1. What are your own expierences of having been involved in meaningful conversation? Identify one or two such occasiosn in your life. What made these conversations memorable and full of meaning? What can you learn from these expierences that you can apply in counseling situations.
2. Reflect on the feeling of being really understood. Identify one recent occasions when you felt that another person really understood what you were expierencing. how did they express their empathetic engagement with you- how did you know that they understood? What was the effect of their empathetic sensitivity on your relationship?
3.When was the last time that you exhibited a puzzling reaction to a situation? Take a few minutes to write a description of the situation, how you reacted, and how you felt afterwards. What was strange about the way you responded in this situation? are you now able to make sense of you reaction? who or what helped you to develop an understanding of what happened? What have you learned from this whole event that might help you to work with a client wishing to make sense of a problematic personal reaction.