Therapist Development through International Dialogue: Students' Perspectives on Personal and Professional Life Changing Interactions in China

Abstract

Many educational opportunities are available for students developing into professionals as psychotherapists and psychologists. Textbooks, conferences, and endless lectures provide outlets to research and theory, but they fall short in providing the human factors available through cross-cultural encounters. Trips to China, where students and professionals interacted in dialogue and engagement, have created personal and professional changes in the way we live and practice. Through encountering the body, compassion, and being, the importance of creating culturally sensitive and flexible psychological interactions became prevalent throughout our travels in China, in which we dialogued with many professionals and lay persons that worked in various psychological settings. It became apparent that, to support the existential orientation, we had to also be willing to critique it.

Acknowledgments

This article was drawn from experiences as students at the First International Conference on Existential Psychology in Nanjing, China, April 2010 and the year prior during various trainings and interactions. The article was written, however, after Michael Moats and Trent R. Claypool had graduated with their doctoral degrees.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Michael Moats

Michael Moats has a Psy.D. in clinical psychology and is currently a post-doctoral resident at the Switzer Institute in Colorado Springs, is working with end-of-life issues at a local hospice, and teaches cultural diversity at the college level. His varied clientele has included individuals with low-income or that are indigent, incarcerated and court-mandated family programs, as well as members of the military. His passion lies in working with clients that are facing loss in different facets and are learning to redefine their lives and create new meaning. Michael's research interests have been a qualitative, cross-cultural study that investigated meaning making and the lessons learned through loss, and he is currently planning on qualitatively researching the use of existential group practices with individuals suffering from degenerative diseases. His future goals are private practice, writing, and continuing to dialogue internationally to contribute to a more rounded perspective of the psychology community.

Trent R. Claypool

Trent R. Claypool is a Psychologist Candidate in the state of Colorado and is completing his Postdoctoral Residency at the Switzer Institute in Colorado Springs, CO where he provides psychological services to individuals, groups and families. His professional interests include existential–humanistic psychology, cross-cultural psychology, issues of diversity, the contextual factors movement, depth-psychotherapist development, and the psychological treatment of people diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. He has spent significant time in China and Hong Kong teaching and engaging in dialogue about existential–humanistic psychology and its application in Eastern Culture.

Elizabeth Saxon

Elizabeth Saxon, MBA, Psy.D., was born and raised in Japan before moving to the United States. As a student, along with other doctoral students from the Colorado School of Professional Psychology, Elizabeth traveled to China with Dr. Louis Hoffman, where she taught and presented in Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Qufu, and Nanjing. Her presentations include presenting at the 2nd and 4th Sino-American Psychology of Religion Conferences, including the presentations New Directions for Mindfulness-Based Therapies: A Buddhist Critique with Michael Dow and Death and Dying: East West Comparative. Elizabeth co-authored a review of the book, Paradoxes of Time in Existential Therapy: Can a Time-Limited Existential Approach Work? and co-authored a chapter in Existential Psychology East–West. Her research interests include neuropsychology, trauma, mindfulness, and existential psychology and will be a guest lecturer on Addictions at the National Labor College in Placid Harbor, Maryland in 2011.