Paul Bakalite Emotional intelligence
Britain is dangerously addicted to anti-depressants like
Prozac and the government is to push for wider use of a different approach
to our problems: talking cures. In other words, counselling.
I used to be sceptical about counselling; how could someone else fix my problems
just by talking to me? But having experienced it myself, I now think counselling
is worthwhile and a move away from dosing people up on happy pills, and towards
listening to them is good and healthy.
In fact, these days I think counselling is pretty amazing and that’s
coming from someone whose confrontational approach to counsellors was initially:
“Come on then, fix me. Get on with it.” See, that was my fundamental
misunderstanding. They don’t fix you, you fix you.
What a skilled counsellor does is guide you in finding the resources inside
you, the understanding of yourself, that will enable you to fully identify
your problems and get through them. Often what you think is wrong isn’t
really the deeper key that you need. And it’s not that the counsellor
has that key. You do, if only you knew it.
Of course when I say “you”, I mean “I”, too. I think
this applies to many of us. We have the answers within, all we need, but many
of us can’t get to them, can’t calm our emotions or can’t
interpret
clearly things one part of our mind is trying to tell another.
So what exactly does a counsellor do? As you talk, a counsellor listens intently,
and watches all the non-verbal signs you give out. That may sound a bit threatening,
but a good counsellor won’t judge you and will regard you with empathy,
as a complete equal. What they do is really very clever, because they hardly
appear to do anything. With counselling, less is more.
Every now and again during a session the counsellor comments or asks a question
to get you thinking more clearly or more deeply. You are gradually peeling
back your emotional layers. They don’t know what you’ll find and
neither do you, but in the exploration, you experience insight. It goes as
far as you want it to.
This is dependent on several things:
You need to have a good rapport with your counsellor, to feel totally safe
and at ease with them; that they ‘get’ you; that they really do
understand, or are at least sincerely interested.
It’s not your fault if you don’t get on. Some counsellors are
poor at their job. Or maybe the chemistry between you just isn’t right.
In that case, see someone else. You also need to be as open and honest as
possible. All the things that are secret or embarrass you; the things about
which the little voice in your head says: “Oh no, don’t say that”.
They are the things you should bring up.
I believe secrets are what hurt us. And the worst secrets are those we keep
from ourselves. But if we don’t even know we’ve got them, that’s
where counselling can help. It’s about self-discovery.
It also helps simply to have someone to talk to. Who else can listen in confidence,
without imposing their opinion on you? Friends tend to judge and advise. They
may do this with the best intentions, but a counsellor’s approach of
encouraging you to advise yourself can get you further in overcoming your
problems.
It’s a shame free counselling is hard to find if you don’t have
a specific need to attach it to, such as being HIV positive. I believe it
can be good for pretty much anyone who feels the need to talk things through.
Even if you don’t, you may be curious to see where it can take you.
But counselling is useful. It’s effective and practical and sometimes
truly revelatory. You can see a counsellor for a period of weeks or months,
usually for 50-minute sessions, most likely once a week. You can receive counselling
free through your GP (though sometimes there is a long wait) or free through
service providers, like Terrence Higgins Trust or PACE.
I’m not ‘fixed’ yet but I’ve a much greater understanding
of myself as a result of seeing a counsellor and a greater belief in my own
ability to fix myself, or that I don’t really need ‘fixing’
at all, that I have what I need, but just couldn’t recognise it. I’ve
less fear and less
confusion, and more self-awareness. I’d recommend counselling to anyone.
You may be surprised by what you can tell yourself about yourself, and what
change that knowledge can bring.
