In our modern world, many components of human life have been compartmentalized: chopped apart and put into different categories. Each of these categories has its own specialist to deal with the individual component. We have separated the aspects of human well-being into the realm of the physical, the mental and the spiritual (mind, body and soul). It is noteworthy that in Earth Centered cultures these distinctions are blurred. The Shaman or Village herb-woman would be called on for healing, to help deal with personal problems, and act in a religious function as well. In our dismembered world, you go to a doctor to fix the body (a specialist for each body part), a psychologist to fix the mind (in the time allotted by the insurance company), and matters of the soul and to find meaning in life, are told to see a minister. In our modern western world, each of these professionals would be expected to deal with a single person at a time, not becoming too concerned with society as a whole. In my path to become a Unitarian Universalist (UU) Minister, I must remember that the dividing lines between these professions may not be as clear as we are led to believe. It will be my challenge to balance many roles, which would include delving into the social problems of the world, providing inspiration to the congregation and hope that we can work to make the world a better place and help people on an individual basis.

In preparation for fulfilling my role as a minister, I have endeavoured to expose myself to several counseling techniques. Several of which may be highly useful in my future chosen profession and some which may not prove as beneficial. I would not, most likely, be dealing with mental illnesses. The types of disorders that would be caused by some sort of physiological problem would be beyond my scope. Rather, I would most likely be called to be available for congregates during times of family crisis and bereavement and perhaps to help with people you may be seeking meaning in life -- specifically religious meaning. Helping others to find meaning takes on a different aspect with a UU minister than it would with other denominations in that UUs don't have any set creeds or dogma.

In a Unitarian Universalist Church, each person is given the opportunity to find their own personal meaning in life. This concept is expressed by the UU Principle that we, "Affirm and promote a free and responsible search for truth and meaning," and continues, "Grateful for the religious pluralism which enriches and ennobles our faith; we are inspired to deepen our understanding and expand our vision." (UUA, 1985) With this sort of religious outlook, there are no easy answers to life's questions. A UU minister is more likely to raise more questions about the meaning of life than provide answers.

For this sort of quest for meaning in life, I believe that I would find many of the aspects of Existentialist Therapy very helpful. Many of the basic principles of Existentialist Therapy are very much in synch with UU philosophy. Namely, the ideas that each person has a unique concept of life depending on the context of their life, that we have the freedom to choose and have responsibility for those choices and that the search for meaning is an important aspect to our existence. These concepts would be useful to use in services as well as with individuals. We could explore, together, the "nature of being human." Why do humans act the way they do? Why do we as individuals do the things we do? Is there a deeper meaning to life? It would be very useful to ask these questions, asking each person to think of how they would answer these questions for themselves rather than trying to answer them for people. Doing this will put the responsibility to find meaning and purpose in life in the hands of each individual, keeping with the existential idea that we all do ultimately have responsibility for our own lives. When applying these concepts to social problems, we can realize that we must not only take responsibility for our own lives, but also recognize that our individual actions influence the world around us, that we truly are "part of the interdependent web of existence which we are a part." (UUA Principles)

It may seem that concern for the social systems which predominate our world may be beyond the scope of counseling techniques. It is my contention, however, that beyond being a concern that a congregate may wish to discuss with a minister, that the societal pressures are a major component to many of the mental and emotional problems that are encountered in individuals in our world today. As a minister, my concern may not be as much trying to fix the damage in one individual, but rather call attention to the fact that this damage is being done, explore how it is being done and identify ways that we as a religious body can work to change these conditions in our world. This course in counseling techniques has made me more aware of some of the conditions that arise from living in a dysfunctional society. From Freud, I have learned about all the different defense mechanisms that people employ to keep from dealing with aspects of life they find too troubling. From Jung I have learned of the concept of the Shadow Self, "the part of us that we will not allow ourselves to express." (Singer, 1973) Similarly, Perls spoke of layers of neurosis, in which we play games and get lost in roles, have catastrophic fears, etc. Ellis has shown that many of an individual's problems can be traced to faulty beliefs about self, things we must have or do to have happiness. All these theories show the results from living in our dismembered world. The behavior therapists have shown how people can be trained to act certain ways. We live in a world in which people do not feel that they are free to express their true self. They wear masks, hide behind false personas, use every imaginable technique to hide from themselves who they really are and how they are truly feeling. They have been made to feel bad about their own bodies and sexuality. They have been coerced into thinking that acquiring material possessions is the key to happiness. They have been told that they have no voice. They have been told that they must obey the orders of those who wield power over them. It is these social forces in our world telling us these things that are the root cause of many of the "mental illnesses" that we have been studying ways of curing.

In my role as minister, I feel that it my calling to do more than slap band aids on the souls of those afflicted by the effects of our dismembered world. Rather than having to say to people individually, "Hey, you are O.K., you don't have to beat yourself up all the time. You have the freedom to choose your own path in life," to those few that can afford the cost of going to see a therapist, I have a calling to work to change the societal influences that cause these problems in the first place.

Working towards this sort of goal is something that could not be done by myself alone. That is one of the reasons that I wish to aspire to UU ministry. It is my hope that I will be able to first provide information about these issues and then work with the other members of the congregation to work towards making these changes. By no means do I think that I will be "leading a flock of people towards the path they must follow." On the contrary, people join UU churches usually because they are already concerned with social problems and wish to help fix them. They expect their minister to inform them of societal problems, suggest some solutions (or ask members to work on finding solutions) and then encouraging people to go out and work for change in the world. In short, I will be asked to help people to discover their UU faith, which has been described as, "Trust in ourselves to do what our own internal principles drive us to do." (Demma, 1995)

Working towards these sorts of goals is also perhaps beyond the scope of any of the Psychological techniques that we have discussed in class. To be sure, many of the Existentialist Therapy ideas of freedom and responsibility, Cognitive ideas of wrong thinking, and Humanist ideas of the inherent goodness of every person are helpful. But none of these offers a compete system of dealing with the problems of oppression that have left so many in our world wounded.

To deal with this oppression, I found very useful the techniques of psychologist and feminist theologian Miriam Simos, known best by her pen-name Starhawk. Her methods are deeply rooted in Liberation Theology and Earth-Centered religion. She calls it a "Psychology of Liberation" whose "primary focus is the communities we come from and create. Our collective history is as important as our individual history. A liberation psychology is more concerned with how structures of power shape and bind us than with the particular events of our childhoods. Individual therapy may be helpful, and sometimes necessary, but a liberation psychology is more concerned with ways of creating communal healing and collective change." (Simos, 1987)

She identifies in her works the systems of power-over which are at work in the world and how they affect people. She describes a "self-hater" that is much like Jung's Shadow-self that can manifest itself as the Judge, the Conqueror, the Censor, and the Master of Servants. She describes how we can reclaim value, risk boundaries, find our voices and create a sustainable culture. There are several differences between the techniques that she suggests and the more traditional techniques. First, she insists that the language that is used is that of the common people, realizing that part of the problem is caused when power is reserved for people that have the training to understand the technical jargon. Jargon that "implies that the human psyche is constructed like some kind of machine." (Simos) Jargon that is created and sustained, in part, to give insurance companies more control. Second, it is a psychology that is centered on dealing with the cause of the problem rather than "treating the symptoms." It deals with identifying and dealing with the systems of control and power-over which have lead to the individual problems in the first place. It is also a psychology that is deeply rooted in spirituality, allowing for exploration of mystery and the sacred. It does not assume that one must dismember the mind from the human spirit, or even worse, just deal with our thoughts or behaviors only. Lastly, it is a psychology that is undertaken as a community. It realizes that we are part of an interdependent web of existence and that none of us exists in a vacuum. What we do effects those around us as those around us effects us. I found that the counseling approaches we studied, save Family Systems therapy, did not place much significance on how those around you influence you.

To be fair, the counseling systems that we have studied have not given much attention to the social environment from which we come or discussed how we might go about changing them simply because it is beyond the scope of any single person. In my calling as a minister, however, I will not be alone. I will have members of a congregation and other Unitarian Universalists and like minded individuals to help in this endeavour. To be sure, many of the individual techniques may come in handy from time to time in my work. I feel, however, that my calling is to try to deal with overall social problems more than counsel people on an individual basis. To understand overall social problems, however, it is helpful to understand the problems and suffering of individual people and how you might help a single person work toward wholeness. It is my hope that I will be able to take some of the concepts that I have learned in this class and integrate them in with other, perhaps less traditional, approaches to exploring and improving the human condition and integrate them into an approach that would prove effective to help institute change in our world.