Maybe you agree that to discover these themes or pattern is a good thing and will be very beneficial, but you still desire to know how to do it. How can you practically go about discovering patterns and themes that you and your counselee are still unaware of? Another helpful suggestion Dr. Mack makes is that you ask your counselee to begin keeping a journal. You should ask your counselee to keep a journal for a longer period of time, preferably for a few weeks at least. You will specify exactly what kinds of information you desire your counselee to include in their daily records and ask them to write honestly and accurately. They must make entries on a daily basis and note a number of details surrounding the incidents in their lives you have required them to take special note of.

A journal is a tool you as a counsellor can use as a homework assignment for your counselees. It serves as a way for you to have eyes and ears in your counselee’s life when they are not in an actual counselling session. It gives you more information than they are able to give you by recalling the details of their week as they sit in your office. It gives you access to their daily routine, the circumstances they live in, and the things they think, their attitudes, the things they feel, the things they desire, the things they do, the way they react in those circumstances.

A journal is valuable to you because it helps you to gain an inside understanding of your counselee’s life. It helps you understand what kind of interpretations they are making as they look at their circumstances. Not only that, but it helps you to grasp the frequency and severity of the problem. So much detail is either lost or modified in the counselling environment, so a journal, in which a counselee records in an honest way, is of inestimable value in counselling.

Below are some suggestions as to what kinds of things you can ask your counselee to record in his/her journal.

· You could ask them to record their eating, drinking or drugging habits. Have them include the details of when they did it, how much was involved, where they were when they did it an in whose company they were.

· Or you could ask them to detail their family relationships. Ask them to include the details of good family interactions and bad ones. Have them record the times, places and types of communication they had, and with whom they had it. Ask them to write about the efforts they made to demonstrate practical love to another family member, what happened, how the other person responded and how they responded to that. Ask them to detail family conflicts and resolutions. There are many things to write about when it comes to family interaction.