how Do counseling, Psychotherapy and Coaching life differ?
I currently specialize in solution-focused counseling and life coaching. Solution-focused counseling and life coaching overlap in many ways and both generally require less time than traditional psychotherapy. While counseling, coaching, and therapy can all support you in making significant changes in yourself, your relationships, and or other areas of concern your life, there are important differences. The following information may help you in determining the best fit for you:
Psychotherapy generally focuses on treating diagnosable mental health conditions or psychological issues creating dysfunction and/or significant ongoing distress for the client or those close to the client which impede a satisfying or productive life .
Typical Examples: Depression, anxiety disorders, mood disorders such as bipolar, chemical and behavioral addictions, emotional trauma, and personality disorders.
Process: Talking with the therapist—generally therapists refrain from dispensing advice, guidance, or opinions, and the client-therapist relationship may be a focus of the work because it is seen as paramount in emotional healing.
Time/Focus: Typically on past experiences or triggering events/situations and a focus on processing the thoughts and feelings related to the past and present problems stemming from the problem of origin.
Duration: Typically requires months to several years, depending on the nature and severity of the issue and other factors
Goals: Developing insight into the origins and impact of the problem as well as changing long-standing “stuck” patterns of thinking/feeling/behaving to relieve symptoms and improve functioning are often the primary goals for psychotherapy.
Alternative variations: Short-term therapy approaches are available Counseling generally focuses on adjustment to common problems in living, such as situational setbacks or temporary challenges to personal, occupational or social development or functioning, and does not engage in remedying underlying psychological causes of dysfunction such as childhood trauma.
Insurance Coverage: Issues addressed with psychotherapy meet the “medical necessity” criteria of most health plans and so are generally eligible for insurance coverage.
Typical Examples: Stress or difficulty in adjusting to major transitions/changes, such as career change, relocation, grief/loss, new relationship, becoming a parent, starting a new business, completing educational goals, and many others.
Time Focus: Counseling is likely to focus on the past, present, and'/or future at various points in the process as practical for resolving the concern. Counseling is most often short to medium term in duration, ranging from a single session to around 6 months for a single area of focus.
General Approach: With counseling, the focus centers on identifying existing personal strengths and resources needed to respond to the challenge and overcoming any gaps in knowledge or other resources and external support.
Goals:
Process: The approach often combines verbal processing, planning, and problems-solving, and the counselor may offer guidance and opinions when appropriate. When adjustment problems become prolonged or create moderate levels of distress or disruption to normal functioning, these issues may be eligible for insurance coverage.
Typical Examples: The focus remains almost exclusively on the present and future and on identifying strategies for success and overcoming barriers that may become evident during the process through developing and utilizing existing personal strengths, as well as introducing new tools and information as necessary.
(Note: Employee Assistance Programs are designed to provide brief assessment and referral to the appropriate level or care, whether to counseling or psychotherapy, but they can also be utilized for short-term counseling to address limited problems if they can be appear to be resolvable within 4 to 8 sessions. Coaching and Brief Solution-Focused Counseling both focus on a client’s greater future vision for him/herself and on achieving specific goals in the identified area of focus such as job or athletic performance, health, career, and many others.
General Approach: The process is distinctly “positive” in the sense that it maintains a focus on what is going well in the process which provides opportunities to glean new insight and new ideas on how to amplify progress, which in turn generally promotes greater motivation, focus, and a sense of success, further building confidence and momentum. Coaching and solution-focused counseling generally takes a minimum of three sessions and many areas of focus can be addressed in 12 to 24 sessions depending on the nature of the goals and current strengths and resources of the client.
Life-coaching is generally not currently reimbursable by traditional health plans; however, solution-focused counseling may be used to address some issues in the terrain of traditional counseling and psychotherapy, if appropriate.