The Corrective Experience
Often people develop negative thoughts and preconceived ideas of people, situations and events. If a person had bad experiences with someone of the opposite sex, they often will transpose that feeling onto a new person they meet. While this is not always fair or true, the past event is remembered and brought to the forefront of a person's subconscious as a sort of protection. The mind remembers past trauma and recalls it when a situation reminds it of the negative event.
This will often happen with a person during counseling. The person in counseling will be reminded of a trauma and bring it into the counseling room. It is the counselor's job to take care of this trauma and provide an alternative pathway for the brain. This can often be done through a process that is called the corrective experience. The counselor provides a different way of thinking about a person or event by providing a positive experience similar to the event.
A client comes in and the counselor asks them if they have ever seen a therapist in the past. The client answers that they had seen a therapist years ago. When prompted to talk about it, the client divulges that it was a pretty bad experience. The counselor and the client talk about the experience and the client begins to process it. The counselor works hard to promote a therapeutic alliance where the corrective experience can begin to be felt.
The counselor begins to provide an alternative experience for the client. The experience of the previous counselor begins to be replaced by the experience provided by the new counselor. By carefully addressing what happened with their previous counselor, processing it, and acting in a way that is different and opposite of the previous counselor, the new counselor changes the mindset the client has towards counselors.
This process, called the corrective experience, can be applied to a variety of different experiences. A male counselor can provide a corrective experience for a person who has had poor experience with men, and vice versa for a female counselor with a client who has had bad experiences with women. An older counselor can provide a corrective experience for a client who has had a bad experience with their parents. They can be a substitute parent of sorts. These are just a few examples of how the corrective experience can be utilized.
Then there is the corrective experience that a counselor and a client can create by talking through a situation and imagining a different outcome. This is a bit more complicated than a counselor substituting a character in the client’s life themselves. The counselor and the client talk through the situation presented. The counselor can then provide prompts to have the client think about the situation differently, in a new way. Through this process, the client can imagine a corrective experience for themselves. Through this imaginative process, the client can begin to realize the experience they had was not correct. They can then imagine a situation better and more healthy than the one they went through. This kind of corrective experience is not as impactful as an individual such as a counselor providing an alternative positive experience, but nonetheless can be quite helpful to the client.
The goal of the corrective experience is for the client to begin thinking differently about a situation, person or persons. The job of the counselor is to provide an opportunity for such thinking, whether that be through being different themselves or providing a space where the client can imagine a healthier way of interacting. The corrective experience can be a powerful tool for the client to begin to overcome past trauma and unhealthy relationships.
