Co-counselling

Co-counselling (spelled co-counseling in American English) is a grassroots method of personal change based on reciprocal peer counseling. It uses simple methods. Time is shared equally and the essential requirement of the person taking their turn in the role of counselor is to do their best to listen and give their full attention to the other person. It is not a discussion; the aim is to support the person in the client role to work through their own issues in a mainly self-directed way.

Co-counseling was originally formulated in the early 1950s by the American Harvey Jackins and originated in a schism in the Dianetics movement (itself in part derived from schisms in General Semantics and Cybernetics) ). Jackins founded the Re-evaluation Counseling (RC) Communities, with headquarters in Seattle, Washington, United States. His son, Tim Jackins, is currently the international leader of Re-evaluation Counseling and its main affiliates.

There are a number of smaller, separate, independent organizations that have resulted from breakaways from, or re-workings of, Re-evaluation Counseling. The principal one of these is Co-Counseling International (CCI).

The main activity in co-counselling involves participants arranging to meet regularly in pairs to give each other peer-to-peer counselling, in turn taking the role of counsellor and client, with equal amounts of time allocated to each. Co-counselling functions by giving people an opportunity to work on whatever issues they choose with the accepting support of another person, with whom they have no actual relationship. The person in the role of counsellor acts as a facilitator to the client, sometimes as athird-party observer and sometimes as a second-party confidant. While co-counselling is sometimes practiced outside a formal organisation, formal co-counselling organisations have developed leadership and support structures, including trainings and retreats.

...
Wikipedia