What is psychological counseling?

Before starting to answer this question, Little Whale would like to describe some scenes, which will happen to everyone who encounters psychological counseling.

Scenario 1:

A: What major do you major in?

B: I study psychology

A: Wow, are you a psychological counselor?

B: Well, I have a national third-level/second-level psychological counselor qualification certificate and am currently engaged in psychological counseling.

A: Oh, then you must know what I am thinking now, what do you think I am thinking now...

B:... /p>

Scenario 2:

A: Are you a psychological counselor?

B: Yeah, yes.

A: Then you must know what is right, you must be able to solve all my problems, and you must be able to tell me what to do...

B:··· ···

A thousand people have a thousand understandings of "psychological counseling", and everyone has different expectations for psychological counseling. What exactly is psychological counseling?

Psychological counseling has different interpretations in different psychological schools. Simply put, it is "helping others to help themselves", helping clients learn to help themselves.

Psychological counseling is based on the trust relationship between the client and the counselor. The counselor helps the client to improve his or her psychological well-being through words, expressions, body language, sand table, painting, hypnosis, intentional dialogue, etc. Understand and explore yourself more, and help clients use their own power to choose their own way to solve problems.

Psychological counseling has two important foundations, one is the scientific theoretical system of psychological counseling, and the other is the professional and ethical basic setting.

Psychological counselors must undergo professional and systematic training and master relevant theoretical knowledge and relevant professional skills in psychology in order to help clients solve psychological problems.

This is also the reason why Yixin requires psychological counselors to have professional qualification certificates, more than 2 years of systematic training, extensive consultation time, and proof of supervision when selecting counselors.

In addition, the main goals of psychological counseling are:

Helping clients establish good interpersonal relationships

Helping clients deepen their self-understanding

Helping clients correct misperceptions

Helping clients learn to accept the facts

Helping clients increase their psychological freedom

Helping clients understand and resolve inner conflicts

Helping clients develop healthier behavioral patterns

Helping clients develop good personality traits

Helping clients develop healthier thinking patterns and strengthen psychological maintenance Healthy awareness promotes one's own mental health.

Has reading this given you some clear understanding of psychological counseling?

In order to let you know more about psychological counseling, Little Whale wants to answer some misunderstandings about psychological counseling, hoping to help you!

Misunderstanding 1: Psychological counseling is just chatting.

Answer: The family and friends around every psychological counselor will think, "What a great job you have, you can make money just by chatting."

Psychological counseling is not just about casual visits. If you just want to chat with someone else, it doesn’t make any sense for the visitor to pay the high consulting fees.

Psychological counseling is when counselors provide very professional and unconditional positive attention, listening, and affection, and use different counseling techniques and theoretical backgrounds to collaborate with clients to explore their own problems and help clients Patients learn new behaviors or thinking patterns and can use them outside of counseling to better adapt to life.

Misunderstanding 2: I can also read psychology books, learn a little psychological knowledge, and solve problems by myself.

Answer: When encountering psychological problems, books and knowledge play a certain role in solving your own problems, because self-adjustment is also a very important psychological ability for a person.

However, this has little effect on solving and adjusting psychological problems.

First, in terms of professional knowledge and skills, professional psychological counselors need to receive systematic training. Usually, a qualified counselor needs to receive specialized systematic knowledge and skills training, and be familiar with Several schools of psychological counseling, proficiency in using at least two or more specialized psychotherapies, and professional psychological identification capabilities and counseling techniques cannot be achieved by reading a few books and taking a few courses.

Second, self-adjustment can only alleviate the problem to a small extent and cannot solve the root cause of the problem. Judging from the actual situation, professional psychological counseling workers will not consult themselves, and it is even difficult for counselors to provide effective consultation to relatives and friends around them.

Third, generally speaking, situations that require psychological counseling are when self-adjustment fails or has little effect, and you still need to seek help from professional psychological counseling workers.

Little Whale Gives a Chestnut

When you have a cold and fever for 1-2 weeks, you can read some books and knowledge about "treating colds" to help yourself get better quickly. stand up.

However, when your cold and fever last for more than 1-2 months, you need a professional doctor to diagnose and treat you. Psychological counseling is the same!

Misunderstanding 3: If I go to psychological counseling, I will be completely relieved.

Answer: Many people have high expectations for psychologists, thinking that one consultation can solve a problem that has been bothering them for a long time or is very serious. Of course, some people feel relieved after the first consultation. In fact, these two understandings of consultation are biased.

Psychological counseling is difficult to achieve quick results. Counseling is a process of continuous development and dynamic change. This process includes factors such as establishing a trusting relationship between the counselor and the client, dealing with emotions, clarifying problems, and the client's subsequent change and development. These factors determine that psychological counseling is almost impossible to be effective at one time. It is possible that effective psychological counseling can take months or even years, because psychological growth, personality improvement and personality soundness take time.

Most people seek help from counseling, usually with many long-term psychological problems. For example, misconceptions that create psychological problems, incorrect behaviors or ways of thinking, misfortunes experienced in childhood, or unhealthy influence patterns in the original family cannot be solved at once.

Usually, in the first consultation, the consultant will collect your information and situation, then coordinate with you to agree on the consultation goals, and gradually develop a consultation method. Therefore, generally after one consultation, you still need to make further appointments for consultation.

Misunderstanding 4: I have no emotions, I just want to solve the problem rationally, so just solve the problem

Answer: In Chinese cultural genes, expressing "anger" and "angry" It is always a sign of poor self-cultivation, and "forbearance" is considered a virtue in the traditional sense, which means that one is mentally determined and determined, that is, being able to endure what others cannot tolerate. Therefore, our growth environment requires us not to express our emotions and face problems with a rational attitude.

The significance of psychological counseling is that when faced with psychological distress, what we really need is not to suppress and deny emotions, but to express emotions in a safe environment and understand the meaning behind them, so as to complete the treatment. Exploration and discovery of your true self. Psychological counseling mainly focuses on your "inner feelings" and "inner reality", focusing on the parts that have an impact on you.

In essence, emotions are your clues to solving problems, instead of being trapped in the cycle of "solving one problem one by one". I believe you must have many ways to solve problems, just like "I understand the truth. But I just can’t do it.” Emotions are the fulcrum that allows you to move the rock of "can't do it".