How to Scare Off Counselees
StaciandKora
Not every pastor enjoys counseling. But other than by skipping town,
how can you decrease the demand? Here, based on specious clinical
research, are a dozen methods guaranteed to keep counseling off your
to-do list.
12 Ways to Reduce Your Counseling Load
1. Don't put a door on your office.
2. Sing songs such as "Put On a Happy Face" and "Don't Worry; Be
Happy" to counselees.
3. Step out of the office and start laughing uproariously.
4. Tell the counselee that although you can't figure out a solution
to the problem, you'll bring it up in the sermon on Sunday and see if
anybody has any ideas.
5. Casually catch up on your reading while counselees bare their
deepest problems.
6. Tell the counselee you are videotaping the session for replay on
the local cable program: Candid Clergy.
7. Put a bumper sticker on your car: "I'd rather not be counseling."
8. Refer them to a helpful article in your favorite professional
journal: The National Enquirer.
9. Suggest counseling by fax machine.
10. In front of the counselee, phone your spouse and ask for his or
her opinion on what to do.
11. Recite tales of people who are a lot worse off, and call the
counselee a crybaby.
12. Engage the counselee's mother-in-law as a co-therapist.
-Paul Bailey in Leadership, Vol. 10, no. 4.