Page 14 - PartA
P. 14
Counselling Skills
Key Fact
Empathy is not the same as sympathy.
4. Active listening
Active listening is another important core counselling skill that can be practised in
ordinary situations to enhance your communication skills.
Q. What is ‘active listening’?
A. Active listening is ‘listening for meaning’.
Active listening means orientating your whole attention towards the speaker or client
so that you ‘hear’ everything that they say. This includes messages that they are
transmitting with their body language and tone of voice.
To enable this orientation towards the client, Egan developed the following non-
verbal listening process that you can remember by the acronym S.O.L.E.R. This skill
is particularly important at the beginning of the counselling process, but should be
practised in all sessions until it becomes second nature to the counsellor.
Q. What is S.O.L.E.R.?
A. S.O.L.E.R. is an acronym that stands for the following ways to ensure that
attention is focused on the client.
12
