Curiously enough, a positive evaluation is as threatening in the long run as a negative one, since to inform someone that he is good implies that you also have the right to tell him he is bad.” Though revolutionary in his time, many of his ideas are nowadays widely accepted by psychologists worldwide. Namely, that “the innermost core of man’s nature, the deepest layers of his personality, the base of his ‘animal nature,’ is positive in nature – is basically socialized, forward-moving, rational and realistic.”

Carl Rogers - The Person Centred Association Carl Rogers - The Person Centred Association

Psychological adjustment exists when the concept of the self is such that all the sensory and visceral experiences of the organism are, or may be, assimilated on a symbolic level into a consistent relationship with the concept of the self. We feel relaxed and in control when the things we do and the experiences we have all fit in with the picture we have of ourselves.Rogers really is superb isn’t he? (And he has been most unfairly ignored by the academy in recent decades I think. I suspect that academics are more comfortable with the fixed than the flowing and thoughts rather than feelings.) In this book, one of America's most distinguished psychologists describes his experiences in helping people to discover the path to personal growth through an understanding of their own limitations and potential. What is personal growth? Under what conditions is it possible? How can one person help another? What is creativity, and how can it be fostered? These are some of the issues raised, which challenge many concepts of traditional psychology. Now, if men are essentially good, then it’s not your job as a psychotherapist to fix them but to understand them. The best vantage point from which to understand behaviour is from the internal frame of reference of the individual himself. To understand the behaviour of a person, we must look at the world from their point of view. It’s still hard for me to understand why accepting yourself as you are is about the last thing many of us can do. Finding your voice and using it without fear – you’ve gotten right to the heart of it there.

Carl Rogers - On Becoming A Person - Tom Butler-Bowdon Carl Rogers - On Becoming A Person - Tom Butler-Bowdon

Once again – unnecessarily complicated; let us rephrase it in Rogers’ words: “If I accept the other person as something fixed, already diagnosed and classified, already shaped by his past, then I am doing my part to confirm this limited hypothesis. If I accept him as a process of becoming, then I am doing what I can to confirm or make real his potentialities.”In thus floating with the complex stream of my experiencing, and in trying to understand its ever-changing complexity, it should be evident that there are no fixed points. When I am thus able to be in process, it is clear that there can be no closed system of beliefs, no unchanging set of principles which I hold. Life is guided by a changing understanding of and interpretation of my experience. It is always in process of becoming. Optimal development, referred to below in proposition 14, results in a certain process rather than static state. Rogers describes this as the good life, where the organism continually aims to fulfill its full potential. He listed the characteristics of a fully functioning person (Rogers 1961): The person-centered approach, his own unique approach to understanding personality and human relationships, found wide application in various domains such as psychotherapy and counseling (client-centered therapy),education(student-centered learning), organizations, and other group settings. For his professional work he was bestowed the Award for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Psychology by the APA in 1972. Towards the end of his life Carl Rogers was nominated for theNobel Peace Prizefor his work with national intergroup conflict in South Africa andNorthern Ireland.In an empirical study by Haggbloom et al. (2002) using six criteria such as citations and recognition, Rogers was found to be the sixth most eminent psychologist of the 20th century and second, among clinicians, only toSigmund Freud. The fully functioning person

Review of On Becoming a Person. - APA PsycNet

So yes, Carl Ransom Rogers was a pioneer. Yes, he was one of the most influential figures in the field of psychotherapy, but he was also an incredibly tedious and challenging writer. Another quote that I’ve used in just about every assignment since Level 2 to help illustrate the development of person-centred therapy. Characteristics of a Helping RelationshipIn therapy the individual learns to recognise and express his feelings as his own feelings, not as a fact about another person. Thus, to say to one’s spouse ‘what you are doing is all wrong.” is likely to lead only to debate. But to say ‘I feel very much annoyed by you are are doing,” is to state one fact about the speaker’s feelings, a fact that no one can deny. IT no longer is an accusation about another, but a feeling which exists in oneself. ‘You are to blame for my feelings of inadequacy,” is a debatable point, but ‘I feel inadequate when you do thus and so’ simply contributes a real fact about the relationship.” I have been trying to suggest what happens in the warmth and understanding of a facilitating relationship with a therapist. It seems that gradually, painfully, the individual explores what is behind the masks he presents to the world, and even behind the masks with which he has been deceiving himself. Deeply and often vividly he experiences the various elements of himself which have been hidden within. Thus to an increasing degree, he becomes himself – not a façade of conformity to others, not a cynical denial of all feeling, nor a front of intellectual rationality, but a living, breathing, feeling, fluctuating process – in short, he becomes a person. Key Lessons from “On Becoming A Person” Depression can be a life of moments, days, years, of a present that is tense, changing, recurring, empty, full, ugly and beautiful. This ebook is now available in most common ebook formats at major retailers.