by Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D.

Most clients need to feel accepted by their therapist in order to feel safe enough to make changes. As you balance acceptance and change, you should be responsive to the needs and abilities of your clients.

"You can throw this out if it doesn’t fit." I say this liberally to my clients as a way of giving them permission to tell me that the balance isn’t right. If a client rejects many interventions, I tip the balance toward supportive therapy.

"I’m holding up a mirror for you," I tell clients when I reflect back to them an obvious gift or strength that they have but they don’t see in themselves. It is much easier for a client to accept troublesome parts of themselves if they can also see it as a gift. For example, one client was more capable of accepting her "bossiness" that led to relationship problems when she could see it also as a capacity for leadership. For her, change came to mean gaining skill in expressing her strength rather than invalidating an essential aspect of her identity.

Also by Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D.