This training starts Tuesday, January 23, 2024. Register now at the bottom of this page.
What: A course on Client-Centered Therapy
Who: Clinicians who want to learn Rogerian theory, and enhance their clinical effectiveness.
When: Tuesday mornings, from 9am to 12:15pm,
- January 23rd, 30th
- February 6th, 13th, 27th (no meeting 2/20)
- March 5th, 12th, 19th
Where:
GETME Experiential Process Studio
615 Congress Street
Suite 423
Portland, ME, 04101
Instructor: Tom Kubasik, LCPC, NCC
Cost:
Students and conditionally licensees: $595
Fully Licensed Clinicians: $695
A deposit of $95 dollars is required to hold your space.
A certificate of 24 Contact Hours will be awarded for the completion of this program.
Register for this course at the bottom of this page.
One of the oldest traditions in the humanistic therapy movement, Carl Rogers developed Client-Centered Therapy in the 1940s, and continued to research, practice and teach this method until his death in 1987. The approach was wildly popular in the 60s and 70s, and Rogers himself is considered to be one of the most influential therapists in history.
Rogers was a giant of psychotherapy research. He was among the first to bring audio recording to sessions in order to deeply study both client and therapist processes. He made recordings and transcripts available for study, both to show how therapy works, and to demonstrate the effectiveness of his approach. Much of academia was unmoved. Rogers’ commented:
“In universities we are underrepresented, badly misunderstood, mistakenly seen as superficial. We are underrepresented partly because we constitute a threat to the academically minded. We espouse the importance of experiential as well as cognitive learning. Such learning involves the risk of being changed by the experience, and this can be frightening to one whose world is intellectually structured.”
Since the 1980s Client-Centered Therapy’s influence has faded, but in some ways we can see this as the approach becoming a victim of its own success. Most therapists now would endorse Rogers’ three “core conditions” of therapist authenticity, positive regard for the client, and accurate empathy. Yet many don’t know where these ideas came from, or are under the mistaken impression that this form of therapy has been superseded, or even “proven wrong.” Other therapists imagine that client-centered therapy is “easy,” or that they themselves are sufficiently “empathic” as to have already mastered client-centered interventions without needing to study them.
None of this is true.
Client-Centered therapy is as powerful as it ever was for anybody willing to learn its discipline. Far from being proved wrong, research continues to support the effects of Rogers’ principles on therapy outcomes. And, while most therapists prefer more directive approaches, contemporary research has affirmed the efficacy Client-Centered Therapy itself. Even Aaron Beck, founder of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, insists on the importance of the Rogerian core conditions. So, even if you don’t plan on becoming a Client-Centered therapist, being able to hone in on immediate client experiencing will improve your odds of selecting the correct intervention in whatever theory you use.
There is much more to this theory than “being a nice person,” or “repeating what the client says,” as was the old caricature of the Client-Centered Therapist. There is, in fact, an intricate Client-Centered theory of how people come to suffer, and how they can be helped. Come learn it.
Topics Include:
– Client-Centered Theory
– The Conditions for Therapeutic Change
– Rogerian Empathy
– Therapeutic Presence
– The Rogerian Repertoire
– Testing Therapist Understanding / Checking Perceptions
Learning Objectives:
This course will help participants to:
– Articulate the central features of Client-Centered theory and practice.
– Develop their personal therapeutic presence.
– Strengthen therapeutic relationships with clients.
– Identify the most important and productive client material.
Meeting 1
Introduction to Client-Centered Theory
Meeting 2
The Necessary & Sufficient Therapeutic Conditions
Meeting 3
Rogerian Empathy: What it Is, What it Isn’t.
Meeting 4
The Client-Centered Repertoire
Meeting 5
Personal Meanings of Client Expression
Meeting 6
Testing Therapist Understanding / Checking Therapist Perceptions
Meeting 7
Gene Gendlin’s Contributions to Client-Centered Therapy
Meeting 8
Client-Centered Therapy From 1980s to the Present
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