Would the area you notate be the most needed area? I am just starting out in Professional Counseling and want to head towards my area of interests early on. I am familiar with individual, group counseling.
How do you like family therapy? Substance abuse counseling?
or Children therapy?
Any suggestions would help.
My clinical experience has been in the treatment of substance use disorders. There is always a great need for skilled clinicians in this field. soaring rates of opioid addiction and overdose deaths have spurred a great deal of research and now many approaches are being employed to help those who struggle to overcome this disorder. I think we need clinicians who can bring their expertise in conventional counseling approaches such as DBT and CBT, but who are also open to integrative and holistic interventions. Above all, the most important qualities you can offer any addict or their family members is a non-judgemental, compassionate attitude- accomplished through educating yourself regarding the true nature of SUD, which is a complex disorder that has been misrepresented for far too long as a weakness of character.
Good luck on your career path!
It depends on what you like and which kind of clients you find interesting. Also whether you want to work independently or in an organisation.
About addiction counseling, it is advisable to only do this if you have an institution and support behind you. Addicts are very manipulative and you can only help them if you keep out of their destructive patterns. Therefore it is ill-advised to do that on your own.
The same goes for family counseling. It takes a system to treat a system and preferably you would not counsel a family on your own. For partner therapy the same logic applies. Preferably a team of two counselers should counsel a couple together.
If you want to work on your own, that leaves child and adult counseling. As to adults, there is a lack of career counselors, helping people find out what they really want to do as a profession. And occupational counseling, when there is a tangle of work problems and personal problems, difficult to know if one is the cause of the other or whether there is a common denominator.
If you work independently, it is very important to organise support for yourself either through peer consultation groups or paying for supervision, presenting your clients and your approach to a senior counseler who helps train you on the job. That way you prevent yourself becoming “stuck”.
I am currently at the end of my Masters in Counselling program and I find myself being drawn to Counselling for Children (adolescents in particular).This is an area which has a lot of potential for growth in understanding our younger generation - especially focusing on issues concerning social media addiction, peer influence, defiant teens, rightful parenting techniques when coping with aggressive teens, etc;It is challenging but if can succeed in speaking their language, it is definitely an area in counselling worth exploring.
Results of several meta-analyses indicate that the the working therapeutic relationship is the strongest predictor of + benefit of psychotherapy across transtheoretical approaches and presenting issues. Placebo accounts for about 15%. It is our honest commitment to our clients over time that makes the difference!
Welcome to our profession, Rich
Don't rush the process or short-cut yourself by starting to focus too early. You will likely change your area of focus several times over throughout your career. As you mature in the field, your experience will tell you where to go next. The recommendations so far are quite good. You have a wide variety of perspectives here that lay out good options.
All important aspects of human functioning requires counselling. Education, marriage, career etc and all are important and trendy. It depends on your area of interest and passion to guide your choice.
I am still in school for Mental Health Counseling but the need is those who are unable to get mental health counseling. I want to join a non-profit organization to assist others in obtaining counseling that other insurance compainies or those without insurance have aceess to discounted or free mental health.
I am a student at the end of my internship in marriage and family therapy. I have been in private practice as a hypnotherapist since 2014 working with a wide range of clients from very young to old, men amd woman, and many different issues. I say I specialise in using hypnosis to create lasting change and market that as my nitch. I love the variety and I feel competent with most of my clients, but know the value of referal to others when needed. I believe my training in MFT gives me confidence in working with family systems. I do think you will find areas where you thought you would enjoy it but might change your mind and steer away and vice versa. Personally, I am considering working part time in an agency to get my hours but love the indepedence and flexibility of private practice. It takes time to learn marketing, bookkeeping, connections, etc though. Get out there and experience you in the counseling world, you will find an area you are drawn to.
Counseling becoming irrelevant and loses its effectiveness when a counselor stop learning about the changing social,cultural ,economic and political realities in the new limelight.The dynamics of the society has huge impact on the psychological functioning of a individual.Our psychological issues have many correlates in the systems surrounding us.. These systems are in state of flux and so are individuals who are the custodians of these systems.The ever increasing changes in the ways people perform routine life activities and the new perceptions created by the expansion of technology , and globalization demand on part of the counselor to remain vigilant and aware of the underpinnings that directly or indirect effect human social and emotional functioning.
Thanks so much for the insight into the counseling world endeavors! I am truly excited and value your contributions in my new beginnings. I do intend to keep an open mind, for direction and continue my educational opportunities to keep relevancy noted, protecting myself around the built organizational walls for areas and private practice for others. Especially not being in a hurry to find either, but gracefully taking steps into my position. Thanks so much! Incredible.
I don’t know how to respond to someone else’s response, so I’ll do it here. I object to Ms. Hupkens characterization of addicts as “manipulative”. Those individuals who are dis gnoses with substance use disorders should not be labeled in this manner. They are individual and unique human beings. The concept of an “alcohol (or addict) personality” was discarded years ago as unscientific.
While it may be said that someone in the active stage of their SUD, or in very early recovery, may exhibit this particular trait as a symptom of their illness, the same may be said of many other disorders such as Borderline Personality Disorder. Many individuals who lack the ability to assert their needs have learned to use manipulation as a means of survival. Helping our clients to recognize their self-worth and replace manipulation with assertiveness can be a treatment goal. Ultimately, I can understand one’s reasons for gravitating towards a particular patient population for personal reasons, or even avoiding one because we lack the training needed to be effective, but avoiding one - based on bias -seems anathema to the very mission of helping professionals.
Patricia,
There is some evidence that temperament is one of the risk factors: High Novelty Seeking, High Impulsivity, High Reward Dependence, and Low Harm Avoidance. Certainly there are more risk factors to this complex syndrome. And I agree w/ you about not using pejorative language to describe these clients.
Rich
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