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Why I Chose to Be a Counselor

At the height of the ethnic violence in Kenya, I spent a great deal of time in camps for internally displaced people in the Rift Valley, Nyanza, Western and Nairobi provinces. My job with the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) was to bring relief: food, clothing and shelter, and later support to help families rebuild their livelihoods. But the people I met had lost more than property. They had lost homes, livelihoods and loved ones, and they carried grief and trauma that no relief package could reach. That is where my journey into counselling really began.

A Career I Never Planned

Counselling was not a career I imagined for myself as a young man. Unlike law, medicine or engineering, it was seen as a profession for "less serious" students, with little promise of a good job or a successful career. It also carried a stigma: counselling was for people seeking a divorce, going through crisis or suffering mental illness, a last resort rather than a calling. Those perceptions kept me away from it for years.

Seeing the Link Between Body and Mind

My work as a development worker and then as a peacebuilder with NCCK changed my view. I began to see how closely people's physical needs are tied to their psychological needs. We were not only distributing aid; we were supporting efforts to rebuild social cohesion and the mental health of those directly affected by violence. I wanted to help people overcome their grief and trauma, and I realised that, despite years of doing this work, I lacked formal training. I believed I would be more effective, and more trustworthy to the people I served, with the right skills and a recognised qualification. So, years after leaving high school, I went back to study and earned a BA in Counselling.

Counselling in Everyday Life

I soon found that counselling applies to almost every part of life. We are constantly confronted with challenges, our own and those of colleagues, friends, neighbours and family: marriages under strain, teenagers navigating adolescence, people changing careers or preparing for retirement. As a parent, I am often invited to speak to pupils at my children's school and to offer guidance at my church. These are places where counselling skills make a real difference.

At its heart, counselling is about helping people help themselves: making better choices and becoming better at choosing. A counsellor builds an understanding relationship and then supports the client to explore their circumstances, re-evaluate their experiences and discover their own capabilities and potential. Self-reliance is the goal. My greatest satisfaction comes when a client feels free to express their feelings in confidence, perhaps for the first time with someone who truly listens without judgement, and leaves more motivated to act for themselves.

Strengths and Struggles

Working with diverse communities and faiths has taught me not to judge others by my own values or impose those values on them. I try always to listen to and accept the views of the people I work with, a skill rooted in my training in communication. Years of working with people have also strengthened my social skills, which I consider essential to counselling. And I hold confidentiality as sacred: what is said in a counselling relationship stays there.

The beginning was not easy. I felt anxious before meeting clients, doubted my ability and was constantly tempted to give advice instead of listening. Over time I learned that I needed to define my role clearly and develop my own counselling style, one that is natural to who I am.

What Counselling Gave Me

Counselling has made me a better listener and helped me understand myself. It has also shaped my peacebuilding. The communities I work with carry wounds that are as much emotional as material, and peace that ignores those wounds does not last. The same is true for those of us who do this work. We, too, absorb grief and pain, and we need care. In that sense, choosing to become a counsellor was also choosing a deeper way of being a peacebuilder.

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