as inherent to my way of being as much as the precepts of existentialism are. Personally, I hope to find out my purpose in life and contribute something meaningful to the world.

Basic view of human nature

I believe that human nature has all along been portrayed as one that strives to attain a given level of achievement; striving to attain the fullest of its potential in achieving the highest level of the individual's endeavors, as Alfred Adler would put it 'striving for perfection'. Everyone is seen striving for self actualization; which is the tendency of people developing themselves towards their fullest potential or fighting to achieve their ideal. It will be very common that everyone will find himself striving not only to be better but also striving to be superior to others (Samuel, 2004).

I have a feeling that human beings also tend to have assertiveness drive that pushes them to fight for settling their humanly needs such as need to eat, sexual satisfaction, love and others. They also want to strive to overcome or rather have an inherent motivation for compensation. Young boys have always been seen have higher esteem than ...