Characteristics of an Effective Counselor Effective counseling calls for one to have a number of characteristics that are founded on one’s personality. Patience and calmness are some of the desirable characteristics for one to be a good counselor. More often than not, counselors deal with people who are mentally and emotionally distressed. Patience, therefore, puts the counselors in the best position to tolerate all kinds of behaviors that may be portrayed by the clients. Without patience, it is difficult to put up with the behaviors and propel the clients towards the stages of recovery. Moreover, patience enables the counselor to establish and sustain relationships with clients successfully. It may take too long for some clients to establish trust in the counselors. It implies that the counselors must always be ready to bear with such clients to be able to help them to achieve the goals and objectives of counseling (Palmo, Weikel & Borsos, 2006). I have a lot of empathy towards others, besides being a good listener. During training, I have to pay a lot of attention to instructions on the subject of empathy because it is one of the most misused personal characteristics in intense counseling situations. Empathy is used within certain limits in counseling to maintain objectivity. It is important for me to understand the limits within which I am required to show empathy towards the clients. I have to know how I can avoid the tendencies of being too empathetic because this might result in personalization and transference of emotions and feelings in counseling sessions. This can create difficulties in attaining the goals of counseling. Therefore, gaining skills on how to control empathy in counseling is critical in helping me deal with emotional situations in counseling (Greason, & Cashwell, 2009). Comprehending my defense mechanisms Repression is one of the main ego defense mechanisms that are often used unconsciously. It is critical for the counselor to detect the tendencies of repression among clients during counseling sessions. The counselor has to think about the underlying issues in the cases that are presented by the clients when the client seems to be defensive. It calls for careful listening to be able to identify errors in the client’s statements and any other signal that the client may portray consciously or unconsciously. The best way to deal with repression is to dig into the past experiences. It is important to listen to critical symbols to avoid misinterpretation (Sharf, 2012). Regression is another defense mechanism that is common in counseling. It entails acting in a silly or childish way when a person goes through trauma. Such characters can easily escalate some forms of weird behaviour. Sharf (2012) observes that there are two main ways of dealing with people who portray regression. First of all, the counsellor can adopt the nurturing role by taking the position of authority over the client. The principle of authority should be used relatively, failure to which the client might develop opposition. The other way of dealing with regression is identifying with the behaviour. Identifying with the behavior encourages trust and eases the ability to read the mind of the client and make the right diagnosis. Rationalization is als