Essay Sample on Confrontation in Counseling: Promoting Wellness, Awareness & Positive Change

Confrontation is one of the basic interventions in counseling, where the counselors use in the promotion of the client's wellness. The effective confrontation is a source of awareness and also insight and increases the congruencies between the goals of the client as well as their behaviors. Also, it provides a basis for open communication and results in people's positive change in emotions, actions and thoughts (Cormier, 63). Despite the necessity and the benefits brought about by confrontation, the term can invoke people's negative emotions as particular during training when counseling students. There are some of the essential elements of healthy confrontations, which are described below.

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To describe the elements, we can base on the following case study. "A teacher enters a classroom over and over again and finds a student making noise. The teacher confronted on the student that 'you have said that you will change this habit but from the look of things, it shows that you will keep doing it over and over. Kindly let me know what could be going on and how your habit repetition benefits you'". Another case study is where a judge confronts a criminal. The criminal has been judged for many offenses including minor ones like stealing and personal assaults. The judge confronts the criminal to either ask for forgiveness or use the chance as a final warning against him committing any other crime. Otherwise, he will have to undergo a life sentence.

First, an effective confrontation must be in person, in private. This means that if it is possible, meet the person face-to-face especially in a private setting (Cormier, 64). Other places can do for one-on-one conversations in cases where the offices or the private setting will not allow for the conversations. Confrontations also need to have positive non-verbal. In this case, the facial expressions, mannerisms, tone of voice all have common communication with the other person. Despite that, there could be cultural differences concerning the non-verbal communication, then making eye contact always reveals a show of focus and respect. Besides, confrontation should have no excess emotional baggage. As depicted from the above two case studies, maintaining control in a confrontational conversation, one needs to keep calm and also focused on any specific issue (MacCluskie, 213).

The use of the "I" messages is also another basic element of another effective confrontation. One needs to own their ideas, feelings, or thoughts. Using "I" is helpful in being specific as opposed to using generalizations. Besides, it is crucial to focus on desirable behaviors. Thus a good confrontation mainly concentrates on what one wants rather than what he/she does not want. Finally, one should focus on the positive results and the consequences (Harrow, 173). This hence appeals to the self-interest of a person or the basic vision through the introduction of the factor of 'what is in me?' factor.

The aspect of not handling issues the right way or letting things happen for long in a confrontation are symptoms of the drag in an organization or person's thrive since it has a lasting impact. Confrontation when done right, add up to one's assets of the business, while when it is done in the wrong way, it becomes disastrous. Everyone desires a healthy confrontation which allows people to close their existing gap and find a resolution to the underlying problem.

References

Cormier, Alan S. "Helpful Strategies for Teaching Effective Confrontation Skills." Ideas and Research 1ou Can Use: VISTAS 1.1 (2012): 1-2. https://www.thinkhdi.com/library/supportworld/2017/redefining-confrontation-how-confrontation-can-be-a-good-thing.asp

Harrow, Alan S. "Helpful Strategies for Teaching Effective Confrontation Skills." Ideas and Research 1ou Can Use: VISTAS 1.1 (2012): 1-2.

MacCluskie, Kathryn. Acquiring counseling skills: Integrating theory, multiculturalism, and self-awareness. Pearson Higher Ed, 2011.