My Approach to Therapy, Counselling & Coaching

My approach to therapy / counselling / coaching is person-centred.

Person-centred (or non-directive / Rogerian) therapy is a highly effective evidence-based approach that helps people to find their own best solutions to their problems.*

Person-centred therapy provides an environment for you to reappraise your thoughts, feelings, actions, values and strengths, so that you can understand your situation in your own way, unlock your potential, and overcome your difficulties.

The ‘purest’ form of therapy, this approach seeks to do nothing to you: no assessment, no judgment, no treatments, no expectations.  This radical respect for your self-determination is unique.  It allows you to re-organise yourself internally, becoming stronger and more authentic.

You don’t know the answers yet.  Of course you don’t – you don’t even know the right questions yet.

But you’d be amazed at how powerful this can be.

A truly holistic approach, person-centred therapy works with whatever the client brings: cognition (thoughts), emotions, feelings and the body’s ‘felt sense’.  The focus is on how the client relates to these things in the present moment.

Person-centred therapy is unique in being non-directive, with no diagnoses, no homework, expectations or judgments from the therapist.  These things are not normally helpful to real, lasting personality change.

So in person-centred therapy problems and solutions are addressed from the client’s unique, individual perspective, not the therapist’s.  No mumbo-jumbo, no do this, do that.

Things move forward at the client’s pace, in accordance with what is most important to them.  Change happens from the inside-out, and often occurs in the sessions.  Therapy is complete whenever the client feels that they no longer need support.

Person-centred therapy works well with all types of condition and all types of person.  It is the specialism that suits all conditions.  And it is as individual as you are.

The non-directive / person-centred approach was developed in the mid-twentieth century by the famous psychologist Carl Rogers, based on analysis of thousands of hours of client-therapist contact.  He discovered that it is the therapeutic relationship, not any particular treatment or technique, that is at the heart of therapeutic change in the client.

His theory is based on the observation that all living things have great potential for adaptation, recovery, growth, healing and development.  No matter what the world does to a living thing, it will always and only persist in trying to to be its best self – even if at times we humans lose sight of this.

Rogers also noted that mental distress arises where the personality struggles to reconcile our temperament and our social conditioning, usually with in relation to interpersonal relationships and societal expectations.

So a person-centred approach to therapy is me helping you to de-programme yourself.  It is not me re-programming you.

All of these insights have been very well-supported by research over the years.  The science is on our side.

Find out more here: Blog: Person-centred Therapy: the Misunderstood Miracle

*  Person-centred therapy is as effective as CBT (in research funded by BACP and published in the journal The Lancet Psychiatry in 2021).   Also In a major study of previous research it was found that person-centred therapy is broadly as effective as other leading types of therapy.  [Elliott, R, & Freire, B., (2008) Person-centred experiential therapies are highly effective: summary of the 2008 meta-analysis. Person-centred Quarterly, November, 1-3.]

* See Jordan Peterson’s ‘Personality and its transformations, lecture 1: introduction and overview’. Available for free on YouTube.

Mindfulness is an important part of my daily life as a Buddhist.  But it is also actually what person-centred therapy is all about: bringing life’s experience into our awareness.  Uniquely, the person-centred approach involves the facilitation of mindfulness in the client, from within, not the direction of it from the outside.

I am ready to discuss mindfulness and meditation practices if this is raised by the client or seems to be in our path as the dialogue unfolds.

Experiential, existential and spiritual perspectives might also be useful for some clients, and I will focus on these if this seems to be appropriate.

These are very closely related to person-centred psychology, and do not diminish the essentially non-directive nature of the therapeutic conversation: a person-centred dialogue often includes these things.

The person-centred approach is very different to other therapies.  We’ll be having a real conversation, but as equals, with gentleness and respect for your self-determination.

We will focus on whatever is most important to you at that moment, feeling our way forward together.  Bring words or bring silence, its all ok.  We can start anywhere.

Person-centred therapy is difficult and requires skill.  Many therapists and counsellors claim to work in a person-centred way but may not be suitably trained.  Choose your therapist carefully.

Find out more about my services.