Kristen Eckhardt

Well, the end of the semester came and went last week, and little by little, I’m sifting through everything I have learned and experienced. (And I took some time out to bake some Christmas cookies, too!) With a new job, an internship, and a whole new city, that meant a lot of sifting. Here’s what I’m taking away from this semester.

Back when I started my degree last January, one of my teachers spoke about what happens when she gets on an airplane and ends up telling her seat partner what she does for a living--either the person has no idea what a counselor does, or the person wants her to solve all of their problems. Either way, this can be a fairly irritating situation for her, and probably most counselors. She told us she finally decided to say something vague, like she works with kids. Other teachers have shared what they do to avoid certain types of self-disclosure in addition to dodging tricky questions, like putting away family pictures before seeing certain clients.

Like any intern or counselor, my days are filled with ups and downs. I’m learning that the downs can really get you down, like difficult clients, sticky institutional issues, and personal problems. These can quickly sap my energy and make me less open when I work with my clients.

I took last Tuesday evening off. Really, I should have been in one of two places--either working with a client or at my husband’s wind ensemble concert--but since my last client of the evening cancelled, I decided to come home for an evening for myself and do not feel too bad about it.

I think most counseling students alternately feel like experts one moment and complete frauds the next. I know that describes my own experience pretty well. The field is so wide and varied that at the moment I think I’ve really mastered something, I realize that I’ve actually mastered about 4% of whatever it is and still have to learn the other 96% of it.