Called to Counsel

Rating:
Summary: Counseling Skills Made Easy
Review: I found it relatively easy to learn the 58 counseling micro-skills featured in Called to Counsel, due to the book's programmed learning format. However, it did take longer than I anticipated to do all the practice exercises.

Each of the counseling micro-skills has its own mini section in Called to Counsel. Each of these sections starts with a true counsling story, which halped to get me intrested in that particular skill.

The story is followed by one or two pages of clear "how-to-do-it" text for each skill, which is usually accompanied by a humorous cartoon.

The cartoons are in a series called "Doc & Duck," in which "Doc" is a wise old owl who is the master counselor, "Duck" is a Gumby-like character who is the perpetual client, and a third character, "Quack," is a wanna-be counselor who makes every mistake in the book!

The last part of each micro-skill section is a written "Skill Builder" exercise in which you actually write right in the book, so that you keep a record of your progress. Also, there is a suggested format at the end of each chapter for making a practice tape which incorporates the micro-skills found in that chapter.

Called to Counsel is organized in nine chapters, which teach skills for avoiding common counseling mistakes, structuring an interview, using active listening and attending skills, including probes and prompts where appropriate, connecting content and emotions with values, and functioning as a "coach" to help your client create and test various action plans. Three specialty chapters teach micro-skills for using (not abusing) Scripture in counseling and knowing when and when not to introduce prayer into the counseling process, as well as dealing with issues of the occult if and when they come up in a counseling interview.

In conclusion, this is not a book of psychological or counseling theory, but a practical handbook for learning specific counseling skills.

It took me about twenty-five or thirty hours to do all the practice exercises in the book, including the counsling tapes and tape analysis. I found it very worthwhile, because the skills are very helpful.