Week 5

        I really wanted to take this blog post as an opportunity to speak about how impressive the CBT lecturer was.  It was an interesting experience, because I am currently taking a CBT class, but i really have not been enjoying the material.  I found it to be abrasive and offensive to clients.  We keep having to listen to lectures by Albert Ellis, and I personally would never speak to clients the way that he does.  However, he is brilliant and helped create one of the most widely accepted forms of therapy.

        I don't know if it was the speaker's approach to this technique or the facts that it was in a group setting, but I found it to be much more natural and much more effective.  The challenge in implementing the therapy was certainly present, but I'm confident that will come with practice, practice, practice.  As far as I understood, he's centered his career around CBT, which might feel a little restricted for me, but he is clearly very effective at what he does.  I'm confident that with experience and practice, I'll be able to be an great therapist.
  
       In terms of future learning, I find the idea of transference overall very daunting and also very fascinating.  I am familiar with the concept and have been for a while.  In my first  field placement, my supervisor helped me identify transference with some of the students I was working with.  I had found myself at a loss as to why some of them related to me in certain ways.  I think that the dynamics of transference in groups will be much different, but I'm glad I have a little experience under my belt.