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Many people believe that you find the inspiration to be a marriage or couples counselor from being a child of divorce or from experiencing marital difficulties yourself. But most couples counselors have no personal experiences that compelled them to want to specialize in couples – they simply have an interest and a passion in helping people in love be able to communicate and be able to make their relationship last.
There are many aspects of relationships you can focus on as a counselor, and you will work on finding immediate and long-term solutions to the problems that arise in a couple’s life together.
1. Relationship and Pre-Marriage Counseling
Often, responsible couples will seek counseling before they actually get married, which can help them figure out if they are ready for a long-term commitment and how compatible they really are. If a couple is moving in together for the first time, there are a lot of issues to discuss – they may seem small, but they could be the root of bigger problems later on. Not only that, many couples need a mediator as they figure out whether their vision of the future is the same when it comes to children, career paths, and owning property.
2. General Couples and Marriage Counseling
Couples counselors don’t only work with married couples – many of them service or even specialize in unmarried couples or same-sex couples. It doesn’t really matter – most couples face the same issues. The staple of counseling for long-term relationships is learning how to communicate, which can often mean lessons in active listening and how to express your feelings constructively. Counselors can deal with a lot of extreme circumstances in these cases, including abuse and infidelity, and they can work to provide their patients with the resources they need.
3. Divorce Counseling
Sometimes, when marriages are ending, either one or both members of the relationship will seek out help with making the transition to divorce smooth and amicable. They need help talking to their children, dividing their assets, and dealing with the legal situation, and sometimes talking to lawyers is not enough. Counselors can play a big part in minimizing the negative effects of divorce on the lives of the entire family.
4. Discernment Counseling
The future of couples counseling may involve something called discernment counseling – a non-traditional form of marriage counseling where at least one half of the couple, married or otherwise is contemplating ending the relationship. Discernment counseling sessions can help the couple decide, point-blank, if they should save their relationship or end it. With the divorce rate constantly growing, this is a new area of counseling that many couples find increasingly helpful.
Falling in love is easy, but making a marriage or any long-term relationship last is extremely hard. Being a couple’s counselor can be a rewarding job because they help to keep families together, and more often than not, they can give a couple the push they need to solve some of their issues and bring their feelings to the table. Nothing can mean more than getting the right help for the things that matter most.
Nancy Meyers writes articles for educational sites and suggests finding information about the Top 10 Best Online Counseling Degree Programs.
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