|
Article Excerpt
In 1996, the Journal of Humanistic Education and Development published a special issue on counselor impairment. There has been a shift in focus over the intervening years, away from issues of impairment and toward counselor wellness. This article highlights that shift and introduces this special issue on counselor wellness.
**********
Counseling is a profession in which the person of the counselor serves as the instrument for the work that we do. As counselors, we are taught to see the world through our client's eyes, to experience our client's feelings through empathy, and to connect to our client's pain when they are vulnerable. That level of connection, commitment, and caring are among the greatest strengths that we counselors bring to the work that we do, and they are also among the characteristics that may make us vulnerable. Witnessing the cruelty and despair in our clients' lives places us at risk; compassion fatigue, vicarious trauma, and burnout are a few of the potential consequences of that risk. Counselor impairment often occurs when counselors have persistently focused on the plight of clients while ignoring, dismissing, or minimizing their own needs for balance and self-care.
In addition to the pain we witness as counselors, we also have the privilege of listening to triumphant stories unfolding. We witness growth in our clients and share their joys, and we can learn to trust the resiliency of the human spirit to prevail. Walking alongside our clients on their journey to wellness is a rewarding and meaningful part of the work. Our stories, like those of our clients, reflect the whole of human experience--our triumphs, our adversity, our shortcomings, and our fallen heroes.
When our actions reflect a respect for our own wellness, it is more likely we will be able to nurture wellness in others. This special issue represents a merging of two professional paths of study that have been working, for the most part, quite separately over the past several decades. The first path represents all we have learned and come to understand about happiness and being well. The second path is the study of counselor impairment. It is time to bring the wisdom gained from both fields of research together--to shift our focus toward ways we can use what we know about wellness and self-care to prevent the devastation, fatigue, and distress that plagues too many of our own. It's time we put ourselves first--not only because it is the right thing to do for our clients, but, more important, because it is the right thing to do for ourselves.
Carl Hammerschlag is a psychiatrist who has worked with Native Americans in the southwestern United States throughout most of his career. Hammerschlag's (1992) stories of hope and healing are especially powerful as he describes his quest to understand his patients and to learn from them as he helps them to heal. In one of our favorite stories, Hammerschlag encountered a man who was a traditional Mayan healer. At one point, Hammerschlag asked the man what he believed was the most important thing he had learned that allowed him to heal people, and, after a pause, the man responded that one should never drink a cold beverage on an empty stomach on a hot summer's day. Certain that something had been mistranslated, he asked again and received the same answer. Finally, he confessed his confusion and asked how it could be that avoiding a cold beverage on a hot summer's day could be the most important lesson a healer needed to learn. The man replied that if you drink a cold beverage on a hot summer's day, it will give you bad belly, and you can't heal if you have bad belly (Hammerschlag, 1992).
This simple and eloquent story can be interpreted two very different ways. One interpretation is that we, as counselors, are not allowed to have our own vulnerabilities or struggles--our own "bad belly." Some counselors seem to believe that because of our training, skills, or natural talents, we should be impervious to the stresses of everyday life. A more realistic interpretation would be that, in order to be an effective healer, we must first be aware of what keeps us well and what challenges our wellness. This is the only interpretation that can stand up to any scrutiny. Counselors are no less vulnerable to the challenges of living in a complicated world, and, in fact, the nature of our work often places us at greater risk. In order to be effective, counselors must be aware of their wellness and be active in maintaining it.
Counselor wellness is not a new issue in the profession, but it has not received nearly the attention that we believe it is due. In 1996, the Journal of Humanistic Education and Development (now called the Journal of Humanistic Counseling, Education and Development; JHCEAD) devoted a special issue to the topic of counselor impairment. That special issue represented the first comprehensive examination of the topic of impairment within the counseling profession. The authors who contributed to that special issue made a compelling case for a more conscientious and vigilant focus on counselors' own functioning and for continued attention to the issue of impairment within the counseling profession. We recognize that the special issue you hold today is possible because the trail has been blazed by those who have come before us. In that spirit, we have invited the editors from that 1996 issue to contribute to this introductory article to share their perspective on the progress of the past 10 years and their vision of the future of wellness and the counseling profession.
THE UP AND DOWN COUNSELOR--RICHARD J. HAZLER
Jeffrey and I had worked on issues related to the human side of counselors for many years prior to the special edition on counselor impairment and wellness that was published 10 years ago. This human side of counselors gets much less attention than do the knowledge and skills of counseling. The result is that professionals and nonprofessionals alike can begin to view the counselor more as a piece of technology rather than as an actual living, breathing human being. A being with all the needs, joys, hurts, and competing life demands of every other person. That special edition came from the desire to emphasize the being of the...
|
