Person-Centered Therapy

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Person-Centered Therapy created by Carl Rogers, this form of humanistic therapy deals with the ways in which people perceive themselves consciously rather than having a therapist try to interpret unconscious thoughts or ideas. There are many different components and tools used in person-centered therapy including active listening, genuineness, paraphrasing, and more. But the real point is that the client already has the answers to the problems and the job of the therapist is to listen without making any judgements, without giving advice, and simply help the client feel accepted and understand their own feelings.

Person-centered therapy gives more responsibility to the client in their own treatment and views humans in a positive manner. 

Carl Rogers stated: Practice, theory and research make it clear that the person-centered approach is built on a basic trust in the person depends on the actualizing tendency present in every living organism's tendency to grow, to develop, to realize its full potential. This way of being trusts the constructive directional flow of the human being toward a more complex and complete development. It is this directional flow that we aim to release.

The statement by Rogers that "our relationship transcends itself and becomes part of the something larger" is similar to the description of the reality which LeShan described as the one in which healing can take place, "healer and healee become one entity in a larger context without either of the two losing their individuality"

Most researchers would agree that Rogers person-centered therapy evolved throughthree developmental phases. The following phases are as follows:

1. PHASE I (1940-50): NONDIRECTIVE PSYCHOTHERAPY


2. PHASE II (1950-57): REFLECTIVE PSYCHOTHERAPY


3. PHASE III (1957-70): EXPERIENTIAL THERAPY

Person Centered Therapy and therapist

The therapist is free to be his or her own genuine self rather than having to respond in a specific manner.  Thus, the therapist can be who he or she is, including who he or she is while being totally attentive to the client's world. 

The therapist will move the client towards self awareness,  helping the client to experience previously denied feelings. They will teach the client to trust in themselves and to use this trust to find their direction in life. The person-centered therapist makes the client aware of their problems and then guilds them to a means of resolve them. They motivate the client in experiencing and expressing feelings. The person-centered therapist believes that good mental health is a balance between the ideal self and real self. This is where the problem lies, the result of difference between what we are and what we wish to be causes maladjusted behavior.

The therapist and client must have faith that the client can and will find self-direction. The therapist focus on the here and how. 

The three critical attitudes or values in Person or Client-Centered Therapy are:

1. Unconditional Positive Regard (Nonpossessive Warmth):
2. Empathy
3. Genuineness (Congruence)