I have to take two buses to get the college every Friday. I hope I will always be able to catch the first bus that passes from the bus stop in Wednesfield once in half an hour. Yet in my second week, I almost missed it. It was a relief to see 525 coming late. Well, to some extent. I hadn't completed my assignment. I wanted to have a copy of it to see how I would change, and to ask the questions to other people. (I hope there won’t be a copyright problem!) I thought the tutor had asked the students to bring it back after answering the questions. I misunderstood it. My hurry was in vain. Although I came to Walsall on time, I was almost late for the class because I was looking for a place to copy a sheet of paper. When we mentioned how we felt at that moment, I admitted that I was a bit annoyed myself. It is just waking up 10 minutes earlier than I normally do. It is a simple solution. I won't have to worry about running, puffing, catching buses, getting annoyed, telling off myself etc. Then why am I not always doing it as it should be?

We learnt about how to decorate the counselling room, how to sit, how to look, how to appear etc. I first thought that kind of stuff could have come later. On the other hand, I thought that now or later shouldn't be a big concern in a ten-week introductory course. Maybe what matters is that what was said was directly related to counselling. I found it a considerate thing to make sure that clients are put in a confident, safe, easy and comfortable situation.

When we practiced the class, the feedback I received from my fellow students made me realize again that I tend to smile a lot. In some circumstances, it is actually too much, I should imagine. No wonder I got abused on the bus some months ago. I should have suspected that it was me who was addressed, when the drunken guy said, "Stop laughing." After he put his hand on my shoulder saying, "Stop laughing." again, I looked myself in the window of the bus. I wasn't laughing at all, but I had a smile on my face, the existing effect of the nice evening with a friend. It should have made him even angrier to get the motive to hit me. I thought I had learnt my lesson from that incidence, but probably I haven't completely got it yet. It wouldn't be appropriate if I smiled when the client was telling a sad story, would it be?

Nodding. I do it a lot, too. Not necessarily in a counselling situation. (As the codes of ethics and practice require an explicit agreement from both the client and the counsellor to call the conversation counselling, I have never given a counselling anyway.) Is it good to nod? I guess it depends. We may find out soon. Nevertheless, I saw Carl Rogers nodding and humming a lot. Just like me! When I saw him listening to the client, I said to myself, 'Hey, he is doing more or less what I am doing in my everyday life. And he is considered as a great listener. Wow, that is to say...' I was delighted to discover that.

As the storyteller, I told the listener one of my holidays to Wales with my host family. Before I got to the holiday bit, I had spent more than half of my supposed time just talking about the fact that Lorraine had not mentioned I was invited and how I felt about that. What I am saying is that I have some difficulty to get to the point when I talk. I should be able to keep it short and straight. When I thought about clients' story-telling ways, I considered myself as more like those who tell their story fluently. But now when I re-think about it, I see that it isn't actually that easy. Do clients make a plan, preferably a written draft, about how they would tell the counsellor their story? I guess I would do that if I went there to talk about something specific. I suppose it would be wise of me to prepare what I want to say in advance instead of rambling on and sort of wasting my time.

I think the tutor is a fever proponent of the Code of Ethics and Practice for Counsellors. Particularly he seems to support and defend strongly the idea that counsellors shouldn't give advice to their clients. It sounds reasonable to me as well. Still I cannot refrain myself thinking of any example of a situation, which could show that giving advice actually works. Maybe it could be specific phobia. Behavioural therapy is reportedly doing a good job to overcome it. Systematic desensitisation is being used as an exposure technique. Face it. It is as simple as that. So maybe counsellors should be able to act a bit flexibly according to different cases using an eclectic approach. That is just what immediately came to my mind, but I don't know if what I thought is actually true. I may be missing some parts of the big picture.