Person centered therapy, or Rogerian therapy, is a form of therapy we covered last week. Having been around for decades, it’s well-studied, respected, and many aspects of it can be found in plenty of other therapy modalities. It has a few core concepts, which we’ll cover in this post.
Unconditional positive regard
This can seem like a fancy title for a special technique. However, at its core, it’s a simple concept and is carried over into many other modalities. Unconditional positive regard is, simply, accepting someone. It’s caring for a person regardless of how they behave or what other people feel about them.
Carl Rogers believed that this was a crucial aspect of therapy. He felt that by prioritizing a client’s feelings and experiences, having this positive regard towards them, and using other skills, that clients had the best chance of growth and positive change.
Many people experience lives in which many people around them judge them, invalidate them, or make them feel as if they’re unloved or unliked. By using unconditional positive regard, clinicians create a space in which people are able to open up and do the difficult work of therapy knowing that they’re safe, not being judged, and that they’re finally being listened to.
Empathy
Empathy is an important cornerstone of many different forms of therapy. Many people are familiar with the word and it can have several different meanings. However, in the counseling field, empathy has a very specific meaning. It’s the ability to sit with a client and truly put yourself in their situation and feelings. It’s being able to relate to someone else’s experience. Having empathy does not mean excusing every action, behavior, or thought someone has. But what it does mean is that you make an effort to understand where someone is coming from. That you can sit with them in these feelings.
In therapy, it’s also important to not just experience this empathy, but to also have a healthy distance from the client. A clinician shouldn’t be relating to their client so much that they’re unable to look at situations objectively. They need to be able to understand the client without feeling as if they are the client or vice versa.
Congruence and genuineness/authenticity
Being fully authentic or genuine with a client is important during the therapeutic process in person centered therapy. Carl Rogers believed that a clinician being open, honest, and authentic with a client could help the client be able to do so in their own lives. It’s a form of modeling that can help build better interpersonal skills, more effective emotional regulation, and allows individuals to be able to build trust.
Person centered therapy builds a space in which clients do not feel spoken down to. Genuineness is one way in which it does this. The client feels as if they are on a more even playing field with the therapist, as if they are both experts, as opposed to the therapist being on a pedestal.
Congruence is a form of harmony or sameness between the client and the clinician. It’s the ability to “click” and form a good therapeutic relationship. This also allows for trust building and can help clients be able to share vulnerable thoughts or feelings with the clinician.
