Working directly with parents can be either terribly frustrating or exceptionally gratifying. Many counselors initially feel both fear and frustration at the prospect of counseling parents. That was certainly the case for me. I not only felt intimidated, but I also held several negative beliefs about parents that adversely affected my ability to work with… continue reading

When I was younger, I often wondered how it was possible that elderly people weren’t consumed with fear of the inevitable. But Erik Erikson seemed to have a “good enough” theory to settle my inner turmoil. As an undergraduate back in the early 1970s, I surmised from Erikson’s theory that as we successfully move through… continue reading

Author’s note: Although this article is written mainly for school counselors, its basic concept and the strategies it contains are easily adaptable to other counseling fields. When the paperwork begins to mount and the phone calls never seem to stop, school counselors often wonder, “When am I going to get the chance to see the… continue reading

Today’s counseling students bring a unique array of characteristics and perspectives not previously seen in our classrooms. For instance, it is not uncommon for students to approach classroom assignments through technological means rather than by engaging in thoughtful dialogue. Counselor educators have a responsibility to learn about these students and to adapt pedagogical approaches to… continue reading

Counselors are good at relationships, or so they say. As folklore would have it, counselors are the “knowers” of all things relational and, therefore, can and should be “masters” when it comes to their own personal relationships. But is this really the case? As a counselor, I thought I was good at relationship until I… continue reading