Once, I invited someone to take my workshop and she replied, “Oh, I don’t need to take your right-use-of-power workshop. I won’t cause any harm because I have good intentions.” I want to talk about how good intentions are necessary but not nearly enough for ethical use of power.

The simplest reason is the profound fact that our impact doesn’t always match our intention. In the example described in this article, the therapist’s intention was to set good and ethical boundaries with her client. The impact on the client, as you will see, was that she felt hurt, abandoned, betrayed, confused, and wrong.

Other reasons include cultural differences, impact of the power differential, projection, shame, and trauma responses. These are subjects for another article.

In the paper the other day, I found a letter in the “Dear Abby” column that was a painful example of how good intentions plus lack of skill and awareness of impact can cause more harm.

Read the rest of the article on GoodTherapy.org

Please note: I am a regular contributor to GoodTherapy.org, an association of mental health professionals from over 30 countries worldwide who support efforts to reduce harm in therapy. GoodTherapy.org is ranked as one of the top therapist directories on the web.

Despite all odds, he made it through to a successful adulthood with a career, a loving wife, and two wonderful children. Many remarkable people do. David had loving parents and a caring neighborhood environment. But the web of misuses and abuses of power by adults in authority — teachers, principals, and therapists — that he encountered in his desperate quest for meaning and financial independence is staggering.

Reading my friend David Patten’s book: Dummy, a Memoir, I am truly amazed at the power of his will to create a life worth living in what he experienced as a hostile world. I’m thinking about how he could possibly have gotten such little support.

It was the 1950s. David was born with unusual sensitivity, was slow to talk, and was unable to learn to read or remember names or sequences like months or days of the week.

To continue reading this article, click here to visit GoodTherapy.org.

Please note: I am a regular contributor to GoodTherapy.org, an association of mental health professionals from over 30 countries worldwide who support efforts to reduce harm in therapy. GoodTherapy.org is ranked as one of the top therapist directories on the web.