I like the Kottler & Brown (2000) statement about the breadth of counseling: “It is a hybrid of knowledge from philosophy, education, psychology, psychiatry, sociology, and family studies.” With that broad caveat I have decided to create a category for this blog called “Wisdom.”

When I decided to enter the counseling profession I had an interest in wisdom. I thought that attaining wisdom might be the solution to any number of problems. Perhaps, I thought, people were having difficulty because they lacked wisdom. Actually, it is not a sound counseling practice to just tell someone that what they do is not wise… we need to be more subtle than that.

Patrick McKee and Clifton Barber developed a nice short definition of wisdom with three integrated conditions:

“Seeing through illusion”

• The pellucid insight that a belief is illusory [pellucid means admitting maximum passage of light without diffusion or distortion

• The freedom from further temptation by or vulnerability to the error

• Empathetic identification with those who are prey to the illusion

From a counseling perspective, Professor Sori’s comment (from an earlier post) that “the definition of crazy is doing the same thing and expecting a different result” tends to show the therapeutic need for wisdom. If someone determines that “doing the same thing” really, really does not work, then it seems that they have gained pellucid insight. If someone is no longer tempted with “doing the same thing” they are free to think about other options. When people show empathy both for themselves and others for making mistakes they are better able to let go and move on to those new options.

It seems that at least in some sense and in some cases, counseling is a process that can turn life experience that is not working into wisdom that allows for moving on with a better life.

References:

Kottler, J. A., and Brown, R. W. (2000). Introduction to therapeutic counseling: Voices from the field. 4th ed. Wadsworth/Thomson Learning: Belmont, CA

Patrick McKee and Clifton Barber (International Journal of Aging and Human Development. Vol. 49(2), 1999, pp. 149-164)