For many of the woman counsellors, the professional identity of a counsellor sometimes took precedence over the other roles of parent or spouse. Latha joked
‘My husband often asks me, is the psychologist talking, or my wife?’ Such role conflicts could often throw some counsellors off balance. For instance, Aruna recounted being expected to be perfect in all aspects by her family members and friends. She said
I have become a quiet person over the years. I used to be social but now as more and more people know that I am a counsellor they discuss their problems with me all the time;
whether I am in my son’s school, travelling in the train or at a public function. I stopped going down to the building for my walk also now. Nobody talks to me about the gossip in the building or about movies and actors. My friends and relatives think that I have to be the perfect wife and perfect mother. I cannot look angry or upset; I am always supposed to be cheerful. (Aruna)
While counsellors consciously or unconsciously found changes in themselves by being in the profession, the family members found it difficult to accept these changes; especially for those who began their profession after many years into their marriage. It appeared that married women counsellors (three out of five) were often responding from their professional roles more often than from their per- sonal ones, thereby causing role conflicts in their own lives. This resonates with Hemalatha and Suryanarayana’s (1983) study which reported that married work- ing women do face ‘role conflicts between the various roles played by women including mother, wife and earner’. While the married male counsellors expressed positive influences on their family, none of the three male counsellors expressed any such role ambiguity in their family life which indicated that they probably had a clearer demarcation between their personal and professional lives.
Most counsellors also had a strong need to practice what they preached; whether it was with changing themselves, raising their children, or accepting their spouse;
indicating their own willingness to change or perfect themselves. While some coun- sellors appeared to be willing to strive towards a ‘highly congruent’ (Ronnestad and Skovholt 2003) self, others wanted to be accepted for who they were and preferred switching roles from being themselves to being the counsellor as and when required.
Skovholt and Starkey (2010, p. 129) refer to Sue (2005) when they say ‘integration of the practitioner’s personal and professional lives is essential because then the work becomes an expression of one’s total being’ and the current study showed that some counsellors are in the process of achieving this integration.
4.4 Current Professional Practice
bulk of it comes from being with it and learning from that presence’ (Skovholt and Starkey 2010, p. 127). Aruna reiterated ‘… I learnt it all on the job. I learn every day. Learning to deal with the variety of clients and their problems does not hap- pen overnight’. Apart from improving and honing skills and techniques, counsel- lors had also incorporated new approaches to their practice. For instance, Rajesh said that he had included lifestyle suggestions and spiritual exercises in his prac- tice; Madhuri had learnt to schedule her appointments in such a way that she did not get overwhelmed or tired at the end of the day. For instance, if she had to use a deep therapeutic exercise in one session, she scheduled a session with a lighter issue next or kept a longer break before the next session.
McLeod (2003, p. 39) stated that ‘Counselling is an activity that is inextricably bound up with the culture of Western Industrial societies, and is therefore not nec- essarily relevant to problems experienced by members of other cultural groups’.
If so, how do Indian counsellors use these approaches? It was found that the sam- ple of counsellors also invented and experimented with newer techniques and approaches that they believed in. For instance, Anita reported including energy sci- ence in her process wherein she suggested to her clients that they take a salt-water bath to remove negativity from their bodies (a practice followed in Reiki).
Counsellors also learnt from their mistakes and experiences with various clients and various client problems; they, hence, contextualized their therapy practices and approaches to suit their clientele. For instance, Suhasini, having studied and worked in the U.S.A., had realized over the years that clients in India functioned differently; so she deleted a line from her contract sheet2 which had asked clients to pay the session’s fees even if they missed their appointment. She also stated that through experience she had learnt to recognize what kind of questions or state- ments triggered an argument or a volatile situation between couples during her marital counselling sessions and hence avoided those. Similarly, Madhuri had found out that she could not rely entirely on psychological assessments done by various psychologists, but needed to complement those with her own observations and judgement. She said,
Indians are culturally vocal people, they prefer talking rather than writing. So they don’t like doing tests and questionnaires. On the contrary, when you are talking to them, you can observe so many things such as their body language, tone and expression which will give so much more insight and understanding compared to a written test report. (Madhuri)
This corroborates with Kolb’s experiential learning model (1984). For instance, counsellors first experienced an unexpected outcome such as an intense argument between couples with marital disharmony during the session (concrete experi- ence). They then reflected on their practice, looked for anything that they could have done differently in the session or with the client (observation and expe- rience); they then formed abstract concepts of the possible reasons, ways to re- establish what was lost or how they could have prevented what had happened
2The counselling contract outlines the confidentiality and boundaries that a counsellor offers.
(forming abstract concepts) and finally applied their new ways of dealing with the similar issue with another client having a problem of similar nature (testing in new situations). This is perhaps the process of how experience taught counsellors to create new techniques and ways to deal with newer problems or difficulties faced by them in the counselling process (Smith 2001; Fortin and Chevrier 2003).
Most counsellors viewed failure as an opportunity to learn. They also viewed every single day with their client as a new learning experience. This learning mode observed in counsellors was seen from several responses of counsellors,
‘Every client teaches you something so valuable’, ‘every day is a new learning experience’ and ‘I will learn until I die’. Such openness to learning has also been found to be an important prerequisite for optimal functioning of a therapist by Ronnestad and Skovholt (2001 as cited in Skovholt and Starkey 2010). It has also been evidenced in Skovholt et al. (2004).
4.4.2 Professional Identity
A counsellor’s job is not restricted to dealing with clients alone but also network- ing with other professionals and maintaining a good rapport with them. Thus, over the years of practice, counsellors develop a professional identity for themselves.
Vineeth through his experiences in the profession had become more confident to talk to and deal with senior faculty and had shed his fear of people in author- ity. He had also earned the confidence and appreciation of many psychiatrists with whom he had worked with. Prabhu and Madhuri who worked really hard to set up their private practices felt proud of the confidence that other professionals and clients had in them when more clients were being referred to them. Madhuri said
There is a certain amount of recognition, appreciation and respect for my work. I know that I have established myself and I am pretty confident of my credibility. That comes from my clients because every client has come by referral; I don’t advertise or anything;
only through word-of-mouth… It makes me feel good, feel successful. (Madhuri)
Such confidence and credibility increases motivation in counsellors to deal with more difficult clients and challenging problems. Aruna also had found herself earning the confidence of her colleagues in the hospital she worked in. She said
Earlier doctors used to say ‘what is she going to do? How can talking and listening to a patient help?’ Today, they come to me and say ‘this patient might be depressed since the operation, can you talk? Can you look it up and see what is wrong?’ (Aruna)
According to Prabhu, ‘it really takes a lot of effort and time to establish that even non-medical intervention can be equally efficient just as medical interven- tion…’. Rajesh who began counselling at the age of forty, found himself becom- ing more passionate, intrinsically motivated and always looked forward to meeting clients and engaging himself in the counselling process more. The level of cred- ibility, competence and trust that counsellors have earned reflect on their expertise.
This professional identity is often an integral component of counsellors’ self- definition. The integration was to such an extent that one of the counsellors needed to respond to her own personal problem from her professional role. When Madhuri had a personal problem she asked herself, ‘If I had a client with the same problem how would I deal with it?’ Many of the other counsellors derived much of their self-identity, strength and fulfilment from their profession as accounted by some of the counsellors below:
If I was a mechanic I would have remained a mechanic. Having made the decision to change my profession against my parents’ and relatives’ advice and having achieved so much, I feel proud to have chosen this profession; proud to have worked in an educational setting and I will learn till I die. It has definitely been a rewarding journey so far. (Vineeth)
For Latha, Rajesh and Renu it gave them a deep sense of satisfaction to make a difference to people but for Latha it was more than that. She said ‘I now know why I was born. I found my niche; my purpose. I am satisfied’. Renu also expressed that psychiatrists and psychologists were considered to be in the field of failures and her confidence in the profession was seen when she said ‘I try to suc- ceed in this field of failures’.
For Suhasini, her life experiences have contributed to her success as a counsel- lor. She said
I went through a lot in my life before I became a counsellor. All those experiences have helped, especially my age. My husband was ill for a long time before he passed away…
I basically had a lot of empathy for human beings, and I was always good with interper- sonal relationships. That helped me become a counsellor. (Suhasini)
It appeared that counselling others had a deep-rooted impact on the self, both personally and professionally. With experience and practice, counsellors have learnt to change those techniques and approaches which did not work and create new ones to tackle the newer issues they faced every day. This corresponds to the professional development and integration at the ‘personal/environmental interac- tional level’ that Ronnestand and Skovholt (2003) found in their study on practi- tioner’s development. Previous successes and the diversity of clients and problems they have dealt with, have made them confident of their competence as a success- ful counsellor. For many counsellors, their professional development was more of a personal journey to fight against stigma, to create a niche for themselves in the helping field and to reach the status that they have achieved. These findings corre- late to what Skovholt and Starkey (2010) said, ‘To know and understand suffering on a personal level helps practitioners better understand client pain and suffering thereby increasing the practitioner’s capacity for empathy’. p. 129
There appeared to be two main factors that were striking about counsellors from their narratives. One was the strong thirst for knowledge and learning end- lessly and the other was an inclination or an interest to work with people.