The education, supervised training, and outlooks of these professionals vary greatly, as do their fees and the average length of time therapy can be expected to last. We will look more closely at these differences later on.
THE RANGE OF APPROACHES TO THERAPY
Because of their differences in training and personal or theoretical preferences, the distinct classes of therapists represent a diversity of approaches to therapy. There are numerous schools of psychoanalysis, psychotherapy, behavioral therapy, group therapy, and marriage and family therapy, and a range of approaches to personal adjustment, including exercise therapies, relaxation techniques, forms of meditation, and drug and nutrition therapies.
From any one of these, a multitude of schools of thought branches out. For example, psychoanalysis has, since Freud, developed along a number of different lines: each major psychoanalyst has formulated his or her own approach to analysis that distinguishes itself from Freud's. Psychotherapy, to take another example, is not a single approach to therapy, but rather makes up an entire field. It is the largest and most rapidly growing area relating to mental health. In it are included distinct approaches, such as client-centered therapy, Gestalt therapy, transactional analysis, rational-emotive therapy, existential-humanistic therapy, reality therapy, logotherapy, Adlerian therapy, emotional flooding therapies, and direct decision therapy.
In later chapters, we will look at these approaches to psychotherapy more closely. The goal throughout this book will be to enable you to understand enough about each of the major therapies to make an informed decision in choosing an approach (and there may be more than one) that will be most useful in relation to your own understanding of your objectives, whether they are long-range or focused on the need to eliminate immediate obstacles to growth.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN COUNSELING AND PSYCHOTHERAPY
Counseling and psychotherapy have developed a great deal in recent years—so much so that their boundaries have often overlapped. Clear-cut distinctions between the two fields are increasingly hard to draw. Nevertheless, some professionals prefer to call themselves by one name and some by the other.
In general terms, counseling tends to be a short-term process the purpose of which is to help the client, couple, or family overcome specific problems and eliminate blocks to growth. Counseling gives individuals a chance to resolve personal problems and concerns. Most counselors attempt to help their clients become aware of a widened range of possibilities of choice; from this perspective, counseling tries to free clients from rigid patterns of habit.
Habits can be useful, but they can also interfere with life. The technical habits of a pianist, for example, are essential in performance. Similarly, only when language skills become habitual does a speaker of a foreign language achieve command of it. On the other hand, fears can also become habitual, and they may come to interfere with everyday activities. Anxiety over public speaking may become habitual. There are many personally destructive habits—alcoholism, smoking, over- or under-eating, abusive behavior, shyness and social withdrawal—and all can become self-perpetuating patterns. Counseling can help people break out of these habits, often in part by helping clients become aware of unrecognized alternatives.