Psychological counseling training materials

At the same time, it should teach you "the ethical bottom line of not hurting others", "practical skills for solving problems" and "self-awareness that dares to admit limitations". There is no standardized teaching material that can suit everyone, and there is no quick path to practice directly after completing the course. All training that advocates "getting a certificate in 7 days and earning over 10,000 yuan a month" are essentially harvesting the IQ tax of industry novices.

Don't think that ethics is just empty talk written in a manual. I once took an intern who just graduated from the 211 Department of Psychology. When she answered the public welfare hotline for the first time, the visitor on the opposite side said that she had an affair during marriage and was trapped in guilt. She opened her mouth and said, "You have a moral issue and I can't talk to you." She made him cry and finally complained to the center. If you think this is just a mistake made by novices, when I participated in the industry supervision last year, I met a consultant who had been working as a consultant for 5 years. Because she took it upon herself to advise the visitor on how to divorce her, the husband of the visitor finally brought her to the studio and paid her a small sum of 100,000 yuan to settle the matter. Different schools actually have different requirements for the implementation of ethics: psychoanalysis will emphasize that you must first be aware of your own countertransference. If you were hurt by your cheating father when you were a child, it is easy to be unintentionally critical when receiving such visits, which itself breaks the ethical boundaries. ； The humanistic school simply incorporates ethics into the attitude of consultation. Instead of saying "I don't judge", the expression becomes wrinkled first. ； The ethics of CBT are more grounded. It directly stipulates that you cannot intervene for clients beyond your ability. If you have not received training in suicide intervention, you can just refer a client who has suicidal tendencies as soon as possible. It is irresponsible to force yourself to do so.

After talking about the bottom line, let’s talk about the skills issue that everyone is most concerned about. I saw a question on Zhihu a while ago, saying, "I know the CBT textbook by heart, but why do I still get a blank when I take on the first case?" 」At that time, I met a young man who said that he had completed 200 hours of CBT recorded classes in three months and had obtained his certificate, so he dared to take on cases of depression. As a result, he received a real case for the first time. He came to visit and said, "I really don't want to live anymore." His first reaction was to dig out the handouts and look for the "Suicide Intervention Process." He searched for half a minute and couldn't find it. I often tell newbies that counselors always have several keys in their pockets. You can't just hold a screwdriver and try to open all the locks in the world. You can't talk to a person who has an acute anxiety attack about his childhood Oedipus complex, right? Different schools actually have very different approaches to skill learning: an old professor who does classic fine analysis told me that the students he taught were not allowed to touch any cases in the first three years. They had to complete 300 hours of personal experience first and sort out their own problems before talking about it. ； Young counselors with an integration orientation think that you should first learn three general sets of skills - empathy, stabilization, and cognitive adjustment. You should first be able to handle ordinary emotional distress cases, and there is no problem in improving as you go. Both views are correct, it just depends on which bowl of rice you eat, there is no need to score higher or lower.

One thing that many trainings will not tell you is that what is more important than skills is that you must have the courage to "give in". I once had a colleague who I knew well. She had just lost her mother, and she received a visit from the mother of her child who died unexpectedly. She originally thought that she could handle any emotion after four years of counseling. However, when she heard the visitor say in the first consultation, "The new sneakers I bought for my son are still in the shoe cabinet," she burst into tears on the spot. Instead, she asked to visit her to comfort her. After that consultation, she stopped working on cases for two full months. She first went to her supervisor for ten counseling sessions before she recovered. Different schools of thought have different opinions on this matter: Traditional counseling training always says that counselors should be "value-neutral and emotionally stable," wishing you were an emotionless listening machine. However, many postmodern schools now believe that it is normal for counselors to have emotions. You can even tell the client, "I was sad when I heard you say this." But the premise is that you must be able to distinguish whether the emotion is yours or brought out by the client. If your own trauma is brought out, stop quickly and don't hold on. Oh, by the way, don’t believe the nonsense about “perfect consultants”. I have been consulting for 8 years. The last time I received a visit was a professional e-sports player. He said that his hands were shaking during the game. I couldn’t even understand the game of Honor of Kings. After two conversations, I couldn’t find an entry point. I honestly referred him to a colleague with sports psychology consulting experience. There is no shame at all. If you hold back and delay others' careers, that would be really unethical.

In fact, to put it bluntly, is there any unified teaching material in this industry? If you look through all the textbooks at home and abroad, they will not tell you whether you should pass the paper to a visitor who is crying until she can't breathe, or whether you should wait for her to wipe it herself. ； Nor will I tell you whether you should echo the call or get back to the point when you encounter someone who keeps scolding your ex. Supervisors will teach you these things, individual cases will teach you, and your own mistakes will also teach you. The little girl I took care of last time who complained about an affair when she first entered the industry has now been doing youth counseling for three years and is doing extremely well. She said that complaint was the most expensive and most useful lesson she has ever learned. You see, compared to those beautifully printed handouts, these moments of real people colliding with each other are the unique training materials for each consultant.