Person-centred Therapy
Individuals who enter into counselling with a person-centred therapist work towards peeling away layers of defences to be able to find congruence between themselves and their experiences.
Person-centred therapists believe that every person has a basic self, which must be sought out, recognized, valued, respected and followed in order to live an authentic life. If individuals are able to manage their emotions more easily and trust what their inner self is telling them, they will be able to heal.
Therapists who work with this counselling approach believe that people tend to push aside their true inner feelings. When that happens, individuals become a construct of society and their lives are then shaped by the ideals of others. Often it is like there are two people living in one individual: the one which one truly is and the one that is dictated by others.
Carl Rogers developed this counselling approach. He discovered that the underlying question all individuals in counselling ask is: “who am I really?” He believed people want to discover their basic identity and purpose.
References:
Rogers, C.R. (1961) On Becoming A Person: A Therapists View of
Psychotherapy
(10th Ed). Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company.
Rogers, C.R. and Stevens, B. (1967) Person to Person: The Problem
with Being
Human. Utah, Real People Press.
Prochaska, J.O. and Norcross, J.C. (2003) Systems of Psychotherapy: A Transtheoretical Model (Fifth Edition). Pacific Grove, Brooks/Cole.