Non Directivity

The Nondirective Practice

Nondirective counselling was the product of a number of failed psychotherapy sessions of Carl Rogers. At the beginning of his career as a practicing therapist, Rogers had no reservations about giving his insight and interpretation to a client, and when therapy failed it was evident to Rogers that the client could not grasp the significance of his interpretation. Rogers concluded the interview and what followed was the birth of nondirective counseling. In Rogers’ (1961) words:

I had been working with a highly intelligent mother whose boy was something of a hellion. The problem was clearly her early rejection of the boy, but over many interviews, I could not helpher to this insight. I drew her out, I gently pulled together the evidence she had given, trying to help her see the pattern. But we got nowhere. Finally I gave up. I told her that it seemed we had both tried, but we had failed, and that we might as well give up our contacts. She agreed. So we concluded the interview, shook hands, and she walked to the door of the office. Then she turned and asked, “Do you ever take adults for counselling here? When I replied in the affirmative, she said, “Well then, I would like some help.” She came to the chair she had left, and began to pour out her despair about her marriage, her troubled relationship with her husband, her sense of failure and confusion, all very different from the sterile “case history” she had given before. Real therapy began then, and ultimately it was very successful. This incident was one of a number which helped me to experience the fact – only fully realized later – that it is the client who knows what hurts, in what directions to go, what problems are crucial, what experiences have been deeply buried. It began to occur to me that unless I had a need to demonstrate my own cleverness and learning, I would do better to rely upon the client for the direction of movement in the process (p. 11-12)....