Introduction to Counseling
Carlo Olkeriil
May 29, 2014
Counseling can facilitate the process of overcoming or working through personal issues from everyday hardship as well as potentially life threatening situations. This reflective paper will explore the three 50 minute counseling sessions that I attended with a professional counselor and therapist, named Cassy Johnson-Hodge. By attending these counseling session and reflecting on Ms. Johnson-Hodge 's counseling process I have begun to understand the specific skills a counselor may use in session to help clients. Counseling requires the counselors to reach sensitively into their clients world and help them become aware of their strengths and hidden beauty (Michael S. Nystul, p 49). . The invaluable skills of open-ended questioning, paraphrasing, and reflection the counselor used had previously seemed insignificant to me, when it reality it can determine the difference between a helpful or a non helpful session. …show more content…
I was nervous and anxious on the way to the session as I was unsure of where to start or how in depth the session would be. I had planned what I was going to say during the session, but I was still not feeling confident about it. I analyzed in my head what personal issues I could discuss as a student trying to learn the counseling processes, of course this was all based on my assumptions of what the counselor would ask. My nervousness and anxiety were immediately put to rest when I walked in the room where Cassy Johnson-Hodge gave me a warm