Self Examination

Throughout my collegiate years, I have been asked time and time again to question why I want to become a helping professional. I believe I can safely say I have come to a clear and concise conclusion as to why this field is where I am meant to be. When I start to think about what caused me to choose the field of school counseling I think back to every time I hit a rough patch while I was in school and needed somebody.

For my entire life, I always had something on a personal or social level, one way or another, to face while balancing my academics. When I was in pre-school my father passed away on my fourth birthday. When I was in the eighth grade a boy who I shared mutual friends with committed suicide. Junior year of high school my grandfather was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer and died within the year. During my senior year of college, my mother suffered two ruptured brain aneurysms and fourteen brain surgeries which resulted in her being paralyzed on her right side for some time as well as struggling with her speech.

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The passing of my father at such a young age set the foundation and truly prepared me for the adverse situations I faced thereafter as well as gaining the ability to guide and comfort others. I had the choice to let everything I ever experienced in life get the best of me, or let everything I ever experienced in life allow me to be the best for other people.

I knew I wanted to seek a future in a helping profession because what I have been through has the potential to be a huge asset to others who are put in similar situations. I know that dealing with traumatic situations can be detrimental to one's mental health at any phase of life. However, I believe that trying to keep composure in order to effectively maintain schoolwork, social activities, family dynamics, etc. while battling outside circumstances can be especially difficult for students. As a result of this belief, I knew I wanted to reach out to school systems and fulfill my hunger and desire to be a helping professional.

From the minimal experiences I have had thus far in counseling psychology I have taken note of my perceived strengths and weaknesses. I feel that my strong suits are my communication skills, my ability to be empathetic, my multitasking abilities, and my genuine love for helping others. In terms of communicating when speaking to others, I always make sure I have a grasp on the bigger picture. I am not afraid to clarify or ask if I am unsure of an aspect of what is being communicated. That component of being comfortable with being unsure and not being afraid to ask has strengthened my communication skills and allows for adequate exchange in conversation. Empathy is a fundamental element of a helping relationship. In my experiences, I do well in trying to put myself in another individual's position. Prior to studying counseling psychology, I was an extremely sympathetic person, but through my education, I learned that empathy rather than sympathy is a better asset to your helping relationship. I have made a conscious effort to apply empathy rather than sympathy and I now feel that is one of my strongest features. Multitasking has always been something I was especially good at. Fortunately, the field of school counseling requires a lot of multitasking ability since school counselors tackle issues from a variety of dimensions (i.e. educational, career, personal/social) and address these dimensions utilizing diverse methods.

As a beginner in the helping field, I do have some weak areas that I need to work on before entering the workforce. I feel I am weak in improvising, self-care, and appropriate eye contact. When engaging in a discussion I have effective communication skills, however, when I am at a standstill I have a hard time thinking on my feet. I do not work well with curveballs. When I fully understand a situation I have no problem connecting with the individual, but when there is a twist involved I have some difficulty creating discussion points on the spot while also listening and understanding what the person is saying. In regard to self-care, I believe I still struggle with disassociating my own feelings with those of the individual I am dealing with. If I engage with someone who is dealing with a truly devastating issue I tend to bring those feelings of devastation and upset home with me. Since I have such a strong love and passion for helping I feel so deeply with the people I interact with and although at face value it sounds like that could be a positive aspect in the field of counseling psychology it is not. I need to learn how to leave the feelings that arise in practice there and disconnect once the day is over. Eye contact has always been something I struggled with. I feel that I am progressing in the right direction with holding and maintaining appropriate eye contact, but I believe that component still needs a lot of work. Keeping in mind I do have an issue improvising when I find myself in one of those situations where I am stuck my eyes trail off. I also notice my weak eye contact when an individual is speaking for a long period of time. I start to feel like I am staring too long and coming off too strong and as a result, I look away. These are all weaknesses that as I continue in the school counseling program I hope to gain some level of mastery before I enter the field.

Cultural competence and biases are extremely important to be aware of as well as understanding where your own personal biases lie. Every human being has biases, and some act out on those biases more than others. Personally, I do not have strong enough biases in which I act on in my counseling experiences or my day-to-day life. I attribute this lack of overt biases to how and where I grew up. I was raised always in close proximity to my grandmother who holds our Italian heritage very close. I grew up in a predominately Hispanic community in which I only have one Caucasian friend while the rest of my friends are of Hispanic descent. My boyfriend is also ethnically Hispanic, but racially he is black. Experiencing this mix of culture in my surroundings has contributed to my understanding of culture and how culture has an effect on individual’s lives differently. One bias, although it is not strong, that I feel may contribute to my work is my gender. I grew up female and at times that can be extremely difficult in a patriarchal society. At times I view situations through a feminist lens and I believe that can place a bias on the work I do in counseling. Considering I cannot identify many of my biases right off the top of my head I thought it would be a good idea to take the Implicit Association Test (IAT). My IAT results stated that I have a moderate automatic preference for white people over black people. I found this interesting because I never felt that I favored one race over the other, but unconsciously I may do so and that is a concept I may have to be more aware of.

I do have some expectations for when I enter the field, but I try to keep my expectations to a minimum because you truly never know what cards you will be dealt with in this field. I definitely expect to impact a student's life in one way or another. I expect to have improved on some of my helping skills and weaknesses so I can better myself to in turn better others. On a personal level, I expect to feel fulfilled when helping others. I have this longing to help that I hope my future career can assist me in accomplishing. I definitely expect some twists and turns in the road along the way, but overall I am excited to enter the field of school counseling to help shape the foundation of our society.