EVERYBODY LOVES NELSON MANDELA

by Stanley

Some 40 years ago Martin Buber and Carl Rogers engaged in a public debate that has since become famous. Buber was a philosopher not a therapist; Rogers, of course, was the originator of counselling. Buber’s work ‘I – Thou’ is based upon the idea that dialogue is an experience with another person that goes beyond explicit communication. It is not a complete unity with another person. Rather, it is a mutual and equal respect for the differences between two people. This, Buber called the ‘I-thou’ relationship, as different from the ‘I-It’ relationship where the other person is treated as an object.

In the debate, one disagreement between Rogers and Buber was the question of inequality in the therapeutic relationship. Buber’s point was that therapy can never have the equality of ‘I-thou’ because the role of the therapist and the patient are fundamentally different and unequal.

The argument is that the client comes to the therapist for help and therefore there is a power differential, however much we talk of the importance of ‘relationship’. This is the style of doctor/patient or instructor/student [1]. Buber pointed out that these are quite rightly asymmetrical relationships because the instructor teaches the student and the doctor treats the patient. In such interactions, an I-thou dialogue is neither possible, nor desirable. It’s the same for the counsellor, the client requires help and the clinician professes to be able to give it. Thus, by definition, complete equality cannot exist. Rogers, of course, maintained that there was mutuality in his client-centred work.

Rather than follow Roger’s line of argument, I want to suggest that the relationship in counselling is certainly asymmetrical and unequal, but in precisely the opposite way implied by Buber. There is an inequality and it resides in the fact that it is the client who has the greater power, whilst the therapist is, or should be, in a subservient position.

Incidentally, such asymmetry is necessary in any normal, healthy relationship. It swings backward and forward between two people – sometimes one way, sometimes the other, as needs vary.

In person-centred work it is the client who consistently determines the content and direction of the session. The power to explore oneself and one’s direction is the very essence of person-centred work. This never changes, no matter how long the relationship lasts.

(For convenience only I will refer to the therapist as ‘he’ and the client as ‘she’)

As closely as possible the therapist wants to be where she is coming from; he is, if you like, a mirror; but he is not an empty mirror. His mirroring is tinged, but not coloured, by his own personality. Nevertheless, true empathy is possible because there is a commonality of human emotions.

As time goes on there are subtle changes in the relationship. The need for accurate empathic following is always there, but there begins to be room, even a necessity, for his personality to show. In the beginning this might have interfered with her ability to follow herself. As she gains power this is less the case because she has more inner substance to stay with herself and not be thrown off course; but he is always aware of this critical factor, pulling back when it is even dimly necessary; and never happier when she is fully engaged with herself and communicating how it is.

In our profession it is considered mandatory for counsellors to have regular supervision – these are simply counselling sessions designed to keep the counsellor ‘clear’ in his relationship with clients. It’s astonishing that we don’t have the same requirement to keep ‘clear’ our relationships in life that are always challenging and forever changing. If we did, then some form of client-centred work should be a part of the ongoing business of living – as, for some folk, meditation is.

So when should counselling finish. To answer this we have to stop thinking in terms of therapy and remedial treatment. In a sense, person-centred work has become something more than counselling. It is certainly not the cure of sickness; it is not teaching a specific skill. It is not ultimately the solving of personal problems. You can describe it as ‘growth’; but then we have to ask what this means. Does it mean to be ever more adult and grown up? That’s not quite right, is it? In certain ways, one can become more childlike, more spontaneous and silly. For some people it means becoming less responsible; for others more responsible. You can’t describe it in terms of outcome. One person’s outcome is another person’s poison.

Another favourite way to describe its purpose is to say that it helps one to become all that one could be, to realise one’s potential. Good, but there is a nasty little trap in this idea: it can take your eye off the ball; it entices you to overlook where the action is, to measure what you are by something you are not. You become a possibility – a ‘could be’, a potentiality – and never quite as good as you could be. But the real action is where the ball is now’ (see my paper Pausing to Focus).

Perhaps the best description of the work is that of ‘clearing’, as we have said: clarification of what is going on, with an eye for the barely noticeable, for the overlooked unwanted feeling that one is most familiar with, for the off-beat thought that’s not allowed.

Let me give you an example of this last: a naughty thought. Yesterday was Nelson Mandela’s birthday. I had my usual reaction to his name. I asked myself: Why do I hate Nelson Mandela ? … pause … That’s not very nice. Am I jealous? … No, not quite … I know what it is. It’s because my wife and everyone used to think he was so f**ing wonderful … pause … Yes, that’s it, he reminds me of Jacky Slater. Jacky Slater was the boy down the road who was held up to me as being so wonderful, so good. Not like me. Why wasn’t I more like Jacky Slater? He was clever at school, always clean and well dressed. I hated the little turd. I guess my parents were only trying to improve me.

Does this discovery make me wiser? No.

Surprised? Yes.

And I’m allowed to hate Nelson Mandela if I want to.

That feels better !

[1] I am differentiating ‘instructor’ from ‘teacher’. One goes to an instructor to learn a specific technique; whereas the teacher is an educator. Education has, or should have, a broader function; and as such, the practice of education has much to learn from the client-centred approach, as Rogers was never tied of stressing.

WHAT’S GOING ON ?

by Stanley

Freud wrote a paper called ‘Mourning and Melancholia’. (Melancholia is the old fashioned word for depression). He made the observation that mourning the loss of a loved one and melancholia have almost the same symptoms: a sense of loss and sadness, sleeplessness, lack of meaning and motivation in life. He said the similarity was because both cases were suffering from loss. In mourning the person is suffering the loss of another; in melancholia they are suffering from a loss of ‘self’ – the ego he called it.

To be in mourning you must have had some kind of relationship in the first place, otherwise there would be nothing to mourn; likewise, to suffer a loss of self you must have had a self to begin with. But there are some people who have suffered a loss of self so early in life that they have almost forgotten what it is like to have one. They have gotten over it – although they may suspect something is missing. They have, as they say, adjusted. One noticeable characteristic is they have no idea what is going on. I mean they have difficulty grasping life as an ongoing process. To lose ‘self’ is to be disconnected with the flow of life, the flow of life around you that’s going on all the time. You’re not ‘with it’, as they say.

Nouns are a problem here. They make us think in terms of discrete things. ‘Things’ do not flow well. Ideas of the Self or the Spirit tend to fixate the mind on the grand substances, thus missing the flow of what is going on.

Instead of thinking about The Unconscious or The Self or The Soul let’s think in terms of activities and processes – about what is going on. And what goes on for me is unlike what goes on for you.

This distinctiveness is not about our unique abilities, the things we do – like sport or art, music or love of nature. These are all understood as personal preferences. It’s about our specific ‘take’ on the close-in nuances of human interaction. For that sort of carry-on often the only outlet is ‘gossip’. The subtle interplay between familiars where we huddle in secret enclaves to make known our nitpicking loves and hates and to find out what’s going on between Freddy and Fredericka. It’s in these small matters where we can glimpse people’s reality, what’s going on for people and between people.

A mind that has lost the sense of flow is not good at picking up small disparities – being much more interested in static pictures, ideas and outcomes. It’s why women and gay men are better at recognising faces[1] and why they are better at gossip. No doubt this is also why women are better therapists too. It’s the love of detail and the curiosity about people. Of course, what I have just said is more like a piece of gossip itself, which is quite fitting!

This kind of talk between people is quite important. Gossip may seem superficial and judgemental. But it is very specific, delighting the in details. It’s not about me, it’s about other people; and it’s not about the PR stories, it’s a hunger to know what really goes on – or, just as important, what people think is going on, (never forgetting that this is what’s going on too).

Mature discussion is about more important things. But so far, no one has come to me and said: “Stanley, I need a session, I’m terribly worried about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico”. People’s real concerns, here at least, aren’t about the oil spill, or global warming; people don’t have problems with their religion or their spiritual affinities. When they need help it’s with concerns that are much closer to home where it bites: people don’t wrestle with demons on the highway to enlightenment, but in the family lounge room while the television’s going.

“Half the time I think it shouldn’t matter. I should concentrate on seeing things in their proper perspective. If only I could get a more balanced outlook these trivialities wouldn’t seem so important.”

It is always a pain to me when I see people struggling to be better balanced. I mean, it’s OK to be balanced, whatever that means, but to try to be balanced !! For God’s sake, who’s balanced? Science is balanced, philosophy tries to be – but people are not. When I hear someone who has set that up as an ideal for themselves I worry.

High minded theories about the self are great for one’s sense of spiritual significance, but don’t overlook one’s little grumble about who left the food crumbs on the lounge carpet; or why some people leave all the lights on in the house !

Trivia?

No. Bubbling geothermals !

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[1] See Interesting article on this in the Christchurch Press 29 June.

Headline - “Its official: men are worse at faces than women”