Introduction
For the purposes of this assignment, I conducted an interview with my 18-year-old brother who has recently started college more than part-time and also works full-time. Because of the relationship between us, I feel that the conversation was easy and therefore may not be an accurate representation of how a real interview would have gone. Aside from that, I feel that the counseling session went well in some instances but not in others. I will explain my strengths and weaknesses in different areas in the following sections.
Non-Verbal Behavior I feel that one of the largest weaknesses as a counselor for this session was my non-verbal behavior. Listening over the recording, I noticed that …show more content…
In the interview, I felt that I was able to accurate reflect how my client was feeling. What’s more, even though he felt like he had everything under control, I could sense some ambivalence in his tone, to which I responded with sharing a way to help him de-stress. From this, I feel like I was able to let him know that it was okay not to be able to handle everything alone and that I could help him through the struggle of managing school while working full-time.
Multicultural/Spiritual/Religious …show more content…
At one point in the interview, he talked about how it was so easy for him to walk into a place and get a job. At one point, he said, “people usually love me”. He never attributed this to being a white male, which I could not help but think while he was saying this. What is more, the way he spoke about managing and handling his school and work because he “had to” also spoke to the idea of individualism in the American society. Overall, I found this aspect of the conversation very interesting, because while I never explicitly asked about anything to do with multiculturalism, it came up on its own.
Awareness of Self as a Counselor I believe my awareness of myself as a counselor was very high for this interview. While I feel that I was able to engage with my client and help him feel like I was there for him, I do not believe I pushed any of my values on him. While I did share mindfulness meditations as something I like to do, I relayed that information in a way to show the commonalities between what he already does and then express how meditations might be something he would like, as well. He seemed to accept the idea as something he was interested in, so I feel that it was helpful.