Seminar On Counselling

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31363, 8 May 1967, Page 16

Seminar On Counselling

The result of good counselling was often miraculous transformation of personality, Dr. D. O. Williams, director of the Inter-church counselling service in Auckland, who has been giving personal counselling for more than 30 years, told Christchurch Life-line counsellors and social workers at a two-day seminar at the week-end. Good counselling did not seek to solve people’s problems, but to help them solve their own. By offering a loving heart, a listening ear and an understanding mind the counsellor allowed a client to explore his or her problem, and to discover the insights which would solve it

Attitude, hot knowledge, was the most important aspect of good counselling. It had to be based on absolute acceptance of the client as he was, with no effort to judge. The client knew better than the counsellor what the problem was, and as long as the counsellor gave a series of green lights to the client to go ahead, and revealed a concerned, warm, accepting and strong personality the client would find his own way to the solution. “It just happens that in

this particular time In our psychological development we have discovered just what wonderful things we can do for others with loving fellowship,” he said. Psychiatrists had told him that they would be pleased if they could get the results that the inter-church centre achieved. In 14 months the counselling service had held 1964 hour-long counselling sessions, and 2294 calls had been received by the Auckland Life-line telephone service, Dr. Williams said. A counsellor should never show shock, nor be frightened to go to the depths of a person’s disturbance. He must be prepared to goflnto some quite shocking areas, and if he found himself disturbed by some subjects the effectiveness of the counselling was affected, Dr. Williams said. Some people were prohibited from counselling work because of their inner attitudes. All good counselling was done in the emotional areas, and counsellors should never try to quieten people when they became emotional during a counselling session, he said. When counselling was going well, a client’s revelations tended to become more

and more intimate, and a counsellor had to be prepared to accept these without any signs of disturbance.