On Becoming a Person by author Carl Rogers is a seminal text that most students of psychotherapy will be made familar with… and in some cases endoctrinated to worship as gospel. Now this worship is not necessarily unwarranted! For its time it was a paradigm shifting work as it laid the foundation of Therapeutic Change, the fundamentals of which are largely presvered today by practicing psychotherapists and educators of psychotherapy. However, these tenets of Person Centered Therapy that Rogers has enumerated in this book have grown larger than the book itself to the extent that they have become principles in which Humanistic Therapists (and humanists in general) are recommended to live by, not just to adopt as part of a daily job skill. This essay offers an critical examination of some chapters, fundamentals of humanistic therapy and the ground these fundamentals are predicated upon. Tagatz, Glenn E. (2013). ENIGMA: A Veteran's Quest for Truth. Xlibris Corporation. p.141. ISBN 978-1-4836-7942-6. We all want to be our best, but many people wonder if it's actually possible to become a better person once you're an adult. The answer is a resounding yes. There are always ways to improve yourself. This answer leads to more questions, however. The structure and organization of self appears to become more rigid under threats and to relax its boundaries when completely free from threat" (Rogers, 1951). If students believe that concepts are being forced upon them, they might become uncomfortable and fearful. A barrier is created by a tone of threat in the classroom. Therefore, an open, friendly environment in which trust is developed is essential in the classroom. Fear of retribution for not agreeing with a concept should be eliminated. A supportive classroom tone helps to alleviate fears and encourages students to have the courage to explore concepts and beliefs that vary from those they bring to the classroom. Also, new information might threaten the student's concept of themself; therefore, the less vulnerable the student feels, the more likely they will be able to open up to the learning process.

After a lot of research and academic deliberation Rogers (1958) settled to accumulate his methodology for the personality change process through what he called a naturalist observational descriptive approach. This was done phenomenologically, meaning he drew inferences of the process from within therapy from having the privileged position of being both a therapist and a client himself. By this, Roger’s could gradually infer what observations emerge that invite change to occur whilst also preserving the individual differences that get lost among the research that only looks to quantify change as a post-therapy outcome (Tudor & Worrall, 2006) The application to cross-cultural relations has involved workshops in highly stressful situations and global locations, including conflicts and challenges in South Africa, Central America, and Ireland. [35] Rogers, Alberto Zucconi, and Charles Devonshire co-founded the Istituto dell'Approccio Centrato sulla Persona (Person-Centered Approach Institute) in Rome, Italy. the more I can keep a relationship free of judgment and evaluation, the more this will permit the other person to reach the point where he recognizes that the locus of evaluation, the center of responsibility, lies within himself.” Rogers, Carl. (1970). On Encounter Groups. New York: Harrow Books, Harper and Row, ISBN 0-06-087045-1 Experience is, for me, the highest authority. The touchstone of validity is my own experience. No other person's ideas, and none of my own ideas, are as authoritative as my experience. It is to experience that I must return again and again, to discover a closer approximation to truth as it is in the process of becoming me. Carl Rogers

So while I still hate to readjust my thinking, still hate to give up old ways of perceiving and conceptualizing, yet at some deeper level I have, to a considerable degree, come to realize that these painful reorganizations are what is known as learning,” As experiences occur in the life of the individual, they are either (a) symbolized, perceived and organized into some relation to the self, (b) ignored because there is no perceived relationship to the self structure, or (c) denied symbolization or given distorted symbolization because the experience is inconsistent with the structure of the self. From the reading it may be tempting to view the core of personality could as neutral, seeing as accepting disposition of Mrs. Oak towards herself and others’ experiences at the final stages of the change process is “neither punishing nor rewarding” (Rogers, 1961. p.103), albeit belief in the positive theory does emphasise at least two important tenets of Rogerian Humanism which directly influences both the therapeutic relationship and UPR in practice; firstly, the therapist is allowing the range of experiences, desirable or otherwise, to present within the client while not feeling judged in terms of good or bad, but accepted. Secondly, this belief is useful to the therapist as it can convey a depth of genuineness in their attitude of not defining the client as a ‘problem’ to be fixed. The human organism, while fallible, has a richness whereby man is still human in all his vicissitudes (Rogers, 1961. p.105; Sanders, 2006. p.64). The person-centered approach (e.g., Client-centered therapy, Student-centered learning, Rogerian argument)

Perhaps partly because of the troubling business of being struggled over, I have come to value highly the privilege of getting away, of being alone. It has seemed to me that my most fruitful periods of work are the times when I have been able to get completely away from what others think, from professional expectations and daily demands, and gain perspective on what I am doing.” You can experience flow by writing, dancing, creating, or absorbing new material that you can teach others.The organism has one basic tendency and striving—to actualize, maintain and enhance the experiencing organism. Feltham and Dryden (1993: 181) refer to the seven stages of process as one model of stages of change:

The seven stages of process are one of the three pillars of the person-centred approach, the other two being: In my relationships with persons I have found that it does not help, in the long run, to act as though I were something that I am not.” As the individual perceives and accepts into his self structure more of his organic experiences, he finds that he is replacing his present value system—based extensively on introjections which have been distortedly symbolized—with a continuing organismic valuing process. For any students of psychotherapy reading this, I would like to share an important idea that is NOT explicitly stated in the book (maybe rightly so, but) what I feel Rogers is implying in On Becoming a Person is that therapists using the humanistic method are not in a position to say what a client can or can’t do with their consciousness or their experience. Essentially for every client who seeks the services and relationship with Humanistic therapist, your client has a right to stay who you they are.... even if they overtly state that they have no wish to change. Ironically, it’s not about change. Nor is it about a therapist encouraging (or forcing) the client to change in a way the therapist wants to see. It’s about the therapist providing an environment that gets the client tuned into themselves. Facilitating their awareness and increasing the acceptance of their own experience which builds their congruence and thus their sense of authentic self… the proof of whether this facilitates change or not is in the therapeutic process. ReferencesRogers, C.R. (1958). The characteristics of a helping relationship. Journal of Counselling & Development. 37(1), 6-16 If I let myself really understand another person, I might be changed by that understanding. And we all fear change. So as I say, it is not an easy thing to permit oneself to understand an individual,” Ismail NAH, Tekke M. Rediscovering Roger's self theory and personality. J Educ Health Community Psychol. 2015;4(3):28-36. Feeling connected to others can help you feel more resilient. Good friends can help you to process negative emotions, brainstorm solutions, and get your mind off your problems when necessary. It's sometimes challenging to find time for friends when you have a busy, stressful life, but our friends often make us better people both with their support and their inspiration. All individuals (organisms) exist in a continually changing world of experience (phenomenal field) of which they are the center.