To work as a counsellor or a coach, it is necessary to have a theory about how people develop and think and function, and then to work in a way which is consistent with this.  I base my practice on what has come to be known as the ‘Person-Centred’ philosophy and approach, which was first expounded by Carl Rogers in the 1950s.  It views each person as having qualities and characteristics which are the result of influences in their life.  We function and interact with others according to how we have learnt to survive over the years.  But because past influences and experience play such an important part, we don’t necessarily function in a way that best suits us now.   It is the job of the counsellor to help understand what’s going on now and help sort out the past influences which are getting in the way in the present   It is the job of the coach to help discover a vision for what might be possible in the future and a way to work towards it   The person-centred approach looks at how we are conditioned by our past and uses the relationship of the counsellor with the client to re-evaluate those influences and undo the conditioning which is hindering us.  To this I bring a long experience of working with how  we function as people, how we very often get in our own way and obstruct ourselves from realising our potential.  In anyone’s life situation there are things which can’t be changed, but the effect they have, depends very much on our attitude both to ourselves and to what’s going on around us.   A lot of the work of the counsellor and the coach is on helping the client release themselves from the assumptions and patterns which waste effort and energy and get nowhere.   It is truly amazing where we can go if we can set ourselves free.   return to home page