Re-evaluation Counseling

Re-evaluation Counseling (RC) is an organization directed by Re-evaluation Counseling Community Resources, Inc., that practices "co-counseling", a peer-based counseling procedure centered on helping people and of bringing about social reform. It was founded in the United States by Harvey Jackins in the 1950s and was led by him until his death in 1999. It is now led by his son Tim Jackins. RC teaches co-counseling and holds workshops throughout the world. It is based in Seattle, Washington, USA.

In the early 1950s, Jackins became acquainted with L. Ron Hubbard's theory of Dianetics. In 1952 Jackins formed Personal Counselors Inc. to "engage in, conduct and teach the art and science of Dianetics." While practicing Dianetics, he developed the concepts of "re-evaluation" and "discharge" and came to believe that they could be encouraged by the "exchange of aware attention" in the "co-counseling process". At this time, Jackins used some of the terminology of Dianetics, such as "clearing up patterns", "rationality", "present time" and "passing distress by contagion". Psychiatrist Richard M. Childs claimed that Jackins' book The Human Side of Human Beings (1965) plagiarized Hubbard's Dianetics (1950), saying that Jackins "paraphrased Hubbard's terms by recasting them in his own jargon. Hubbard's 'Engrams' became Jackins' 'distress patterns', 'release' became 'discharge', and 'to become clear' became RC's 'to re-emerge'." In 1957, Hubbard's Scientology organisation claimed that Jackins was describing himself as a "Dianetics Auditor".

Harvey Jackins' own story of the origins of Re-evaluation Counseling leaves out any mention of Dianetics. In his own account, he developed Re-evaluation Co-Counseling after observing a troubled friend make changes in his thinking process as a result of being patiently listened to while he cried. Curious about the effect of this crying, he worked with others to develop a method of reciprocal counseling based on the recollection of psychological and physical traumas or "hurts" accompanied by various types of emotional catharsis. He called these effects "discharge", which he came to believe led to clear thinking or "re-evaluation". He held that rational thinking was prevented by the accumulation of past hurts, which could be removed by repeated discharge through co-counseling. The objective of RC became the dissemination of this method of creating rational thinking, a process called "re-emergence". Re-evaluation counseling, it is held, can remove "oppression", which it considers to lie at the root of most of the problems in the world.

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