not suit his nature. That he is very broad-minded about this becomes obvious, for instance in his comment about the often widely diverging working methods of the therapists in the schizophrenic study:Perhaps the deepest of these learnings is a confirmation of, and an extension of, the concept that therapy has to do with the relationship, and has relatively little to do with techniques or with theory and ideology. In this respect I believe my views have become more, rather than less, extreme. I believe it is the realness of the therapist in the relationship which is the most important element. It is when the therapist is natural and spontaneous that he seems to be most effective. Probably thisis a 'trained humanness' as one of our therapists suggests, but in the moment it is the natural reaction of this person. Thus our sharply different therapists achieve good results in quite differentways. For one, an impatient, no-nonsense, let's put-the-cards-on-the-table approach is mosteffective, because in such an approach he is most openly being himself. For another it may be amuch more gentle and more obviously warm approach, because this is the way this therapist is.Our experience has deeply reinforced and extended my own view that the person who is ableopenly to be himself at that moment, as he is at the deepest levels he is able to be is the effective therapist. Perhaps nothing else is of any importance As will be discussed further on, this respect for the therapist's own style is no passport to 'reckless experimenting'. Attention to the client's process and continuous following of his experiential track remain theultimate guidelines for our interventions.Congruence As Conditio Sine Qua Non of Acceptance and EmpathyAfter having examined the therapist's congruence from the angle of his 'personal presence', we now wish to inquire about the core meaning of the concept and discuss its importance for therapeutic work.Congruence requires, first of all, that the therapist be a psychologically well-developed and integrated individual, i.e. sufficiently 'whole' (or 'healed') and in touch with himself. This means amongst other things daring to acknowledge flaws and vulnerabilities, accepting the positive and negative parts of oneself with a certain leniency, being capable of openness without defensiveness to what lives in oneself and being able to get in touch with it having a solid identity and a strong enough sense of competence, being able to function efficaciously in personal and intimate relationships without interference from one's own personalproblems. Self-knowledge and ego-strength can perhaps be seen as the two cornerstones of this way of being Congruence is a correlative of acceptance: there can be no openness to the client's experience if there isno openness to one's own experience. And without openness there can be no empathy either. In this sense, congruence is the 'upper limit' of the capacity for empathy . To put it differently: the therapist can never bring the client further than where he is himself as a person.IncongruenceThe importance of this attitude becomes especially clear when it is lacking, i.e. when the therapist is defensive and incongruent. Our personal difficulties may