Supportive Skills & Techniques in Counseling
- Supportive counseling provides assistance in relieving stress and anxiety.horrified expression image by leafy from Fotolia.com
The skills and techniques employed in supportive therapy provide a counseling patient with tools to affect change in his daily life. A skilled counselor is more than a guide and more than a support system, managing to strike a balance somewhere between the two. A counselor must be able to listen with empathy and understanding to help alleviate stress in the patient, while also teaching the patient through thoughtful, focused education. - A counselor must demonstrate empathy.Senior Doctor image by Paul Moore from Fotolia.com
A counselor should be able to demonstrate empathy during counseling sessions with patients. The therapist should practice active listening with the patient and show understanding of the patient's fears, stresses and anxieties. As a result of the empathy shown, the patient feels accepted, more relaxed and more comfortable in the counselor's presence. A patient who does not feel the counselor empathizes with his feelings or does not understand his situation is more likely to feel guarded and unwilling to reveal his innermost feelings during the counseling sessions. The unwillingness to open up in counseling can hinder the positive effects counseling should have in a patient's life and may derail recovery or personal advancement. - Supportive counseling can help you implement strategies for life.discussing achievment image by Steve Johnson from Fotolia.com
Successful counseling professionals are able to introduce and implement coping strategies for patients. Counselors help a patient establish coping strategies and techniques to change life situations in addition to coping strategies that help a patient deal with internal thoughts and feelings about external events. A counselor can guide the patient directly by recommending concrete coping strategies to help the patient deal with a specific problem present in the patient's life. Solving specific problems may involve offering advice on the steps a patient should follow to find a new job or place to live. The counselor might also provide a sounding board to spark the patient's creative thought processes and identify problem-solving techniques and strategies on his own. - A supportive counselor guides patients with education and clarification.woman and man talking silhouettes image by Slobodan Djajic from Fotolia.com
Supportive counseling techniques incorporate the ability to teach and educate patients about their circumstances, feelings and about the possible outcomes of certain choices and actions. A counselor who can understand and empathize with the patient's feelings and thoughts is also able to reflect those emotions back to the patient. Accurate reflection allows the counselor to help a patient clarify certain feelings and circumstances in the patient's life. The counselor should also have the ability to educate the patient in a way that is complete, concise and reassuring throughout all stages of a patient's awakening and development.
