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From: Joel A. Germond, Psy.D.
Date: 12/29/98
When one attempts to "empathically understand", one is merely rolling an educated die. The more one is accurate in such attempst, the more one is likely to have a meaningful therapy with one's clients. Of course, as therapists (or even just as human being in general), one may be right on the mark a lot of the time and more or less off the mark at others. The ability to accurately have empathy may be a talent some have more so than others as well as one that can be honed with experience. Of course another level of this is one may think one has accurately been empathic, or may have been encouraged to believe so, but may not have been. This is the never ending game of interacting with people in the therapeutic milieu (excuse my use of the word "game"). Likewise decentering is a process of self-observation that is not flawless, but may be right on the money more or less often depending on talent, skill, luck or practice. Again, the next level is that perceptions are not facts (though not necessarily not facts either). I like these templates, but hammer my head only lightly into them.
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