CNL-515 Topic 3: Challenging Practice Exercise
Challenging is a tricky counseling skill for a beginner to do well. Challenging that is too early,
too challenging, or too far ahead of the client can backfire and make the client feel
misunderstood and unsafe. This is also an area where it is very easy for the counselor’s agenda to
intrude on the counseling process. Counselors are often impatient with clients for the pace of
change. They forget that clients have gotten where they are over a long period of time. Starting
with the assumption that clients are doing the best they can with the resources they have can help
you to be less judgmental of the ways that clients are “stuck.” One of the observations
discovered in motivational interviewing is that the denial and defensiveness of clients
experiencing substance use disorders was in large part a reaction to the confrontational style of
counselors. When clients feel judged and attacked, they deny and become defensive. What
motivational interviewing offers is a way to challenge and confront in a gentle, nonattacking way
that is congruent with the client’s own value system. Clients will choose to change when they are
able to see that change will get them something they want. A counselor trained to apply
motivational interviewing skills has to be deeply empathic and really understand the client’s
value system in order to help the client to choose change. Motivational Interviewing is a great
skill set that takes time to learn and refine. The core of these skills are the skills addressed so far
in CNL 515. Using active listening, open-ended questions, and reflections, a counselor can
enhance client motivation to make changes. Being attentive to what desires, needs, reasons to
make changes, and abilities/strengths for the client to make changes empowers the client to
identify goals and steps to reach these goals. Reflecting discrepancy between what the client
values and current behavior can gently challenge the client in their words to help motivate the
client to make changes to promote physical and mental health.
As the textbook outlines, there are a number of times when a counselor may challenge a client:
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When there is a discrepancy between what a client says and what they do
When there is a discrepancy between two things a client says
When a client is engaging in self-destructive behavior
When a client is caught in dysfunctional beliefs
When a client is being too hard on his or herself
When a client has distorted expectations of self, others, or the world
When the client does not recognize their own strengths and resources
When the client has significant blind spots
There is a special skill that can be useful for challenging what is happening in the process of the
session. To give an example, imagine you are engaging in an open dialogue with a client, and,
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suddenly, the client withdraws. This technique is termed “calling the process.” It has two parts:
an observation: “I notice that you became very quiet and seemed to shut down when we started
talking about your family,” followed by a question: “What’s happening?” or “I’m wondering if
this is kind of a touchy subject?” For this to be successful, the second part needs to be tentative
or posed as a question, not a statement. For example, it would probably not be productive to say,
“I notice you became really quiet when we started talking about your family; obviously you are
defensive about your family.” The attitude that is sometimes useful in working with clients is
“naïve curiosity.” “Help me to understand what’s so challenging about your current job.” “I’m
curious what it means to you when you say, ‘I just don’t care what anyone thinks.’”
It is critical when you are challenging clients to watch their body language. A challenge that is
too confronting or too early may lead to defensive behavior or a shutdown in communication. At
that point, you may be able to recover the connection by “calling the process” and exploring
what is happening between you and the client.
PRACTICE EXERCISE:
In this exercise, you are going to challenge yourself. Think of a belief or a behavior that might
interfere with your effectiveness as a counselor. To give an example, a student had a strong
tendency to want to “fix” things. The result of this message was that she tended to move too
quickly to giving advice or trying to get the client to solve the problem. It was hard for her to be
patient and develop empathy first.
Think of a belief or a behavior that could become a challenge for you as a counselor. What is that
belief or behavior? How could it interfere with you as a counselor? What might you need to do to
work with that challenge to become a more effective counselor? What is a strength or ability
which may help you overcome this challenge?
Reference
Egan, G. (2014). The skilled helper: A problem management and opportunity development
approach to helping. Brooks Cole.
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