November 25, 2019

How to BE a Therapist

37 minutes

Curt and Katie talk about Person of the Therapist training. We talk about a revolutionary training model that starts with who a therapist is and what will come up for them as a therapist – rather than setting unreasonable expectations of blank, neutral, perfect therapists.

It’s time to reimagine therapy and what it means to be a therapist. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy talk about how to approach the role of therapist in the modern age.

In this episode we talk about:

Person of the Therapist training – addressing the whole person therapist

The work of Dr. Harry Aponte at Drexel University

Looking at how pulling from your own history can impact how you approach the work in the room

The importance of finding your own personal themes and challenges, owning your own story

Innovative classes that start graduate programs with personal growth and insight

Normalizing reactions and individual differences from the beginning of our education

How close the line can be between education and therapy

The fallacy that therapists can be blank or neutral

The drive toward Evidence Based Practices

The depth of supervision that occurs when focusing on the person of the therapist

The problem of siloed areas of the field and how bringing it back into the same room

The vulnerability required for the depth of this work

The ability to increase maturity of the therapist more quickly through this type of work

The importance of structure and containment to do this type of work

Teaching self-awareness and self-monitoring

The power of building supportive community to do work more in the open, to decrease shame and perfectionism

Learning how to give respectful, structured, effective feedback – exercising your empathy muscle

How building resilience and connection can improve the profession as a whole

Increasing distress tolerance and capacity for taking feedback

Looking at the benefit of doing this work at all stages in your career

Resources mentioned:

We’ve pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links.

Dr. Harry J Aponte

Person of the Therapist Training Model by Dr. Harry Aponte

Claudio & Watson: Perceived impact of the Person of the Therapist Training model on Drexel University Master of Family Therapy postgraduates’ clinical work

Kissil, Carneiro, & Aponte: Beyond duality: The relationship between the personal and the professional selves of the therapist in the Person of the Therapist Training

Watson: Doing it right: Branding the Person of the Therapist Training model in Drexel University’s Master of Family Therapy program

Aponte & Ingram: Person of the Therapist supervision: Reflections of a therapist and supervisor on empathic-identification and differentiation

Relevant Episodes:

Therapists in Therapy

Impaired Therapists

That’s Unethical

Therapist Haters and Trolls

Connect with us!

Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group

Get Notified About Therapy Reimagined 2020 (and TR2019 Virtual Conference)

Our consultation services:

The Fifty-Minute Hour

Credits:

Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/

Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano http://www.crystalmangano.com/

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By Curt Widhalm, LMFT and Katie Vernoy, LMFT

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