If you currently have problems at home with your family, and you would like to resolve them, you may want to consider family counseling as an option. It can be difficult to resolve problems on your own, especially if no one is talking. If you are not able to speak with people that you know in your family to talk about issues you are facing, they will continue to get worse.
That’s why it is important to develop communication styles, provided by a family counselor, that will be able to help you resolve many of these issues. Let’s talk about communication styles for family counselling styles that work today for family counseling, and how long it will take in order to resolve certain issues that all of you may have.
What Is Family Counseling?
This is a type of counseling that revolves around the family unit. You could have a small family, perhaps consisting of the father, mother, and a single child. Other families may be much larger, perhaps consisting of several children of both genders. Finally, you may be struggling with family members that are outside of the home, perhaps aunts, uncles, and cousins that are simply not getting along. What family counseling will do is provide you with a conduit by which you will be able to start some form of communication. You will have to get many of these techniques from a certified family counselor.
How A Family Counselor Can Help All Of You
A family counselor is a person that has a degree in psychology, or perhaps one that is related to counseling. They will likely have years of experience in this industry, either operating out of their own office with the private practice, or they will be part of a larger group. These professionals will have at least a decade of experience, usually a combination of proper schooling at a certified college and also in the field training.
They may have already worked with hundreds of different families, and you will want to choose a family counselor that has quite a bit of experience. They are able to help by providing a conduit by which family members can communicate, either in their office, or at home once they leave. Most of this begins within the office setting, and they will start with some very simple strategies.
Initial Strategies That They May Implement
One of the first strategies that these professionals will use are those that are related to interpersonal communication. This is a field of psychology that deal specifically with people interacting with each other, something that can help during these communication styles for family counselling sessions. It is called interpersonal because it takes each person’s viewpoint into account, and allows the other people that are having problems understand their perspective.
They will then work with each person, developing a set of skills on how to properly communicate. One thing they will always ask is that you focus on one strategy at a time. It could be as simple as making eye contact, followed by asking a question. The question is designed to be simple, opening up a dialogue, one that is not intrusive in any way. More complex strategies will be built upon the others, helping people develop a routine of how to properly interact. The key is to help people start a dialogue, one that will make them more comfortable with the other person, conversations that are absent any type of condescension.
Common Communication Issues With Family Members
Most of the problems that family members have when they cannot get along involve misunderstandings. They may believe that another person is perceiving them in a certain way, and it keeps them from having a dialogue. It is also possible that other people may misinterpret what other people have said, despite the fact they may have been trying to have a positive conversation. This can lead to arguments and tension, and even if they have only intermittent interactions, these problems can last a lifetime.
When working with a family counselor, they are going to identify the problems that each person is facing, and with whom they are having these problems with. They will then address each of these problems individually, potentially working out a solution so that communication between both parties can begin. It is also very common for one family member to have problems with multiple people in the family, many of which are all sharing the same opinion. This is another problem that can be addressed by a family counselor that can identify the issue, and eventually find a way to bring people back together.
Can Lifestyle Contribute To Communication Issues
Although it is much more common for strangers to have problems with people based upon lifestyle differences, this is definitely true within the family unit. There will always be family members that have accomplished many things with their lives, perhaps are wealthy, and they will not understand why other family members have not been successful.
These people may never have asked for any money at all, or any help from these individuals, yet their lifestyle is what the others are concerned about. Instead of looking at them as equals, as family member should, they will look down upon them as if they are failures. In the same way, those that are not as well off will look at those that have done well as if they are arrogant and spiteful. These communication problems might be real, but in many cases, these are simply misperceptions.
It is so easy for people to develop these perceptual differences, but during these communication styles for family counselling sessions, these problems can be identified and solutions can be discovered.
Can Culture Actually Affect Family Interactions?
When people talk about culture, this can mean many different things. People tend to think about different cultures that reside in foreign countries. However, culture pertains to the way that people believe, and this can affect how family members interact with one another. One might be religious, whereas others might be agnostic, and still others will be more nature oriented. These subtle differences in how they perceive the world around them, and what they value in life, can dramatically affect who they interact with in the family.
These differences can lead to many different constraints within the family unit which will include cognitive, behavioral, and emotional differences. This can lead to many problems including misperceptions about people, and how they perceive others in this relationship, which can lead to substantial problems. The family counselor will be able to identify these dissimilar frames of reference, make recommendations, and hopefully help people resolve their differences as easily as possible.
Identifying Different Communication Styles
Another problem that is very common between family members is the manner in which they communicate. You have to remember that many of these people have grown up together, already have formed opinions about family members, and will use those opinions as a frame of reference. It is possible that there are family members that will be very assertive in the way they speak, making others feel as if they are talking down to them, or that they are condescending.
In reality, these people may simply talk like this, but due to past differences, they will begin to misinterpret what the other person is trying to say. Of course, it is possible that neither one of them will like each other because of problems they have had in the past, and this will lead to differences that may be irreconcilable. However, if the family counselor is very good at what they do, there is a possibility that they will be able to interact with each other working with this professional.
How They Can Help Improve Communication Between Family Members
It is so important to identify different types of communication styles, something that every family member needs to understand. Instead of looking specifically at the content of the conversations that they are having which are causing problems, they must first consider how they are communicating. First of all, there are both verbal and nonverbal ways of communicating which will include facial expressions, posture, body language, and gestures that people make.
These alone can set someone off because they will believe that the way a person is standing, or moving, are actually aggressive in some way. By first working on these nonverbal cues, they will be able to disarm what could almost instantly be a hostile environment. Once people understand how to present themselves, before they even speak, it can set the stage for a much more positive experience. Second, they need to address both passive and aggressive communication styles that each person will have.
Aggressive communication styles are usually directed at the feelings that another person has, using inappropriate suggestions that are designed to hurt the other person. On the other hand, passive communication can also be detrimental because people are not expressing how they really feel. You tend to see dominant family members using aggressive communication styles, and those that do not like them, will be passive, not wanting to have a confrontation.
However, sometimes it is necessary for the passive individual to use aggressive speech so that the other person can see what they sound like. By doing so, they can actually look into a proverbial mirror of how they are communicating. As a result of this, some progress can be made as long as the mediator is there. That is the purpose of the family counselor that is there to help each person understand what is happening, and to learn from these examples.
Going to a family counselor may not be the most fulfilling experience. At first, it can be very agonizing. You will have people that will not want to speak with each other at all, and if they are not willing to make decisions that can be helpful for both parties, there will not be any progress in these discussions. However, if the family counselor can use examples of each person’s behavior, allowing each person to act as the other person is doing, results can be accomplished.
It’s a simple matter of seeing yourself for how you are, and in the presence of one of these counselors, you can use this information to help improve the way you communicate. If all of the family members will participate in this manner, many of the barriers that exist can be removed. The key to succeeding with communication styles for family counselling is for each person to be open to trying strategies that can help start a conversation. At the same time, family members can have much more productive conversations by avoiding the need to dominate the conversation and learn to listen to the others that are talking.