In episode 19 of the Counselling Tutor Podcast, Rory Lees-Oakes and Ken Kelly talk about the Saturday Book Club, and how to read academic books. ‘Theory with Rory’ looks at empathy, while ‘Person-Centred Business’ covers how to request and take payment from clients in private practice. Finally, the presenters discuss the importance of insurance.
In the Saturday Book Club on the Counselling Tutor Facebook group – which now has nearly 3,000 members – Rory reviews useful text books in plain English. Various publishers have recently donated copies of key books, which members will have the chance to win in competitions.
Rory and Ken give two top tips for reading academic books:
On-demand access to a rich lecture library covering theory, skills, and professional development for counselling students—Mapped to the UK awarding body criteria
“The Student Library has been BRILLIANT, I can’t recommend it enough!
It has been a lifeline in helping me prepare for practice and my first clients. If you’re considering it, go-for-it, it’s absolutely worth it!”
Kelly – Graduated and now in practice.
Episode 5 of the Counselling Tutor Podcast covered empathy as a skill; now, Rory looks at the theory of empathy.
The term ’empathy’, applied to counselling and psychotherapy, refers to being in the client’s frame of reference, experiencing the world as they see and feel it. The word is derived from:
British psychologist Edward Bradford Titchener first translated Einfühlung into English – as ’empathy’ – in 1909. Since then, there have been many attempts to define this concept. Particularly well-known is the work of Carl Rogers, who wrote a paper for the Journal of Consulting Psychology in 1957 entitled ‘The Necessary and Sufficient Conditions of Therapeutic Personality Change‘. He describes ’empathy’ as follows (1957, p. 98):
Empathy was also a key focus of the work of US psychologists Charles Truax and Robert Carkhuff, who created the Empathy Scale, available as a free download in Counselling Tutor Podcast episode 8.
Rory explains the four types of empathy: affective, cognitive, receptive and expressed. Empathy has been written about in detail by Dave Mearns and Mick Cooper in their book, Working at Relational Depth in Counselling and Psychotherapy (see ‘Links and Resources’). These authors (2005, p. xii) define ‘relational depth’ as ‘a state of profound contact and engagement between two people, in which each person is fully real with the Other, and able to understand and value the Other’s experiences at a high level’.
Neuroscientific perspectives on empathy have examined brain structure in relation to empathy, with members of the Max Planck Institute identifying the right supramarginal gyrus as key, and mirror neurones also playing an important role.
Regardless of the scientific explanation for empathy, the human experience of being heard, understood and validated is one of the greatest gifts that one person can give another.
Tips on How to Use Academic Books for Your Assignments
It can feel difficult to ask clients for payment, especially if you have been accustomed to working without charge (e.g. on placement). The client may have shared heavy, personal material, and it can feel strange to turn then to the topic of money. Key tips include:
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The new Ethical Framework for the Counselling Professions (BACP, 2016, p. 6) requires: ‘We will be covered by adequate insurance when providing services directly or indirectly to the public.’
Rory and Ken underline the importance of: