“If you wish to achieve worthwhile things in your personal and career life, you must become a worthwhile person in your own self-development.” – Brian Tracy

Finishing my first year of a Master of Counselling program at the University of Lethbridge, I’ve been reflecting on how far I’ve come, and how far I have to go.  The program has opened my eyes to a wide range of skills and knowledge that I will take with me in to the world of counselling, and to a plethora of skills and knowledge that I don’t yet have.  There are times in which I feel as though I will not be able to gain this knowledge in this short time.  However, we aren’t meant to learn everything we will need within our post-secondary and graduate programs.  Each client, each experience, and each day will bring new challenges and will stimulate further learning.

Professional development is not simply the attendance of workshops and conferences, although that is a part of it.  Professional development requires us to open our minds, suspend judgement, and allow ourselves to learn from everything we encounter.  It is surprising the ways in which we can learn and develop ourselves as professionals outside of the traditional methods of reading and attending lectures.  Every day we encounter possibilities for gaining knowledge that we can apply to our work, making us more effective counsellors. What this requires, then, is a willingness to merge professional development and self-development.  We need to see our work as part of our life, part of us.

I propose that we make interdisciplinary learning an important aspect of our professional development.  The application of knowledge from a variety of backgrounds nourishes our understanding of the world around us, and allows us to be open to the stories of our clients. Each person that we meet, be it client, friend, acquaintance or stranger, provide us with a seed of knowledge that we can use. The trick is to recognize the seed and pursue it. We need to branch out and explore learning opportunities outside of our discipline. Science, sociology, nthropology, religion, social work, politics, environment, and the humanities can all inform the work that we do every day with our clients.

So how do we do this?  I’m not sure I am fully able to answer that. For each of us it is different. But I would suggest that we take time every day to meditate on what lessons we’ve learned. We need to remember that as counsellors, we are not experts on our clients’ lives, but facilitators of their self-exploration.  Each client brings a lesson that we can learn ourselves, and it is the collaboration between the client and counsellor that make this profession so exciting.

Author Bio

Laura Gothreau is currently working on her Master of Counselling degree through the University of Lethbridge, while working at a non-profit disabilities service agency. Her areas of counselling interest are gender and sexuality, and she is passionate about her belief that accessible counselling services for all people strengthens communities.