Section A

There are many core skills that are critical to becoming a successful counseling professional. Empathy for the client, active listening, and authenticity are some of the skills that are key to understanding and helping clients. You will be better able to develop these skills once you have assessed your own strengths and challenges. Understanding your existing strengths and objectively assessing challenges you may face are key to building core counseling skills.

For this Discussion, you will take the Survey of Character Strengths from the VIA Institute on Character. This self-assessment will help you analyze your character strengths, and act as a foundation for developing critical counseling skills. It can also aid you in developing your Self-Care Plan.

To Prepare:

Review this week’s Learning Resources and consider your personal character strengths and how they will contribute to your counseling skill development.

Take the VIA Survey of Character Strengths found in the Learning Resources and save your results for your Discussion.

Based on your VIA survey results, post an analysis and explain the strengths that will help you thrive as a counselor. Discuss any results that you found surprising, as well as results that you were expecting.

• Section B
• To be successful in your mental health counseling career and remain passionate about serving clients, it is necessary to maintain personal and professional wellness. Helping clients, while intrinsically rewarding, is difficult work. Counseling sessions are often filled with intense client stories, experiences, and emotions that can be stressful for you as well as for the client. Focusing solely on clients and losing sight of yourself can have a significant impact on your effectiveness as a counselor and can potentially lead to burnout.

For this Assignment, you will develop a Self-Care Plan that you can use to help maintain your personal and professional wellness.