Using a culturally informed approach in individual and family therapy
I was listening to Ted talks on this topic, and most of them were relevant, informative, and engaging. However as a mental health practitioner, I found it difficult to understand how all this information and knowledge can be understood from the perspective of a client who may or may not have access to education, language, cognitive maturity, awareness to understand them. How does a patient understand the implications of cultural competency on mental health access and initiatives amongst various ethic groups or simply put, how does this impact her?
If I was to explain in simplistic terms, I could say that we all have this innate need to be respected, understood, and not judged. We want to connect with people that understand us. We feel comfortable in the company of people who understand us, do not judge us and who genuinely seem to be interested in what we bring to the table.
In my practice, I have found that having a multicultural lens has helped in understanding the context in which the client operates, how she defines and understands the problem and its impact on her overall health and functioning. How it impacts on her sense of self, what does she identify as her coping mechanisms, who she identifies as her support, who comprises her family, how does her family, ethnicity impact on her definition of problem, how does her cultural values, principles, traditions, customs and mores guide her about life in general. How do gender roles, spiritual orientation, faith in her ethnic group impact on her?
Being a student of liberal arts, human behavior, culture and society has always fascinated me, and I have always made a conscious effort to learn about cultures and ethnicities, it has helped me become aware of assumption and stereotyping that could affect how we develop relationship with our clients, how a successful therapeutic alliance is created and how that helps with successful treatment outcomes. But I also realize that I may not always have knowledge pertaining to all cultures/subcultures, ethnicities and I know that asking questions helps in accessing that knowledge. I believe that people generally are willing to share information about their cultural background if the other person is genuinely interested in learning. I can confidently say that utilizing a multicultural lens in mental health counseling has been the hallmark of my clinical practice.
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