May 2023 Clinical Supervision Topic: Congruence and Genuineness
Check out the conversations from previous years here!
Lately I’ve been learning about the POTT, person of the therapist, reading a few chapter’s from Aponte’s book, courtesy of Susie Snyder.
One of the things that has stood out to me is the importance of a therapist knowing their themes. Themes are basically our stuff. The stories, wounds, difficult patterns, etc. that we all carry. Here are some examples:
Needing to be liked
Conflict avoidance
Not enough-ness: I should be more ________
Thinking there’s something else you should be doing
Feeling pressure to fix things
Doubting yourself/not trusting yourself
Burnout: I can’t cope, there are no solutions, I give up
I’m the expert, the “healthy” one
This month I’m going to ask you to identify one of your themes, and potentially, if you like, share it with me and/or your supervision group.
Why?
When we’re shooting for congruence and authenticity, it doesn’t mean that we share everything that we experience with the client. We need to know which things we keep private and work on separately, and which are important to share and in service of the client. Along these lines, we’ll also be talking about self-disclosure.
Can’t wait to see you all!
