Counselling in France

What is counselling?

Counselling is a process that enables a person to sort out issues and reach decisions affecting their life. The counsellor sees a client in a confidential setting to explore any difficulties the client is having, distress they may be experiencing or perhaps their dissatisfaction with their current circumstances. This is achieved by the counsellor facilitating personal growth, development, and self-understanding in the client, which in turn empowers the client to adapt more constructive life practices. 

In counselling, the relationship between the client and the counsellor is an essential part of the process. As trust is built, the counsellor will encourage the client to look at aspects of their lives; their relationships and themselves and pent-up feelings such as anger, anxiety, grief and fear can become very intense. The counsellor will encourage the expression of these feelings, thus making them easier for the client to understand. There may also be some exploration of early relationships to discover how the client came to react to certain people or situations in certain ways. Clients usually find counselling a very liberating and empowering experience.

The counselling process

The counselling process will depend on the individual counsellor, the individual client and the specific issue. However, there is a general counselling process that the counsellor will follow:

1. Background information collection
2. Identification of core issues
3. Case formulation
4. Goal setting for the therapeutic process
5. Implementation of intervention
6. Evaluation of intervention
7. Closure

Counselling approaches

Counsellors work from differing theoretical approaches. For some counsellors, the focus is on solving problems here and now, dealing with more immediate issues. This is particularly valuable if you are having difficulty with a specific issue that needs addressing immediately for you to be able to move forward in your day-to-day life. Different counsellors will place varying levels of emphasis on the clients behaviour, thought processes and on emotional aspects. All counsellors have the ultimate goal to assist you in increasing your sense of well-being. The actual length of counselling treatment depends on numerous factors, including the severity of the problem, the motivation of the client and the type of problem. The more focused and limited the problem being addressed, the shorter treatment can be. The more the treatment addresses healing emotional injuries, the longer it is likely to take.

How can counselling benefit me?

For many people, deciding to see a counsellor is the first actual step to feeling more in control of their lives. Acknowledging that you need help or support doesn’t mean you are weak or self-indulgent. In fact considering the ever growing demands of the modern world, stress and anxiety, difficulties people face juggling family and work commitments as well as constant pressure on relationships, counselling could really be seen as an absolute necessity rather than a luxury.

Emotional problems don’t go away by themselves and suppressing strong emotional and psychological feelings can lead to such symptoms as sleep disturbance or insomnia, headaches, depression, anxiety, lethargy and feelings of worthlessness. It can also lead to unhealthy behaviour such as drug and alcohol abuse, destructive or codependent relationships. Counselling can help you to accept yourself as you are and help you to make the changes necessary to make your life more satisfying.

Through counselling you can examine the behaviours, thoughts, attitudes, and feelings that may be causing difficulties in your present life. You can learn effective ways to deal with your problems by building upon your own unique personal strengths. A counsellor will encourage your personal growth and development in ways that match your interests and will best support your overall well-being.