Why Your Personal Therapy Matters More Than You Think in Counselling Training
- Ben Jackson
- 12 hours ago
- 5 min read
Personal therapy isn't a box to tick for accreditation. It's essential to counselling practice because the therapist's self-awareness matters to therapeutic change. If you won't engage with your own work, we need to talk about suitability for the course.
Personal therapy is a requirement of counselling training, not optional. Yet many students approach it with resistance, confusion, or resentment. Some see it as a box to tick for accreditation. Others question why they need therapy when they're here to help other people.
But here's the fundamental misunderstanding: if you don't understand why personal therapy is essential to your practice, you probably don't understand what counselling actually is.
The Heart of Therapeutic Change
At the heart of therapeutic change sits the relationship. Not the techniques. Not the theories. The relationship between counsellor and client.
If the relationship is the heart of therapeutic change, then the therapist needs to be aware of who they are and how they're showing up on that side of the relationship.
Personal therapy isn't just sitting down for a chat. It's not venting about your week. This is about examining the material that comes up for you. Working through what's happening internally. Supporting the self-inquiry that's crucial to being a counsellor.
If someone signs up to a counselling course and thinks their own personal counselling is discretionary, that's a fundamental misunderstanding of what this work is.
What It Looks Like When Someone Isn't Doing the Work
You can tell when someone isn't engaging with their personal therapy. They'll say things like:
"I don't get anything from my therapy. It just feels like I'm ticking a box."
"I don't really feel like I'm showing up."
"I can't be bothered with my own therapy."
What's interesting about that last one is the voicing of disengagement itself. If you wanted to be a counsellor, why would you shout about not bothering with your own therapy unless you were drawing attention to something? There's often pushback there. Maybe an undermining of therapeutic change in the statement itself.
When someone IS doing their personal therapy work, you hear different language.
They'll say:
"When I'm working with my therapist, we've worked out X, Y, and Z."
"I'm recognising that I am feeling activated."
"I'm reflecting on my experience."
They sit with what is theirs and what they can own. They spend far more time looking at that instead of assessing the other individual or closing judgment on them. The signs are pretty clear. It starts with self-inquiry. The fundamental conversation they have is about what's going on for them and what they're experiencing. Far later down the line, maybe they'll speak about the other person.
How Personal Therapy Changes Your Practice
When a counsellor does their own work, something shifts in how they show up with clients.
First, it deepens the respect they have for their client. They appreciate the challenges that an individual goes through when you look to peel off some well-welded layers of self. Respect comes through. Empathy is more available.
If someone's struggling, you get it. You know it's difficult. You're not sitting there in the face of a breeze where they should be an open book from day one. You do your own work, so you understand.
What the Client Experiences
Think about being with someone who is unafraid of being themselves. Not cocky or overly assertive. Just unafraid.
What might that invite you to consider? That maybe you could step into being unafraid too.
Now imagine being with someone who is not only unafraid of themselves, but also unafraid of you as a client. You might be feeling afraid of yourself. What would it be like to be received by somebody who wasn't afraid of you being you? Who wasn't afraid of themselves? Who wasn't even afraid of not knowing parts of themselves, but recognised they are there and still wasn't afraid?
Not perfect, because they recognise they're imperfect. But unafraid.
What would it be like to sit with something like that?
That's the invisible, tacit quality of a counsellor who's done their own work. When you're received by someone who exhibits those conditions authentically, you may experience unconditional positive regard. Love for being who you are.
How would that not create an invitation or evoke change?
Why Students Resist
So if personal therapy is this essential, why do students resist?
It's often the human condition that we don't like to be told what to do. You enrolled on the course, you committed, but there's a reduction of agency when something becomes a requirement. When we feel there's a reduction in agency, we typically go the other way and say, "well, no. You're not taking my agency. I will decide."
There's also probably a degree of defensiveness to looking at yourself. Alright, well, what's going on for me there? That could be a very creative way of not engaging.
There's also the reality that the cost of therapy is a factor. At Level 4, you've got a high-price entry for the qualification itself. Then you've got personal therapy at twenty-five, thirty pounds once a week. That's a hundred and twenty pounds a month. There can be a convincing yourself that it's not worthwhile because a hundred and twenty pounds saved seems like a good idea. That feels like a defense mechanism, but it's real. It's expensive.
And sometimes the course hasn't been presented in a way that clearly shows the importance of self-reflection, personal therapy, that experience. Training providers say personal therapy is important, but they probably don't articulate the connecting tissue well enough.
It's Not Optional
I'm not here to convince someone on a counselling course that therapy is important. That's not my role or anyone's role other than the individual recognising it themselves.
What I will clearly articulate is this: personal therapy is a requirement of the course in the same way attendance is a requirement of the course. If you don't wish to engage, then we're going to have a conversation about suitability for the course itself.
It's not convincing. It's a requirement.
Search for accredited and verified counsellors and psychotherapists at BACP and Counselling Directory.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is personal therapy required for counselling training?
Personal therapy is required because the relationship is the heart of therapeutic change. If the therapist needs to be aware of who they are and how they're showing up in that relationship, personal therapy supports the self-inquiry that's crucial to being a counsellor. It's not discretionary. It's essential to understanding what counselling actually is.
How does personal therapy change how a counsellor works with clients?
Personal therapy deepens respect for the client, enhances empathy, and reduces judgment. When a counsellor does their own work, they understand how difficult it is to peel off well-welded layers of self. They're not sitting there expecting the client to be an open book from day one. This creates a therapeutic connection that supports change.
What if I can't afford personal therapy while training?
The cost of personal therapy is real and significant, especially alongside training fees. However, personal therapy is a requirement of the course in the same way attendance is a requirement. If you cannot engage with this requirement, we need to have a conversation about suitability for the course itself. This isn't about convincing you. It's about being clear about what counselling training requires.
At The School of Counselling, we deliver CPCAB-accredited Level 2, 3, and 4 counselling training with qualified counsellor tutors. Our courses are designed around the person-centred approach where personal therapy is understood as essential, not optional. We support students in engaging with their own therapeutic work because we know it fundamentally shapes the counsellor they become.
