Josh Greiner
What comes to mind when you think about your strategy for cleaning up your house? Better yet, what is your strategy when you have company coming over and you only have a little bit of time? Do you even have a strategy? There are several ways to clean your house, but two main competing themes come to mind. The first strategy is to clean every little thing that comes up. You dust every corner, you pick up everything in the room, you polish the furniture, etc. The other method is that you will just focus on the significant issues that need cleaning. You will handle all the small things later. Yes, you need to put away your laundry, but no, you don’t need to dust under your piano.
That same principle can be so very helpful in counseling as well. One of the most common situations I observe in the supervision of ACBC candidates is that they like to clean up every little mess that the counselee brings up in their lives. They are coming to counseling for their broken marriage, sinful communication, and unresolved anger. However, this week they had a smaller, unrelated situation come up (say, a child who was discouraged by a poor grade), and they want to talk about it.
In those moments as a counselor, it can be tempting to play spiritual Whac-A-Mole or clean up every little mess they bring to you. However, let me encourage you that doing this will not only lead to ineffective counseling but also to burnout. Here is what you should do instead.
Acknowledge Their Concern
When someone brings up an issue to you, dismissing it out of hand is not going to go well. You will only push them away and fail to display the love of Christ. You will lose relational capital with them, and it may be challenging for them to listen during your session.
But that doesn’t mean that you should automatically change your agenda (you do have one of those, right?) and go with this new direction. You may believe that their concern warrants a change in plan, but you might not. Consider very carefully if you will change your plans.
If you do not believe that you should (and in most cases, you should not abandon your agenda), start by acknowledging the severity of the issue with your counselee.
Take Notes
Next, write this issue down in your notes (you are taking notes, and in such a way that keeps all this organized, right?). If you do not think it is wise to move from your agenda but also think there could be value in circling back one day, make a note.
You can tell your counselee that you hear them and that you will circle back to the theme when the time is right. Many times, this will be a great encouragement to your counselee!
Look for Larger Themes
After this, look to see how this “new” situation might fit into the larger context of what has been happening in counseling. Many times, the counselee’s situation contains deep themes, patterns, idols, etc.
They may bring up a conflict at work. This might be a great time to use that to talk about the issues you see at home as well. Many times, these issues are not present in a vacuum, but you, as a counselor, have to see the larger picture and connect the dots. The only way you can do that is if you have done really good and careful data gathering in your opening sessions (you are doing careful data gathering, right?).
Handle Primary Things First
One of the most challenging things in counseling is knowing where to start. A metaphor that I often use with my counselees and trainees is that of the Emergency Room. When a person comes into the ER with bullet wounds, the doctors and nurses are not primarily concerned with the patient’s eating habits.
Everyone in that situation is working toward one goal: stop this patient from dying by stopping the bleeding. We do the same kind of triage in the counseling room.
As you attempt to navigate the various messes that your counselee brings up, make sure you stick to the more significant issues you see in your counselee (you do have a bit of a map of counseling, right?). Knowing the major issues and where you are going will prevent you from cleaning up all the spills that come along the way.
Trust in the Lord and His Spirit
Finally, remember that you and your counselee need to trust in what the Lord is doing. There might be issues that they (and you) want to deal with, but you know you must handle other things first. You might even be concluding counseling and know that there is much more work to be done, but you just do not have the ability to handle that right now.
Both parties, the counselee and the counselor, need to have a deep trust in God’s ability to handle all of these things (you are making sure you are dependent on the Lord, right?).
As your counselee brings all kinds of messes that were not there when you started, or were there but you did not see them, remember that you don’t need to clean them all up, and you don’t need to clean them up right away.
Rather, assess the situation, and if the issue can wait, follow these steps.
