Pyschology Counselling

Remember that an essay should be well-written. Be sure to include an introduction and a conclusion. You may use your outline to guide your response.

Joyce is a 25-year-old law student who attends a highly respected law school on the East Coast. After considerable hesitancy she has gone to see a counselor. What the counselor knows about Joyce’s story is provided below.

Joyce’s Story

Joyce attended an undergraduate school in a small liberal arts college in Indiana. She is the youngest child in a family of four children. She is the only girl. Her oldest brother is a winning attorney in Atlanta, Georgia. Her other brothers are professionals who still live in the hometown where her family resides. One is a prominent biochemist with a large pharmaceutical firm. The other brother is a dentist with a thriving practice. Her mother is a school teacher, who about ten years ago was selected that year’s Outstanding Elementary School Teacher in the State of Indiana. Her father, who had been a successful banker, is dead.

Joyce’s high school and undergraduate days were successful academically (GPA in high school = 4.0; in college = 3.8). She graduated at the top of her high school class and was in the top ten students of her graduation class from her college. She reads a lot and reads well. She has had practically no personal or social life since she determined in high school to get a law degree from a law school with excellent credentials. She dated once or twice but felt self-conscious around boys her age and felt more comfortable at home with her family and very comfortable in academic work.

Joyce has been in law school for a bit over three months. The academic demands of this school are unlike anything else Joyce has experienced, and she is struggling to keep up. Never before has she doubted her ability to do well in school. Now she is unsure of herself. She wonders if she will even pass her course on contract law.

There is no one at the law school she feels close to. She lives in a suite with three other women; they sometimes study together. At the beginning of the school year a few men who were fellow law students asked her out, but she has always declined these invitations on the grounds that she could not take the time off from her studies. If pressed Joyce might admit that she is afraid of men and feels unsure how to act around them. Her finances are tight, and her continuance at the school depends on her keeping her scholarship. Ever since Joyce can remember she has prided herself on her independence, on her ability to solve her problems on her own. The two persons who have got close to Joyce and got to know her are her father and her oldest brother. Her letters to her oldest brother give no hint of her current difficulties.

In order to effectively and compassionately influence a client’s actions, a counselor needs to build an empathic relationship with that person. Use your work with Joyce to illustrate how you might influence a client’s actions.

1. How might you use empathic confrontation with Joyce to seek clarification, to discover a new resolution of difficulties, and to provide a supportive challenge?
2. Provide an example of how you would reflect meaning with Joyce to help her find a new and/or clearer vision(s) for understanding herself and others as well as clarifying her purpose in life. Provide an example of how you might reframe Joyce’s experiences to supply her with new perspectives and ideas to create new ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving.
3. How might you use empathic self-disclosure and feedback on thoughts, feelings, and behavior that you observe to benefit Joyce?
4. Develop one directive for Joyce and demonstrate how you might use psychoeducation to teach her critical life skills.
5. Help Joyce clarify one goal and weigh the logical consequences of the decision selected by her using the cognitive and emotional balance sheet.
6. Explain to Joyce how stress may be either growth producing or destructive. Show her how one Therapeutic Lifestyle Change (TLC) may be useful in improving her