As a Counselor, I am mainly trained in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which is not a rarity in the mental health world. I did my training many moons ago and since then have added some additional facets to the work that I do. If you have had any type of conversation with me about this, you’ve probably heard me talk about Unconditional Positive Regard. Which sounds lovely, but what exactly is it? Unconditional Positive Regard is a cornerstone of the work done by Carl Rogers and is part of Rogerian Therapy, also called Person Centered or Client Centered Therapy. It does not mean that I like everything about everyone and think every choice humans make is wonderful. Even I’m not quite that forgiving. What it means is that regardless of the actions and behaviors people choose, I will regard them and their humanity unconditionally as inherently worthy of love and acceptance. It goes beyond seeing people as good or bad or somewhere in between those ideas, and to a place where people I work with (hopefully) know that they are accepted and supported by me no matter what.

Other than spoiling people rotten and telling them how wonderful they are, what is the point of this concept? The idea is that if I create an environment where you always feel accepted and supported for who you are, flaws and all, you will feel that the therapeutic relationship is one that is positive and can be trusted. And if the relationship and the experience feels positive and trustworthy, odds are you will start to come to terms with and start to face down some of the things you are feeling not-so-great about because you know you will not be judged. And then in turn, since I have now modeled for you how to accept and support your pain/shame/whatever, the hope is that you will also be able to mimic that and treat yourself with unconditional positive regard moving forward.

Make sense?

Thinking back to an experience or a feeling you don’t feel great about, is there a way that you can use the concept of unconditional positive regard to support and accept yourself? Is it hard for you to do this and if so why do you think that is? Have you already caught yourself mimicking me and reframing your thoughts to be kinder to yourself? If so, in what areas of your process have you noticed that?

I want you to focus on resilience and how it impacts different aspects of your life. People often use the term resiliency when discussing someone who has experienced something traumatic or challenging and yet appears to have come through the experience unscathed. Almost as if their inner and organic quality of being a resilient person is what allowed them to avoid any impact from the trauma. We say things like “Well, her house burned down and her dog ran away and her best friend moved across the country, but she seems fine” as if this woman is so strong that she can sustain these experiences unscatehd due to her resilient nature.

That is certainly one way to see it, but according to The Merriam Webster Dictionary, it is defined as “an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change.”

Recover from or adjust easily. That little phrase right there is the meat of this concept. Resiliency does not mean that challenges have no impact on us, it means that when we are impacted by challenges, we can bounce back or adjust course to suit the new situation we find ourselves in. It means that after her house burned down, she found a new place to live and understands fire safety in more detail now, but doesn’t stay up all night in fear of another fire. Or that her dog did run away, but she made a concerted effort to find him by posting on social media and hanging flyers until he was located. And that her friend did move away, but they were able to maintain their connection via technology and planned a few trips to see each other next year. It’s not that she is unscathed from these experiences, it’s simply that she was able to pivot and recover from each in a way that made moving along in life accessible. I think the word “easily” throws a bit of a wrench in the whole concept, but it can be subjective and what is easy for someone else might feel differently to you.

Taking this definition of resiliency, are there areas in your life that maybe you didn’t give yourself enough credit for at the time? Maybe you don’t view yourself as resilient but upon further thought, you realize you do in fact have situations that were challenging for you and that you navigated through by recovering and adjusting to your new normal. Everyone on this planet recently navigated a global pandemic, and regardless of what your experience with it was or how you feel now two years after it started, the fact remains that somehow you did in fact pivot your life a bit to deal with the changes and challenges it presented. Would you view your resiliency as growing during this time or being tested in new ways where you found yourself struggling more? Take a few moments to ponder your own resiliency and how you have recovered and adjusted at various points in your life.