About peer counseling and facilitation

I anticipate many people may be unfamiliar with peer facilitation and counseling.

Peer facilitation follows in the ethos of peer counseling, that within each community, we have the means to support one another through the natural challenges of life and don’t always need to rely on professionals with degrees. It has both advantages and disadvantages relative to professionalized counseling.

Peer facilitation recognizes and prioritizes the interconnection of people within communities, and it comes without requiring the distance and boundaries of professional counseling.  For example, as a peer facilitator, I can still be friends with the people I support and invite them over for dinner and sometimes share about the struggles I’m going through.

Part of my orientation in peer facilitation is in skill sharing. I hope in my work with others to share the theory, practices, frames, and skills I find useful in personal, relational, and group work.

Please carefully read below about my particular philosophy and practice, and ask any questions you wish in order to decide what’s good for you. Thank you!

1. I am intentionally not certified in any counseling/coaching style. I think of what I can do as having elements of supportive listening, facilitation, and coaching/skill building. I believe this is something people can always do for each other, though it’s useful to be mindful, for example, not to coach when someone doesn’t want it. I do this work as your peer, not as someone wiser or smarter than you. I draw from a variety of schools of thought, including nonviolent communication, peer counseling, mindfulness, powerful non-defensive communication, formal consensus, and parenting by connection.
2. Peer support is always experimentation in a effort to be helpful. You’re the best judge of whether or not our interaction is serving your needs. I think we’re unlikely to be successful together unless you give me realy information about your experience, thoughts, feelings, and preferences about our times together. Also I ask you to: Incorporate your judgment into suggestions I make; Take the time you need to discern what you want to consent to (it is ok to say no); And tell me, are we making progress from your perspective?
3. My approach is founded on the firm belief that everyone I’m working with is good-natured at heart. I will attempt to understand with compassion both you and anyone with whom you’re experiencing conflict.
4. Good listening requires presence and energy, and if I’m running low (which would probably have to do with my state, rather than with what you’re sharing), I’ll let you know that I need a break.
5. If I sense that what you’re dealing with is outside what I can be of use for, I will recommend you add or switch to someone with particular training in a relevant area. I don’t work with ongoing domestic violence (I think that requires a more interventionist approach than I use) or people who have a known risk of suicide, and I don’t work solo on substance abuse, because I think it requires additional support to be successful. Licensed therapists and social workers have access to larger institutional resources that could be vitally helpful for people in those situations.
6. Unlike most professional counseling modalities, I do not hold the constraint that we can’t develop future social or work relationships. Professional counselors hold this boundary to help maintain integrity in the counseling relationship, which is seen as primary. To me as a peer counselor, I view us as members in the same community. In this context, I think friendships, family, and relationships are primary, and listening/counseling can be an aspect of any of these. And making friends or other relationships can be a positive side-effect of support conversations. I believe there are other ways to have integrity in our relationship, particularly holding the intent to see all members of a conflict with compassion and stepping back if I feel that integrity is threatened. It’s ok for you to set a different boundary. Feel free to ask for help sensing and expressing what you need here. I’m committed to supporting your boundaries between us.
7. I encourage you to reflect on and share any goals or aims you might have going in to our conversation(s).
8. My goal in this time is to support you and your aims. I want to invite you to have as much of the attention in our time together on yourself as you would like. At the same time, you are welcome to ask me questions about myself, whether in order to decide how comfortable you feel sharing with me, out of curiosity, because you enjoy it, or for any other reason.
9. If you wish to learn about and perhaps practice peer counseling or facilitation, let me know.
10. On a very serious note, there are many cases of people in powerful positions using pseudo- counseling, coaching, or support in a manipulative way. This is an unfortunately common form of abuse in spiritual, self-help, and yoga communities, as well as in startups, and multi-level marketing organizations. For a brief but insightful listen about that, check out this Conspirituality Podcast, starting at 13:23. I want to empower people to resist and interrupt these kinds of abuse.