A PHENOMENOLOGICAL INQUIRY INTO COUNSELLORS’ EXPERIENCES OF
BEING-ETHICAL IN ETHICALLY AND/OR MORALLY CHALLENGING SITUATIONS

by

RYAN J. SCHUTT
B.A., Trinity Western University, 2010
Thesis
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for
the Degree of
MASTER OF ARTS in COUNSELLING PSYCHOLOGY
in the
FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES
TRINITY WESTERN UNIVERSITY

March 2020
© Ryan J. Schutt, 2020

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ABSTRACT

What does it mean to be an ethical counsellor? Being an ethical practitioner is often
thought of as doing the ‘right thing,’ considering possible risks, mitigating harm, maximizing
benefits, using decision-making models, or abiding by a code of ethics. I investigated the
phenomenon of being-ethical through semi-structured interviews with six clinical counsellors
who shared their experiences of a morally and/or ethically challenging situation. I analyzed data
using Personal Phenomenology, a novel research method rooted in hermeneutic phenomenology
and existential philosophy. Based on my analysis, I proposed six features of being-ethical. Beingethical involves: (a) seeing and composing the world ethically, (b) demonstrating the skill and
giving the gift of attention, (c) opening one’s self to being exposed to the suffering of and
evaluation by others, (d) negotiating one’s proximity to the other, (e) critically engaging with
third parties, and (f) acting in the decisive moment. Implications for counselling education,
institutions, practice, and research were proposed.

Keywords: Ethics, morality, counselling, existential, phenomenological

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT.................................................................................................................................... II
TABLE OF CONTENTS .............................................................................................................. III
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................................... VIII
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................... 10
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ...................................................................................... 13
A Brief Overview of Ethics................................................................................................... 13
Definition of Key Terms ....................................................................................................... 15
Morality and ethics. .......................................................................................................... 15
Challenging situations....................................................................................................... 16
Counsellor. ........................................................................................................................ 16
Perspectives on the Main Features of an Ethical Counsellor................................................ 17
Compassion. ...................................................................................................................... 18
Commitment. .................................................................................................................... 18
Integrity, fidelity, and trustworthiness. ............................................................................. 20
Practical wisdom. .............................................................................................................. 21
Awareness. ........................................................................................................................ 25
Conscientiousness. ............................................................................................................ 26
Courage. ............................................................................................................................ 27
Conclusion. ....................................................................................................................... 28
Empirical Research on the Features of an Ethical Practitioner ............................................ 28
Experiences of ethically and/or morally challenging situations. ...................................... 32

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An Existential-Phenomenological Perspective on the Ethical Counsellor ........................... 35
Being a counsellor. ............................................................................................................ 36
Competence....................................................................................................................... 37
Being-with-others ............................................................................................................. 38
Authenticity. ...................................................................................................................... 41
Being-ethical. .................................................................................................................... 43
Summary. .......................................................................................................................... 44
Rationale of the Present Study .............................................................................................. 44
Purpose of the Study and Research Question ....................................................................... 45
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY ..................................................................................... 46
Phenomenology as Philosophy ............................................................................................. 46
Hermeneutic Phenomenology as Research Method ............................................................. 48
The method of Personal Phenomenology. ........................................................................ 49
Researcher positionality. ................................................................................................... 55
Data Collection ..................................................................................................................... 57
Recruitment. ...................................................................................................................... 57
Sampling ........................................................................................................................... 58
Participants........................................................................................................................ 59
Interviews. ......................................................................................................................... 60
Data management.............................................................................................................. 61
Development of Research Focus .......................................................................................... 61
Ethical Considerations .......................................................................................................... 62
Data Analysis ........................................................................................................................ 63

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Waypoint 1: Phenomenological description. .................................................................... 63
Waypoint 2: Impressions................................................................................................... 64
Waypoint 3: Understanding. ............................................................................................. 64
Waypoint 4: Positioning. ................................................................................................... 65
Waypoint 5: Expression. ................................................................................................... 66
Research Team ...................................................................................................................... 66
The Role of Bracketing ......................................................................................................... 67
Evaluation Criteria: Rigour, Resonance, Reflexivity, and Relevance .................................. 68
Rigour. ............................................................................................................................... 69
Resonance. ........................................................................................................................ 69
Reflexivity. ........................................................................................................................ 70
Relevance. ......................................................................................................................... 71
CHAPTER FOUR: PHENOMENOLOGICAL WRITING .......................................................... 73
Being-Ethical: Seeing and Composing ................................................................................. 74
The composition of the ethical.......................................................................................... 77
Being-Ethical as Demonstrating the Skill and Giving the Gift of Attention ........................ 79
Being-Ethical as Negotiating Proximity to the Other ........................................................... 91
Concession. ....................................................................................................................... 93
Recession. ......................................................................................................................... 94
Procession. ........................................................................................................................ 98
Being-Ethical as Opening One’s Self to the Inevitability of Being-Exposed ..................... 103
Being-Ethical as Critically Discerning Third Parties...........................................................113
Our own third parties .......................................................................................................117

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Third parties who harm ....................................................................................................118
Third parties who are overseers ...................................................................................... 120
Defence. .......................................................................................................................... 125
Third parties in the life of the other ................................................................................ 125
An Illustration ..................................................................................................................... 128
Conclusion: The Decisive Moment in Being-Ethical ......................................................... 131
CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION ............................................................................................... 136
Alignment with Counselling Ethics Research and Theory ................................................. 136
Seeing, attending, and composing .................................................................................. 137
Being-exposed................................................................................................................. 139
Proximity......................................................................................................................... 141
Third parties .................................................................................................................... 142
Connections outside of counselling ethics. ..................................................................... 144
Contributions to Counselling Ethics ................................................................................... 146
Methodological Contributions ............................................................................................ 149
Implications ........................................................................................................................ 152
Education. ....................................................................................................................... 152
Clinical practice. ............................................................................................................. 153
Policy and organization................................................................................................... 154
Research. ......................................................................................................................... 155
Limitations .......................................................................................................................... 156
The researcher: A novice inquirer. .................................................................................. 157
Data collection. ............................................................................................................... 157

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Data analysis. .................................................................................................................. 158
Sample............................................................................................................................. 158
Interpretation: The circle continues. ............................................................................... 158
CHAPTER SIX: REFLEXIVITY ............................................................................................... 160
CHAPTER SEVEN: CONCLUSION ........................................................................................ 181
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................... 183
APPENDIX A: RECRUITMENT NOTICE ............................................................................... 200
APPENDIX B: PARTICIPANT PROFILE ................................................................................. 201
APPENDIX C: INFORMED CONSENT................................................................................... 203
APPENDIX D: SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEW GUIDE ................................................. 207
APPENDIX E: CONFIDENTIALITY AGREEMENT .............................................................. 208

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Though I took far longer to complete this work than I ever could have anticipated, this
thesis prepared me for the most significant ethical decisions I have ever had to make. For that
reason alone, this thesis was worth it. But this thesis is not the product of one person. I want to
express my deepest gratitude to the community of people who made this thesis possible:
My participants, who courageously shared their experiences with me, challenged me with
their practical wisdom, and provided me with much to reflect upon.
My long-suffering co-supervisors Mihaela and Lynn: Thank you for your endless
encouragement, enthusiasm, and support through every twist and turn. Little did you know what
you were signing up for. Thanks for sticking with me!
Derrick, Kristin, Ryan, and my MA Counselling Psychology faculty and colleagues for
the various ways in which you helped me throughout the duration of this thesis and my tenure as
a CPSY student.
My supervisors Shawna and Kurt, and my colleagues in Mental Health Services for your
understanding, patience, and adaptability. Thank you for taking a chance on me, allowing me to
work to my sweet spot, and supporting me to become more ethical in all that I do.
To the care providers, especially Tammi and Dr. N., who showed me what being-ethical
and caring look like in difficult moments of suffering and uncertainty.
My “godmama” Kim: for your gentle encouragement, peacefulness, interest, and
providing a beautiful space in Vernon to work and think.
Our families, Jim, Carol, Karena, Bill, Marilyn, Gerrit, Amy, Sally, Joseph, Chris, and the
all the kids: Thank you for your support and for putting up with so many years of thesis work on

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holidays. Kel’s thesis and my own were on the verge of becoming official members of the
family!
Brenda DeVries, Emma Strobell, and Amanda Egert: You are the steady anchors that have
helped Kelly and I weather the many hurricanes of life (that also crashed into Thesis Island one
too many times.) Your humour throughout has been infectious. Your encouragement,
cheerleading, and solidarity are second-to-none. You embody what it means to be caring.
Kelly, my partner-in-life, intellectual equal, colleague, confidant, encourager, challenger,
and lover. What a journey. I am relieved that we are arriving at this destination and look
forward to our next adventure with anticipation and joy.
Finally, this work is wholly dedicated to: Little One, Gabriel, and Dominique. Remember
this: Love without judgement. Care without agenda. Risk for the sake of the good at whatever
cost.

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CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION

What does it mean to be an ethical counsellor? Far from being a purely philosophical
one, this is a patently practical question given that counselling is comprised of various practices
that may or may not be therapeutic to those seeking counselling, that is, clients. Broadly
speaking, clinical practices include assessment, diagnosis, and treatment. Counsellors also
conduct research to enhance the knowledge-base of the profession and generate evidence to
shape clinical assessments and interventions. Counsellors also engage in education, training, and
supervision of fellow clinicians and students who are entering the profession. More recently,
many counsellors have identified advocacy and social justice as a core to professional identity
and practice (Sinacore, 2015).
Undergirding these practices are an assembly of ethical principles, standards of practice,
and statutory and common law that guide professionals in doing these practices competently,
justly, and legally. It is widely accepted that to be an ethical practitioner, one must acknowledge,
commit to, and defer to codes of ethics and legal statutes or case law (British Columbia
Association of Clinical Counsellors (BCACC), 2008; Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy
Association (CCPA), 2007; Kitchener & Anderson, 2011; Truscott & Crook, 2013). The ubiquity
of the codes of ethics and standards of practice published by professional associations and
regulatory bodies, of which counsellors are a part, ought to establish beyond a reasonable doubt
that counsellors must take ethics seriously.
It is all too easy to cordon off the various facets of professional practice into detached
domains that occasionally intersect with others. Ethics can sometimes be relegated to a slice of
the discipline that becomes relevant when one must follow certain principles or perform certain
duties in order to meet the minimum ethical and legal standards required by institutions such as

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an employer, government, or a professional body. However, it is widely held that being an
ethical practitioner is dependent upon more than following prescribed rules and standards
(Kitchener & Anderson, 2011). In other words, there is more to being ethical than simply
checking boxes and fulfilling obligations like a list of chores on a Saturday morning.
Some practitioners writing on the theme of ethics have emphasized that ethics goes much
deeper than mere behavioural prescriptions or risk mitigation. In addition to this, it is also not
the case that professional ethics is only triggered when dilemmas and difficulties arise in day-today practice. Rather, ethics permeates all practices and is the very foundation of the discipline
(Dueck & Parsons, 2006; Gregoire & Jungers, 2013; Guignon, 1993a; Kitchener & Anderson,
2011; Sugarman & Martin, 1995; Tjeltveit, 2004). If “ethics is at the core of every discipline”
(International Union of Psychological Science, 2008), and ethics and morality are thickly woven
into the practices and discourses of counselling beyond the obvious codes and standards
(Guignon, 1993a; Sugarman & Martin, 1995), then it follows that there is something particularly
important and necessary in being concerned with understanding the practitioner doing the
practices that comprise counselling. What does it mean to be an ethical practitioner? What does
it look like when a practitioner expresses their ethicality in those concrete, challenging ethical
situations that require careful discernment and meaningful action?
Detecting an answer to the question, “What does it mean to be an ethical practitioner?”
may be satisfied by pointing to philosophical reflections on virtues and character (Jordan &
Meara, 1990). Virtue ethics has become commonly referred to resource in professional ethics
literature, in ethics education, and in some ethical decision-making models (CCPA, 2007; Hill,
2004; Stewart-Sicking, 2008). Notwithstanding this, I would like to propose that insights to this
question—and other vexing questions about professional ethics— may be found in investigating

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how ethical and/or moral challenges are experienced by practicing counsellors in the actual
practice of counselling. Thus, in this phenomenological inquiry, I aimed to understand what it
means to be an ethical counselling professional by delving into the lived experience of six
counsellors who shared their lived experiences of ethically and/or morally challenging situations.
I approached this inquiry from an existential-phenomenological angle using Personal
Phenomenology, a variety of hermeneutic phenomenology, as the method of inquiry with the
purpose of understanding the lived experience of being ethical for counsellors faced with morally
challenging situations in their clinical practice.

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

I started this project with the simple question, laden with a limitless range of answers,
“What does it mean to be an ethical counselling practitioner?” This question cannot be answered
with the simple and sole assertion that an ethical counsellor is someone who abides by the codes
of standards of the profession. Principle and virtue-based ethical systems would answer the
question in different, yet complementary, ways. Principle-based ethics seeks the answer to
“What shall I do?” Virtue-based ethics, on the other hand, seeks the answer to “Who shall I be?”
(Jordan & Meara, 1990; Meara, Schmidt, & Day, 1996). Depending on which question one asks,
the answer to our initial question might be very different.
In this chapter, I will review examples put forward of what it means to be ethical
practitioner in the field of counselling psychology. Various characteristics of an ethical
counsellor have been proposed based on the works of philosophers, researchers, clinicians, and
institutions such as professional associations that prioritize principles and standards for their
members. First, I will focus on theoretical reflections. Following this, I will give a brief
overview of relevant findings from empirical research. Next, I will discuss an existentialphenomenological perspective on the features of an ethical practitioner. Finally, I will conclude
with providing a rationale for my inquiry.
A Brief Overview of Ethics
What are the basic contours of ethics in counselling psychology? Ethics can be parsed
into two broad categories: descriptive and normative ethics. Kitchener and Anderson (2011)
succinctly described the difference, stating: “Descriptive ethics focuses on what is, and
normative ethics evaluates what ought to be” (p. 3). Counselling codes of ethics vary in content
and focus; most contain normative principles and standards that counsellors are obligated to

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follow and aspirational ideals that are not binding but are strongly advanced as the highest level
of ethical conduct that professionals should aspire to (Meara et al., 1996). The codes of ethics of
many associations and regulatory organizations share four central values: (a) respect for dignity
of all persons and peoples, (b) responsible caring, (c) integrity in relationships, and (d)
responsibility to society (BCACC, 2008; Canadian Psychological Association (CPA), 2017;
International Union of Psychological Science, 2008). Other codes of ethics may be based on
related iterations of these four principles derived from bioethics such beneficence; fidelity;
responsibility; nonmaleficence; respect for people’s dignity, rights, and autonomy; justice and
fairness; and acting in society’s interest (American Psychological Association, 2017; CCPA,
2007; Tjeltveit, 2006). More recently, professionals informed by critical perspectives such as
feminism have stressed the importance of the principles of equity, advocacy, and human rights,
all of which have substantial implications for professional ethics (Crethar & Winterowd, 2012;
Feminist Therapy Institute, 1999; Kennedy & Arthur, 2014).
The seriousness of the question, “What does it mean to be an ethical practitioner?,” has
prompted many practitioners to appeal for a thorough re-envisioning of counselling ethics to
include ethical principles, practices, and decision-making models that are informed in virtuebased ethical systems (Hill, 2004; Jordan & Meara, 1990; Kitchener & Anderson, 2011; Meara et
al., 1996; Pettifor, 1996). Virtue ethics has a history that begins with Aristotle (2009) and
continues to the present day, such as the work of Alasdair MacIntyre (2007). Virtue ethics has
been endorsed as a necessary component of professional ethics in the counselling profession, in
addition to the dominant model of principle-based ethics developed in medical, psychological,
and religious contexts (Fowers, 2005; Hamilton, 2013; Hill, 2004; Jordan & Meara, 1990;
Kitchener & Anderson, 2011; Meara et al., 1996; Pettifor, 1996; Stewart-Sicking, 2008).

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Proponents of virtue ethics have expressed concern that the prevailing principle-based
ethical systems are not sufficient to guarantee that professionals’ behaviours will be ethical.
According to Meara et al. (1996) virtue ethics presupposes that ethical action—doing the right
thing—is just one piece of professional ethics. Thus, attributes of practitioners, such as their
ideals, character, motivation, and emotion, must also be incorporated into our understanding of
ethics and morality. These attributes are embedded in cultural traditions and practices (Meara et
al., 1996). Virtue ethics is particularly attentive to traits and virtues or to “qualities of a person
that have merit or worth in some context . . . [and] are often related to matters of right conduct
(i.e., morality)” (Meara et al., 1996, p. 24). Virtues are not, as in the case of principles, “prima
facie obligations” (Meara et al., 1996, p. 28), but rather “a set of ideals” (Meara et al., 1996, p.
28) that one aspires to uphold, embody, or fulfill. These ideals may be attributes or abilities or
outcomes such as concern for the welfare of others, self-awareness, self-regulation, or
knowledge (Meara et al., 1996, p. 29). In conclusion, Meara et al. (1996) posited that virtue
ethics, united with principle-based ethics, “can result in better ethical decisions and policies and
enhance the character of the profession” (Meara et al., 1996, p. 5).
Definition of Key Terms
Morality and ethics. Within the professional counselling ethics literature, the terms
ethics and morality are sometimes used in conjunction, that is, ethical/moral (Houser & Thoma,
2013), or interchangeably (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013). Kitchener and Anderson (2011) surveyed
the efforts, in philosophical discourse, to distinguish between ethics and morality. The authors
concluded that although the differentiation between the two is at times tenuous, “it could be said
that morality refers to human belief structure and ethics to the philosophical study and evaluation
of that belief structure” (Kitchener & Anderson, 2011, p. 3). In practical usage, ethics appears to

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be favoured in professional discourse; this is most obvious in the fact that there are professional
codes of ethics, not codes of morals. Morality, for some people, is also laden with religious
connotations that are often negative. In this inquiry I use the terms ethical and moral
interchangeably in order to reflect the common, pragmatic use of these terms. I also used the
terms interchangeably in recruitment notices and in my initial interview prompt, in an effort to
create a wide space for participants to bring their own experiences and language without preexisting abstract philosophical distinctions.
Challenging situations. When I refer to ethically and/or morally challenging situations,
I mean circumstances which a person experiences as demanding, testing, or obscure. These
situations might be a classic ethical dilemma that must be solved. The challenging aspect of the
situation may be that there is no clear and incontrovertible action to take because multiple,
equally valid decisions present themselves. A situation may also be challenging because the
ethical or moral action is blocked, and one must summon an internal resolution to act despite
these obstructions. These situations may be moments that necessitate thorough reflection on and
consideration of various ethical and/or moral principles or standards that are engaged by the
situation. In these situations, ethical and moral questions, dilemmas, uncertainties, and/or
violations often surface. In response, one may experience distress at being unable to adequately
carry out a moral or ethical action. One may simply disengage from reflection and action
because of the distress. Finally, one may act, perhaps with great personal or professional risk,
thereby exercising moral courage (Storch, 2013).
Counsellor. Though I will discuss my positionality as a researcher in chapter three, I
want to briefly note that I conducted this inquiry within a particular socio-cultural, political, and
professional context. I am situated as a graduate student in a Canadian counselling psychology

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program. It should be expected that my situatedness has shaped how I define counsellor in light
of the diversity of professions situated within, or that intersect with, the practice of counselling.
In Canada, the disciplines of counselling and counselling psychology intersect and overlap but
also have distinguishing qualities such as the disciplines’ emphases on research (Sinacore, 2015).
Thus, counsellors are members of an amorphous community that crosscuts with other social
science and health disciplines. Unlike, for example, the disciplines of nursing and medicine,
there is no single discipline or professional body in Canada that represents or regulates all the
professionals who engage in the practice of counselling. For the purposes of this inquiry, I
defined counsellor as a professional whose practice falls within the CCPA’s (2011) researchbased definition of counselling:
Counselling is a relational process based upon the ethical use of specific professional
competencies to facilitate human change. Counselling addresses wellness, relationships,
personal growth, career develop, mental health, and psychological illness or distress. The
counselling process is characterized by the application of recognized cognitive, affective,
expressive, somatic, spiritual, developmental, behavioural, learning and systemic
principles. (p. 3)
Perspectives on the Main Features of an Ethical Counsellor
What are the main features of an ethical counsellor? Although there is an inexhaustible
supply of features and iterations that could be used to describe an ethical counsellor, I summarize
eight features that appear in the literature on counselling and professional psychology ethics.
Ethical practitioners exhibit compassion, commitment, integrity, fidelity, trustworthiness,
practical wisdom, awareness, and courage.

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Compassion. To begin with, having compassion for and wanting to help others are
frequently core motivators for why people choose to become counsellors (Sommers-Flanagan &
Sommers-Flanagan, 2007). Compassion is an expression of a counsellor’s care and concern for
their client’s well-being. Beauchamp and Childress (2001) described compassion as “an attitude
of active regard for another’s welfare [and] an imaginative awareness and emotional response of
deep sympathy, tenderness, and discomfort at another’s misfortune or suffering” (p. 32).
Counsellors ought to demonstrate a marked allegiance to seeking the good of the others—
particularly and especially client welfare—without self-interest (Welfel, 2016). Being motivated
by anything but compassion puts a clinician in a position where they are likely to do harm
(Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2007). To compassion, Kitchener and Anderson’s
(2011) integrated insights from Noddings (2003) and other advocates of feminist and care ethics.
These perspectives bring forward a critical perspective that creates an equilibrium between
principles and rules, on the one hand, and genuine regard for the welfare of others that is humble,
kind, caring, and deeply humane on the other (Kitchener & Anderson, 2011).
Commitment. Besides holding a fundamental commitment to client’s welfare, expressed
in part through one’s compassion, an ethical practitioner is one who recognizes, affirms, and
maintains loyalty to fulfilling the profession’s guiding ethical principles and the standards of
practices set by their respective institutions (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2007;
Welfel, 2016). A selection of ethical principles cross-cut many healthcare professions’ codes of
ethics and appear in the codes of ethics drafted by various institutions of which counsellors may
be a member or registrant. A practitioner’s commitment to ethics is, Welfel (2016) argued,
encouraged and solidified through the formation of one’s ethical identity developed in and
through formal and informal training, collaboration, and reflection (p. 32).

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An ethical practitioner, then, is someone who has pledged to upholding the principal
ethical values of the profession (CCPA, 2007). Counsellors may also be required to commit
themselves to upholding ethical and/or clinical standards (American Psychological Association,
2017; CCPA, 2015). Standards are often obligatory and enforceable by the issuing institution
(Cottone & Tarvydas, 2016; National Board for Certified Counsellors, 2016). Standards tend to
be more specific than codes of ethics; standards often elaborate on or interpret what is found in
the codes. Standards are concerned with assuring that counsellors’ behaviour and professional
activities meet a minimum threshold. Standards may provide general guidance and specific rules
regarding communication, confidentiality, professional boundaries, informed consent,
assessment, collection of fees, and research activities (CCPA, 2015; Cottone & Tarvydas, 2016).
Commitment is a pledge made by the ethical practitioner to people, institutions, and
themselves. It is the acknowledgment of an obligation that one has a duty to fulfill. It is the
emergence of a duty toward someone else; this duty is taken up as less of an obligation and more
as an aspiration. When a practitioner has a responsibility to someone, they are accountable for
their actions if they do not fulfill their obligations, perform their duties, or enact their
professional values in a thorough and consistent manner. Taking responsibility requires personal
and professional humility. Humility makes it possible for one to reflect on, answer for, and make
things right when one does not live up to one’s professional values (Welfel, 2005). When a
counsellor, practicing humility, asks themselves if they have acted with ethical and personal
integrity, sometimes their awareness is drawn to their lapses, mistakes, absentmindedness, and
negligence. However, humility is difficult. It is much easier to be sidetracked by assessing other
professionals’ ethicality “while sparing ourselves from a searching self-assessment” (Pope &
Vasquez, 2016).

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Integrity, fidelity, and trustworthiness. Related to the quality of commitment are
integrity, fidelity, and trust. The ethical practitioner’s character is consistent meaning they show
moral integrity or “soundness, reliability, wholeness, and integration of moral character”
(Beauchamp & Childress, 2001, p. 36). Integrity, Kitchener and Anderson (2011) added, may
mean a counsellor must take the often unpopular and sometimes perilous step of advocating for a
particular ethical value even when they are in the minority opinion. Integrity may also be
illustrated when a practitioner is showing fidelity or is “being faithful to moral values and
standing up in their defence when necessary” (Beauchamp & Childress, 2001, p. 36). Meara et
al. (1996) noted that a practitioner’s fidelity, to the client, is vital because the relationship is more
than a simple transactional business relationship. It is a fiduciary relationship within which the
client trusts that the practitioner will seek their best interest in all matters.
Clients, the general public, and fellow professionals develop trust in the practitioner who
demonstrates personal and professional integrity. “Trust,” wrote Beauchamp and Childress
(2001), “entails a confidence that another will act with the right motives and in accordance with
appropriate moral norms” (p. 34). The trustworthy counsellor can be depended upon to act
ethically, responsibly, honestly, and compassionately. Fowers (2005) underscored the
importance of a professional’s honesty. Meara et al. (1996) cited a practitioner’s truthfulness—
or veracity—as a key ethical principle that practitioners must seek to fulfill. Honesty enriches
the conditions for trust to grow. Counselling is largely, if not solely, dependent on the quality of
the relationship between a counsellor and client as well as others who the counsellor engages
with. The relational nature of counselling means that trust is essential to the success of the
counselling endeavour (Kitchener & Anderson, 2011, p. 67).

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Practical wisdom. Kitchener and Anderson (2011) and others (Fowers, 2005; Meara et
al., 1996) highlighted the Greek word phronesis, commonly translated as practical wisdom,
discernment, or prudence—is the “ability to reason well about moral matters and apply reasoning
to real-world problems in a firm but flexible manner” (Kitchener & Anderson, 2011, p. 63).
Phronesis is an essential ability for counsellors to cultivate and demonstrate (Fowers, 2005;
Kitchener & Anderson, 2011; Meara et al., 1996). Fowers (2005) contrasted how the practice of
phronesis differs from an episteme approach when it comes to making ethical decisions: “The
episteme approach is based on universal, comprehensive rules, whereas the phronesis approach is
based on applying good judgment to identify a response that fits a particular case in light of past
experience” (p. 182–183).
Similarly, Beauchamp and Childress (2001) spoke of the importance for practitioners to
exercise discernment in their work; phronesis is sometimes translated as discernment (Kitchener
& Anderson, 2011). Discernment, Beauchamp and Childress (2001) said, involves sensitive
insight, understanding, and acute judgement (p. 34). Rest (1982, 1984), a psychologist and
counselling educator, created a four-component model to explain the processes behind moral
behaviour. These components included (i) moral sensitivity, (ii) moral judgement, (iii) moral
motivation, and (iv) moral character (Rest, 1994). It is the first component, moral sensitivity, that
is of particular importance in the practice of discernment.
Sensitive insight— and related concepts of moral sensitivity or moral perception—
supports the process of discernment. At a base level, sensitivity involves process of interpreting
a given situation “in terms of how one’s actions affect the welfare of others” (Rest, 1984, p. 20).
When one possesses a sensitivity to moral and ethical aspects of the moment, they are able to see
the ethical or moral dimensions at play, to prioritize what is important, to leave out what is not,

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and to collect the necessary knowledge required to make a decision (Sommers-Flanagan &
Sommers-Flanagan, 2007; Welfel, 2016). Developing the acuity of one’s ethical sensitivity is
imperative, Rest (1984) argued, because “typically, professional education is so focused on the
technical aspects of the job that students in graduate programs in most professions are
‘professionally socialized’ not to look for moral problems or to recognize moral issues in their
work” (p. 21).
Thus, moral sensitivity is developed through acculturation into the profession via one’s
initial training, continuing education, and ongoing collaboration and consultation with colleagues
and supervisors (Kitchener & Anderson, 2011; Knapp, Gottlieb, & Handelsman, 2015; Welfel,
2016). Knapp, Gottlieb, and Handelsman (2015) described acculturation as a process of one’s
adoption of the attitudes, behaviours, traditions, language, and values of the profession,
particularly in terms of ethics. Acculturation shapes a practitioner’s “ethical intelligence” (Pope
& Vasquez, 2016, p. 3) which is the capacity to be vigilantly, responsibly, and artfully ethical;
“ethical intelligence,” wrote Pope and Vasquez (2016), “is intelligent ethics” (p. 3).
There is no doubt that knowledge of the foundational ethical and legal documents and
tenets, and their supporting theories, is central to being an ethical practitioner (Kitchener &
Anderson, 2011; Pope & Vasquez, 2016; Truscott & Crook, 2013). However necessary
knowledge of ethical codes, principles, and values may be, knowledge is not sufficient in and of
itself to guarantee ethical behaviour or wisdom in navigating ethical situations (Kitchener &
Anderson, 2011; Meara et al., 1996; Truscott & Crook, 2013). Moral judgement and decisionmaking is the mechanism for applying knowledge in actual practice.
It is widely acknowledged that decision-making skills, ethical reasoning, and judgement
are vital to being an ethical practitioner (American Counseling Association (ACA), 2014;

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American Psychological Association, 2017; CCPA, 2007; CPA, 2017; Fowers, 2005; Kitchener
& Anderson, 2011; National Board for Certified Counsellors, 2016; Truscott & Crook, 2013;
Welfel, 2016). Even if being an ethical practitioner were simply about following the rules and
applying these rules as if they were pre-determined solutions, some degree of judgement would
be necessary to figure out if one needed to abide by a rule and how one would apply the rule in
the given situation.
Knowledge of principles, values, and standards is translated into action through skillful
utilization of reasoning about and evaluating courses of action. Ethical reasoning may be
critical-evaluative, intuitive, or a combination of both (Kitchener & Anderson, 2011). Various
models have been developed to help guide reasoning in a systematic manner. Models may be
grounded in distinctive ethical theories, assumptions, and findings from research that point to
how we make decisions. Models may emphasize reason or intuition, principles or virtues, and
the role of individual or collective knowledge, values, and reasoning (Barnett, Behnke,
Rosenthal, & Koocher, 2007; Betan, 1997; CPA, 2017; Garcia, Cartwright, Winston, &
Borzuchowska, 2003; Garcia, Winston, Borzuchowska, & McGuire-Kuletz, 2004; Meara et al.,
1996; Pollard, 2015).
Garcia et al. (2003) surveyed several leading examples of ethical decision-making (EDM)
models used by counsellors. Rational EDMs (e.g., Kitchener & Anderson, 2011) are reliant on
principles and on the practitioner’s use of reason to evaluate which ethical principles carry the
most ethical force, advantages, and disadvantages. Practitioners also use moral reasoning to
evaluate the likelihood of harm and benefits of certain actions to the parties that may be affected
by said actions. Rational EDMs are frequently embedded in professional associations’ codes of
ethics (e.g., BCACC, 2008; CCPA, 2007; CPA, 2017).

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Jordan and Meara (1990) stressed the centrality of the practitioner’s personal moral
character, beliefs, and values in their Virtue Ethics EDM. The nucleus of attention is on the
moral agent, not the moral act. Tarvydas (2012) proposed that the Integrative EDM harmonizes
elements of virtue ethics and rational EDMs. The Integrative EDM is inclusive in that both
personal values and ethical principles are engaged in the analysis process (Garcia et al., 2003, p.
271). Like the Virtue Ethics and Integrative EDMs, the CCPA (2007) Code of Ethics contains a
set of virtue-based ethical decision-making questions. These questions encourage the
incorporation of the practitioner’s identity, emotions, intuitions, and values in ethical decisionmaking.
Betan (1997) proposed a hermeneutic-based EDM that admits more of the practitioner’s
subjectivity in coming to an understanding and decision in response to an ethical dilemma.
Betan suggested this hermeneutic approach could used in conjunction with other models. He
argued that the therapeutic relationship and practitioner’s subjectivity are “fundamental,” (Betan,
1997, p. 347) alongside moral reasoning, in ethical decision-making. “Ethical analysis,” wrote
Betan, “is a hermeneutic analysis” (p. 353); the practitioner is not a removed, objective observer.
Betan’s model bridges moral reasoning, principles, and standards with the practitioner’s virtues,
intuition, and personal sense of meaning of the given situation. He argued that a hermeneutic
approach could help dissolve the “false dichotomy between the rational and the intuitive, the
universal and the subjective” (Betan, 1997, p. 356) that are sometimes introduced by “linear,
logical-reductionistic” models (Betan, 1997, p. 356).
The Social Constructivist EDM, by Cottone (2001), lays the emphasis on the social
context and construction of ethical knowledge and action. This model helps guide the
practitioner into close contact with the profession, as a body of knowledge, and with other

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professionals. A decision is reached by being attentive to the network of relationships in the
given situation, negotiating differences in understandings of the situation, generating a consensus
about how to act, and seeking arbitration of disagreements, if necessary. Similarly, the
Collaborative EDM (Davis, 1997) puts the emphasis on intentional relational contact with
stakeholders in order to arrive a solution that is “mutually satisfactory” (Garcia et al., 2003, p.
270). In response to the strengths and limitations of various EDMs, Garcia et al. (2003)
conceived another model—the Transcultural Integrative Model—that embraces a multicultural
perspective and includes a component that considers cultural aspects of the given ethical
situation and cultural factors that may shape a counsellor’s ethical decision-making and action.
Whatever avenue one takes, the destination remains the same: A decision has to be made.
A counsellor, one who practices phronesis, demonstrates that they have ethical knowledge and
skills in reasoning and in judgement, along with meticulous creativity and finesse that is faithful
to what is legally and/or ethically required. They also have a sensitivity to the particularities of
the situation (Fowers, 2005; Kitchener & Anderson, 2011; Pope & Vasquez, 2016); “the
practically wise person understands how to act with the right intensity of feeling, in just the right
way, at just the right time, with a proper balance of reason and desire” (Beauchamp & Childress,
2001, p. 34). Phronesis is necessary for being compassionate at the right time, in the right place,
for the right reason, to the right person (Fowers, 2005; Kitchener & Anderson, 2011).
Awareness. Awareness is also seen as integral to being an ethical practitioner (Truscott
& Crook, 2013). Awareness is directed internally, toward one’s self, and externally, toward
people, situations, institutions, communities, traditions, or other interpersonal experiences. A
counsellor who demonstrates awareness possess a component of ethical intelligence (Pope &
Vasquez, 2016). Awareness is an “active process . . . that involves constant questioning and

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personal responsibility” (Pope & Vasquez, 2016, p. 2). A counsellor ought to reflect on their
personal history and be cognizant of how their life experience—including successes and positive
experiences as well as failures and negative experiences—may alter their perception of their
clients, their counselling work, and ethical issues (Brennan, 2013; Welfel, 2016). A counsellor
should be aware of their temperament, of their emotional vulnerabilities, and of the “meaning
and impact of her own ethnic and cultural background, gender, class, age, and sexual orientation”
(Feminist Therapy Institute, 1999, sec. I.B) on their activities, especially with clients (Brennan,
2013; Pope & Vasquez, 2016).
Awareness is accelerated through this intentional reflexivity. Reflexivity is also directed
toward the clinical, socio-political, cultural, economic, and institutional contexts in which a
counsellor works. For example, an ethical practitioner is one who exhibits an awareness of,
understanding of, and respect for cultural diversity (CCPA, 2007; CPA, 2017; Feminist Therapy
Institute, 1999). Counsellors ought to be mindful of the extent of their professional
responsibilities that are shaped by their practice context; that is, private practice may require a
counsellor to do billing, direct client contact, and accounting—activities that require additional
ethical knowledge and sensitivity (Brennan, 2013). Counsellors’ reflexivity may be turned
toward the very structures of the profession—values, principles, history, and other foundational
components such as therapeutic modalities—that shape practice, sometimes explicitly, often
implicitly (Pope & Vasquez, 2016; Stewart-Sicking, 2008).
Conscientiousness. As Beauchamp and Childress (2001) explained, the conscientious
counsellor is “motivated to do what is right because it is right, has tried with due diligence to
determine what is right, intends to do what is right, and exerts an appropriate level of effort to do
so” (p. 37). Conscientiousness emerges from within us. Beauchamp and Childress linked

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conscience and conscientiousness together. Conscience, they wrote, “is a form of self-reflection
on and judgment about whether one’s acts are obligatory or prohibited, right or wrong, good or
bad” (p. 38). Kitchener and Anderson (2011) expanded on this description of conscience,
clarifying that “in contrast to acting on personal values, acting on conscience implies that one is
guided by moral values which one is considered in relationship to the situation at hand” (p. 9).
Gregoire and Jungers (2013) emphasized that ethical clinicians are guided by their professional
conscience “which is the voice of care urging us for freedom, from the impersonal, inauthentic
professional self” and the “summons . . . to embrace virtue as the style of our professional life”
(p. 40). Curiously, reference to individual conscience—or some mention of the professional’s
personal ethical or moral values—appears sporadically in professional psychology and
counselling bodies’ codes of ethics. For example, one association cautions its members to reflect
on how their personal values may “unfairly bias one's perceptions and decision making”
(BCACC, 2008, p. 1). Members of the ACA “refrain from referring prospective and current
clients based solely on the counselor’s personally held values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors”
(ACA, 2014, sec. A.11.b).
Courage. As we have already seen, “being an ethical psychologist requires ethical
awareness and knowledge, the ability to reason ethically,” (Truscott & Crook, 2013, p. xiii) and a
personal aspiration to be ethical. Component IV of Rest’s (1994) model—moral character—
includes moral courage and conviction, particularly in the face of challenges, as a feature of
moral behaviour (p. 24). There can be a wide chasm between knowing the right thing to do and
doing the right thing, particularly when there are pressures or forces that make it difficult to act
because of ambivalence, barriers, or intentional efforts to thwart ethical action. Thus, being an
ethical practitioner may, at times, mean countering these obstacles, responding to and rectifying

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ethical violations, or taking ethical action in the face of personal or professional risk, with
courage (Pope & Vasquez, 2016; Truscott & Crook, 2013). Courage and conviction is what
propels professionals from merely thinking about the right thing to do to actually doing the right
thing in actual situations (Rest, 1994).
Conclusion. A feature of many modern pluralistic societies, such as Canada, is the
multiplicity of ethical and moral traditions. Even though there is agreement on some aspects of
what it means to be an ethical counsellor, a complete composite is elusive because ethical and
moral diversity is found amongst individual practitioners within professional communities.
Political or religious values may uniquely shape how a practitioner understands their ethical
responsibility, their action, and their process for arriving at a course of action. Practitioners may
rank certain ethical values over others when these conflict (Pope & Vasquez, 2016). Thus, my
intent in the preceding section was not to make a declarative statement about the features of an
ethical practitioner. Rather, I highlighted features beyond dutiful adherence to widely agreed
upon ethical principles, such as nonmaleficence and beneficence. Indeed, the features of an
ethical practitioner have received considerable attention in counselling ethics literature.
Empirical Research on the Features of an Ethical Practitioner
I found a limited number of examples in the counselling ethics literature that investigated
these features of an ethical practitioner through empirical research. The aforementioned features
appeared in the theoretical and educational literature, that is, introductory counselling textbooks
and theoretical analyses in professional journals. Here I will survey relevant empirical studies
that explicitly focused on identifying or exploring features of an ethical counselling professional.
I will conclude with two studies examining professionals’ experiences of ethically and/or morally
challenging situations.

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Between 1993 and 1997, Prilleltensky, Walsh-Bowers, and Rossiter (1999) organized a
participatory action research-based inquiry into mental health clinicians’ lived experience of
ethics. Specifically, they were interested in understanding the ethical values, challenges,
resources, impediments, and recommendations of clinicians at a child guidance centre in Canada.
The study involved participants as well as agency stakeholders who were presented with a report
at the conclusion of the study. Seventeen clinicians participated in semi-structured interviews
with the investigators. A qualitative methodology that consisted of thematic analysis was used.
The investigators identified seven ethical values that clinicians ascribed to as essential for their
work: (a) respecting clients’ rights, privacy, and dignity; (b) being compassionate and
responsibly caring for clients; (c) inviting clients’ “meaningful input” into service; (d) supporting
vulnerable clients through advocacy; (e) using strengths-based approaches that empowered
clients; (f) seeking to act in the child’s best interest; and (g) promoting informed consent and
ensuring confidentiality (Prilleltensky et al., 1999, pp. 324–325). The investigators also
identified various challenges to ethical action that clinicians experienced such as dealing with
systemic pressures to label their clients; giving in to non-professionals’ expectations or requests;
being hindered by internal institutional conflicts; and succumbing to the temptation to become
too professionalized (Prilleltensky et al., 1999).
A follow-up study by Valdés, Prilleltensky, Walsh-Bowers, and Rossiter (2002) was
carried out in Cuba with 28 Cuban mental health clinicians through individual interviews and
focus groups. Based on their thematic analysis, the investigators noted that Cuban mental health
clinicians understood civic values, or moral principles and ideals of Cuban society, as integral to
their conceptualization and application of their professional ethics. These values included
socialism, solidarity, dignity, independence, and humanism. Valdés et al. (2002) noted the

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Cuban clincians’ distinct integration of Cuban social values into their professional practice. This
integration was in contrast to North American clinicians who, at the time, sought to limit the
interference of personal, cultural, and political values with professional values (p. 238).
Jennings, Sovereign, Bottorff, and Mussell (2016) conducted a qualitative study, in 2004,
to understand the ethical values of master therapists. Ten therapists participated in a main
interview with a follow-up interview to discuss the researcher’s findings. Participants were
found through a hybrid form of sampling that involved snowball sampling, extreme case
sampling, and peer nominations. The ten participants were interviewed using a sixteen-question
interview guide focused on the participant’s perspective on psychotherapy. The researchers used
Consensual Qualitative Research, an inductive analytic framework that uses member-checking to
validate and refine the concepts derived through the initial stage of analysis. Jennings et al.
(2016) reported that master therapists exhibit commitment to five core ethical values: (a)
competence, (b) relational connection, (c) nonmaleficence, (d) autonomy, and (e) beneficence (p.
109). In a follow up publication by Jennings, Sovereign, Bottoroff, Mussell, and Vye (2005),
four more values were added by the investigators: (f) humility, (g) professional growth, (h)
openness to complexity and ambiguity, and (i) self-awareness.
Lehr, Belgrave, Watt, and Hill-Lehr’s (2013) study is helpful in moving us underneath
principles to the more complex zones where counsellors’ personhood and ethics interact. Lehr et
al. wanted to understand how counsellors navigated ethical discernment points (EDPs) and
where dialogue and conversation were an integral part to navigating EDPs. Twenty-seven CCPA
members responded to the researchers’ mixed-method questionnaire that asked questions related
to a hypothetical ethical dilemma. Situated in the social constructivist tradition, the researchers
thematically analyzed the responses from the participants (Lehr et al., 2013).

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From their analysis, Lehr et al. (2013) identified a variety of features that counsellors
presented with when responding to the ethical dilemma. The authors noted that the participants’
approach to the ethical dilemma was relatively consistent with what they would expect of
professional counsellors. They noted that counsellors showed sensitivity to the ethical
dimensions of the therapeutic alliance and process, awareness of ethical principles, and proposed
different ways of resolving the ethical dilemma.
What is most relevant to this inquiry, however, is that Lehr et al. (2013) argued that
navigating EDPs
are not akin to using a formula with precise measures of particular component in specific
proportions, but more like drawing upon an old and treasured recipe that is meant to be
tweaked and adjusted depending on many factors and influences. (p. 454)
To this point, Lehr et al. (2013) emphasized that this navigation is “a slightly mysterious process,
infused with and attending to mind and body and spirit in both client and counsellor” (p. 454).
Indeed, counsellors seemed to lean on intuition, inspiration, and engaging in dialogue with both
themselves and others to discern at a decision (Lehr et al., 2013, p. 454). Navigation is more a
matter of creation and revelation than implementing a one-size-fits-all solution (Lehr et al., 2013,
p. 454). What was also apparent to the investigators was the diverse range of actions deemed
ethical and of rationales given by counsellors for a particular course of action. Lehr at al. (2013)
concluded that the relational dimensions of navigating EDPs, that is, consultation and/or
supervision, are important for researchers and educators to study further. One recommendation
made was that future research could involve individual interviews with counsellors to explore
their experience of navigating EDPs (Lehr et al., 2013).

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Experiences of ethically and/or morally challenging situations. The ethical and/or
moral challenges that counsellors meet in their practice are widely discussed in training and
clinical contexts. Ethical dilemmas are common in clinical practice. Confidentiality, informed
consent, and mandatory reporting of child abuse are thoroughly deliberated upon. But the
experience of ethical reflection and decision making and the consequences of thwarted,
improper, or imperfect action seem to be less so. Uncertain courses of action or varying opinions
on the right thing to do can be disorienting, especially as one tries to consider his/her
responsibilities to clients, the profession, institutions, and society as a whole. Beaulieu and
Schmelefske (2017) asked Canadian Psychological Association section chairs to submit three
challenges and three opportunities they believed psychologists will face in the coming years. One
such challenge named was the prediction that increasing demands on psychologists will continue
to contribute to burnout. The authors shared that some respondents
highlighted the burnout-generating demands they face as a result of there being too many
patients and not enough psychologists. Many of these professionals are faced with moral
and ethical dilemmas when required to juggle adequate and proper care of patients amidst
budget cuts, long hours, and expanding roles and responsibilities . . . . These burnoutgenerating demands being faced by psychologists may lead to the erosion of ethical and
competent psychological practice. (p. 78)
This comment highlights the close ties between ethical and/or moral dilemmas, structural
limitations, resource allocation, and impacts on both individual and collective good. More
importantly, however, is that the ethical aspects of clinical practice have significant impacts on
practitioners themselves. Ethics, then, is not simply a professional domain that one engages with
via reason alone. Rather, there is an experiential aspect to ethics. Ethical and moral challenges

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are not simply problems to be solved with rational application of principles or standards. Rather,
ethical and moral challenges also experienced by the professional.
Mullen, Morris, and Lord (2017) claimed that “the occurrence of ethical dilemmas in
counselling is a distinct source of stress and burnout for counsellors, similar to secondary
traumatic stress and empathy fatigue” (p. 39). The authors hypothesized that counsellors would
be more likely to face high levels of stress and burnout if they encountered ethical dilemmas
more frequently than not and if they spent considerable time reflecting on these dilemmas. To
test their hypothesis, the researchers compared data from 140 participants. Three assessments
were used: The Counsellor Burnout Inventory, the Moral Attentiveness Scale, and the Perceived
Stress Scale. The MAS has two subscales: (a) Perceptual moral attentiveness, or “the degree to
which a person observes and recognizes moral issues in day-to-day activities;” and (b) Reflective
moral attentiveness, or “the degree to which a person considers or reflects on moral issues”
(Mullen et al., 2017, p. 44). These two forms of moral attentiveness were identified as the
independent variables; perceived stress and burnout were classified as the dependent variables.
Structural Equation Modelling was used to test for directional relationships between variables.
Higher perceptual moral attentiveness was positively associated with higher levels of burnout;
26% of the variance in burnout scores was predicted by perceptual moral attentiveness (ß = .51, p
< .001; large effect size); perceptual moral attentiveness also accounted for 10% of the variance
in perceived stress (ß = .32, p < .001; medium effect size). Reflective moral attentiveness, or the
degree to which a counsellor reflects on the moral issues that they perceive in their work, was not
associated with burnout or stress. Mullen et al.’s (2017) study evidences that a practitioner’s
perception of moral issues may personally impact them, namely, burnout. Ethical issues, then,
are not simply thought about, but are actively experienced by the practitioner.

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Ethically and/or morally challenging situations may be difficult experiences because of
the distress that occurs before, during, or after. The nursing discipline recognizes this, evidenced
by the frequent use of the term moral distress in the discipline’s literature. Nursing ethicist
Jameton (1984) first coined the term moral distress, which he defined as the experience of
“know[ing] the right thing to do but institutional constraints make it nearly impossible to pursue
the right course of action” (p. 6). In the last thirty years, moral distress is found throughout the
nursing literature and education. Indeed, moral distress a “feature of the clinical landscape”
(Berger, 2014, p. 395) for nurses. Moral distress has received significant attention in nursing
research, but a singular, all-encompassing definition is elusive. Varcoe, Pauly, Webster, and
Storch (2012) have defined moral distress as:
the experience of being seriously compromised as a moral agent in practicing in
accordance with accepted professional values and standards. It is a relational experience
shaped by multiple contexts, including the socio-political and cultural context of the
workplace environment. (p. 59)
Some studies conducted on moral distress have small numbers of included mental health
professionals as part of a sample. In their study, Austin, Rankel, Kagan, Bergum, and
Lemermeyer (2005) focused on psychologists’ experience of moral distress. The authors used
hermeneutic phenomenology to inquire into psychologists’ experiences of moral distress, the
kinds of constraints and supports that helped them engage in ethical clinical practice, and what
happened when the they attempted to settle ethical issues that arose in caring for their clients.
The sample was comprised of psychologists practicing in mental health care contexts and
psychiatric. No sample size was provided.

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A recurrent theme for participants in Austin et al.’s study (2005) was the friction between
personal integrity, moral choices, and responsibility to patients, colleagues, professional bodies,
and society. Dealing with this friction and maintaining one’s personal integrity and professional
obligations often required saying something. However, fears of reprisals for drawing attention to
inadequate care provided by others or by institutions led participants to stay silent or to take
action, even to fulfill professional obligations, in secret. Participants highlighted instances in
which they raised questions about the care of clients and were censured or ignored by colleagues
or administrators. Institutional constraints also prevented ethical requirements from being
adequately met; in one instance, it was deemed too costly to soundproof a room to safeguard
client confidentiality. Austin et al.’s (2005) study shows that distress may be one response
practitioners experience in response to ethically and/or morally challenging situations. Their
study also provides support for bringing the concept of moral distress into the ethics discourse of
professional psychology.
An Existential-Phenomenological Perspective on the Ethical Counsellor
Looking at something of interest to us—in this case the features of an ethical
practitioner—can be aided by looking from different angles with particular lenses. Principlebased ethics and virtue ethics are the leading examples of how ethics is understood, discussed,
and researched in counselling. Some practitioners may utilize other philosophical and spiritual
traditions to explain and explore ethics. Existential and phenomenological perspectives on
counsellor identity and counselling ethics are examples that can provide positive and informative
insights into being an ethical practitioner. Specifically, these perspectives can push us to see the
underlying ethical structure of our existence and the value of attending to the lived experience of
being a professional as a way of deepening our understanding of ethics.

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Gregoire and Jungers (2013; Jungers & Gregoire, 2016) offered an explicit and sustained
reflection at the intersection of existential phenomenology, particularly Martin Heidegger’s
(1889–1976) thought, and counsellor identity and counselling ethics. They draw on existential,
phenomenological, and hermeneutic perspectives to articulate a description of what it means to
be a professional counsellor that is useful to guide novices and experts in reflecting upon and
authentically participating in the counselling profession. Gregoire and Jungers (2013)
highlighted three main features of professional counsellor’s identity including competence,
being-with-others, and authenticity in ethical action. Though I rely here primarily on Gregoire
and Jungers’ (2013; Jungers & Gregoire, 2016) work, I also incorporate observations from others
writing in the existential and phenomenological traditions that provide insight into what it means
to be an ethical practitioner.
Being a counsellor. Gregoire and Jungers (2013) used Heidegger’s idiom for human
beings, Dasein—translated as being-there—to describe the counsellor as one who is being-therein-the-(counselling)-world (p. 27). This idiom “connotes that we counselors are always located
in a world characterized first and foremost by a rich set of relationships with others, such as
clients, coworkers, and other helping professionals” (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013, p. 28). A
counsellor’s identity and responsibility are greatly influenced by these relationships. These
relationships are patently ethical: a counsellor, as a human being, is a “participant who has a
responsibility to care for and positively change the world” (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013, p. 29). At
the heart of the clinical encounter between client and counsellor is the client’s search for the
“good life” Gregoire & Jungers, 2013, p. 29). The counsellor’s role, then, is to assist the client in
exploring and expanding the client’s grasp of their possibilities and personal responsibility in

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realizing their potential. This is, according to Gregoire and Jungers, an essential quality of the
counsellor’s work that has an ethical quality to it.
Similarly, Guignon (1993a) deftly laid out a case for how counselling is thoroughly a
moral practice in itself. Counsellors find themselves situated on a terrain thoroughly marked by
the moral and ethical. Any activity that seeks to understand and respond to the human condition
is going to be, inescapably, faced with moral concerns and questions because there is an
“irreducible moral dimension” (Guignon, 1993a, p. 218) to being human and as such the
counselling encounter. Guignon (1993a) maintained that the counselling encounter is ultimately
concerned with “moral questions in the broad sense” (p. 217); it is not merely concerned with
identifying moral behaviour, but it is also deeply concerned with one’s sense of self, place, and
participation in the world. It follows that if the counselling encounter is one with deep moral
threads, hidden or obvious, then it we might do us well to consider how the counsellor is, or is
not, ethical in and throughout this encounter. What does an ethical counsellor look like in such a
densely moral world? What are the features that might be manifested?
Competence. Gregoire and Jungers (2013) considered competency to be possessing
skills, knowledge, beliefs, and attitudes that are vital to practicing counselling. Part of
competency includes having an awareness and understanding of ethical principles, codes, and
standards as well as the know-how to apply them in actual practice. Ethical competence is
bolstered by joining with other professionals in developing and growing ethically and in
maintaining an unyielding commitment to respect for the dignity of persons.
When we are being-there-in-the-(counselling)-world, we encounter diverse array of
ethical traditions, personal values, professional ideals, and cultural and ethnic worldviews
(Gregoire & Jungers, 2013, p. 28). Gregoire and Jungers (2013) asserted that it is vital for

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counsellors to take a “disposition of openness” (p. 28) toward others; this openness enables
others to encounter and move toward their possibilities. This posture of openness, for the sake of
the other, is fundamentally an ethical one (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013). Openness toward the
other is furthered by openness toward one’s self, i.e. reflexivity. A counsellor’s openness is
furthered through personal and professional reflexivity. Openness and reflexivity are important
for another reason. “From a Heideggerian standpoint,” Hatab (2000) maintained, “ethics is an
essentially hermeneutic endeavor” (p. 75). Personal and professional reflexivity help us see how
we are engaged in constant interpretation of the world, including ethics. Reflexivity involves
interpretation and re-interpretation of ourselves and the world.
Next, Gregoire and Jungers (2013) contended that being-there-in-the-(counselling)-world
is expressed in “knowledge of history” (p. 30), and they depicted this as being
(a) in touch with its past, including its founders and major social and political
milestones; (b) informed of its present leanings, values, and practices; and (c)
invested in its future by being aware of the dreams that the profession collectively has
for itself and by dreaming ourselves about who we want to become as counseling
professionals. (p. 30)
We look to the past to learn about professional values and the development of ethical principles,
codes, and standards. A profession’s past is evidence of its determination “to become more and
more accountable to its own-most possibilities in relationship to the public it serves” (Gregoire &
Jungers, 2013, p. 30). In turn, this collective determination inspires the ethical practitioner to
aspire to a higher degree of professionalism themselves.
Being-with-others. Finlay (2015) insisted that being-with others means being-with their
vulnerability and frailty. Though she did not explicitly link this to ethics, it is nonetheless a

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central marker of being a counsellor. Gregoire and Jungers (2013) described three senses of
being-there-in-the-(counseling)-world-with-others, that is, the way in which counsellors exist in
the world in relationship, community, and connection.
First, membership in or licensure with professional institutions links counsellors together
with other professionals or being-with-(professional)-others. This is expressed through being
“fully [a] participant and integrated into our professional community where the sharing of our
common roots and destiny can spring into a clearly defined identity” (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013,
p. 35). A counsellor’s disconnection and isolation from others are problematic insofar as contact
and connection with the profession, past, present, and future, inhibit the development of a rich
identity as a professional.
Second, being-with also encompasses other non-counselling professionals. Together, we
share in important work
in order to achieve our full potential to effect positive social change, collaboration across
numerous professional disciplines (i.e., the inter-professional community) remains the
best practice strategy for addressing . . . complex and critical concerns. (Gregoire &
Jungers, 2013, p. 36)
Adequately and responsibly addressing the challenges of the world begins not in isolated silos,
but in the coming-together of professionals from diverse backgrounds who share in the common
cause of care for others. Other professionals help us increase our skills, awareness, and
capacities. Being-with other professionals also expands knowledges and understandings that can
generate fresh solutions to the pressing problems that our society faces.
Finally, we are professionals being-with our clients. As professionals, “what really
makes us professional beings is the fact that our vocation is primarily concerned with the direct

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care of another human person, and not a thing or an object” (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013, p. 38).
The direct care of others is a challenging vocation, expressed through face-to-face interactions in
therapy but also through advocacy work in communities, institutions, and other systems. In sum,
being-with means caring-for-others; this “requires that we be motivated and committed to act for
the good of other human persons, to be there when the others need our presence in the way that
the others need it” (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013, p. 38). For Stolorow (2015), our shared finitude
with others is the unitive feature of being-with-others. He referred to dwelling as a way of beingwith-the-other that exceeds empathy: “In dwelling, one leans into the other’s emotional pain and
participates in it, perhaps with aid of one’s own analogous experiences of pain” (Stolorow, 2015,
p. 134). The analogous experiences we have are fundamentally summed up in our “common
finitude,” our “existential kind-ship-in-the-same-darkness,” Stolorow (2015) added (p. 135). All
of our own existential vulnerabilities weigh down on us and obligate us ethically to become the
place and space for the other to rest in. Thus, our being-with-others is expressed in
acknowledging our own pain and the risk of being wounded.
Further to the point of being-with-others, especially clients, I want to touch on another
region of phenomenology. A contingent within the counselling discipline have brought the work
of French phenomenologist Emmanuel Levinas (1905–1995), known for casting unique
phenomenologically grounded vision of ethics, to bear on counselling practice. Levinas
(1961/1991) emphasized the absolute otherness of the other that we encounter in a concrete
situation. Our infinite ethical responsibility to the other is initiated in this encounter. Themes of
proximity, the presence of others in the face-to-face encounter, and the pre-linguistic,
prereflective nature of the face-to-face encounter feature largely in Levinas’ work (Morgan,
2011).

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The ethical significance of the face-to-face encounter of counselling is illuminated by the
existential and phenomenological insights of Levinas. Huett and Goodman (2012) applied
Levinas’ views on proximity, on face-to-face encounters, and on the presence of third parties, to
critique the inroads made by managed care and institutions into the therapeutic dyad. Dueck and
Goodman (2007) bring Levinas into dialogue with the counselling profession to critique the very
foundations of modern psychotherapy. Dueck and Goodman (2007) examined the relevance of
Levinas’ conception of substitution—a movement in which the self becomes “the one-for-theother” (p. 607)—for therapy. They proposed a provocative vision of a Levinasian-inspired
therapist who is “persecuted” by the other; the therapist is “a person construed as suffering,
accused, and troubled when he or she encounters the Other” (p. 613). The persecution and
accusation of the therapist by the other is essentially a heightening of the therapists’ ethical
responsibility to the other. The therapist “is one who engages in self-limitation for the sake of
the Other” (Dueck & Goodman, 2007, p. 613). This is truly a matter of ethics insofar as the
other is prioritized over and above the self of the therapist.
Finally, Dueck and Parsons (2006) appropriated Levinas’ assertion that ethics precedes
ontology—that is, ethics is the first philosophy— and stressed that “if ethics is first philosophy
then therapy is an ethical event” (p. 279), meaning that “ethics, then, does not enter after, or in
the midst of, but before [emphasis added] the therapeutic encounter” (p. 279). Ethics, then, is not
a separate discipline layered on counselling practice, but the very structure of the therapeutic
relationship.
Authenticity. Authenticity is a key feature in existential philosophy and therapeutic
modalities (Guignon, 1993a). In the Heideggerian sense, authenticity is not a matter of an
individual’s self-expression of some inner, most-true, self (Guignon, 1993a). Rather,

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authenticity may be “both creative, as an innovative departure from established norms, and
elucidating, as an apprehension of existing cultural forms that is clearer and sharper than the
vague, flat commonplaces of ordinary understanding” (Hatab, 2000, p. 27). Dasein’s conscience
calls from “self to itself, calling the (inauthentic) self back to its (authentic) self” (Caputo, 2018,
p. 49); there is no particular moral stipulation made by the conscience, only a “summons”
(Caputo, 2018, p. 49) to the self to be itself.
Heidegger’s “notion of authenticity challenges counselors to take full ownership of their
personal and professional possibilities, even while operating within the given structures of the
counseling world” (Jungers & Gregoire, 2016, p. 106). Counsellors who live authentically from
their possibilities may challenge the reductionism present in various professional domains,
including models of professional ethics that are “a taken-for-granted backdrop” (Jungers &
Gregoire, 2016, p. 107). These reductions shrink the effort to be an ethical practitioner into a
methodical and routinized attempt to mitigate risks, “in which the right response to ethical
dilemmas is treated as if it is contained within and mandated by the code” (Jungers & Gregoire,
2016, p. 106). This reductionistic approach to ethics makes the effort to be an ethical practitioner
more about “self-preservation” (Jungers & Gregoire, 2016, p. 104) that an authentic personal
involvement and responsibility in the world.
Codes of ethics, while important, “might even become a source of social pressure that
dictates what counselors can or cannot do in the name of ‘being ethical’” (Jungers & Gregoire,
2016, p. 107). Thus, Gregoire and Jungers (2016) maintained, a counsellor who is acting
authentically—expressing their ethicality—may be “thrown” (p. 107) into the centre of their
professional world that has its own cultural concerns and norms that may be widely accepted
without critical thought. A counsellor thrown into the professional world may assume the ethical

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structures of the profession without any sort of personal acceptance. Authenticity, or becoming
one’s own-most person, means “taking full responsibility and ownership over [one’s] ethical
decisions even—and especially—if they are not fully in compliance with current practices”
(Jungers & Gregoire, 2016, p. 107).
Being-ethical. Gregoire and Jungers (2013) expanded Heidegger’s term for human
beings—Dasein, or being-there—to describe counsellors’ situatedness in the world by
emphasizing that counsellors are always being-there-in-the-(counselling)-world. They noted the
ethical dimensions that are explicit and implicit in being a counsellor. Though not writing in the
discipline of philosophy, Hatab (2000) explored being-ethical-in-the-world in his discussion of
how Heidegger’s phenomenological project could inform ethics and moral philosophy.
Throughout this inquiry, I have hyphenated being-ethical. The hyphenation is purposeful, both
in Heidegger’s work (i.e., being-there), Gregoire and Jungers (2013), Hatab’s (2000), and my
own.
Svenaeus (2000) provided a succinct and clear apologetic for the seemingly superfluous
hyphen: “The hyphens indicate that Dasein and world are thought as a unity and not as subject
and object. The world is not something external but is constitutive for the being of Dasein” (p.
83). In other words, the hyphen joins being and the ethical into a whole such that we are not
beings observing, doing, or thinking about ethics from a detached perspective. Rather, as Hatab
(2000) stated: “Dasein is ‘always already’ ethical in some way” (p. 59). Being-ethical, Hatab
(2000) added, is a mode of being-there-in-the-world and is therefore subject to “thrownness,
particularity, plurality, unconcealment, temporality, and historicality, which altogether undermine
the search for a purely objective standard” (p. 58). Thus, when I state that my inquiry is
interested in exploring counsellors’ lived experiences of being-ethical, I am indicating my

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interest in understanding how ethicality is experienced as a human being who is situated, limited,
and yet full of potential.
Summary. The existential and phenomenological philosophical traditions have notable
insights into being an ethical counsellor. These traditions offer a challenge to counsellors to
move beyond mere adherence to principles and rules to questions, also invoked by virtue ethics,
such as: Who am I as a human being and a professional? What does it mean for me to be
ethical? How do I live ethically? Who is an ethical practitioner? What does it mean to care for
the other? What is my ethical responsibility toward the other?
Rationale of the Present Study
Jungers and Gregoire’s (2016; Gregoire & Jungers, 2013) rich and inspiring vision of
being-there-in-the-(counselling)-world furnishes a compelling call to develop and receive, as
own’s own, the possibilities that are nascent in the counselling profession and to be ethical in a
manner that is far beyond outcome-based ethics, that is, just doing what the code says one ought
to do without a sense of personal responsibility, reflection, and engagement (Jungers & Gregoire,
2016; Gregoire & Jungers, 2013).
Jungers and Gregoire’s (2016; Gregoire & Jungers, 2013) consideration of how
existential and phenomenological attitudes could influence our understanding and experience of
professional identity poses important questions for us about what it means to be an ethical
practitioner. Could we be pushed beyond the commonplace statements and theories about what
it means to be an ethical practitioner? Does being an ethical practitioner mean being honest?
Yes. Does being an ethical practitioner mean doing no harm? Yes. Does being an ethical
practitioner mean being compassionate? Certainly. But these are satisfying descriptions only to
a certain point. What lies beneath these? What else shows up that we ought to be aware of?

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What else can we learn about being an ethical practitioner that might shape and structure our
relationships and our professional communities by exploring the lived experience of these
counsellors?
I am drawn to moving beyond how being-ethical appears conventionally to us practicing
certain virtues, making a commitment to ethical principles, or performing certain tasks in order
to be ethically compliant. My draw to pushing beyond the conventional is not because I want to
do away with conventional. Rather, the allure of understanding the phenomenon of being-ethical
stems from my own experiences of being faced with moments that I experienced as ethically or
morally challenging. This inquiry, then, originates not in intellectual abstractions but in my own
lived experience of seeking to be authentically ethical in the world, particularly as a professional.
Purpose of the Study and Research Question
I am interested in examining the lived experience of being-there-in-the-(counselling)world, specifically being-there-ethically-in-ethically-and/or-morally-challenging-situations. For
the simplicity’s sake, I shorten this lengthier idiom throughout the thesis to being-ethical (Hatab,
2000). The purpose of this inquiry is to be open to the ways in which the phenomenon of beingethical as a counsellor appears itself in the lived experience of counsellors who find themselves
facing ethically and/or morally challenging situations. This inquiry is a phenomenological
venture that leaps off of the existential and phenomenological perspectives on the intersection of
ethics and counsellors that I discussed earlier. To this end, the question that I aimed to explore
through this inquiry was: What is a counsellor’s lived experience of being-ethical when they face
ethically and/or morally challenging situations in their counselling practice?

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CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY

The purpose of my inquiry was to explore the phenomenon of being-ethical as a
counsellor through understanding the lived experience of counsellors facing ethically and/or
morally challenging situations in their clinical practice. My research question is concerned with
uncovering the phenomenon of being-ethical as it discloses itself in the counsellor’s lived
experience of an ethically and/or morally challenging situation. Given that I situated my inquiry
in the context of an existential-phenomenological analysis of counsellor identity and ethics, it
follows that an existential-phenomenological methodology is a highly suitable to employ in this
inquiry into the phenomenon of being-ethical as a counsellor. I selected Personal
Phenomenology (Klaassen, Kwee, & Launeanu, 2017; Launeanu, 2019; Launeanu, Klaassen,
Konieczny, & Kwee, 2019), a novel existential and phenomenological process of conducting
qualitative research that allows for engaging with the personal and ethical aspects of lived
experience. In this chapter, I will first review some core tenets of phenomenology as philosophy
and as research method. Next, I will discuss the epistemological, ontological, and axiological
features underlying Personal Phenomenology. I will then discuss the process of data collection
and analysis and I will conclude by addressing rigour, resonance, reflexivity, and relevance.
Phenomenology as Philosophy
Phenomenology is a philosophical movement from which a variety of qualitative research
methodologies have emerged. Phenomenology has a varied history beginning with the German
philosopher Edmund Husserl (1859–938). Thanks to the philosophical developments of Martin
Heidegger, Emmanuel Levinas (1906–1995), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961), Jean PaulSartre (1905–1980), and many others, there are an assortment of fertile and diverse traditions that
are encompassed by the term phenomenology (Finlay, 2011). Though each phenomenological

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tradition has its own distinctives, all find a common ancestor in Husserl who is often called the
father of modern phenomenology (Finlay, 2011).
Husserl sought an innovative way to study human consciousness and the objects of
consciousness in a systematic and rigorous manner (Finlay, 2011, p. 45). The phrase most often
associated with Husserl captures his ardent passion to understand the world in a way not possible
by positivistic science that celebrated abstractions and theories: to the things themselves (Finlay,
2011). To get to the things themselves, Husserl stressed that phenomenology required an epoché,
also referred to as reduction or bracketing, which is a concentrated and deliberate attitude of
“putting aside previous understandings in brackets to put them temporarily out of action, thereby
reducing the field which commands one’s special focus of attention” (Finlay, 2011, p. 46).
Reductions enable us to see phenomenon as they appear to us—in time, space, body, and
relations—in vivid and sharper focus. Husserl’s phenomenological approach is often referred to
as descriptive phenomenology (Finlay, 2011).
Husserl’s student, Heidegger shifted the phenomenological discourse by challenging the
notion that we are capable of approaching the world free of preunderstandings and
interpretations (Finlay, 2011). We are entrenched in the world. Our reliance on language to help
us understand the world and our rootedness in time is unavoidable. As such, we are in a
movement of interpretation “between implicit pre-understandings and explicit understandings”
(Finlay, 2011, p. 55). Understanding is not independent of interpretation, but wholly reliant upon
interpretation. That said, Heidegger retained some of the spirit of Husserl’s bracketing,
accentuating the importance of “prioritizing the thing to be interpreted rather than holding on to
preconceptions” (Finlay, 2011, p. 53). Interpretation involves moving between
preunderstandings and searching out new understandings to come to a more potent understanding

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(Finlay, 2011). Hence, the phenomenological methods rooted in Heidegger’s philosophical
tradition reside under the umbrella of hermeneutic phenomenology.
Hermeneutic Phenomenology as Research Method
Explaining phenomenology inquiry in a broad sense, Finlay (2014) asserted, “is a radical
and disciplined way of seeing with fresh, curious eyes, and it is the core element distinguishing
phenomenology from other research approaches focused on exploring experience and
subjectivity” (p. 122). Finlay’s description of phenomenology indicates some basic features of
phenomenological inquiry: a naïve and searching position in and toward the world that is at once
practiced with precision and yet untamed; an eye for life that takes in the whole and the peculiar;
an attentiveness to the lived experience and meanings of the phenomenon being considered; the
way in which the world and the body are weaved together; a curiosity for existential concerns;
and careful, thoughtful, deep, and “resonant” descriptions of these aspects (Finlay, 2011, p. 15).
Upon entering another’s world, “fresh, complex, rich descriptions of a phenomenon as it is
concretely lived” (Finlay, 2009, p. 6) are crafted. Methodologically, hermeneutic
phenomenology is structured but also necessitates a certain flexibility and openness to the
concrete and sometimes-unclear process of looking at the world (Finlay, 2009).
But what does one see with these naïve and probing eyes? What is seen? And what
happens when we see? Before we see? After we see? Van Manen (2007) remarked:
The reward phenomenology offers are the moments of seeing-meaning or “in-seeing”
into “the heart of things” as Rilke so felicitously put it. Not unlike the poet, the
phenomenologist directs the gaze toward the regions where meaning originates, wells up,
percolates through the porous membranes of past sedimentations—and then infuses us,
permeates us, infects us, touches us, stirs us, exercises a formative affect. (p. 12)

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To see the heart of things is not to observe from afar and apart. To see phenomenologically, one
witnesses and participates, gives and receives, pauses and progresses, pushes and pulls, is pushed
and pulled. Seeing phenomenologically is seeing with the insatiable desire to discover the
foreign in that which is familiar, to uncover the familiar in that which is foreign, to see the
newness of that which one is accustomed to, and to become acquainted with the strange. More
succinctly, phenomenology is a particular way of being-in-the-world. Though it is
methodological, it is more of an attitude than a rote system to apply to the world to generate
certain results. However, phenomenology as an attitude can be systematic with a series of
flexible steps that encourage openness, curiosity, and wonder (Finlay, 2011, 2013, 2015; Längle
& Klaassen, 2019).
The method of Personal Phenomenology. In this section, I will discuss Personal
Phenomenology as a novel research method within the hermeneutic phenomenological tradition.
I will start by reviewing the emergence of Personal Phenomenology from a therapeutic method
called Personal Existential Analysis (PEA). I will then discuss the ontological, epistemological,
and axiological assumptions underlying Personal Phenomenology.
Personal Existential Analysis. The impetus for developing a phenomenological research
method that focused on the personal and the ethical aspects of lived experience emerged from
psychotherapeutic practice. PEA is the core therapeutic process central to Existential Analysis
(EA; Längle, 2003), a particular tradition of existential-phenomenological psychotherapy. As a
therapeutic method, PEA is fundamentally phenomenological, engaging the client with the world
through description and interpretation (Längle, 2003, 2005; Längle & Klaassen, 2019). The
method is a systematic and process-oriented application of Logotherapy principles, namely selfdistancing, self-transcendence, and searching for meaning (Launeanu, Klaassen, & Muir, 2019,

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p. 357). In addition to being used in psychotherapy, the PEA method has been adapted for use in
counselling supervision (Kwee, Klaassen, & Launeanu, 2017; Kwee & Längle, 2019).
The PEA method begins with PEA 0 (Description) in which the client and counsellor
create a thick description of the facts of the client’s lived reality, or lifeworld. In PEA 1
(Impression), the client is encouraged and supported in recognizing and admitting primary
emotions, spontaneous impulses, and expanding on their understanding of what their experience
might be saying to them (Kwee & Längle, 2013; Längle, 2003). Next, in PEA 2 (Positioning),
the client begins to deepen their understanding of themselves and of others and starts to name
what they do not understand. The client’s personal moral conscience is then engaged as they
begin to develop their inner position to their experience. The client’s previous experience, their
perspectives of others, and their subjective thinking and feeling are brought into dialogue with
their conscience as they identify an outer position toward their experience. Through positioning,
the client identifies actions (i.e., expressions of their will) that they may want to take in response
to their experience (Kwee & Längle, 2013; Längle, 2003). Finally, in PEA 3 (Expression), the
client takes personal action as an expression of their free will (Kwee & Längle, 2013; Längle,
2003).
Adapting PEA to research. Differentiating between the practices of therapy and research
is important. However, the two practices, particularly in the Existential Analytic tradition, share
unifying tenets that connect these distinct processes together. Early work on applying EA theory
and the PEA method to hermeneutic phenomenological research was started in Austria by Silvia
Längle. This development was motivated by interest in understanding the therapeutic processes
of EA (Kwee & Längle, 2019). Klaassen, Kwee, and Launeanu (2017) aimed to apply insights
and practices from the PEA method to qualitative research. The structure and processes of the

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therapy-oriented PEA method ported to phenomenological research called Personal
Phenomenology (Klaassen et al., 2017; Launeanu, 2019; Launeanu, Klaassen, Konieczny, et al.,
2019). To date, Personal Phenomenology has been employed in two other phenomenological
research inquiries. Klaassen, Kocniezcy, and Launeanu (2018) explored the lived experience of
shame in athletes. Another study is currently underway investigating adolescents’ experiences of
religious doubt (Newman, Klaassen, & Launeanu, 2019).
Ontological assumptions. Personal Phenomenology is situated in the hermeneutic
phenomenological tradition of phenomenological inquiry. Underneath Personal Phenomenology,
we find EA’s philosophical foundation, buttressed by Heidegger’s hermeneutic phenomenology
(Reitinger & Bauer, 2019). As a hermeneutic and phenomenological method, Personal
Phenomenology does not presuppose that there are metaphysical essences or substances that
precede existence (Reitinger & Bauer, 2019, p. 329). Central to Heidegger’s thought is the term
Dasein, translated as being-there, which expresses the situatedness—thrownness—of the being
of humans in the world (Finlay, 2015; Guignon, 1993b; Längle & Klaassen, 2019). Dasein is
“‘always and already’ . . . shaped by everyday concerns, practical involvements, moods and
affects, inherited customs and traditions, social relations and language uses” (Hatab, 2000, p. 11).
That is, Dasein “is never separable from world involvement” (Hatab, 2000, p. 11). This also
means that Dasein is connected with and to others even when Dasein is solitary; Dasein is both
social and relational (Finlay, 2015).
It is important to note that EA stresses the personal and dialogical grounding of human
beings; hence Personal Phenomenology is a method that involves dialogue between persons
about personal experiences. The emphasis on personhood is more substantial than what is found
in Heidegger’s thinking on Dasein (Reitinger & Bauer, 2019). Personal Phenomenology draws

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on the works of European personalism’s leading contributors such as Martin Buber, Emmanuel
Levinas, Max Scheler, Paul Tillich, and Karol Wojtyla (Launeanu, Klaassen, Konieczny, et al.,
2019). In EA, persons are understood to be capable of being free-from and also free-for; this
also means persons can be responsible for and to something and/or someone (Reitinger & Bauer,
2019, p. 338). Responsibility finds its origins in one’s personal moral conscience (Reitinger &
Bauer, 2019). Thus, the Personal Phenomenology understands the person to be “the spiritual
capacity for dialogue and encounter, and as the source of ethical-moral action” meaning that the
person is an “ethical being-to-and-for-the-other person” (Launeanu, Klaassen, Konieczny, et al.,
2019, p. 69).
Epistemological assumptions. In Personal Phenomenology, knowledge is not seen as a
predetermined, static, or abstract idea. Rather, knowledge is interpreted by, in, and through our
being-in-the-world. Describing Heidegger’s approach to studying the world, Svenaeus (2000)
stated:
When we study our relationship to the world, we should not view the world as a
collection of objects outside of consciousness, towards which we are directed by way of
the latter. We should instead study the ‘worldliness’ of the world, the way we are in the
world, giving it meaning through our actions (p. 83).
The “worldliness” of the world, or the way in which we are situated in the world, draws our
attention to the intersubjectivity of the way we understand and create meaning in the contexts of
history, time, culture, and other “meaning-structure[s]” in which we live (Svenaeus, 2000, p. 83).
Thus, in contrast to the Husserlian tradition of phenomenology, which is concerned
primarily with description, hermeneutic phenomenological methods, such as Personal
Phenomenology, incorporate interpretation, “an inevitable and basic structure of our ‘being-in-

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the-world’” (Finlay, 2009, p. 11) to unpack our understanding of the world. Before we
experience the world we have already engaged in its interpretation (Finlay, 2009). In other
words, as Reitinger and Bauer (2019) summarized, the human beings, or Dasein, “has an
understanding of itself, the world, and the others and interprets itself out of this context” (p. 330).
Interpretation is, then, an unavoidable condition of existence and thus of knowing.
The Existential Analytic tradition, which Personal Phenomenology extends from, takes a
decidedly hermeneutic tack towards knowledge and knowing. There is no chasm between
subject-object, nor is there a fissure between knower and known (Reitinger & Bauer, 2019).
Thus, the subjectivity of, for example, the researcher and the participant, are intermingled; the
boundaries between the two dissolved (Guignon, 1993b; Längle & Klaassen, 2019, p. 5).
Personal Phenomenology’s stance towards knowledge and knowing is shaped by hermeneutics,
personalism, and dialogue. In sum, the world, persons, and phenomenon are subjectively known.
Essences appear to us subjectively as phenomenon; a phenomenon “reveals itself by itself to the
observer” (Längle & Klaassen, 2019, p. 3). As a result, the phenomenon may be experienced
differently by different observers. These observers are not detached from the phenomenon nor
from the other observers. Thus, the subjectivities of the observers’ interface with and are
constituted in and through dialogue (Längle & Klaassen, 2019).
However, counselling is an applied discipline. In addition to knowledge derived from
clinical experience, the discipline aims to build practice on empirical knowledge; “research and
practice are viewed as mutually informative” (CPA Board of Directors, 2009, para. 4). Far from
being an impractical, philosophical exercise with no rootedness in the “real world,” hermeneutic
phenomenology is very much interested in the world as we experience and make sense of it.
However, for most qualitative methodologies, including hermeneutic phenomenology, the

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generalization of findings is not possible. In the end, it is the “readers of the report [that] make
the final interpretation” (Streubert & Carpenter, 2011, p. 205) of the study’s findings and
consider the relevance of the findings to the broader world.
In sum, findings from a hermeneutic phenomenology inquiry are “contingent,
proportional, emergent, and subject to alternative interpretations” (Finlay, 2009, p. 17).
Whatever is claimed or stated in a hermeneutic phenomenological study is subject, then, to
limitations and shortcomings that extend from the finitude of the human beings who engage in
the process of the inquiry from the interview to the interpretation. Thus, the knowledge claims
of any phenomenological inquiry are tentative and open to further interpretation. A
phenomenological study is not an expedition to find “true fixed meanings” (Finlay, 2009, p. 15);
rather, knowledge is “relative, intersubjective, [and] fluid” (Finlay, 2009, p. 15). Hermeneutics is
the art of disclosure without closure. It breaches limits and, at the same time, has to be settled—
to a degree—in order for a position to be taken. A position, however, is not a fixed point in
hermeneutics. We are positioned in the hermeneutic circle, a common image used by many to
illustrate the active and enduring task of hermeneutics, where we must “work out our ‘always
and already being interpreted’” (Caputo, 2018, p. 35).
Axiological assumptions. Finlay (2011) contended that phenomenological researchers
seek to take up a position in relation to their participants “that listens to, and values, the other’s
‘voice’ while we also acknowledge the complexities involved” (p. 226) in the process of
conducting the inquiry. Finlay (2011) advocated for a relationally-based ethic of research that
considers power dynamics, manages risks, and promotes reciprocal dialogue in the research
process (pp. 217–218). Personal Phenomenology is constructed on the premise that dialogue is

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an essential feature of personhood and, as a result, is a necessary component for
phenomenological inquiry to be conducted in an ethical manner.
Researcher positionality. As a researcher-in-training, I speak from a position influenced
by a collection of personal and professional factors. Prior to beginning my counselling training,
I graduated from the same institution with a bachelor’s degree, majoring in Christian theology
and minoring in International Development. After completing my bachelor’s degree, I
completed graduate-level coursework in theology. In my readings for these courses, I was
introduced to Continental philosophy and phenomenology for the first time.
Perhaps most relevant to this inquiry is the fact that I am graduate student in a Master of
Arts in Counselling Psychology program. This program is housed in a private, religious,
Western Canadian liberal arts institution. I completed my practicum and internship placements
in private, not-for-profit institutions. Two of these were clinics with multidisciplinary healthcare
teams. I was afforded the benefits of interacting with an array of professionals from other
helping disciplines. I see learning from other helping disciplines as critical to competent and
ethical practice. I also live out interdisciplinarity in many of my closest personal relationships. I
am particularly indebted to the nursing profession for providing me with substantial resources for
reflecting ethically on my own work. Had I not found the rich soil of nursing ethics, my ethical
vocabulary and framework would be far more limited and less imaginative in navigating ethical
challenges and reflecting on the very features of an ethical life.
I am currently employed in a multidisciplinary student health centre at the institution
where I am also a graduate student. The clients I see are university students between the ages of
18 and 25. Many students I see present with anxiety and depression.

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.
My role and responsibility have evolved and so too have the ethical issues become
thornier and weightier. Individual and group counselling make up a portion of my
responsibilities. In addition, this year I oversee student workers and an intern who run a
dedicated relaxation space for the campus community. This space has various offerings,
including informal and formal supports, to provide a low barrier space that is accessible to all
students seeking rest and relaxation. I also co-lead a mental health working group in the student
affairs division. The group’s mandate is to assess where there are gaps in mental health-focused
services initiatives, to shore up existing programmes and policies, and to generate data to support
future expansion and enhancement of services.
My experience of being an ethical practitioner is also deeply embedded in the context of
institutional constraints, competing priorities, and other structural concerns. Limitations in
funding, growing waitlists, and what seems to be an upturn in the number of students in acute
crises seeking immediate access to counselling services have put a strain on our clinicians,
myself included. I often feel both an internal and external pressure to see more clients. Though
exceptions are made on a case-by-case basis, a ten-session limit was introduced two years ago to
our clinic to ensure more students would be able to access counselling services. This limit
affects how I practice counselling. I have also observed how this limit has, at times, negatively
impacted clients’ counselling experience.

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I find it challenging to articulate my personal ethical and moral values. Even so, I am
conscious of how these values interact with my professional identity and the practices of my
profession. There is no doubt that my spiritual commitments have guided me to the counselling
profession. Sacramental theology, shaped especially by my early encounter with the work of
philosopher Richard Kearney (2010), clarifies my moral vision of the world in which the human
person is imbued with dignity and sustained by an intermingling of transcendence and
immanence. Moreover, I do live with significant privileges afforded to me by my education,
economic status, citizenship and nationality, ethnicity, and gender. These invariably are
influences on my ethical and moral visions of the world and feature both explicitly and implicitly
in how I understand my ethical responsibilities and the actions I take to become an ethical
practitioner.
Data Collection
Recruitment. Participants were recruited from the primary professions engaged in the
practice of psychotherapy, counselling, and mental health services in British Columbia (BC).
There are approximately 3,294 counsellors who are members of BCACC, using the designation
of Registered Clinical Counsellor (RCC; BCACC, 2015); 69% of the association’s membership
work in private practice; 80% of its membership is female and 20% are male (BCACC, 2015).
The CCPA has 886 members in BC holding the designation Certified Canadian Counsellor
(CCPA, 2016). Some counsellors are registered with both the CCPA and the BCACC.
Marriage and family therapists in BC are members of the British Columbia Association
of Marriage and Family Therapists and are registered with the Canadian Association for
Marriage and Family Therapy. At this time, no statistics on the number of British Columbia
Association of Marriage and Family Therapists members could be found. Counselling is also

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within the scope of practice of Registered Social Workers and Registered Clinical Social Workers
in BC; not all social workers engage in the practice of counselling (British Columbia College of
Social Workers, 2019). As of 2018, there were 4,172 practicing Registered Social Workers and
181 Registered Clinical Social Workers in BC (British Columbia College of Social Workers,
2018).
Finally, counsellors may also be registered psychologists with the College of
Psychologists of British Columbia. In 2018, the College had 1,240 active registrants; 63% of
registrants (n = 1,221) work in private practice; 10% of registrants work in hospitals; 7% in
schools; 8% in public community practice; and 12% in other public practices (College of
Psychologists of British Columbia, 2018). The College does not track how many of its
registrants are counselling psychologists.
Prospective participants had to hold membership or registration in either a provincial
and/or national association or regulatory body. They could be practicing in non-profit
organizations or agencies, private practices, group clinics, or public sector institutions or
organizations. Finally, participants had to possess at least a master’s degree in counselling or a
related field.
Sampling. Sampling was accomplished through snowballing technique. A recruitment
notice (see Appendix A) was posted on a counselling community social media page, submitted to
colleagues in the local community, and posted on a recruitment notice board on a national
counselling association’s members-only forum. Two participants came from word-of-mouth
avenues with non-participant colleagues. Three participants contacted me in response to a social
media post. One participant recommended a colleague and provided my contact information to
the potential participant.

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Participants. Six participants were interviewed for this inquiry. The participants were
counsellors in the early, mid, and late stages of their careers. They were members of provincial
and/or national counselling associations. The majority of participants were independent
practitioners in private practice. Participants worked with a variety of client populations
including children, adolescents, and adults. Their therapeutic orientations included various
integrations of trauma-informed, humanistic, person-centred, and attachment approaches and
modalities.
Pat was an independent practitioner and contracted their services to a private clinic.
Previously, she had worked in a government psychiatric clinic in an urban setting. Pat possessed
a graduate degree in counselling psychology. She was a member of a provincial professional
association.
Taylor held a graduate degree in counselling psychology and had just under three years of
experience post-graduation. She was an independent practitioner in a group practice. Before
this, Taylor had worked as an employee for two years in a private clinic. Her practice setting
was suburban. Taylor was a member of a national counselling professional association.
Lee, a private practitioner in practice for three years, held a graduate degree in
counselling from an urban institution and returned to their rural community after graduation.
Prior to private practice, Lee worked for one year in a non-profit agency and one year in a
government agency. She was a member of a provincial professional association.
Quinn was the owner and director of a private counselling practice for approximately five
years. The clinic was located in a suburban context. Quinn held a graduate degree in
counselling psychology. She was a member of a provincial professional association.

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Taylor resided in a suburban context where they had recently entered into private
practiced. Concurrently, she also worked in a rural community health centre providing services
to a local aboriginal community. In total, Taylor had been in practice for two years postgraduation. They were a member of both provincial and national professional associations.
Sidney held several degrees in different disciplines, including a master’s degree in
counselling. He was an independent practitioner in private practice for over twenty years in
various urban, suburban, and rural settings. Sidney had also been a counselling educator at
various points in his career. He was a member of a provincial counselling association
Interviews. I conducted five interviews in person; one interview took place via
telephone. Prior to starting the interview, I asked participants to fill out a brief demographic
form (see Appendix B). I then reviewed an informed consent form (see Appendix C) with
participants. Participants were given a chance to ask questions or express concerns prior to
beginning. Interviews were recorded on a digital voice recorder. Audio files were then
transcribed by a professional transcriptionist into a modified verbatim format to enhance the
clarity of the interviews. An interview guide, structured along the lines of Personal
Phenomenology’s waypoints, was used albeit with some flexibility in each interview (see
Appendix D).
In actual practice, interviews were organic and non-linear. Participants were first asked
to describe their clinical practice, especially the client populations they worked with and their
theoretical orientation. I then invited the participants to tell me about a time that was, for them,
ethically and/or morally challenging to navigate. Some participants shared one or two examples
from their clinical work. Others shared multiple stories that were linked by common threads,
that is, discerning what to do in dual relationships. I asked questions to elicit as much detail as

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possible from the participants about their experience, particularly what they felt in their body, the
emotions that emerged in the experience, the impulses they felt, and how they made sense of the
experience. However, I ensured the participants were aware that they could share as much or as
little detail about the specifics of their experience in order to preserve the confidentiality and
anonymity of clients, colleagues, or affiliated institutions.
Data management. Audio files were transferred to an encrypted, password-protected
folder on my computer. An encrypted cloud service hosted by Trinity Western University and an
encrypted password-protected USB drive were used to backup data and to transfer research
materials between the principal investigator, my supervisors, the transcriptionists, the
participants, and one of my colleagues who assisted with early data analysis.
Development of Research Focus
Phenomenological inquiry, as discussed earlier, rests on the practice of openness and
attentiveness to the way a phenomenon appears in lived experience. Sometimes the phenomenon
becomes clearer as the inquiry progresses. Or, the phenomenon presents itself in “sometimes
unpredictable and unique ways” (M. Launeanu, personal communication, February 2, 2020).
From the beginning, my inquiry has been concerned with investigating the lived experiences of
counsellors as they face ethically and/or morally challenging situations. However, early on I
anchored my inquiry on a concept developed in nursing ethics: moral distress. Moral distress is
“the experience of being seriously compromised as a moral agent in practicing in accordance
with accepted professional values and standards” (Varcoe et al., 2012, p. 59). Upon learning
about moral distress, I became interested in the idea of exploring how ethics is experienced,
versus thought-about, in practice. Reflecting on my own experience, I became curious about
counsellors’ lived experiences of challenging ethical situations. I wondered whether counsellors

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also experienced moral distress. Hence, I framed my inquiry to participants as an exploration
rooted in this concept.
As my interviews and data analysis unfolded, I began to sense that the participants did
not necessarily have moral distress. Instead, other features became particularly salient to me
while conducting interviews and data analysis. What became clearer over time was that at the
heart of the participants’ experience was the question of how to be ethical in the given moment.
On the basis of the underlying assumptions and approaches taken by Personal Phenomenology, I
consider this shift in focus to be consistent with the method since constructs, theories, and
concepts “recede” (M. Launeanu, personal communication, January 30, 2020) in favour of
openness and attentiveness to the lived experience of a phenomenon as it appears in a
participant’s experience.
Ethical Considerations
Research ethics clearance was obtained from my institution’s Human Research Ethics
Board. In recruitment, I faced a challenge in that some counsellors were interested in
participating but ultimately chose not to because of concerns about having their actions, or those
of others, exposed to judgement from the research team or legal action or ethical censure by
professional associations. Given the shift in focus that I described above, I will submit a
summary of the findings—prior to my final defence—to the participants and inform them of the
shift in focus from moral distress to being-ethical.
Confidentiality was assured to each of the participants and careful attention was paid to
removing possible identifiers from transcripts. Explicit identifiers such as names, organization
names, and cities were removed by the professional transcriptionist. The first time I read the
transcripts, I also removed other ancillary information that could be pieced together in a way that

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might also identify participants or related individuals. Finally, because ethically challenging
situations can bring about marked emotional discomfort, I included a statement stressing the
risks associated with speaking about one’s experience. Though some participants showed
varying emotions throughout their respective interviews, many participants expressed gratitude
for being afforded the opportunity to talk about their experience.
Data Analysis
Personal Phenomenology is comprised of five waypoints in a dynamic movement: (a)
creating a phenomenological description of a participant’s experience of the phenomenon and the
researcher’s experience of the participant in the context of the interview; (b) identifying the
participant’s and researcher’s impressions of the experience, such as feelings and impulses; (c)
detecting the participant’s and researcher’s understanding of the experience; (d) illuminating the
participant’s and researcher’s position, or inner response, to the impressions and understanding;
and (e) distilling what is uncovered in the preceding moments into expression, or performance
through phenomenological writing. I select the word waypoint, in place of the Längle and
Kwee’s (2013) steps, for the simple reason that waypoint conveys places that one proceeds to,
and through, in the dynamic, iterative, and sometimes muddy route that is traversed in
phenomenological inquiry. I will briefly pause at each of these waypoints, explaining in further
detail the purpose and process at each position in the analytic process.
Waypoint 1: Phenomenological description. Methodologically, the departure point for
the Personal Phenomenology is situated in the moment of encounter with another person, the
world, a situation, or an experience. Längle (2003) calls this encounter “entering a relation” (p.
44). A dialogue forms and is formed in a relation to something or someone (Kwee & Längle,
2013, 2019). How is this relationship initiated? Coming-into-relation with another and the

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world is initiated through description, the careful sketching out of the experience—and the
lifeworld of the participant—at hand: what we see, who we are speaking or listening to, how
others appear to us, what the other is saying to us, and when and where our experience unfolds
(Finlay, 2015; Kwee & Längle, 2013).
Description is the gathering of information of these facts of the situation. Facts, here, are
the certain particulars of the situation. Who did what? What was said? What was not said?
When did something occur? What is sought after is the concrete details of the given
experience—not interpretations, justifications, explanations of intentions, expressions of what
one wanted, and so on. In data analysis, a phenomenological description of the participant’s
experience is developed. The researcher also develops a phenomenological description of the
participant themselves. The aim is to create a “thick description” (Launeanu, Klaassen, & Muir,
2019, p. 358) in both instances.
Waypoint 2: Impressions. Impressions refer to the subjective experience of being
affected by one’s experience (Launeanu, Klaassen, & Muir, 2019). Three kinds of impressions
are explored: (a) primary feelings and emotions in response to an experience, (b) urges and
impulses that arise, and (c) phenomenological content of the experience that begins to shed light
on the experience’s meaning (Launeanu, Klaassen, & Muir, 2019, p. 359). In data analysis,
impressions of the participants are noted along with the impressions of the researcher toward
both the phenomenon and the participant. These impressions form the basis for recognizing
and/or developing an understanding of the phenomenon.
Waypoint 3: Understanding. Understanding is the movement from “being under the
influence of a situation to looking at the situation in relation to other experiences [one] has had”

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(Kwee & Längle, 2013, para. 16). It is here where that which is previous-to becomes presentwith. Values, knowledge, previous experience, and beliefs are brought to bear on the situation.
Understanding begins to take shape as we seek to: (a) understand our own self, (b)
understand others, and (c) note what is missing or not understood (Kwee & Längle, 2013). Selfunderstanding appears in the answers to questions about what the experience was about. What is
it about this situation that was so difficult for us? What values of ours were challenged? How do
we make sense of our immediate reactions when the situation happened? Why did we feel the
way we did at this or that moment?
Understanding the other brings me into relation with another to try and understand their
perspective, motives, reactions, or other aspects of their experience. This understanding neither
obliges me to agree with the other. Nor is this understanding just a requisite gate that we must
pass through in order to access an objective, bird’s eye perspective on life. Other-understanding,
integral to being-together with others, is concerned with empathic contact with the possibilities,
angles, aims, viewpoints, and milieu that may be a part of the other’s life (Kwee & Längle,
2013). Finally, understanding may also be found in the absence of understanding. What do we
not understand about this or that (Kwee & Längle, 2013; Launeanu, Klaassen, & Muir, 2019)?
Waypoint 4: Positioning. The fourth waypoint—positioning—is the decisive point at
which understanding is, as it were, landed upon. Taking a position is the fruit of what was
brought to light in, what is understood through the dialogue between previously received
assumptions with that which is the immediate subject of exploration (Kwee & Längle, 2013).
Positioning in data analysis involves coming to a place of sensing the essence of the
phenomenon (Kwee & Längle, 2019). The participant’s position toward their experience and the

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researcher’s position toward the participant’s experience are vital signposts to the essential
feature(s) of the phenomenon.
Waypoint 5: Expression. In therapeutic application, PEA poses a question to elicit a
response to the facts and impressions of one’s experience: What do you want to do? Having
come to a position in life, we look for a way express my position in a “tangible, concrete, and
focused” (Kwee & Längle, 2013, para. 37) way. In the context of research, expression is the
presentation of the findings in textual form employing interpretative and phenomenological
writing. Textual form can be narrowly confined to the prose favoured in certain hallways of the
academe. How the text is presented could be pushed to the limits, beyond academic prose, with
creative expression. Practically, in my own work, there was space for experimentation thanks to
the flexibility of Personal Phenomenology. I provide two examples in chapter six. It is
important to note that the expression, or textual performance in phenomenological writing, is the
fifth, but not final, movement. It is not final in that the door remains open to returning to the first
waypoint and beginning the phenomenological movement again with the anticipation of seeing
afresh, again.
Research Team
Dialogue plays a central part in the PEA method (Längle, 2003). As a result, Personal
Phenomenology also emphasizes the importance of dialogue, especially in data analysis
(Klaassen et al., 2017; Launeanu, 2019; Launeanu, Klaassen, Konieczny, et al., 2019).
Throughout my inquiry, I was met with my supervisors, Drs. Launeanu and Dr. Musto. On other
occasions, I would meet with my supervisory committee to work through a transcript together.
Together, we met with Dr. Derrick Klaassen, who is involved in the development of Personal
Phenomenology and also teaches ethics in my graduate program, and a fellow student who was

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also using Personal Phenomenology for her own research. This team was interdisciplinary: Dr.
Musto is a nurse-educator and researcher. These intentional dialogues with this small team were
opportunities to reflect collectively and share individual impressions, impulses, and
understandings of the data. These conversations were important to crystallizing the features of
the phenomenon and considering different angles and perspectives offered through the
subjectivity of each of my interlocutors.
The Role of Bracketing
For certain traditions of phenomenological inquiry, such as transcendental
phenomenology, bracketing comprises an essential moment or movement in phenomenologically
encountering the world by keeping prior experience, assumptions, knowledge, or beliefs at bay
(Finlay, 2011; Längle & Klaassen, 2019; LeVasseur, 2003). However, a total and inflexible
bracketing is not imposed in Personal Phenomenology; a staunch bracketing is an “untenable
project” (LeVasseur, 2003, p. 415) because we are situated beings, inescapably rooted in the
world.
Instead, there is space for the suspension, and then retention, of assumptions, of theories,
and the like. This dynamic flow of holding and letting go is part of the hermeneutic circle. As
Caputo (2018) explained, to do hermeneutics “is to work out our ‘always and already being
interpreted’” (p. 35). This sort of working out is not achieved “by keeping our hermeneutic ear
close to the ground of life . . . not by setting in advance the terms that life must meet, but by
allowing life to speak on its own terms” (Caputo, 2018, p. 35). A hard and total bracketing is
supplanted by a sensitive attention and listening for preconceptions. Hatab (2000) remarked:
“No inquiry begins from scratch; it is always shaped by prior modes of understanding or
direction that usually go unnoticed because of their tacit character” (p. 13).

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It is by practicing a phenomenological attitude of openness and receptivity, which may
require holding our existing abstractions, theories, opinions, and views at a momentary distance,
that we may encounter the phenomena and/or persons afresh in their individual uniqueness
(Längle & Klaassen, 2019). In Personal Phenomenology, the phenomenological attitude is
essential. Ample space is made for an inquirer’s pre-existing knowledge to be named and set
aside, especially when crafting phenomenological descriptions. Later, pre-existing knowledge
may be brought back into dialogue with the data as the hermeneutic circle continues. In short,
Personal Phenomenology does not keep out the preconceived, the presumed, but reveals that
which has always been with us.
Even so, it is important for me to name my subjectivity as part of the hermeneutic circle.
I am both the inquirer—albeit a novice one—and a participant in that I have faced ethically and
morally challenging situations and have pondered the question that swells beneath: What does it
mean to be an ethical practitioner? This inquiry is part of my attempt to answer that question for
myself, but also to propose something of value to the profession in which I frequently am faced
with this question, whether I am the one asking the question or it is colleagues who ask it with
me. I focus more intently on my subjectivity in chapter six.
Evaluation Criteria: Rigour, Resonance, Reflexivity, and Relevance
In an effort to generate meaningful research that can advance knowledge and practice, I
do not want to eschew the opportunity to have my work evaluated. Various criteria have been
proposed by qualitative researchers from varying methodological and epistemological traditions
that align with criteria used in quantitative methods (Polit & Beck, 2012). However, Finlay
(2011) submitted that the criteria employed to evaluate phenomenological inquiries should be
“quite distinct from those of quantitative investigators: criteria that are responsive to [qualitative

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researchers’] particular values and goals” (p. 262). I will discuss the four criteria Finlay (2011)
proposed: rigour, resonance, reflexivity, and relevance.
Rigour. Rigour is generally used as a catch-all term that encompasses an array of
concerns about the carefulness of the research. In Finlay’s (2011) proposal for
phenomenological inquiry, rigour specifically refers to whether a research program was
“competently managed and systematically worked through” (p. 265). Since this inquiry is my
first foray into research, I learned the practices of phenomenological inquiry, and research in
general, in real-time. This presented challenges at times. Along the way, the practices and
principles that bolster a study’s rigour were learned concurrently and after the fact. Ongoing
dialogue with supervisors and with a colleague who was also using the Personal Phenomenology
framework for data analysis offered an opportunity to clarify questions and uncertainties about
the methodology. After completing my interviews, I would make brief field notes. After I
received a completed transcript from my transcriptionist, I would listen to the interview while
reading the transcript to ensure the quality of the transcription. This also gave me a chance to
familiarize myself with the data and begin making initial notes. I listened to interviews at least
twice and would revisit sections of the interviews when necessary. I developed my own outline
for documenting my data analysis that was structured according to the five waypoints I described
earlier.
Resonance. The resonance of a phenomenological inquiry is tested by you, the reader.
“Resonance,” Finlay (2011) said, “taps into emotional, artistic, and/or spiritual dimensions which
can probably only be judged in the eye of the beholder” (p. 265). Phenomenological inquiry
begins and ends in the dimension of lived experience. My decision to conduct a study into a
lived experience is a response to something. In other words, something or someone has spoken

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to me. My response is to speak to others, the participants. In return, they have spoken to me. I
have responded by speaking back. Now, I bring the voices both of the participants and of myself
to you. In a way, I am speaking to you and I invite you to speak to me in response. In speaking
to one another, we re-sound (resonare) what we have said, what we have heard, and our response
to what we have heard. Resonance is not a mere intellectual agreement with a stated fact or a
feeling of “Oh, that’s interesting.” Resonance wells up when we are being-struck-by-something
in what we have heard, being-moved-by-something. As van Manen (2007) concluded, “perhaps
a phenomenological text is ultimately successful only to the extent that we, its readers, feel
addressed by it . . . [it] must reverberate with our ordinary experience of life as well as with our
sense of life’s meaning” (p. 26). At various points during my analysis, I shared preliminary
findings with my supervisors and research colleagues to assess the resonance of what I was
seeing in the participants’ experiences. Resonance, however, also extends to the present
moment. Resonance is something that you, the reader, are also capable of experiencing. The
essential question is this: Do the features of the phenomenon that I describe in chapter four
resonate with you?
Reflexivity. Reflexivity is concerned with highlighting a researcher’s self-awareness
regarding their subjectivity: that is, do they see they speak from a particular place as a subject?
In addition, reflexivity is also inclusive of the researcher’s candidness about the process of their
research (Finlay, 2011). So, a certain degree of trust has to be had in the researcher’s statement
“I was reflexive.” I give more sustained attention to reflexivity in chapter six.
However, here I would like to highlight that the Personal Phenomenology method is
deliberately infused with opportunities for reflexivity. It was at first disorienting to be concerned
with my feelings, impressions, and reactions to the participants and their experience. Learning

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the ins-and-outs of hermeneutic phenomenology has also been an unlearning the positivist
assumptions that were inculcated in me from an early age. As these take-for-granted norms were
unsettled by the intentional invitation to attend to my own experience, the value of reflexivity
became increasingly apparent to me as, particularly in terms of situating the inquiry in its rightful
place, a limited exposé that I have crafted of a deeply complex phenomenon. Reflexivity, then,
became not so much a way of alerting others to my invasion. Instead, reflexivity becomes an
intentional participation in the mutual composition of understanding.
Relevance. What is relevance and why is it important for judging a particular inquiry,
this inquiry? Relevance has to do with whether or not the inquiry has to do with the matter at
hand, that is the phenomenon in question, in a meaningful and valuable way that deepens
understanding (Finlay, 2011). Whether or not the findings of this inquiry are considered
relevant, or not, is partly dependent upon you, the reader, seeing it as such. Inevitably, the
relevance of something is dependent upon what we think to be of importance. Finlay’s (2011)
criteria highlights evaluating a study “in terms of its applicability and contribution” (p. 265).
The study should “add to the body of knowledge relating to an issue or aspect of social life”
(Finlay, 2011, p. 265). It ought to deepen our grasp of something particular that is of concern to
us. If the study enables participants and/or readers to reach for something in a new way—in that
it is “empowering and/or growth-enhancing for either the participants involved and/or the
readers” (Finlay, 2011, p. 265)—then it could be said that the study is relevant insofar as it is not
an esoteric product that has limited bearing on anything, or anyone, apart from the researcher.
Finally, relevance speaks to the application of the inquiry in the everyday. This is not
application by force, a heavy-handed insistence that in order for the inquiry to be worth
something, it must have talking points, a program or system to follow, or recommendations.

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Rather, this is where the responsibility of the reader to practice the art of hermeneutics enters the
“non-exactness” of hermeneutic research (Caputo, 2018, p. 237). The relevance of a study is not
in the fact that there are four or five points that can be universally applied. Relevance is found in
receiving the inquiry and letting it sink into one’s life, being open to possible challenges issued
by the phenomenon to us and for us. The question I leave you with is this: How might these
findings impact how you see your own practice? This involves your interpretation of the features
of the phenomenon based on your own situatedness.

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CHAPTER FOUR: PHENOMENOLOGICAL WRITING

Phenomenological writing is the fifth waypoint in the flow of Personal Phenomenology.
This is the waypoint where the phenomenological analysis conducted in the first four
waypoints—description, impression, understanding, and positioning—is given more definite
shape in textual form. In Personal Phenomenology, phenomenological writing is meant to be an
evocative, expressive, and in-sight-full illustration of the phenomenon.
Phenomenological writing is, as van Manen (1990) stated, “the object of the research
process” (p. 111). Phenomenological writing is, in a sense, the product of a phenomenological
inquiry. However, it is also an essential route that the inquirer takes throughout the inquiry. The
distinction between analysis and the final product is blurred by phenomenological writing. It is
through writing that understanding unfolds. Thus, phenomenological writing is not a reporting
of findings, per se. It is a record of thinking, an interpretive expression of the inquirer’s
reflection. It is far from a conclusive statement on the matter at hand. A phenomenological
writing’s finality is ruptured by the constant company of an exit point where we can re-enter the
current of Personal Phenomenology to see afresh again.
In the following phenomenological writing, I wanted to bring attention to five features of
the phenomenon of being-ethical that were manifest in the lived experiences of the participants I
interviewed for this inquiry. I begin with considering the seeing and with composing ethical
situations and responses that happen in everyday encounters with others. I look at the ethics of
attention, both as a means and an end in our encounters with others. I delve into the ethics of
proximity to the other, particularly the dynamic movement of self-constraint in the service of the
other. Being-ethical involves exposing one’s self to the other—that is, the client, and to those
who evaluate us, such as our colleagues. It is the presence of third parties that bring about a

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sense of being-exposed. However, third parties may also be supportive or may make ethical
demands upon us that conflict with our responsibility to the other. Finally, being-ethical unfolds
in decisive moments and in instances of shock, discomfort, uncertainty. Being-ethical also
unfolds in instances of insight and action.
Being-Ethical: Seeing and Composing
In being-ethical, we are situated in the dynamic flow of seeing and composing. In
professional vernacular, counsellors see clients. “What kind of clients do you see?” you may ask
me. “I see couples and adults,” I might reply. Who we see, and what we see in such encounters,
is far more than what we mean when we use the word see. There is an obvious inadequacy to
thinking of seeing the other in the simple sense of physical sight. Seeing the other, and the
ethical features of their presence and our encounter, requires more than the eyes. The sum total
of all the means that we rely upon to interact—senses, intuition, knowledge, and experience—
with the world constitute our seeing.
Ethical events are occurring in front of our eyes. It is a matter of whether or not we see
such events as ethical. It is the mundane, the quotidian, the happenings that are seemingly
morally neutral that are, indeed, most often ethically saturated. To have eyes to see such
instances as ethical is vital to being-ethical. To see the ethical, however, is possible though
thoroughly affected by limitations, internal and external, personal and non-personal, individual
and communal. We have limits to our ability to see the world. We cannot see the totality of the
world in one instant. Most of our world lies outside of narrow band of sight. Our vision—
physical and existential— is affected by the restrictions of our existential and physical finitude.
Peripherally, many things take place, that are ethically-relevant, just within the shallows of our
vision. Sometimes these things take place just out of our sightlines. Sometimes there are

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happenings hidden and veiled. Sometimes they are intentionally hidden. When one counsellor
grappled with whether to break a teenage client’s confidentiality by informing the parents that
the client was self-harming, vital information—the severity of cuts—was literally concealed by a
sweatshirt.
And [the client] said, “Yeah, I do [self-harm] . . .” I’m like, “Oh? Do your parents know
that? “And [the client] said, “Nope. And I don’t want them to know.” . . . And then I
said, “Okay, how deep are the cuts?” [The client] said, “They’re not deep. They’re
superficial. And . . . I’m thinking of not doing that anymore.” . . . what if [the cuts are]
not [superficial] because I can’t see them? It is a form of self-harm. . . . I had cases
before when teenagers require stitches at a hospital. And is it that bad [for this client]? I
don’t know. . . . I think with cutting the grey area mostly was the fact that it was
superficial cuts . . . Realistically is that going to kill [them]? Maybe not. But it’s actually
self-harm. . . . And also that . . . is it really a personal thing? I mean [they’re] doing it to
[themselves], it’s [their] own body so . . . do parents really need to know that? And it’s
somewhere where they can’t see. But what if things end up getting really bad and no one
knows? (Pat)
Our being-ethical is far from a neutral, objective observation post far above and removed
from the moment-by-moment flux of life. We see the world through an assortment of lenses—
personal, professional, spiritual, and political—our attention is charged with taking in what we
see and also with directing our sight toward the ethical and moral features of the world.
I could just go with [not disclosing my client’s self-harm to their parents, because “selfharm” wasn’t in the informed consent] but I felt morally that, no I think, if it was, I think
if it was my kid, I really think parents should know that this kid is, you know (Pat).

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As if we were gazing through a viewfinder of a camera, we see the other situated in space
and time. They are with us in a particular place, physically, but also existentially. We attend to
the field of elements that are present in our vision. Shapes, lines, texture, and colour coalesce
and collide. Then there is the other: the Subject of our seeing. We hold them in our sight as they
hold us in their own view. Who the other is to us, that is, the meaning and significance of the
other, begins to take shape as we see them in space and time. To see the other, we too are here
with them. We see them in the flesh. Or, we see them though we are not with them. We see
them as if we were with them in the flesh. Being-ethical begins with seeing the other as the
central figure. The other becomes the focal point for making our composition of the ethical. As
Quinn stated, “What rose to the top for me about everything is: ‘What does this human being in
front of me need right now?’”
Seeing-the-other is a feature of being-positioned in and with the other. By seeing, we
become implicated, involved, invested, and incorporated with others. Certainly, we may take the
position of a bystander. Try as we may to be objective observers, by virtue of seeing we are
nevertheless injected into the given moment, the tangled situations of human relations, and the
complicated petitions made by others. Being-ethical is made possible by our deliberate
commitment to being-with-others. Severing ourselves from others dissolves not just our
existence. Our capability to act in such a way that we can say with all sincerity, “I am being
ethical,” is jeopardized by separation.
In the crucial moments that are unfolding before us, physically, relationally, and
existentially, our seeing-of-the-other as a vulnerable human being like us cuts through the
veneers of language, assumptions, beliefs, and agendas. What is it that remains to be seen? Our
involvement is more than what we do with or for the other. Our involvement is with the other.

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We’re all wounded pilgrims, folks. Just because my label says “counsellor” and yours
says “client” doesn’t actually mean very much when we really meet each other. Who am
I to judge? Is that a moral position? . . . in some ways, it’s a moral position. It’s also, I
think, just a place of recognizing reality. (Sidney)
Counsellor and client are words that conceal an important message for us, one that can
fundamentally (re)shape our existence with one another: we share in our humanity together.
These terms—counsellor and client—distinguish our rights, roles, and responsibilities,
purposefully shaping the structure and the experience of the encounter. However, seeing—or
recognizing—the simplicity of the moment, the plainness of our encounter with the other, distills
all that happens into a potent concentration, the reality of which is at once comforting and also
terrifying.
I suppose if I reflect on it, and one recognizes just how powerful true acceptance is for
human beings: “This person knows me, sees me and he really does accept me.” . . That’s
my job. To accept. To genuinely, truly accept. . . . It’s who I am as a therapist. . . . Who
am I to judge? (Sidney)
Seeing the world is a feature of being-ethical. Being-ethical forms the way we see. The
way we see forms our being-ethical. We become involved in the human drama that unfolds in
the moment-to-moment encounter with other human beings, seeing and recognizing that what
connects us is our shared desire and hope for fundamental responses from each other.
The composition of the ethical. In our seeing, we are determining the “significance of
an event” (Cartier-Bresson, 1999, p. 42) as well as arranging and putting together (composer), “a
precise organization of forms which give that event its proper expression” (Cartier-Bresson,
1999, p. 42). Here there is a synchronized questioning and deciding about what, who, and where

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we see. We may ask: How does this person fit into this moment? Who is the most important to
bring into sharp focus? Where is this event unfolding? What if we were to re-position ourselves
to a different place? How would that change our perspective?
Our seeing is simultaneously engaged in the act of composition: the bringing together of
the diversity of subjects to a place of being-with-each-other. To put it more succinctly, we are
organizing everything that we see in the moment, things of which we are consciously and
unconsciously aware. Composing, and reaching that decisive moment, may involve a substantial
amount of analysis, practise, and trial and error––that is, a continual questioning and deciding
that photographer Cartier-Bresson (1999) noted as being essential to composition (p. 13). As
Sidney embraced his female client, his questioning and deciding, his composition began to
unfold:
And I can feel the shift, Do I push her away? Do I say something? How do I handle
this? To me, this is beginning to be a real clinical, ethical kind of question because, put
her at arms’ length and say, “There, there, we don’t do that kind of thing together,” is
total rejection. You can’t handle it that way. I’ve got to be careful; she’s female, I’m
male. (Sidney)
Lee was contacted by a client’s father who informed her that his partner had booked a
session under their child’s name. He informed Lee that he and his partner were having
relationship problems. His partner did not know he was calling. Lee described the next day
when the partner arrived at her office:
So she shows up the next morning, she comes in; we, like, have to create a profile for her
because she’d booked all these sessions in her child’s name; we had to create a profile for

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her, we go in, we fill out the consent paperwork. I don’t tell her that her partner called,
and I had really sat down the day before to be, like, “Do I? Do I not?” (Lee)
Our composition cannot be predetermined because we are in this moment with this
person. Being-ethical, however, is not the mere application of a particular set of standards to
give a solution to a dilemma nor is it simply “doing the right thing.” The precise moment that we
say “Yes” to our ethical composition is not when it meets a certain objective threshold of rightness. There could be multiple compositions that are right. And, it would be a mistake to
understand being-ethical as a badge of honour that is given to those who follow the rules. These
are diluted depictions of being-ethical that show more affinity for moralism and for mimicking
conventions.
Being-ethical is a manner or way of being in the world. It is not a matter of simply
“doing the right thing,” even though being-ethical may lead us to act correctly, rightly, justly, or
ethically insofar as these are determined by communities we are a part of our others who are a
significant influence upon us. Whether or not our being-ethical leads us to act in accordance
with the prevailing norms or expectations of another person or group of persons or an institution
may not be evident from the outset. Nor does acting in accordance with the prevailing norms or
expectations of something or someone larger than ourselves—an authority—necessarily mean
that our actions need no justification to cement such action’s ethicality.
Being-Ethical as Demonstrating the Skill and Giving the Gift of Attention
In being-ethical, we are engaged in the activity of seeing what is before us—both
apparent and concealed—and composing a particular response to what is being offered to us in
and through the frame of ourselves. Composition is shorthand for reflection, decision, and action

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melded together. To compose is to create a particular expression of what we see. This
composition also becomes our response to what we see.
Yet, what makes composition possible? To make a composition, we must attend to the
moment. How is being-attentive a quality of being-ethical? Can you have one without the
other? Why is being ignored so terribly painful to the young child who seeks the affection of
their parent? Why is a lack of concentration on a task judged to be the rotten fruit of laziness (a
word laden with moral judgement if there ever was one!). Why do start-up companies design
mobile apps that employ crafty techniques to capture our attention?
Attentiveness lays a footing upon which our ethicality can be firmly established. Our
being-ethical is expressible in large part because of our attentiveness. Without attentiveness, we
may never see the ethical significance of the moments that face us. In short, attentiveness is both
an expression of being-ethical—giving our attention to one another is a performance of the
ethical that is particularly essential to the praxis of therapy. Being-attentive itself makes up the
substance of being-ethical as it is a basic expression of our intention to do good toward and for
the other.
I knew in my gut—really, I pushed expectation aside and knew in my gut, for this person
in this moment, “If I have another minute to just hold them and be still with them and
have that safe container,” that I needed to do that. (Quinn)
Without attention the possibility of contact, encounter, and being-with-another dwindles away. I
lose myself. I lose you. You lose me. You lose yourself. We are lost together when we lose
focus on one another.
Attention is our sensitive concentration on what is within, and without, us. If our
attention were to be focused only ourselves, life would become impossible, irretrievably lost in a

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narcissistic gaze. Attention is a vitality that cannot be contained; it extends to all that is before
and around us. Our attention is drawn out of us, away from ourselves, by the call of the other’s
glance, presence, posture, and expression of emotion and of thought. Attention requires and
inspires all of our perceptive capacities—physical, emotional, and existential—to be dedicated
and watchful to the other. As a feature of being-ethical, attention is the exercise of the
wakefulness (nepsis) of being: to be present to the present moment and the other who is present
in our presence.
We go for a walk; it’s very useful to walk. We often do very, very long sessions. . . . She
needs a hug. It’s the little girl who needs a hug. Often does need physical contact. I am
holding the little girl. And I feel a shift. It’s very difficult to say what I’m aware of, but
I’m beginning to realize this isn't a little girl anymore; this is the grown woman who very
rarely puts in an appearance 100%. So now, “What do I do?” I’ve got my arms around
her; her head is leaning on my shoulder. It was a little girl; it is now a grown woman.
And I can feel the shift. Do I push her away? Do I say something? How do I handle
this? To me, this is beginning to be a real clinical, ethical kind of question because, put
her at arms’ length and say, “There, there, we don’t do that kind of thing together,” is
total rejection. You can’t handle it that way. I’ve got to be careful; she’s female, I’m
male. We know what men are like. It’s easy to get all excited and forget that you’re the
damn therapist. [Interviewer: What did that shift feel like?] Well, that’s what I’m saying.
It’s––we don’t have words for this. It’s like the kind of—you know, if somebody’s
staring at the back of your head. You can’t see them, but suddenly you know somebody’s
looking at you that kind of a sense of, “Something’s shifted here; something’s going on
here.” (Sidney)

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Let us dwell for a moment on a word affiliated with attention: concentration. Some
dissection pushes us beyond received definitions to something more fundamental: To concentrate
is to be together at the centre (Con: together; centrum: centre). The centre of what? The centre
of the space that between us. Together, a space is created between us by our simple acceptance
that we are each here, at this moment. To concentrate, then, is a movement toward one another.
We meet at the centre. Here we find one another being-ourselves-together. Concentration—this
movement toward being-together-at-the-centre—is of an ethical sort. We do not possess
concentration. Rather, we live concentratively by the very way in which we are present in the
world.
Our decision to be together is one that stems from the affirmation of our existential unity
with each other. Our concentration puts us with the other at the centre of the moment; in our
being-attentive, our being-concentrative, we shape a relationship with the other. We becomefastened-with-each-other (atachier). Our concentration upon another, with one another, both to
the meaning of what they are saying, but also to how they appear to us as another being, becomes
a matter of ethics insofar as our concentration attaches us to one another. Attention attaches us to
one another. We become attached-to-one-another when we attend to one another. We reveal our
intention to be attentive to the other. It is in this intention that we hold and are held by one
another. Attentiveness is not possible without lifting our eyes to see the other and the sinews of
the bond between us. Our bond with the other rouses our concentration. Conversely, this bond is
also nurtured by our attentiveness, our concentration on the other. Concentration—beingtogether-at-the-centre-of-life—brings forward the actualization of seeing and being seen,
accepting and being-accepted, hearing and being heard, understanding and being understood,
loving and being loved.

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At the heart of everything [for me]—I mean some would call it “attachment”—but, for
me, I call it “love.” But I really believe love is at the heart of everything we do with our
clients; and that takes a capacity to be aware of ourselves in the room; or those clients
don’t stay. (Quinn)
Whether we call it love or attachment, we are together-with-one-another-at-the-centre, fastenedwith-one-another, thanks to our attention. Attention attaches us to the other. This attentiveness is
directed inwardly to ourselves— the capacity to be aware of ourselves in the room—probing our
being for all that sustains, or inhibits, our care for the other. Our attentiveness—sensitive, tender,
accepting, and affectionate—becomes the vehicle for another’s reunion with the facets of their
existence that they have excised, forgotten, or ignored. My being-attentive invites, calls, and
encourages your being-attentive. You and I are encircled by this experience of being-attentive.
Then, it is possible for my attending to you to bid you to attend to yourself. My attentiveness
accepts you, receives you, and welcomes you into my self. Your attentiveness to me summons
me closer to be me.
“Alleluia”. . . This is who you really are. You’re not seven years old. You’re a grown
woman, and you’re feeling it. You’re not blocking yourself out from yourself. You
know, we’d been working on this for [a number of] years. . . . We’re getting where you
need to be. (Sidney)
Now, it may fairly be asked: Is not attention a precursor to acceptance? Is not attention a
sort of action that has to take place before we can make a decision to accept another person?
Attention is acceptance. We cannot accept something we do not attend to. This acceptance
shouldn’t be reduced to a sort of bland, platitude-ready, liberality. It is a primal acceptance that
transcends decisions, positions, beliefs, opinions, and configurations and is instead an acceptance

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of what is given in the moment; acceptance permits but is also the consequence of
concentration—being-at-the-centre-together—without the sorts of judgments that categorize and
select.
Attention is also the force that enables us to be ethical by looking with sensitive focus on
the other. Literally meaning a domestic hearth or home in Latin, the word focus gradually took
on new meanings such as point of convergence. Our attention then, can be understood, in one
way, to be the avenue that leads us from ourselves to another. When we are focused on the other,
they are the point of convergence for all our senses, intentions, and concerns.
I’m aware of how close we are physically; I’m aware of what the woman part of her is
wanting. I’m aware the little girl has suddenly disappeared; I am aware of her fragility,
her woundedness. All that stuff. I am also clinically aware it’s like––hence, the
“Alleluia, we’re getting somewhere here” . . . [this moment] was demanding. It was
profoundly demanding because it required me [slight pause] to be very, very sensitive,
subtle, delicate, tender, acceptant, and not get worried. Because, well, you get worried,
the other person picks it up, and then they’ve done something bad. . . . It’s just living.
It’s just living. I’m here now in this moment with you. (Sidney)
If our attention is elsewhere—if we have lost our focus—than on the one who is before
us, it is difficult to be therapeutic. It is in the throes of an ethical event where a cohort of
anxieties can spill into our consciousness and drown our attentiveness. These anxieties shed
light on the ethical significance of our attentiveness, a significance particularly sensible when our
attention is interrupted and a creeping sense of guilt awaits us, ready to pounce from the
peripheries. Though we may not be aware that our attentiveness has been directed somewhere—
or to someone—else other than the subject of our initial intention when we become aware of our

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distraction, we intuit that we are not where we want to be. We are not moving toward that which
we have intended to move toward. We have wandered away from the pathway that we had found
ourselves on moments ago. “This isn’t right. I’ve lost my way. I feel farther from where I am
ought to be,” we may say to ourselves. In time, we can look back at the wake behind us and see
that we are far off course and the destination we had set out to reach seems further away that it
did when we unfurled our sails.
It was pretty tough; pretty tough because I actually—to be honest—I kind of lost focus
for a little while because [the client] kept talking about something else [after the client
disclosed that they were self-harming] about something else, and I’m like… ‘Okay, the
parents are sitting outside in the waiting room. I just got this information [slight sigh]
and what do I do with it? . . . I lost a bit of focus in the session.
But I guess the toughest part of it all was . . . I felt like I kind of lost . . . touch.
Like I couldn’t remember things that [the client was] telling [me] because I . . . was in
my mind trying to figure out what to do with this. I basically just thought of all the
possibilities . . . And I couldn’t really just pause the session and say, “Wait a minute, let
me think.” . . . So as [the client was] talking . . . I’m like, “Oh man, I have to keep back at
it because am I missing some other information here?” . . . So I would say it was quite
distracting. . . . I think it was in the moment not only just loss of focus and connection
because you know I couldn’t be present . . . And it’s tough to do counselling where
you’re not present with [the] client. (Pat)
Brain structures and processes may form the essential and exquisite biological basis of
attention. It is our conscience that is the existential foundation of attention. Our conception of
conscience is often limited to the notion that it is an internal guidance system that alerts us to

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when we are doing something right or wrong. Our conscience is ourselves, attended to, trusted,
and acted upon. Our conscience is the subject of our attention. “Pay attention to what your
conscience is telling you,” we might tell one another when we face an ethical conundrum. In
order to listen to our conscience, we have to first attend and listen carefully for our conscience.
What is heard is not a drab, abstract philosophical lecture—to ourselves, from ourselves—on
moral philosophy. Instead, we may be faced with how we are living as ourselves in the moment.
It’s like, “ This is what I experienced. Okay.” You’ve got to hang onto your experience.
“This is how it is for me right now.” And I would say that. . . . there is a moral element to
that. You see, that’s a moral choice. . . . it’s along the lines of Sartre’s notion of, “Good
faith, bad faith” . . . or, you know, Shakespeare, “This above all else, to thine own self be
true.” . . . That’s ethics. Not, “Never have a dual relationship.” (Sidney)
Rightly so, we might experience a vague unease or feel a robust retort brewing: If being-ethical
is simply being true to ourselves, then we end up in the soup of relativity. Everything goes.
Anything goes. Accountability is impossible. Our conscience is not sequestered from the world.
We are not sequestered from the world. By being alive, we are very much involved. Try as we
might to convince ourselves we are independent thinkers, that we answer to no one but
ourselves, the truth of the matter is on the other side of this charming fantasy. Being-ethical is
being-true-to-one’s-self. But one’s self is involved in and with others, particularly the other.
One’s self may also be acutely fragmented by the thick varieties of experience we live.
When we hone our attentiveness to listen vigilantly to our conscience, we may begin to
hear ourselves speaking to ourselves, challenging our initial assumptions and directing us to let
our experience—and the experience of others—infuse us with the potent questions of doubt,
curiosity, and openness.

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There was a part of me that wished that my ethics would have allowed me to give that
gift [to allow the client to die by suicide in the counselling office] to [the client] if that’s
truly what [they] wanted; and you could explore that over a long period of time [with the
client] and make sure that that wasn’t just in this moment, today . . . I can’t though. I
couldn’t. [I was bound] to my own morality. I couldn’t put my own hope aside . . . I
couldn't move into that space that this was the end with [the client]. . . . I couldn’t do it. I
couldn’t do it. I believed the world had great things for [the client] one day. I couldn’t
do it, and I acknowledge that. Like, at the end of that session, I said “I can’t do that for
you. And this isn’t about what my association requires. This isn’t about [what] the law
requires. This is what my own love and care for you will not allow me to do.” And so
that was really tough. And I second-guessed and I went over it and wrestled with it. And
I still wrestle with it. (Quinn)
As much as we may attend to our conscience, sometimes what we hear is a clear
ambiguity, a conclusion that is inconclusive, a stark awareness of not-knowing. Thus, attention
to our conscience does not guarantee that we will uncover a flawlessly constructed approach to
moral perfection or a revelation of which fork in the road we must take to abide by certain
statutes, case law, and standards. Rather, attention to our conscience can be an unsettling
meeting with the sheer cliffs of our existence where uncertainty of what lies beneath is only
shattered by our acceptance that we stand at the edge and must, sooner or later, take our leap into
the haze that shrouds all that lies before us. Attention then, though perhaps enabling us to
connect with our conscience, does not always mean we will find ourselves also in a place of
comfort, confidence, or control. The advent of uncertainty in our listening to our conscience is

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not the end of attention; this uncertainty demands our attention be magnified to notice
everything, including the fact we are shaking in our boots.
Attention is a finite possibility, subject to limits. Unable to master our full attentiveness
to every little thing that enters our horizons, we are always in situations where our attention is
never enough. Our perception of the world cannot be held in flawless, constant, and complete
focus. A myriad of voices merge into a discordant roar, each clamoring to gain our ear so as to
be heard. Our attention may be captivated by the many different features of the moment in
which we find ourselves.
In any photograph, for example, there can be more than one subject to which our
attention is directed. Where do we choose to direct our attention? What is it that we bring into
sharp focus? What is left slightly blurred in the background? What we grant our attention to is,
in a certain way, a question of ethics. What or who is important to look at in this instance? What
or whom is deserving of our attention? What or whom is infringing upon, challenging, or calling
to our concentration at this moment? Who else wants us in this moment? Who else do we want
to be with in this moment? What or whom must we focus upon? Indeed, what guides our
attention may be tested by others who broadcast themselves to us, beckoning us to respond to
them. Their appeal to our attention may be explicit and forceful. Or, their petition may be
hushed and unassuming, sidling up to us in subtlety.
And like I said, I refuse to help people tolerate being oppressed. . . . And so, if that’s the
guiding principle for me in individual sessions then it’s also the guiding principle for me
overall, more globally. And so my concern is that [is my organization] forcing me to do
that? I don't want to hurt the organization. It’s a tough place to work . . . It’s tough to get
qualified people to come and work there, which is part of the problem . . . . I don't want to

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add to the negative reputation of working for aboriginal communities. So I feel a sense
of responsibility there. I don't want to badmouth my employer, ever, but especially in this
case. And yet . . . I feel like I owe the community more than that . . . because they’ve
been so— and not just because they’ve been so profoundly harmed, but because . . . my
job is to bear witness to the individual suffering of that harm every day—six, seven, eight
times a day—I swim in it. And the only thing that makes that tolerable is to also bear
witness to healing . . . to show people their resiliency and to help them to move into . . . a
better place. And so that’s on an individual level; but on a community level, I think that’s
also my role . . . . I think the challenge in that is prioritizing those. . . . I’ve chosen to put
my client first. I am waiting to see what the organization does before I decide if I put
myself second. (Taylor)
Attentiveness to our conscience brings us into contact with what is of value to us in this
moment. It is only then, when we recognize our values as revealed by my conscience, that we
can advance our attentiveness through ourselves to the other. However, what is of value to us
may be many things. On more occasions than not, it is not a question of what is of value. For
us, it is often the question of what, in this moment, is of value to us? What values are drawn out
of our conscience by the present moment? Careful attention to our conscience, however, may
reveal that the action we wish we could to take or feel that the other is calling us to take, is—in
actual fact—incongruent with who we are.
I didn't know what was going to happen [to the client]. But I found relief in that I knew I
had to come to conclusion I couldn’t be that person. No matter how much [the client]
desired for me to be that person, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t do it. [Interviewer: So there
was relief in that?] Yeah. And it wasn't about checking a box for my Association or for a

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legal body. It was just, ‘This is morally what’s right for me.’ . . . and my supervisor at the
time had said, ‘I could do it. . . . If this is . . . if you need permission to say you could it,’
And I still couldn’t do it. So even after receiving, like, permission, so to speak, I still
couldn’t do it. [Interviewer: And was that coming from that personal moral sense?]
Absolutely. Absolutely, that moral sense, I mean my own experience of divinity—my
own experience of, this [client] was a spiritual person—so my own experience of that
shared knowledge of God. I just—I couldn’t do it; it wasn't for me. (Quinn)
In being-attentive, we may see, with wonder, the other becoming more truly themselves:
Through our heightened attention, the other becomes more real, not only to us, but particularly to
themselves.
This is who you really are. . . . You’re not blocking yourself out from yourself. We’re
getting where you need to be. I’m doing what you hired me to do. I’m facilitating you
becoming yourself. I’ll be honest, “professional ethics”—so-called—ere not even in the
room, I’ll deal with that crap later. This is about the client. Morality [participant’s
emphasis] is in the room. This is what you need me to provide for you right now. This is
who you need me to be for you right now, and I need to be really, really [participant’s
emphasis] careful we don’t do anything that is going to wound you further, anything
[participant’s emphasis] that is going to harm the relationship we have, which I know is
so highly prized. Because professional ethics are a hodge-podge of norms, mores,
sometimes some moral thinking, contemporary obsessions that come and go, fears,
window dressing, genuflecting sometimes in the direction of politicians. Morality is
about: what do I owe to this human being here with me now? They’ve asked me to
accompany them to help facilitate change, growth, evolution—whatever you want to call

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it. Or maybe they want me to just help them stay with how it really is and hang onto that.
In either case, there’s where the commitment is. (Sidney)
Our attentiveness may clear the ground for the other’s being to be received—both by the other
and ourselves. The other may be disintegrated, a stranger to themselves, parts and pieces of
identity and experience expunged from their consciousness, feelings restricted from surfacing to
their immediate awareness. Their attentiveness is directed elsewhere. Perhaps they attend to the
exterior of their life: the people, places, and things that they encounter. Sharing our attention to
the other summons their attention. By attending to our experience the other—the voice, the
body, the story, of the other—we may direct their attention to the regions of their existence that
have been overlooked, neglected, and hidden.
There is no law or code of ethics that mandates us to pay attention. Does that mean that
attentiveness has no moral significance or bearing on how we are ethical toward one another?
Attentiveness is, however, assumed beneath the tenets and laws that guide our activities. When
we become a professional, we profess to ascribe to certain standards, values, and norms.
However, more than this profession to the abstract, we are professing our commitment to
attentiveness: the ardent sensitivity to the world around us; our allegiance to being-together-atthe-centre with—that is, our concentration upon—the other. When we give our attention to one
another, we are not meeting some external standard set by an authoritative figure or council.
Rather, we are meeting ourselves and the other.
Being-Ethical as Negotiating Proximity to the Other
When we are being-ethical, we utilize our perceptiveness that sees proximity, and its
magnitude, as a crucial and dynamic feature that makes it possible to craft and refine our
composition of the ethical. Proximity is where being-ethical manifests itself in an exceptionally

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concrete way. Whether the proximity is corporeal or existential, the experience of proximity is
integral to being-ethical. We can radically alter our composition by adjusting our position. A
photographer may take a few steps forward or may climb to a higher vantage point. What
happens is a shift in perspective because there has been a shift in proximity. When we are beingethical, we are engaging in composition. What is treacherous is that compositions are infinitely
variable in part because proximity alters the angle from which we approach the situation or the
person. If we are distant from one another, can we truly come to see each other?
We take on a closeness to another by being-moveable physically, emotionally,
relationally, spiritually, and cognitively. These aspects of proximity are not separate from or
exclusive of ethics. In simple terms, our proximity is mediated by others’ consent to our
proximity and to the degree of closeness or distance. We are, at times, invited into proximity or
aproximity. Deferring to this invitation is an expression of being-ethical. We let the other set the
pace, plan the space, and give a place for us to be. However, proximity is partly determined by
us. In the ebbs and flows of the given moment, we may be repulsed by some feature, expression,
or desire of the other. One moment, we sense ourselves being drawn toward the other. Other
moments, we may make an intentional choice to move closer to the other.
The challenge presented at this moment can be articulated as: How should we move?
Where should we move? Perhaps we can consider three possible movements that intersect with
each other: concession, recession, and procession. We are not limited to a strict exercise of
moving from one to the next. There is a mutual indwelling of each movement. We must make a
concession, granting to the other the gift of being seen, being cared for, being attended to, and
being recognized because of their dignity and otherness. Our concession to the other gives the
other a greater degree of space is because it is followed by our intentional recession from the

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space. We leave the space—yet remain present—allowing the space to become more capacious
for the other to become themselves. In these moments of recession and concession, we are
always being drawn toward the other in an act of procession.
I’m here now in this moment with you. . . . Fundamentally, what we are offering is an
utterly lopsided relationship such that, the needs of the client are what it’s all about, and
the needs of the counsellor are someplace else. It’s a deeply [participant’s emphasis] ––
the counselling relationship is deeply, deeply [participant’s emphasis] asymmetric. And,
for many clients, they’ve never, ever encountered this before. For others, for most
people, they only get this kind of asymmetry as a child—possibly, possibly as an adult—
with a parent or a very, very close relative. “Your needs are what this is all about, not
mine. I can put my needs someplace else so I can be fully, acceptantly present to you, in
respect of how it is for you.” (Sidney)
Concession. To concede something to admit to something, to grant or allow, to award or
bestow, to yield, to give up, or to step aside in consequence of a request or demand (“Concede,”
2019). Encompassed in being-ethical is the act of concession, an acknowledgement that there is
another amidst us who requires something of us. This concession is made in consequence of a
request or demand. But whose request? Whose demand? Do we concede to the client?
What rose to the top for me about everything is, “What does this human being in front of
me need right now?” We can become too aligned with kind of the “checking boxes” and
miss out on, “What does this human being in front of me need, here in this moment?”
(Quinn)
Do we concede to our profession or to other institutions, such as the law, that tell us what we
ought to do or that inform of what we probably ought to do?

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I feel that I’m more comfortable [laughter] with a black or white because I just say it’s
out of my control, it’s the law, it’s legal. I didn’t make that law but it’s there for a reason
and . . . we have to do it. (Pat)
Concession is our admission that we cannot be alone at the centre of this encounter. The other is
with us. We are with them. But to be with them, we must acknowledge their presence. More
than that, we must admit that if we are not careful, we can push the other out of the centre in a
way that harms them deeply. This is contrary to our commitment to being-ethical.
I really believe in creating a space that’s not counselor-centered. And so to not do work I
know I have capacity to do because I’m protecting myself, that feels really counselorcentered. And it is in contrast to everything I believe, morally; everything I believe
morally. (Quinn)
Being-ethical, then, we take ourselves to the place where we must give way and let the
other, the client who has come to us seeking our care, be themselves as truly other. But this
admission is not enough. If we are being-ethical, there are movements of recession where we—
while being-fully-ourselves—allow parts of ourselves to be carried, away at times, by the ebbs
and flows of the tides and currents of our intuition of how we ought to respond in a given
moment. We recede from the space in a deliberate way with the hope that the other may find
their footing to ground themselves as they take those wobbly and fragile steps that they have
feared or forgotten how to take. Our recession supports their attainment of something else that
would, perhaps, not be possible if we were to fill the space with totality of ourselves.
Recession. In our act of care, our attention is drafted in the service of the other. We have
seen and heard that the other requires, if not asks for, something from us. We have concurred. It
is good to us that the other is granted a more spacious domain. One spacious domain, in our

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profession, is the counselling room. When the other enters, we concess that the space is theirs.
Once we have acknowledged that the other can—and perhaps must—be granted greater territory
to call theirs, even if just for a moment, we have to go somewhere.
But where? Recession, as an ethical movement, is the act of holding-ourselves-apart,
keeping our distance, a deliberated subtraction of ourselves. To recess is to go back from
something, to withdraw, or to take leave. This is an intentional withdrawal of our selves from the
space in which we are engaged with the other. It is not that we are obliterated. Rather, this
distancing is a service to the other. At our best, the detachment of ourselves—our notions,
preconceptions, judgments, expectations, and power—from the space permits a dynamic bond to
be formed with the other. Somehow we are not ourselves. But we are truly with the other as
ourselves.
I feel like there was a moment in which I sort of recognized that the other huge piece of
what I was experiencing in that moment was grief for that baby. . . . I couldn’t show that.
I couldn’t express that because that’s not where she was at yet—or may not get to—but
she wasn’t there in that moment. And it wasn’t what she needed in terms of her work . . .
from what she was communicating. And so I felt like I had to shut off—not shut off—
but put away. I almost had this visual, sort of visual [and] internal conversation with
myself . . . “This, not now. We’ll do this later” and sort of a putting aside in a safe place
for the moment my grief—the part of me that was grieving that baby, that was grieving
that this was a life that was lost. . . . I was . . . in a very sort of intentional, deliberate,
controlled way, not allowing that part of myself, that emotional experience—the impact
of that to be fully acknowledged, because it wouldn’t—I couldn’t . . . as a therapist,
where my primary concern is the therapeutic benefit to her, I couldn’t see a way for it to

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be brought in therapeutically. . . . [it could have been] damaging to the relationship
because . . . my sense was that, in that moment, from the information I had—and I could
be wrong, like I could be really wrong—but because that would have been interpreted as
the judgement she feared and the reason that she had kept it secret from everybody else.
(Jordan)
Recession is not without cost. The emotional impact of this setting-aside ourselves can
be particularly burdensome. We brace ourselves in the face of the impact of being utterly open to
the other; abandoning ourselves, our hard-won beliefs, our dearly held values, even for a brief
moment, and allowing ourselves to be impelled by the gravitational forces that emanate from the
other in their call to us.
I felt like I’d been hit by a truck for two days afterwards . . . I knew I was feeling kind of
the emotional impact of the loss of that baby, and also the emotional impact of having to
sort of shut down that part of myself for that hour . . . it’s . . . not a long period of time,
but that took [expels breath] . . . what felt like a herculean effort to—I don’t want to say
“suppress,” because . . . I didn’t deny it, it didn’t stop existing. . . . It was very conscious
and deliberate and aware. Surprisingly conscious. I was a little bit surprised at how clear
I was on what was happening within me and the choices that I was making in the
moment. But then I was also a little surprised at how costly it felt . . . that emotionally, I
felt drained. Physically I felt drained and weary and tired and just, like, low for the next
couple of days. (Jordan)
Somehow, even in this recession of ourselves from the immediate space between us and
the other, we remain ourselves, truly, fully, and absolutely. We remain ourselves through the
memory—that we hold and that others hold of us—that establishes the necessary landmarks to

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help us return to ourselves when the time is right. We are returned to ourselves with the help of
others who know us and the way we express being-ethical in all areas of our lives, both personal
and professional.
I don’t know if anybody else grieved that life. . . . And so, then, me feeling that, me
carrying that grief for this child felt like it honored the baby. . . . I reached out. Like,
there are . . . people in my life who . . . I just let them in on . . . while . . . not giving
enough information for them to know who she was, but enough to know why it was
costing me so much. . . . I needed a debrief [laughs]. . . . And I remember saying that to
somebody . . . [pauses for 6 seconds] it’s funny because I can't [quite] remember the
words [laughs], but the emotion is [inaudible]. . . . Just tears coming up in my throat.
Tears of—probably a mix of remembering the grief, of gratitude for that relationship with
the person I was sharing it with. And lots of times, my tears just seem . . . to sort of
signal significance, “This is weighty. This is important,” . . . But I think I said something
along the lines of, “It was so hard that, like, there was no one thinking about that
baby.” . . . it wasn't quite that it was all alone, like, that the baby was alone, but just there
was no . . . you know, nobody was grieving that baby. And then the person I talked to
said that [cries], “There was. It was you.” [Interviewer: Hmm, yeah. How did that feel
when they said that? Participant sighs and pauses for 10 seconds] Affirming, but that
doesn't . . . [laughs] like, that doesn't feel like a big enough word. . . . it felt really [sighs]
anchoring to have sort of what I had done honored and seen by somebody whose opinion
and care and insight matters to me. (Jordan)
Recession, however, may be a recession from risk, from exposure, and from the
possibility of things going south very quickly. That is to say, we can sometimes recede from the

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other out of fear, knowing that we enter into a proximity where we may become consumed by
the other.
I don’t know [the client] socially, but her partner is quite good friends with my uncle,
who lives in [same town]. Good friends is maybe a stretch. No, no, they’re pretty good
friends, I think [laughs], actually, now that I say it out loud. They play sports together.
So he’s never been in my home, which is a rule that I had to make. I had to make a rule
where, “If a client’s been in my . . . I will not see them.” But that just had to become the
rule because there were people who were getting so close to my life but had never been in
my home. And it was, like, “Okay, that could be the line that I drew.” Because there were
a couple times when people showed up, and I was like [expels breath], “Ah, too close,
too close, too close.” (Lee)
Whether our recession is from the other to seek refuge from risk or whether we are recessing in
order arrange a space for the other by rescinding our elements of ourselves for the sake of the
other, where then do we go? A total withdrawal might lead us to lose ourselves entirely,
shrinking into a total absence. It is a possibility. However, might we move toward someone or
something? Where we move toward and for what reason are important to be aware of as our
movement happens in the space between ourselves and the other. This space is ethically charged.
Taking a step in one direction over another has ethical significance that cannot go unnoticed by
us.
Procession. From that point where we have retreated to, we gaze out upon the space that
we have conceded, in full or in part, to the other. Here, we are met by the question: Where do we
go now? Do we continue to recede? Do we become approximal to the other? Do we put
distance between ourselves and the other simply out of interest for ourselves? We reach a

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juncture here, a decisive moment that we must carefully consider who, or what, we are for. To
whom, or to what, do we go toward now? Our answer will, no doubt, have a bearing upon our
world, upon our life, and upon the relations that we are involved in, the persons for whom we are
most concerned, and the principles or values to which we are committed.
Proximity may first be established in a physical encounter. We lean forward in our chair,
bringing our being into a posture that communicates our intent to be attentive to and care for the
other. Proximity may also be established in and through our imaginations. This is a movement
toward the other and their experience as-if we were them, as-if we were with them in the midst
of their deepest pain. This is a proximity that is not always expressed in the body or seen with
our physical eyes. But closing the distance between ourselves and the other through the
imagination is no less a procession that we make.
And so I walked [the client] through . . . a “portrayal” which is essentially . . . it’s sort of
an imaginal, like you go back to a scene in your past and sort of really connect to some of
the sensory cues of the situation, like how you felt. Those kind of things. And [the
client] chose . . . the moment that she was in this waiting room waiting for this abortion
to happen. And we have, already, at that point, had quite a strong connection, a very safe
connection. And so then the scene that she ended up sort of exploring and . . . reauthoring was her just sitting there and she just noticed that she felt very alone and so
disconnected from her feelings. She couldn’t let herself feel. She just had to do it. And
so then she explored what she was feeling and what it was like for her to have to just turn
it off. And we brought me into that scene with her. . . . I was sitting in the waiting room
with her just being with her and being a support to her. And I could fully and complete
engage with . . . own that, be congruent, and be like, “Yes I want to be with you and

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support you in feeling how hard this was for you. Feeling how difficult—how much you
needed somebody to be there. How much you needed support. . . .” That was totally
congruent; there was none of that that wasn’t completely authentic. (Jordan)
This is to say, a proximity established in the imagination is the footing that takes empathy from
possibility to actuality.
We forget these nuances; we think, “Yeah, yeah, empathy. I can repeat what you tell me,”
right? That’s not empathy. How can I let [the stick] person in my heart go toddle over to
your heart and hang out in there and really feel, really be in that moment with you as an
experiential collaboration, as opposed to something I’m imposing on you? How do we
always remember, “This is your experience; it’s not mine.” I truly believe, in my heart, in
that session . . . if I would have moved to defensive counselor-centered counseling, [the
client] would have left. . . . That, if I wasn't able to make it all about that person . . . I
wouldn’t have been to keep that client. . . . They were so attuned to feeling manipulated
and so attuned to rupture in relationship, so attuned to having someone else exploit them,
that they might not . . . they wouldn’t have had the words, but they would have been
gone. . . . This client won’t have the growth potential if I’m selfish in this relationship.
(Quinn)
Client-centredness, that principle and practice of inestimable value to the practice of counselling,
is not without a cost to us. To be client-centred, an ethical act in itself, we have to concede that it
is the client who is at-the-centre of our attention. As we near the other, at-the-centre, there is a
choice for us to make: To permit a gap to open within ourselves, we begin to take all that we are,
our values, beliefs, expectations, hopes, and fears, and we place them to one side. Then we turn
and walk toward the other, closing the gap between us and the other. For what reason though?

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I think what I'm getting at [is] that it was hard. But that I had a sense within myself of
knowing what I was doing and knowing why I was doing, and being able to accept the
difficulty of it. To sort of see the value in—on both sides—the value of not speaking my
convictions to my client because that wasn’t where she was at. . . . I think it was about
[pauses for 12 seconds] choosing to not be what felt like—in the moment—choosing not
[to] be fully who I am for the sake of her. For her sake, out of my care for her. (Jordan)
Closeness to the other is not exclusive of a closeness to ourselves. Indeed, if we are not close to
ourselves, how can we be close to another? Without being close to ourselves we are a no-one.
No-one cannot be close to the other as there no-one is in existence. Thus, being-close to
ourselves, for example, listening close to our conscience and being aware of how we are present
in the space between ourselves and the other, is what makes it possible for us to enter into a
proximity to the other that is transformative, as in the case of Jordan. Jordan’s proximity to
herself was an antecedent to her movement toward her client.
However, being close to our conscience may mean we recede further from the other who
is before us. Our recession is not total. We are still there, present and attentive. But our
procession toward the other may be affected by our decision to move closer to others.
I have no problem with doing the right thing in my heart and suffering the consequences.
Like, that is not the tension. But to see it impact my children, that’s where I need to draw
the line. That’s it, that’s it; that’s the heart of it. It’s like I can’t go MIA for a month and
a half. . . . I can’t do that to them. And so, if I’m doing, you know, my own moral
analysis, my kids have to come first. And doing the right thing for my kids has to come
before doing the right thing for other people. (Quinn)

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Quinn’s movement toward their client, who indicated their intent to die by suicide in Quinn’s
office, was matched by a confident procession toward their own family. These are the moments
of where fissures begin to form and our decisions emerge from friction. This friction wears on
us and can, over time, whittle away at our courage and commitment, giving way to grief and to
the longing to be loosed to move freely about our world, being-ethical toward the others with
whom we interact.
I think it’s a grief. It’s a grief. I mean, like, the tension is there that I have desire to work
with those populations, [but that] I won’t for my own family. So that’s the tension. But
the grief that comes up is that I am setting aside my own moral values and my own ability
to make change with humanity, for regulation. And that is just not my values system. I
mean I’d way rather get myself in trouble and do the right thing. . . . And it’s very sad to
me that my own fear, really, of the process of [complaint] would hold back what could be
meaningful work for another person. And I really . . . [pauses for five seconds]
sometimes, we find our population . . . And it’s just a fit, it’s just a fit. And I feel like
I’ve found a population that’s a really good fit for me. (Quinn)
Perhaps like Quinn, we find ourselves being drawn away from others who we have come to see
ourselves committed to care for in a particular way. But drawn away by what? For Quinn, it
was the exposure to evaluation—the risk of a complaint and investigation—that caused her to
carefully consider how close she wanted to be to clients with certain presenting issues, namely
those with significant attachment traumas. Quinn’s procession toward her family was mixed
with a recession from the population of clients as a whole. This procession was initiated in part
by the next two aspects of being-ethical: the exposure of being-ethical and the critical

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engagement with third parties—others who are part of the situation we find ourselves sorting
through.
Being-Ethical as Opening One’s Self to the Inevitability of Being-Exposed
Proximity leads us into varying degrees of closeness and distance to the other. In our
proximity to the other, there is a basic openness that can begin to unfold. But we may also
become closed to the other. Being-attentive to the other, we pick up on different aspects of the
other’s experience. Being-close to the other, we see things differently than if we stood back at a
distance. If we are being-ethical, we do not cease to be ourselves when we become close to the
other. Being-close does not mean we are fused totally to the other. If we are to be ethical, we
must be close even if we do not ultimately decide to do what the other thinks we ought to do for
them. But being-close is necessary for us to discern our way forward. We can be physically
distant but be existentially close. We can be emotionally close but situated in a different region
of life and experience. Closeness is integral to being-ethical. But with both attentiveness and
closeness, we are exposed in a particular way.
What is more is that once we are open to the possibility that the world in which we move
is saturated with ethicality, encounters take on new meaning and significance. They are no
longer merely neutral occurrences or coincidences. In our encounters, we are provoked by the
presence and the need of the other to respond. The other—and those around us—will see when,
how, why, and to whom we respond. Eyes are upon us. Others are being-ethical alongside of us.
They are seeing-the-ethical too. We cannot move about the world in secrecy for very long.
Thus, being-ethical, we are always being-exposed to others. Quinn expressed this clearly:
And I think the “Holy shit” came out of, “I’m vulnerable in this moment.” That
vulnerability, that precariousness. . . .[pauses for 5 seconds] I adore my profession. I

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adore the people I have the privilege to work with and, in many ways, serve. And so, the
thought of a complaint process where my license could be withheld after, you know,
many years of schooling and, you know, investment that’s terrifying. If you take in the
entirety of that, in a moment where you’re thinking, “Holy shit” [laughs], I don’t think
you can serve your client. So then you become attuned to counselor-centered work.
That’s not the heart of what we do; that’s not what we’re called to do, “Do no harm.”
And if I’m looking at protecting my own butt, I am doing harm to that person in front of
me. (Quinn)
Being-exposed is vulnerability. Indeed, exposure is what happens when we become marked by a
potential to be wounded. The origins of the word vulnerable can be traced to the Latin noun
vulnus, meaning wound. Vulnerability belies a certain degree of susceptibility to being-wounded.
By being open to the other, we become vulnerable to being affected by what it is that they are
carrying to our encounter. In being-affected by the other, we are confronted with whether or not
we are capable of effecting a response to their bid for care. To be exposed is to be laid open, to
be left without shelter or defence, to be exhibited openly, and to be unmasked (“Expose,” 2019).
By getting entangled in the world, we are opening ourselves up and laying ourselves out, to life,
to others, and to the possibility of being-wounded. Is it any wonder that we take certain
measures to protect ourselves from the other? This openness is truly a risk. Our exposure can
have grave effects on our sense of our ability to be ethical and to live from a place of deep and
abiding concern for the other.
Being-ethical means we are open to judgement—willingly at times, but often
unwillingly—from ourselves and others. We are concerned with being-ethical and judgement
may reveal to us whether or not are being-ethical. Judgement reveals to us our authenticity or

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our inauthenticity to ourselves, to the values we espouse, to the beliefs we hold, to the people,
causes, and/or to institutions to which we have committed ourselves to. As critical as judgement
may be, it is only on rare occasions that we invite such judgement openly and explicitly.
To be ethical, one is opened to evaluation from one’s own self. There is an initial
evaluation that one makes—beginning with the swift response that comes on the heels of the our
recognition that we are in a situation that requires us to respond. How do we respond in this
sliver of time? Following closely behind this first evaluation is an assessment of the right course
of action to take. We have made our decision. We have acted. Can we live with ourselves?
Have we listened to ourselves? Have we found agreement within ourselves, between our values
and how we have acted? Are our values and actions fastened together in near-perfect
correlation? Can we receive the responsibility of results and accept the outcomes come what
may? Have we received the responsibilities that flow from our action and responded to them
accordingly?
[The client] came in, burst into tears, laid it all out, like, “This is what happened [the
client was sexually exploited by the counsellor’s colleague].” And she feels
responsible. . . . I was just like [pause] you know, to be perfectly honest, I was really mad
at myself. Because, when I first met this guy [the colleague who sexually exploited the
client], I was like, “Oh, this is trouble. He should not be a case manager of a women’s
house.” [Interviewer: What was the sense there? Where did that come from?]
Probably—well, total bias, right. He’s good-looking, he’s covered in tattoos, he’s a body
builder, he’s got this [nationality] accent. . . . this just looked like trouble to me. And
then I checked myself and I’m like, “No. Let’s be fair,” you know? “He’s a
professional; I’m a professional.” People probably think that about me sometimes, like,

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“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what’s this lady doing here?” [laughs] . . . But I ignored my gut
response to give him the benefit of the doubt and my own history of . . . being violated by
people in positions of power was—and I know that about myself—and I was like, “No,
just check yourself. Let’s just wait and see. . . . Look for red flags, and if there aren’t
any . . . be fair here,” right? I should have trusted my gut, you know. I think what I
should have done, or in hind—like, if I had trusted my gut to do anything about it, I
would have pushed harder for a second case manager. (Taylor)
There is also the judgement that comes from those around us who are not the other who is
seeking our attention and care in this given moment. These others may be part of the encounter.
Or they may stand far and apart from the encounter, observing from a distance. Whatever their
position, these others take up the activity of evaluating us. The task is at its roots a distinctly
fundamental task of being human. It is also a task that becomes a collective mission when we
gather together with others in institutions. Evaluation is analysis, interpretation, and meaningmaking. Evaluation is the expedition that we all take to find that which we are searching and
longing for. Evaluation, when commenced by an institution, is often, but not always, a quest for
homogeneity. Whatever the motivation of evaluation, whether for better or for worse, it is
something that is only viable when there is exposure. Our exposure invites the evaluation of
others who are also being-ethical. They may evaluate us and our being-ethical and determine
that we are not ethical. They may see us as violators of the ethical. Thus, evaluation can be a
threat that alters our earnest determination to be ethical.
And so, in many ways, this complaints process and this threat of litigation even from . . .
one’s [professional association] [or a] legal standpoint, I think, many times . . . can
paralyze the work we do, the true heart of what creates change. And if we’re always

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focused on defensive counseling, it becomes counsellor-centered. . . . How can we repair
attachment, and support healing attachment wounds if, in many ways, we’re protecting
ourselves? Are we not now like their initial abuser? (Quinn)
We can muster a defence against the threats that surround us. We have an appetite for safety and
are nauseated by the risks that our exposure produces in us. It is human to dig trenches to make
our way through the tumult of existence. Fires burn on the terrain we tread. These are the fires
of judgement, of censure, and of the doubt that others have about our goodness or worthiness as
persons. These are also the fires of pain and terror that rage inside the other who comes to us
seeking care and relief. Fearing that we might be consumed by these raging infernos, we dig
trenches like lines in the sometimes-treacherous encounters with others around us. Beingethical, with its attendant vulnerability, dwindles in intensity when our proclivity for protection
and self-preservation are nourished. What is particularly excruciating is when we are coerced
into taking a protective posture, often not for the benefit of the other who comes to us seeking
care. In many instances, we are asked to hide the nakedness of others who are not the ones to
whom we are most responsible or feel most responsible for. These naked others are those who,
by omission or commission, naivety or conviction, have sought to shore up their safety, conceal
their missteps, or disguise their actions as just. Although we are exposed in being-ethical—and
thus vulnerable—at times, it may be the fulfillment of our ethicality to expose what is ensconced
in protective wrappings to enact justice. But in our unmasking of the facades that others set up
to counter exposure, we become more acutely exposed and likely to be wounded, especially
when we set out to show that the masquerade of institutions and those in positions of power is an
unadulterated hoax.

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And the only thing that makes that tolerable is to also bear witness to healing, you know;
like, to show people their resiliency and to help them to move into— in a better place.
And so that’s on an individual level; but on a community level, I think that’s also my
role . . . So by forcing me to not say anything—and nobody’s actually explicitly said,
like, “You can’t tell people what’s going on”—but I think if I got caught telling people
what’s going on, I’d be in trouble. . . . I just get that sense that, like— my supervisor’s
keeping it quiet, the Health Director’s keeping it quiet, the [quality control] person is
keeping it quiet; we’re not actually naming it publicly. So there’s this, like, this sense of,
you know, secrecy which is so ironic. You know, like, when I do the trauma training—
you know, I’ve trained the nurses, I’ve trained the—you know, the recovery house—that
we talk about trauma, and I talk about secrecy, right, and the veil of secrecy and how that
is siding with perpetrators, you know, to keep the secret. That’s what perpetrators are
relying on. And so when we’re keeping the secret, we’re siding with the perpetrator.
How many more ways can we side with this particular perpetrator? And I’m not
comfortable with that. . . . it’s disgusting, isn't it? (Taylor)
Being-ethical, a mode of living that involves attentiveness to the ethicality of our encounters
with the other, can be expressed as calling others’ attention to—and thereby exposing—the
subterfuges and pretexts, the deceits and inventions, and the cons and shams that are set up in
the name of justice. By exposing what we are sensitive to, to others around us, we expose
ourselves in a particular way.
As we take in our experience of the world, the frontiers between ourselves and the other
become permeable. Our once impermeable borders are softened, made more and more pliable as
we enter more fully and truly into the world of the other. When this happens, we become

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progressively exposed to the suffering of others. How we respond to the other when we become
aware of their pain—this is a matter that ethics seeks to address. Ethics, however, does not show
up on the scene after the fact to sort out the answer. Preceding the cognitive, analytical role of
ethics is the more central mode of being-ethical that is sensitive to the suffering of others.
This begs a question: What is suffering? Suffering conjures in our minds grimaces and
groans generated by agonizing pain. Suffering is the opposite of pleasure, we presume.
Suffering is the absence of pleasure unless the pleasure is of a sociopathic or masochistic sort.
Rightly so, suffering has strong moral connotations. To endure pain for the sake of another is
said to be a meaningful and self-sacrificial act. If we incline ourselves to some of the original
senses of the word suffering, we will see, however, that suffering is simply that which the other
carries, endures, or bears. The other carries to us innumerable experiences that are laid out to us
as they search the extents of their existence for that which they most long for. Thus, suffering—
used in this inquiry—is not to be limited to pain. We can suffer—undergo, be subjected to,
allow, and permit—many things. Sensitivity to another’s suffering, then, can be stated in this
way: Being-ethical is being-exposed—being-sensitive—to that which the other is carrying.
Enmeshed into being-ethical is a way of being-in-the-world that has the marks of
sensitivity. Being-ethical cannot come to be without a sensitivity, a sensuous engagement with
the particularities of who we are receiving, and who is receiving us, at this very instance: The
other who comes to us as one-laden-with-something, that is, one-that-is-suffering.
We meet people throughout the day who lack sensitivity. They may say an unkind word,
a cruel remark, or a sarcastic commentary. Or, they may say nothing at all: the silence, and
dearth of sensitivity, punctures us. “They were so insensitive!” is more than a casual assertion of
our frustration. It is an expression made when we become an object to another, when we are

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neither seen nor heard by another, or when our presence in the world is unnoticed. It is as-if our
very being and our suffering—that which we carry—is invisible. If what we endure is not
noticed, we are not noticed. If what we are undergoing is invisible, we are invisible. Although
we may be physically with the other, it seems all but certain in this instant, we do not exist to the
other.
If we are being-sensitive, we become susceptible to being affected by another’s suffering.
The suffering of another can cut at us with incisive precision. This sensitivity is our tenderness
to the touch of another’s pain, the sensation of meeting our despair when we happen upon
another face-to-face in the throbbing throes of their anguish. Our eyes meet the other’s eyes. In
that moment, we are exposed to the elements: the fierce winds of the other’s sighs. The icy
malaise of numbness that protects and cools the fiery terror. We become aware that we too, in
some sense, are on the cusp of succumbing to the same elements of suffering. We sense we are
nearing that which the other is bearing, and it may appear to us unbearable. Yet, we have been
asked to bear this burden with the other, to carry what the other has carried to us, that is, to suffer
with the other.
I think I felt . . . I don't remember exactly, but when you ask the question I feel a sinking
feeling in my stomach right now, so that’s probably how I felt just sort of a sinking
heaviness, like a deep sadness . . . that she was so alone in making that decision and in
going through that, whether or not she had to be [or] she felt she had to be and then for
the loss of this baby. (Jordan)
Sensitivity and vulnerability go hand in hand. If we have an open wound, it is likely that
is sensitive to the touch. This sensitivity moves us to action, to protect, to defend, and to
respond. Sensitivity to the other leads us to a place of being-responsible. Taking responsibility

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is a conventional way we express that we see our place in a given situation. But responsibility is
more than taken. It is acknowledged with solemn resolve. Never without cost to us. It is
animated in the words we pronounce. The declarations of our acceptance that what-is is not
what-ought-to-be and that we sense that we are compelled to see what-ought-to-be become whatis.
At the forefront of this whole thing, is [the client’s] experience in this, and her harm,
right? And [expels breath] . . . [my colleague] couldn’t have picked a better victim. . . .
[my client] was so broken, so broken. And then he did that to her. . . . it’s the absolute
worst that somebody could have done to this particular person; and that’s what he did.
And she was taking responsibility for it; and so I needed to take that. . . . I needed to:
“No, this is not your fault. It’s his fault. But it’s also our fault. . . . This should not have
happened. What happened shouldn’t have happened.” Now, her taking responsibility . . .
that just made me sick to my stomach. (Taylor)
Being-ethical means that we are responsible to respond (respondere) to something or
someone. An event has taken place, we must make a response. We can also not respond. The
must is not definitive in determining one direction or another. Though others may ask something
of us—we are asked to take responsibility—we remain free to choose to make our response in
however way we wish. Someone has asked something of us. That someone may be the other,
another, or even ourselves. We must measure ourselves against their request to see if we have
met it. Do our actions correspond with what has been requested of us? What we have said we
will do? Are our actions an echo in response to a greater calling? Responsibility is not a finite
response; our response is, perhaps in actuality, finite in that we cannot humanly meet the

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demand, call, or invitation to act. However, our responsibility, however, remains unfulfilled and
incomplete therefore infinitely finite: infinitely in need of further and further fulfillment.
When I first found out I got [into an advanced graduate degree program], I was like,
“Okay, well, I defer for a year.” I defer for a year so that all my clients can be okay, so I
can . . . tell them now, give them a year and half to prep [for my departure]. And then it
was like, “No! I can’t do that for clients.” But that was . . . my initial instinct: “I can’t go
yet because my clients aren’t ready.” And there’s been a mixture. . . . some clients are
like, “Wow, congrats, that’s amazing.” And then some clients are like, “How could you
do that to me? You know how hard it was for me to come to counselling. I’ve never
talked to anyone about these things, and now you’re leaving.” . . . It’s like, “How can
you?” and I welcome their sense of betrayal and I actually used the word “betrayal” first.
I’m like, “I wonder if this makes you feel betrayed by me?” . . . I don’t want to apologize
[for going back to school]. . . . I’m so excited for this [opportunity] that I’ve worked
really flipping hard for. And reframing it for them . . . making it clear to them: “I’m
going away so that when I come back, I can actually fill that gap.” That’s the whole
thing . . . I’m going so that the children and youth in [my town] don’t have to wait a year
and half to see a psychologist. . . . We let people down, don’t we? We’re human beings;
being intimate with someone means, at least at sometimes, [disappointing] them. (Lee)
The infinite quality of the call to us to be responsible is sometimes embraced and
sometimes dreaded. How many times do we find ourselves fearing the responsibilities—real or
hypothetical—that may arrive on the doorstep of our lives? What sorts of responsibilities might
we have to consider accepting? Who calls us to be responsible? What happens if we do not take
responsibility? Or, what happens if we take responsibility, but it is seen as not enough? To make

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a response, to determine if our response matches the call that we are responding to, to consider if
our response is an echo of the call, these are vulnerable movements to make. That is because our
responsibility is something that we create. We make our response even if our response is no
response. We make our response even when we try to heave the weight of responsibility from
our shoulders by saying that we have no choice in the matter. But the responsibility is still ours:
Our response is to say that we are bound.
Responsibility emerges from being-exposed to the other. When we see the other, are
attentive to the other, and determine our proximity to the other, we are exposed in myriad ways.
Once we are exposed, we are confronted with the question of how we will respond. How we
respond is not set a priori to our exposure. Though there may be past experiences, principles and
procedures, and beliefs and values that dictate how we ought to respond, the response that we
actually make is an unrepeatable response because it is a response made in this moment, to this
other. We will not pass through this same moment ever again. Moments and others may
resemble those that we have seen in the past. But they are not the same moments. Hence, beingexposed is not a once and for all event simply because we have faced a certain ethical situation.
Being-Ethical as Critically Discerning Third Parties
Being-ethical embraces a particular way of seeing the world as ethically charged. In
seeing-ethically, we are attentive, exposed, and sensitive to the other who is before us. We
become responsible to—that is, we make a response—what we sense in the moment with, from,
and toward other. However, it is never the case that the other is encountered in isolation. We are
always exposed to others. Though we may be alone in a room with the other, we are not truly
alone. Who, or what, is with us?

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We are exposed to others who are essential figures in the drama that we see unfolding in
the life of the other who seeks our care in this present encounter. These essential figures that
enter into our encounter may be persons in their own right, may be icons of values or ideas that
have a weighty bearing on how we will respond to the other, or may be impersonal institutions
with certain norms that require commitment from us. These others may be an alien, an
acquaintance, or even one who we love. These others may be the ones to whom we owe a
greater debt to—perhaps even more than the other who stands immediately before us.
This additional other—the third party—can appear to us in myriad forms. A third party is
another who is part of our relation with the other who seeks our care. Together we encounter one
another and are joined together. Thus, we are always and everywhere confronted with the
presence of another who also calls to us. In our joining with third parties we are also enjoined by
these third parties to make a response to them. The third party is another who we are vulnerable
to. The third party is another to whom our attention is directed. The third party is another who
we are in proximity with to different degrees. Being-ethical is being-attentive to the presence
and participation of the third party in our experience of the one who is suffering. If we are not
attentive to third parties, our being-ethical suffers from myopia. Being-ethical is being-attentive
to the third party, being-vulnerable to the third party, being-proximal to the third party, and
accepting that our eventual composition and action is rarely, if ever, without some presence of
the third party.
We are invariably posed with the question: Who are these others and what are we to do
with them? Are they friends? Are they foes? Do they help us be more responsible to the other?
Or, do they demand responsibility from us? Do they ask or compel us to leave our responsibility
to the other? To whom do we give ourselves ethically? To whom are we to be-ethical toward?

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Being-ethical, then, is being-seen-by-another, being-called-to-by-another, being-judged-byanother. Our encounter with the one who seeks our care is actually part of a network of
encounters. We are tethered to one another even when they are not immediately located, in some
way, in the encounter. They can be distant and obscure to us, but they are still very much
present.
When we become aware of these third parties, we may find solidarity, certainty, and
support. Or, we may encounter judgement, critique, and censure. The third party may bring to
us knowledge that aids our responsibility to the one who seeks our care. Or, the third party may
enter into the already delicate encounter with the other. They may seek to shape our encounter in
their image by inserting themselves strategically. We cannot always discern the third party’s
intent. Even if the intent is benign or beneficent, we can be left with an uncomfortably feeling
that our encounter with the other who seeks our care has just been radically altered by the influx
of the third party. Multiple third parties may even enter. Our encounter becomes a tangled mass
mired in machinations and manoeuvres of multiple third parties. This dizzying labyrinth is what
we are left to sort through. We find ourselves discerning—distinguishing, sifting, sorting, and
perceiving—who the third party is and what it is they want from us or from the other. As we
have already seen, being-ethical involves perceiving, recognizing, and distinguishing the myriad
features of our encounter with others in the world. The third party is one such feature.
Discernment is difficult. It is terrifying, unsettling, perplexing, and tenuous. What if we
see wrongly? What if we do not understand? What if we miss something important? Thus,
when we notice the third party moving toward us, a nervousness, a state of fear, and an anxious
awareness rises in our body.

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And then I get a call the day before from the child’s father saying to me, you know, “It’s
not our child coming tomorrow. It’s my wife.” Then, all of a sudden, I was like, “Oh,
this is strange.” . . . And he was like, “I don’t know what she’s going to be talking to you
about. I don’t know if she wants it to be couples counseling or just for her.” . . . First of
all, she’s technically not my client at this point; I’ve never seen her alone. So the child’s
my client . . . So then there were all these, like, confidentiality questions because I was
like . . . didn’t want to say anything that would disrespect her, but she’s technically not
even my client. She hasn’t signed any consent with me [to do work], right. And so that
was kind of an awkward thing, and . . . he said, “I don’t know if she’s going to want me
to do my own counseling.” I said, “Well, I can always send you info [about referrals]
once I meet with her.” But there was this air of . . . like, he didn’t want me to tell her he
had called me. He didn’t say that, but that was, like, the sense that I got.
Anyway, that made me very uncomfortable. [Interviewer: Can you describe more
of that discomfort?] Yeah, just, like, that instant, like, tummy . . . I call it like a “void.”
It’s almost like there’s like some pushing-away feeling. I could feel like my face getting
hot because I felt, like, awkward and uncomfortable. And I was really pleased at how I
handled it, but I definitely . . . maybe not [in] full “fight-or-flight,” but . . . I was
definitely, like, responding to what was happening in a way where I was like . . . “I’m
uncomfortable with this, and I’m not allowed to have this conversation with you.” . . . I
hung up the phone and I was like, “Oh, that was weird. I now feel weird.” . . . I definitely
felt it . . . the call felt almost duplicitous. And that’s where the discomfort was coming for
me. . . . And then I felt uncomfortable because I felt like I was primed for seeing her the
next day. (Lee)

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Our own third parties. There may be a third party whose proximity to us is intense and
irreducible because of our personal connection. Our relation is not borne from merely an
economic exchange, but from a proximity that is personal, non-professional, and nontransactional. This is the other to whom we have vowed ourselves to. The mere fact that another
has sought a service that we have publicized that we provide and has consented to a formal
relationship defined, in part but not entirely, by an exchange of service and money, does not
obliterate our responsibility to the ones we are fastened-together-with. The mere exchange of an
instrument that our society has agreed carries a value does not de-value our relation to the third
party to whom we bear an inescapable responsibility.
So when I take on new clients, it doesn’t happen very often . . . I am in a place in my own
professional development where, if I could choose only those clients [who have
significant complex traumas], I would. I would. But I don’t because I don’t have the
space. I had to choose my own family over my clients. . . . And so, I would probably say,
for the two complaints [made against me], it was close to . . . well, my responses were
equivalent to a thesis. . . . So significant hours and hours and hours of work. So the toll is
huge on my family. And then I run a clinic, and I have a full practice myself. I just won’t
do that to my kids. And so, as I get older and more distinguished in my career, I may take
those clients on again because I believe it is the right thing to do morally. (Quinn)
Here, we see the friction and strain of sustaining our attentiveness; the test of maintaining our
proximity to the numerous others present; and the task of discerning the arrangement, in our
composition of all those who we are responsible. In Quinn’s situation, the deference to the third
parties—her family—is temporary. To be truly ethical, Quinn senses she will one day return to
working with others who at the moment pose a risk to her proximity to her kids.

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Third parties who harm. Being-ethical can involve being-a-witness to the harm that
others suffer at the hands of a third party. This third party may be those who steals away justice
from the other: The third party is the spectrous offender, the instigator of total pain, the illicit-one
whose true intentions are boldly cloaked in counterfeit care. When this third party enters the
frame, we want to hold them at bay from the other and from all others who are set in the sights.
With equal vigour, we want to close the gap between ourselves and this rogue third party and
release ourselves to vindicate the other.
[My colleague] is a monster and [he] fills the room. . . . [he’s] a fiery . . . what’s the one
from Lord of the Rings? The Balrog? . . . Gandalf is fighting the Balrog and it’s like this
burning monster . . . He’s this big—it’s this big, burning Balrog of a monster that literally
fills the room . . . like a big, black monster on fire and dangerous . . . just nasty. And so
I’ve got to shrink that thing down . . . and put it away. And like, talking about it makes it
smaller or it makes it less fiery. Maybe it doesn’t make it smaller, but every chance
[expels breath] that I get to, like, to enact a little bit of justice . . . every time I meet with
the client that was violated, and I see her doing well, it shrinks it, right? Like, every
chance that I get to provide a corrective experience for [it] makes this smaller . . . yeah,
every little bit of justice in this situation kind of shrinks it down for me. (Taylor)
In Taylor’s search for justice for her client, she felt “pulled between” wanting to preserve her
client’s desire not want to share the information with others and intensely desiring to tell
everyone her colleagues name “and what he did . . . so he never gets [to] work with vulnerable
people ever again.”
The third party may be those with virtuous intentions who have, nonetheless, injured the
other who seeks our care. They are others who have attempted to help, and not harm, the other.

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The other who comes to us seeking remedy may arrive with scars from wounds inflicted by third
parties who said they cared and failed. Or, these third party may have truly cared and did not, or
could not, show the attentiveness and sensitivity to the other. The other comes to us bearing
wounds complicated by the fact that it was through “care” that wounds were inflicted.
This client had numerous hospitalizations for suicidality. They had attempted multiple
times. . . . [they] found the hospital system quite triggering and quite trauma-producing
all on its own. . . . most psychiatrists would pass this person on because they wouldn’t
adhere to medication. . . . So oftentimes, this person felt like I was the only person in the
world that could get them. And that quite a lonely journey for them. And each time a
psychiatrist would pass them on, they would feel rejected, which would further
exacerbate the symptoms of the trauma . . . [when the client shared they wanted to die by
suicide in the counselling office] I was very aware that . . . I would be required to report.
This would be a 9-1-1 call. I was also so aware of this person’s history that morally, 9-11 was not the intervention that was going to help this . . . person. . . . I felt pretty morally
[opposed to] that unless this was the last possible moment and the client’s life was
legitimately on the line here in this second . . . There had been many, any times where
people outside of our practice had called police or ambulance or fire departments, and
there had been conflict and it had been . . . a big thing and [the client was] forcefully
removed. And so, I was really looking to avoid that re-interaction for that person. So I
knew in my gut—really, I pushed expectation aside—and [I] knew in my gut for this
person in this moment, if I have another minute to just hold them and be still with them
and have that safe container that I needed to do that. I also knew it was risky for me.
(Quinn)

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The desire and longing to be ethical is not a guarantor of ethical behaviour or that our
actions—which we sense to be ethical or are in harmony with certain set standards—will be
received as ethical or caring by the one who suffers. It becomes our responsibility, then, to
respond to what we have become sensitive to: that the other carries with them the tragic
consequences of misplaced or ill-fated attempts to care. The third party complicates how we will
respond. We have to find a new way to care for the other, a way that will not be shut down in the
exquisite yet heartrending efforts of the other to protect themselves once more.
Third parties who are overseers. Being-ethical exposes us to others being-ethical.
That is to say, there are others being-ethical, seeing-the-ethical embedded in the world around
them. We are entrenched in their seeing of the world and, as such, can be part of their
composition. In fact, by being-in-the-world, by giving ourselves to others, by choosing to
participate in a community that practices a certain trade or art, we are a subject to being-seen by
the third party. In professional jargon, the third party who is brought into our work is a
supervisor who gives supervision, literally over (super) seeing (videre). This word points us
back to the fundamental structure, of seeing and perceiving, present in the practice of care. It is
not always possible to know with certainty that we stand in the sightlines of the third party.
There is, however, a feeling of being-watched, a sense of being-held-in-another’s-gaze, a feeling
of peculiar awareness that we are being-noticed-by-another. At the fringe of this experience, we
may even believe that we are the subject of another’s surveillance.
Whether or not we can clearly identify who is seeing us, we feel that we are being-seenby-another. They too are being-attentive to the world. They too are being-in-proximity to
others, including us and perhaps the other. They too are exposed. However, they may end up
making a very different composition of the ethical compared to ours. Their composition may

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focus more acutely on distinct features that we may have seen but chose not to or were unable to
focus on. They may have identified, and perhaps even acted in, a distinct decisive moment.
These others—who may not even been present at the moment of our encounter with the other—
are inextricable to shaping our encounter sometimes for better and other times for worse.
The third party may be a trusted guide who helps us see the pathway ahead. They may
help us anticipate the snares that we might otherwise miss. They may support us as we struggle
to accept the obstacles that cannot be sidestepped. The third party—who we have apprenticed
with, who oversees our practice, who teaches or gives us direction, who supports us—remains
ever-present with us. Supervisors can provide a pointed reassurance to our doubtfulness and
uncertainty.
My first instinct was, “Holy shit. I’ve got a problem on my hands.” . . . and so I could
feel the body tension and then, kind of as an overlapping layer, I could hear . . . my
former supervisor’s voice, “You can never go wrong with empathy.” And so, we stayed
there and held that space . . . for about 40 minutes. (Quinn)
In the holy shit moment, we sense intensity, seriousness, and risk. We are presented with the
unfathomable and with a demand from the other that provokes in us. This is a moment in which
we may sense the presence of the other as overwhelming us as we search for a clear way through
the uncertainty of what to do, how to respond, or who to reach out toward. The “holy shit
moments” are sometimes followed by a frenetic energy that courses through our body. We feel
as though we must leap into action to meet the rising demands threatening to overwhelm us. We
have to do something. Now.
This third party who oversees us may be a single person or an institution. It may be a
collective formed by persons interested in shaping the way things are done with an organized

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system of beliefs and practices concomitant with discipline and accountability to ensure that we
are aligned with these beliefs and practices. This may be an agency, a professional association,
or, in certain jurisdictions, a college. The third party may linger with us, appraising our actions
and evaluating the course we have chosen. We are exposed to their oversight. Vulnerable to
their judgement. What happens when we find ourselves not in agreement with our supervisor
haunts us.
I think that ethics is super-grey . . . I feel like I experience the grey more than I
experience anything else. I feel quite comfortable in it until I think about, “What would
another therapist say about this? What will my supervisor say?” That comes up for me a
lot, and she doesn’t like grey . . . she works in a specific population, from a specific
orientation. She doesn’t see kids; she doesn’t see youth; she doesn’t see couples. Like
it’s much cleaner. (Lee)
How do we include, or not include, the third party who watches over us in our compositions?
Knowing that our supervisors will be crafting their own composition of the situation, a quiet
concern is nascent inside of our mind. Perhaps we share our composition with them in
conversation. Perhaps we invite them to share theirs with us. At a certain point, we must act in
alignment with what we have composed. Or, we must shed our composition for that of the
master. Perhaps we reluctantly move ourselves to where the third party who oversees stands,
hoping that we might see what-is-seen through their eyes. Perhaps we have already acted.
Ultimately, we must decide what we will do with this third party that observes us. Do we
invite them further into this space? If the third party is occupying the foreground, obscuring our
subject, do we ask them politely to step aside? Will they step aside? Do we demand that they

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step aside? Or, do we shift our position and essentially crop the third party from our
composition?
I’m doing what you hired me to do. I’m facilitating you becoming yourself. I’ll be
honest, “professional ethics”—so called—were not even in the room. I’ll deal with that
crap later. This is about the client. Morality [participant’s emphasis] is in the room.
This is what you [the client] need me to provide for you right now. This is who you need
me to be for you right now. . . . professional ethics are a hodge-podge of norms, mores,
sometimes moral thinking, contemporary obsessions that come and go, fears, window
dressing, genuflecting sometimes in the direction of politicians. Morality is about, “What
do I owe to this human being here with me now?” They’ve asked me to accompany them
to help facilitate change, growth, evolution—whatever you want to call it. Or maybe
they want me to just help them stay with how it really is and hang onto that. In either
case, that’s where the commitment is. (Sidney)
Are the third parties who see over us, by virtue of their position, self-proclaimed power,
or other privilege, always “right?” Are they always objectively positioned to make a
composition that extinguishes all other compositions, including our own? It is entirely plausible
that the third parties who oversee us are “right,” not in the sense of having an objective standard
with which they can unfailingly measure our composition. Rather, they too have seen what-wehave-seen and based on their assessment, they advocate for an entirely different approach that
mirrors what is generally accepted as the “right” way to act in this moment. We do not view it
from the same point but from varying points of proximity to the subject and even to one another.
Differing points of proximity permit us to make differing compositions. If we have listened
attentively to our conscience, we will find ourselves positioned elsewhere than where the third

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party may be. At best, this is a friendly disagreement. At worst, it requires us to compromise
ourselves.
I feel like I have a responsibility to my employer, right, that if they wanted—if they were
prepared to publicize this event, then—and I had their permission to do so—then I would
do it in a heartbeat. . . . Nobody has said anything. . . . [Interviewer: Do you feel like the
organization has taken responsibility for what’s happened?] . . . No, not at all.
Minimally, by terminating [the colleague who sexually exploited a client]. . . .
[Interviewer: How does that sit with you?] Not well, because it means I’m a party to the
cover-up. . . . Which is why I have such a hard time holding all of that in, you know?
(Taylor)
Compromise is more than a compromise of ideas. It is a compromise of existence. We are torn
apart at times by the responsibility we feel we have toward the third party who oversees us and
the other who is before us. Some of us can concede to institution. Some of us cannot.
Faced with a challenge to our compositions by the overseeing third parties, we enter into
a realm where our exposure is heightened. Other third parties may join in and, collectively, call
us to make an account of how we have chosen to be ethical. We are asked to respond to their
inquiries into whether or not we were truly being-ethical. Our response may satisfy the
overseeing third parties. But we will never be the same. We will proceed into our future, into
the onslaught of unknowns that are a part of our work, with caution and unease. Some of us will
succumb to the apprehension and adjust our trajectories. This fear exacts a cost. It taxes our
being.
And it’s very sad to me that my own fear, really, of the process of [complaint] would hold
back what could be meaningful work for another person. . . . And I really . . . [pauses for

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five seconds] sometimes, we find our population. Yeah? And it’s just a fit, it’s just a fit.
And I feel like I’ve found a population that’s a really good fit for me. But, instead, I’m
working [with] perfectionism or I’m working [laughs] . . . you know, like, with things
that aren’t really that population. And that’s sad, because I really enjoy that work, too.
(Quinn)
Defence. Faced with our exposure to the third party who over-sees us, we seek out the
security provided by rational argument. We gather evidence. We point to the codes, perhaps the
same codes that are deployed to evaluate us. We develop arguments that support our
interpretation. We prepare to defend ourselves against the evaluation of the third party.
It scares me to think . . . “What would . . . ?” Maybe not scary, but . . . this always
happens to me—and maybe other people experience too—but when I’ve bumped up with
something ethical I always prep my defence. I always prepare what I would say if
someone called me out about it. I’m always ready. . . . I’ve only ever had one client
where I think that they would have made a complaint to the [professional
association]. . . . It was three days ago. [The client is] not probably going to make a
complaint. But if [they do], I’m so ready [laughs] for my defence. That’s what I think. I
think “If someone questions this, here’s going to be what I answer.” And who do I think’s
going to do that? Other therapists, even though none of them know anything about what
I do. (Lee)
Third parties in the life of the other. We do not encounter the other as if they are truly
alone. Another’s aloneness is challenged by the simple truth that others are present in their life.
Just as others shape the our perception and expression of ourselves, so do others shape the
perception and expression of the other. The other’s aloneness is contested by the constant aura of

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others in their life who become third parties to us, calling to us, inviting us to respond, to take
responsibility. This is particularly true when the other who is before us has acted, or will act, in a
certain way that affects another. Suffering is instigated in the intricate weavings of human
connection. For this reason, there are many others who could conceivably come to us seeking
our care. These others become third parties to us though their presence is mediated in and
through our encounter with the other who seeks our care. Can we give our care to all of those
present in the life of the other who we are encountering this very moment? These third parties
may even appear to us—perhaps not always tangibly—in the encounter with the particular other.
Being-ethical—though attentive to the other who we are encountering this very moment—is not
restricted from being-exposed to third parties and sensing that we must respond to them ethically.
A sense of duty or a concentrated compassion toward the third party may well up inside. The
third party may become someone to whom we must be attentive to, we must respond to, we must
move closer to, we must be sensitive to, and we must be ethical toward. The third party’s
physical absence and intangibility, that is, the fact that they are not present in their body, does not
automatically dilute the demand that they make upon us.
But I feel like there was a moment in which I sort of recognized that the other huge piece
of what I was experiencing in that moment was grief for that baby. . . . I think [my grief
for the baby] was pointing to how deeply I value individual life, the life of a person. . . .
Like there was an appropriateness to it. . . . there was almost a way where it was, like
[sighs], I was okay that it was so hard for me. I was okay with it being so hard for me
because it felt honouring of that child. . . . I felt drained and physically, I felt drained and
weary and tied and just . . . low for the next couple of days. . . the feeling low, the feeling
spent like I had just output a lot of effort . . . I was still sort of moving through the grief

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of that—it sort of felt appropriate because I don’t know if anybody else grieved that baby.
I don’t know if anybody else grieved that life. And so, then, me feeling, that me carrying
that grief for this child felt like it honoured that baby. . . I needed a debrief. . . . I can’t
[quite] remember the words, but the emotion is just tears coming up in my throat . . . I
think I said something along the lines of, “It was so hard that, like there was no one
thinking about that baby.” . . . it wasn’t quite that [the baby] was all alone . . . but just
[that] there was . . . nobody grieving that baby. And then the person I talked to said that
[cries], “There was. It was you.” (Jordan)
Pat sensed the presence of her client’s parents—third parties—as she plotted a course
through a session muddled by unclear informed consents created by a third-party insurance
company.
I think a problem with that also was that the informed consent was not written by me. . . .
You’re kind of on your own sitting there in the room and [you’ve] got to make decisions
based—and [they] have to be informed decisions—based on not only what’s best for the
client but the whole system around the client, right? (Pat)
That searching question “What is best for the client and their world?” is situated in a milieu of
others who enter even into our face-to-face encounter with the other. Faced with the other and
the multiplicity of third parties, we must make a composition that is incisive—in that it remedies
the vexing questions proposed by ethics—and expansive—in that it maximizes the good and
minimizes harm for the one who suffers amongst many.
The third party does not appear to each of us in the same way. The third party is rarely, if
ever, felt in the same way each time we encounter the third party. The voice of the third party
may waver, shift, and evolve. Their presence and participation in our encounter with the other

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may be inconsistent from one moment to the next. The third party may not even be nefarious,
fixed on constraining or impeding us. They may be a confident guide that is fundamental to our
efforts to be ethical. Making a generalized declaration about what how a third party ought to, or
ought not to, influence our composition would be misguided. Stating a fixed rule of how third
parties are to be situated in the ethical composition assumes that the third party will always
appear to us the same, ask of everyone the same question, or expect the same response of us.
Rather, interpreting the presence of and negotiating the influence of third parties is part of our
critical encounter with them.
An Illustration
Take a moment to look at this photograph carefully (see Figure 1). Without a caption or
title, the photograph’s meaning is an enigma that each of us may attempt to de-encrypt through
our conscious and unconscious processes that are constantly humming along, making sense of
what we see. Though we are involved in looking at this photograph, we stand afar with a
cacophony of presuppositions, assumptions, models, and beliefs about what might be going on.

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Figure 1. Photo reprinted from Majoli (2003). Copyright 1995 by Alex Majoli/Magnum Photos.
Reprinted with permission.

The woman herself is faceless. We cannot see how she is reacting. We notice the man’s
seemingly contented posture. Or is it really contentedness? Their hands joined together catches
our gaze. Perhaps it was the first thing that caught us when we turned the page. Our attention is
being engaged. We have been attending to what we see.
We are involved in the situation of this photograph as an observer. But also, as a human
being. However, our involvement is truncated by our distance from the encounter between these
two individuals in space and time. This photograph was taken in Greece in 1994. Our proximity
may also be further distanced by our unfamiliarity with what is going on in this encounter. Our
uncertainty signals that we have not yet neared the truth of the encounter. Who are these people?
They are unknown.

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Is the curiosity growing about what is happening between these two people? Perhaps the
uncertainty is difficult. Perhaps we must be exposed to these two others. The caption discloses
some important information for us. We are about to have this encounter opened to us. Are we
prepared to be open to this encounter? Are we prepared to be vulnerable to these others?
This image is one of a series of photographs that formed Magnum photographer Alex
Majoli’s essay on life in one of Greece’s most notorious psychiatric hospitals on the island of
Leros. Majoli’s caption reads: “A patient and a care worker lie in the sun. Leros, Dodecanese
Islands, Greece.”
What are we aware of in this very moment? Are we re-evaluating this encounter because
of this new information? What are we attentive to? Do we notice new things about the
photograph? The things about the photograph that struck us at first, do we notice these in a new
way? Does the woman’s body take on a different ethical significance now that we know she is
also this man’s care worker? Why has it changed for us? What do we notice in our conscience
now? Is a tenacious certainty welling up inside of us to state that the care worker’s behaviour
exceeds the limits of ethics? Do we feel justified in believing that this behaviour evidences a
corrupt system that let everything, and anything, happen? Certainly, we tell ourselves, this
would not happen today.
Perhaps we must pause here for a moment and also acknowledge that we have taken the
position of the third party—the overseeing, evaluative third party. The third party who stands at
a distance and considers whether or not what is happening between these two individuals is in
fact ethical. Can we actually evaluate this encounter ethically? We can. We can deploy our
principles. However, it is vital that we recall the essential truth that the way that we come to
understand this encounter, the composition of the ethical elements of this encounter, is one

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possible composition among many. Thus, let us remember that being-ethical is marked by
humility, an acknowledgement of the limits that prevent us from knowing with precision the
right course of action.
Clinically, we all feel at sea sometimes. We’re looking at this hurt human being and there
are times when it’s like, “What do I do?” But that’s not moral uncertainly; that’s––I
wouldn’t even say perhaps it was a clinical uncertainty. It’s sort of an existential
uncertainty [laughs]. It’s like, “What do I do?” [laughs]. And if we don’t feel that
sometimes, we’re missing the point [laughs] of what we’re there for. . . . if the
uncertainty is real, then it’s neither good nor bad; it’s part of the situation. And I’m
thinking there’s some kinds of human distress when, if you don’t just think, “What do I
do?,” you’re missing the point. . . . you’ve got to accept . . . your own feelings and
experiencing moment to moment. If you’re not doing that, you’ve not even begun to be
any kind of useful therapist. . . . [You] need to be able to sit with your own sense of
helplessness, ignorance, shock, horror—whatever it is. (Sidney)
Conclusion: The Decisive Moment in Being-Ethical
Ethical situations are encounters with life that are submerged in questions that seek out a
direction toward that which we believe to be good. “What ought I do in this moment?” is among
the essential ultimate questions that we are asked, in these encounters, to answer. There is a
decisive moment in these situations, a point in time when we must act. The ought becomes is.
Or, to put it another way, these are the decisive moments when our being-ethical become more
wholly experienced and expressed. These decisive moments are the moment of being-ethical.
Moments happen in time, in the flow of now becoming then and the future becoming
here. Moments are embedded in movements (momentum). This moment within movement may

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not always be a distinct instant of clarity in which we say with uncompromising confidence:
“Yes! That’s it!” Rarely can we slow down the rush of life. Being-ethical is a response made to
others in the dynamism of life. Life does not stop for us to make an ethical decision that can
account for every possible pitfall, consider all plausible options, or foresee and thwart all risks or
outcomes.
There will be a moment in which a “Yes” must be made. This point in time may not be a
split second, come and gone. Our “Yes!” to a course of action may unfold across time and place.
It may creep out, shy and wary. Or a “Yes” may come to us as piercingly distinct. However, our
“Yes” comes, there will be a moment that this “Yes,” this decision in the moment, becomes
actualized. In other situations, our “Yes!” happens with a swift and resolute confidence. What
we must do or, rather, who we must be, strikes us, shocks us, and propels us.
When a client shared that had told no one that they had terminated a pregnancy, Jordan
felt a surge of caution rise up inside of her as she contemplated how to respond in this moment.
Her moral values sharply diverged from the client’s decision:
[I] believe very [participant’s emphasis] strongly in the value of human life beginning at
conception . . . that’s very core to me . . . not like “anti-abortion” is core but “value of
life” is core in many more spheres than just choosing whether or not to keep a baby.
(Jordan)
Aware that her personal values could induce shame, the counsellor could imagine—a seeing that
extends us into the unknown yet possible—that the slightest manifestation, even unintentional, of
her personal beliefs could harm the client by deconstructing the therapeutic alliance. “I have to
keep this safe for her to explore this,” the counsellor remarked. “I had to be very careful with

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sort of what came across from me. That [my own feelings] didn’t come out into her experience
because I knew it would shut things down.”
The decisive moment, for Jordan, was a moment in which a choice emerged about what
action would be the most expressive of who they are as a person. That is to say, the question of
“How am I ethical in this moment?” From this question flows the question of, “What do I do to
be ethical in this moment?”
[In] the moment, it felt like I was making a choice, or I might be making a choice about
being true to something that is . . . acting in integrity, acting in authenticity, acting out of
sort of like: This is who I say I am. This is what I say I believe. Do I have the integrity
and the courage and the wisdom to actually live like that, to actually live like I value
human life from the point of conception? Am I denying that core part of my being by not
making it explicit in this moment. (Jordan)
Though Jordan felt their moral position to stand in contrast to the client’s actions, Jordan
perceived that the other—the client—was in need of something particular: a certain steadfast
involvement and a presence that would hopefully engender healing.
And so I felt like I had to shut off––not “shut off”––but like, put away; like, I almost had
this visual––sort of visual/internal conversation with myself. It was like, “This, not now.
We’ll do this later.” . . . I was very . . . in a very sort of intentional, deliberate controlled
way, not allowing that . . . part of myself, that emotional experience . . . the impact of that
to be fully acknowledged because . . . as a therapist, where my primary concern is the
therapeutic benefit to her, I couldn’t see a way for it to be brought in therapeutically.
(Jordan)

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A pressing and vexing question emerges: How do we know when it is the right moment to act?
How do we know how we should act in the moment? How do we know to whom our action
should be directed? How do we know all of these essential avenues to take?
With each passing moment, what we see may become clearer or cloudier as we take in
more of what we see. When faced with the question of whether or not she should disclose her
adolescent client’s self-harm to their parents, Pat spoke of the internal friction and unease as she
sorted through possible ways of responding. “I was trying to figure out if I should trust my own
judgement,” Pat remarked. She wondered
if I should just let it go . . . there were so many––because [the situation] was taking me in
so many directions that . . . I could decide on . . . I was able to justify [my decision] at the
end [of the situation] but in the moment there was a lot of push and pull. (Pat)
Life is comprised of these decisive moments that stream before, through, and with us. Decisive
moments, then, are not ideals or abstract points of perfection, but moments at which we are
seized by what we see. This moment is a true moment for us, here, now. That is to say, decisive
moments of ethical action are not verifiable, factual, or correct, in an objective sense. In our
experience of life, there is no one moment that can be extracted and proved to be the moment at
which we should act. Even though models, frameworks, structures, and systems have been
designed to demarcate a pathway for us to make our way toward doing the right thing, these are
often most meaningful, assistive, and effective in retrospect or in moments when we have slowed
down the situation as it hurtles past us.
Our classes always said: “If you make a decision, you’d better know how to back it up.”
There better had been, like, an ethical decision-making . . . model, right? Like, “How did

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you get to the core of that decision?” But usually that’s so fast, right? You have to . . . in
your head, in a moment, you have to do that, just like this [snaps fingers]. (Lee)
Decisive moments are scattered throughout our interactions with other persons. Why do
we choose to speak when we speak? Why do we shift our body toward the other at this precise
instant? Why do we choose to let our voices trail off at certain junctions in our conversations,
opening up the space for the other to respond to us? Certainly, there is some amount of analysis
and leaning on past experience that helps us have some sense of when a decisive moment is
present. The decisive moment may be determined by something more fundamental: who we are
to the other, who the other is to us, and who we are for the other in this very instance:
My first instinct was, “Holy shit. I’ve got a problem on my hands” . . . I think in the
“Holy shit” moment, I was like this has to be about them and not me. Just simply that.
And I’ll deal with me later. . . . because I am constantly––really, every moment in therapy
session assessing, “Is this for me? Is this for them?” (Quinn)
Being-ethical involves seeing, composing, and committing. Being-ethical means seeing that
ethics saturates ordinary existence like a full, plump sponge. In seeing the other before us, we
are proposed to by the other. They call us to see them, to respond to what they carry—what they
are suffering—with ourselves. They call to us to be ethical.

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CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION

In the previous pages, I attempted to accentuate features of being-ethical that appeared in
my participants’ experiences of ethically and/or morally challenging situations. Attention is the
deep and intentional rendezvous of our being with the totality of the other who we meet in the
moral spaces of the world. It is not only a mode by which we move our whole being, but also a
gift we endow to the other, a responsiveness to their presence, and an admission of their being
into our own. In this space, we are proximal to the other in varying degrees of proximity. This
includes the recession of ourselves from the space so that the other can experience an expanse in
which they may take more defined shape and also to protect their uniqueness from being
consumed by us. This recession is vulnerable. So too is our exposure to the evaluation of others
who look at us from afar, sometimes through the other. Thus, we are constantly having to
critically sort through the many others who meet us in what we often experience as a dyadic
encounter.
Alignment with Counselling Ethics Research and Theory
My inquiry was concerned with pushing through the “everydayness” of professional
ethics to gather together an understanding of counselling ethics, as it is lived, that can lead to
creative, vibrant, and personally authentic expressions of professional ethics. Jungers and
Gregoire (2016; Gregoire & Jungers, 2013) posited an existential-phenomenological perspective
on counsellor identity and authenticity in pivotal ethical moments. The authors argued that “the
understanding and implementation of ethics in counseling has the distinct possibility of being
limited by a reductive, risk-management approach to decision making” (Jungers & Gregoire,
2016, p. 100). As an antidote to ethical reductionism, Jungers and Gregoire (2013) proposed that
an ethical vitality can be found when counsellors move beyond codes of ethics, decision-making

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models, principles and standards, while still retaining their essential insights, practical value, and
necessity as agreed upon by communities of professionals.
Broadly speaking, what gradually became palpable in the participants’ experiences was
their quest for personal and professional authenticity in an ethically and/or morally challenging
situation. Sidney expressed this most succinctly when he noted Shakespeare’s famous words,
“To thine own self be true,” as a maxim that he followed. Each participant’s experience
appeared as an effort to become their “own-most persons” (Jungers & Gregoire, 2016, p. 106),
that is, to be authentically ethical. To become their own-most persons, however, meant being
confronted by a litany of possible ways to think about and respond to the ethically and/or morally
challenging situation they faced. Although codes of ethics, standards of practice, and the
collective values of the counselling discipline were present, participants appeared to be deeply
concerned with acting in a way that was consistent and congruent with their personal conscience,
values, and perspectives.
Seeing, attending, and composing. For the purpose of my discussion, I blend the first
(seeing and composing) and second (attention) features together to reflect the chemistry of
perceiving, judging, and acting. Seeing, attending, and composing correlate, in my estimation,
with ethical sensitivity and moral perception. Both shape a practitioner’s capacity to exercise
phronesis, or, practical wisdom (Fowers, 2005; Kitchener & Anderson, 2011).
Sensitivity to the ethical aspects of a situation is a feature of one’s ordinary moral sense,
a “prereflective response to the situations we encounter” (Fowers, 2005, p. 195). A
practitioner’s moral perception, Kitchener and Anderson (2011) contended, is the process of
“discerning the essential components or features of the situation” (p. 63). Moral perception is

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not simply “seeing what is right or wrong but rather what is most important and valuable”
(Kitchener & Anderson, 2011, p. 63).
Indeed, recognizing a situation as an ethical or moral situation is a basic requisite for
being an ethical practitioner (Fowers, 2005). The fact that each participant presented what they
had determined to be ethically and/or morally challenging for them, signals an important feature
of being-ethical: We may see ethics all around us, but we may see it differently. But, in seeing
we are also composing, or interpreting, the world ethically. Each situation was experienced as
uniquely ethical to the participant before they could identify the precise ethical dynamics or
principles at play. Each participant recognized the ethical situation as ethical to them in
particular.
This also speaks to the peculiar sensitivities of each participant. Moral sensitivity refers
to a person’s insight into and interpretation of a situation such that they recognize that what they
choose to do, or not do, could directly or indirectly impact another person’s “welfare, interests,
or expectations” (Rest, 1984, p. 21). Each participant showed a unique ethical sensitivity. As
Fowers (2005) stated, “psychologists and trainees will vary in their ability to perceive the ethical
dimension of their work, ranging from those who are highly sensitive to those who are ethically
oblivious or even outright vicious (exploitive, deceptive, or avaricious)” (p. 194).
Attention is frequently conceptualized as one of many essential components that make it
possible to think and act in the world. Attention, as “the prioritization of processing information
that is relevant to current task goals” (Nobre & Kastner, 2014, p. 1204), may have been integral
to the participants’ cognitive appraisal and decision-making. Participants’ experiences revealed a
plethora of information, details, and features of ethically challenging situations. Participants had
memory of fine details of certain aspects of their experience; other aspects did not come through

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quite as clearly in their recollection of their experience. The participants’ experiences also
highlighted the importance of attention to the therapeutic alliance. Distracted by her own
internal response to her client’s disclosure of self-harm, Pat described losing her focus on—her
attention toward—the client. Sidney’s attentiveness toward his client was heightened as the
ethical situation he faced unfolded; he noted his heightened awareness of his client’s physical
presence and response.
Participants’ attention was also directed internally: to their internal thoughts, feelings,
responses, and personal conscience. The participants’ attended to themselves; the focus was cast
on what was unfolding inside themselves, not simply on the external aspects of the given
moment. Jordan attended to her internal reaction, emerging from her personal moral values, as
her client disclosed their terminated pregnancy for the first time to anyone. Quinn carefully
listened to her conscience and what she had to tell herself about her response to her client’s
intention to die by suicide in her office at the next session. Lehr et al. (2013) viewed “dialogue
with self and with others” (p. 454) as a particular way that Canadian counsellors’ steered through
ethical discernment points. Attending to the self, to one’s experience and especially to one’s
conscience, opens up an internal dialogue that aids in coming to a place of clarity and choice.
Self-awareness and personal reflexivity are considered fundamental to ethical decision-making,
judgement, and action. The Integrative Ethical Decision-Making Model developed by Tarvydas
(2012; Tarvydas & Johnston, 2018) emphasizes the counsellor’s sensitivity and awareness as
important to cultivate in the process of using the model.
Being-exposed. I rendered one feature of being-ethical as the inevitability of beingexposed. This exposure is the condition of being-vulnerable to the other—that is, the client, who
suffers—and others who may evaluate us, such as third parties. The sense of exposure to a client

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is particularly palpable when the counsellor is physically face-to-face. Being-exposed to their
physical appearance and verbal and non-verbal expression is not just a matter of receiving
information, but also experiencing the client first-hand as an person-in-the-flesh. Pat was
exposed to her client’s physical wounds, though hidden beneath their clothing. These wounds,
from self-harm, roused Pat’s sense of responsibility for the client. Taylor’s indignation towards
her colleague was incited by meeting her client in deep trench of sexual exploitation.
Dueck and Parsons (2006), in their sketch of the implications of Levinas’ ethics,
commented that “the deepest relationship with the Other is one of vulnerability and radical
responsibility” (p. 278). This vulnerability and responsibility are incited when we come face-toface—being-faced-with—with the other (Dueck & Parsons, 2006, p. 277). Being-faced-with the
other stimulates our sensitivity to the other’s pain. But it is precisely this vulnerability, and the
sensitization of our being to the pain of the other that makes it possible for the very healing that
is hoped for. Stolorow (2015), writing on the phenomenological and ethical features of trauma,
noted the significance of the counsellor coming to see that they share in the client’s vulnerability
and finitude by virtue of also being a human. He envisioned a “new form of human solidarity”
(Stolorow, 2015, p. 136) borne out of a
shared recognition and respect for our commo human finitude. If we can help one
another bear the darkness rather than evade it, perhaps one day we will be able to see the
light—as finite human beings, finitely bonded to one another. (Stolorow, 2015, p. 136)
Quinn expressed fear that her ethical decision would be found wanting by her
professional association. She had already had to answer a complaint made against her by a
former client. She prepared to defend herself in order to preserve her ability to do the work she
enjoyed and to which she felt called. Lee acknowledged her sense that she might be critiqued by

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fellow counsellors who might not see the full picture of the ethical situations she faced in her
rural community.
Kitchener (1986) stated the importance of helping trainees develop tolerance for ethical
ambiguity and uncertainty as ethical decisions are always subject to scrutiny and critique.
Despite carefully engaging in the task of ethical reflection and reasoning, using decision-making
models, and engaging in consultation, counsellors are, at the end of the day, responsible for their
decisions (Gregoire & Jungers, 2013; Jungers & Gregoire, 2016).
Proximity. Participants exhibited a sensitive self-limitation that seemed prompted by a
pledge to the other’s welfare. The act of self-limitation by the counsellor is tumultuous to
undergo as was evident in the experience of Jordan and Quinn, in particular. I described this in
terms of movement that concerns the proximity of ourselves to the other. The proximity between
the self of the counsellor and the self of the other involves an acknowledgement of the other’s
presence and the ethical demand placed upon us in this particular moment (concession). Next,
we may retreat (recession) from the space of this moment, giving the other greater freedom by
rescinding our right to be. Then, we move toward the other (procession) or the sake of the other,
still fully ourselves yet carefully reduced to make it possible for the other to become. These are
painful movements at times.
Similarly, Dueck and Goodman (2007) maintained that a counsellor “engages in selflimitation for the sake of the Other” (p. 613). Using Levinas’ phenomenological analysis of
expiation, surrender, and substitution, Dueck and Goodman (2007) emphasized the distinct and
difficult practice that counsellors undergo: suffering for the sake of the other. Self-limitation is a
response to the ethical demand made upon the counsellor by the other. This is neither a legal
demand nor an ultimatum that is simply an ethical principle expressed by an institution; it is an

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existential demand advanced by the face of the other as radically other (Dueck & Goodman,
2007; Dueck & Parsons, 2006). The counsellor who self-limits is “a person construed as
suffering, accused, and troubled when he or she encounters the Other” (Dueck & Goodman,
2007, p. 613). This self-limitation is impressed upon the self of the therapist by the therapist’s
self for the welfare of the other: “The therapist is one who ‘gnaws’ at himself or herself to create
space for the other” (Dueck & Goodman, 2007, p. 615).
Third parties. Gregoire and Jungers (2013) emphasized that “being-there-with-others
refers to our involvement in both our intra-professional and inter-professional communities” (p.
37). However, Gregoire and Jungers provided only three examples of “others” that a counsellor
may interact with in their being-there-with-others: other counsellors, other non-counselling
professionals, and clients. This is a somewhat limited view of the sorts of others, third parties,
whom a counsellor may engage with while caring for a client.
For the participants in this inquiry, there were myriad types of others who appeared in the
participant’s experiences as third parties. Third parties who were manifested in the participants’
experiences included counsellors’ own family members (e.g., Quinn, Jordan), professional
institutions (e.g., Sidney, Taylor), or those people the client had personal relationships with (e.g.,
Pat, Jordan, Lee). The participants in this inquiry pointed to various ways they experienced
institutions, and other non-institutional third parties, involvement in the therapeutic dyad. The
encounter and engagement with these third parties required the participants to critically discern
the authenticity of the third party in order to sense the magnitude of the ethical demand of the
third party upon the counsellor. Engaging in discernment, participants in this inquiry responded
to third parties in varying ways. Quinn sensed that the ethical demand of her family was
significant enough to shape her response to her client and to guide her to carry out her ethical

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responsibilities, such as her documentation, in more of a defensive manner. Though Jordan
sensed the existential presence of the client’s terminated fetus, she discerned that even the
slightest hint of her personal moral perspective that the fetus was a human person would result in
a breach of the therapeutic dyad. Taylor was haunted by the third party—her colleague—who
exploited her client, and she also struggled to reconcile the actions of her employer in response
to the colleague’s actions with her sense of responsibility to the client’s community, two other
third parties who appeared in the dyad.
Codes of ethics and ethical decision-making models recognize that third parties are likely
to appear in counselling encounters. The appearances of third parties may be ethically
challenging to the counsellor (CCPA, 2015). The “primary responsibility” of the counsellor is
for their client (e.g., ACA, 2014, sec. A.1; CCPA, 2007, sec. B1), though a legal obligation exists
to protect the well-being of a third party if a client threatens them with harm (e.g., ACA, 2014,
sec. B.2.c; BCACC, 2008; CCPA, 2007, sec. B1, 2015). The confidentiality of the client’s
information must be carefully maintained in instances where a third party is involved (e.g., ACA,
2014, sec. B.2-B.5; CCPA, 2007, sec. C5). While principles are critical, how does the counsellor
experience and respond to the third party in an encounter that appears, at the outset, to be simply
a meeting between two people: counsellor and client?
Huett and Goodman (2012) delivered a critique of the incursions of managed care
institutions into psychotherapeutic practice using Levinas’ analysis of the ethical significance of
presence of others in our face-to-face encounter with the other. Levinas’ termed these third
parties, these others who are ever present in our encounter with another person, Thirds. Thirds,
that is, third parties, are a threat to the therapeutic dyad, Huett and Goodman argued, when they
are a-proximal, faceless, and impostor Thirds. Thus, they asserted, these institutions

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cannot enjoy, suffer, or encounter the Other; cannot feel the imperative nearness and force
of the neighbor qua patient; and seeks to unburden itself from the fact that “nothing is
more burdensome than a neighbor” [Levinas, 1981/1998b, pp. 88, 90, 91]. (Huett &
Goodman, 2012, p. 98)
In response to the encroachment of a-proximal Thirds, Huett and Goodman (2012) called
upon psychologists, their main audience, to “engage politically and resist complicity with
professional practices and policies that will further subjugate our [profession’s] position to the
economic prepotency of managed care organizations” (p. 99). To counteract the advance of aproximal Thirds, they argued, a more robust professional autonomy, for the sake of the other, that
is, clients, was vital to shore up. Even though Huett and Goodman dedicated their attention to a
particular sort of Third, that is, managed care institutions, the insights they accumulate are
germane to considering the ethical significance of other third parties such as employers and
professional associations and/or regulatory bodies.
Connections outside of counselling ethics. My inquiry is not the first to underscore the
ethics of perception, interpretation (composing), attention, proximity, exposure and vulnerability,
and encountering third parties. Moral psychology, moral philosophy, and the insights of other
professions’ ethics provide ample resources from which counselling ethics can receive
significant insights. In my view, my inquiry’s contributions offer more in terms of setting up
anchor points to connect with the knowledges and practices of other disciplines than offering
entirely new ideas, theoretical propositions, or solid truths.
The ethics of attention has been reviewed in other helping professions’ ethical discourses
and philosophical analyses (Klaver & Baart, 2011; Sontag, 2007; Weil, 1950/1973). Likewise,
the ethics of proximity has also received careful consideration in nursing and business ethics

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(Mencl & May, 2009; Peter & Liaschenko, 2004; Wildermuth, De Mello e Souza, & Kozitza,
2017). The vulnerability of choosing an ethical action and positioning one’s self ethically in the
face of evaluation or disagreeing may be a personal distressing. We have our nursing colleagues
to thank for decades of research on moral distress and the courage to act ethically (Austin, 2012;
Burston & Tuckett, 2013; Corley, 2002; Epstein & Hamric, 2009; Hawkins & Morse, 2014;
Musto, Rodney, & Vanderheide, 2015; Rodney, 2017).
Finally, attention has also been given to the ontological foundations and assumptions of
many helping professions, especially the nature of the human person (Gergen, 2009) and the
“thickness” or “thinness” (Slife, 2004, p. 166) of human relationships. This also has implications
for how situations are negotiated with third parties. The features of being-ethical that I
articulated are indicative of a relationality that extends beyond two totally autonomous
individuals intersecting. Rather, there is a deep intertwining between self and other that occurs
in the therapeutic encounter.
Thus, the features of my inquiry align with relational ethics which has been proposed as
an alternative or parallel structure to principle-based ethics in various helping professions,
including professional psychology (Bergum, 2013; Bergum & Dossetor, 2005; Gergen, 2015;
Truscott & Crook, 2013). In particular, the features I articulated in chapter four align with
several features of relational ethics that have been proposed. Shaw (2011) wrote that from a
relational ethics perspective, “a process of ethical reflection requires rationality, attunement to
feelings and intuitions, and attention to care-in-relationships” (p. 2). Relational ethics
emphasizes the importance of acknowledging a moral space between one’s self and others
(Bergum, 2013), the value of vulnerability in generating mutual respect and care, and the
significance of being a human being situated in a particular context (Bergum & Dossetor, 2005).

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Contributions to Counselling Ethics
The features that I explored in chapter four of this inquiry are, I hope, not subsumed into
some drab realm of theory. Rather, my hope is that these features are contributions to the pathic
knowledge of counselling practice. I also hope that my inquiry will encourage further attention
to the pathic knowledge embedded in the ethical practices that we take for granted. What does
this mean exactly? Van Manen (2007) contended:
Professional knowledge is pathic to the extent that the act of practice depends on the
sense and sensuality of the body, personal presence, relational perceptiveness, tact for
knowing what to say and do in contingent situations, thoughtful routines and practices,
and other aspects of knowledge that are in part prereflective, pre-theoretic, pre-linguistic.
(p. 20)
The phenomenological features of being-ethical that I suggested as being central to being an
ethical practitioner in ethically and/or challenging situations are not so much new, discrete
concepts or ideas. Rather, they are signposts that point to the pathic knowledge that “inhere so
immediately in our lived practices—in our body, in our relations, and in the things around us—
that they seem invisible” (van Manen, 2007, p. 22). The features described earlier, then, are not
the final destination of “findings,” per se. They are markers that mark the path toward our
coming-to-know the hidden, yet in-plane-sight, implicit, preconceptions, prereflections,
preunderstandings, and pre-practices that reside in the practice of being an ethical practitioner.
In one sense, the contributions of this inquiry to the domain of counselling ethics will continue to
emerge as I am still unearthing the meaning, significance, and import of this inquiry for myself
and my practice. Further, the meaning, significance, and import of this inquiry will emerge in
the dynamic, real-time interpretation in which you, the reader, are currently engaged.

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The features I expounded upon in chapter four are not facets of being an ethical
practitioner that one might typically encounter in ethics textbooks or in everyday conversation
between practitioners. Thus, the contribution I see my inquiry making is that of drawing
attention to zones of being an ethical practitioner that require further exploration and analysis in
the domain of counselling ethics. These zones include the nature of a counsellors encounter with
and responsibility to third parties, the effort to reserve one’s self for the sake of the other, and the
role of attention as a necessity for decision-making and as an authentic ethical expression in its
own right. I also consider it valuable for counsellors to reflect further on the experience of
facing the other who suffers and that this experience is necessary and vital, but perhaps not
sufficient in itself, to acting ethically.
It is also the actual practice of doing phenomenological inquiry into being-ethical as a
practitioner that is a contribution to the profession and its ethical knowledge and discourse.
Phenomenological inquiries, in my view, are not philosophical indulgences or narcissistic selfgratification on the part of the inquirer. The contributions of phenomenological inquiries are
found in their capability to provoke, move, and displace the inquirer and reader from received
assumptions to a vantage point that opens up one’s perception to a wider horizon of possibilities
(Finlay, 2011; van Manen, 2007).
The goal, then, of phenomenological inquiries is not to supply new concepts or develop
new theories, but to incite in the reader a fresh experience of an encounter with phenomenon that
evade our cognitive clutching yet are so fundamental to who we are as human beings. As van
Manen (2007) wrote:
Ordinary cognitive discourses are not well suited to address noncognitive dimensions of
professional experience. A pathic language is needed in order to evoke and reflect on

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pathic meanings. Pathic understanding requires a language that is sensitive to the
experiential, moral, emotional and personal dimensions of professional life. For
example, we need to employ certain writing methods in order to orient to the pedagogical
dimensions of teaching, the healing dimensions of medicine, the therapeutic dimensions
of psychology. This is where human science inquiry and especially the process of
phenomenological writing may play a helpful role (see van Manen, 1997; 2002).
Through a certain kind of phenomenological writing . . . these pathic forms of knowing
may find expression in texts, which make demands on us that find expression in our
practices. This phenomenological writing constitutes a phenomenology in practice and
promotes a phenomenology of and for practice. (p. 22)
In other words, it is difficult to describe the contributions of this inquiry in the traditional form of
a research study’s discussion. What I have aimed for in this inquiry is not to come up with new
concepts or abstract theories of operation, but to describe that which eludes our attempts to
categorize, operationalize, conceptualize, measure, or test and requires us to stretch our language
to the limits (van Manen, 2007). The features that I described in chapter four are also
contributions to the profession and to the domain of counselling ethics only to the extent that
they sensitize the reader to reflect upon and to listen for the knowledges that “inhere so
immediately in our lived practices—in our body, in our relations, and in the things around us—
that they seem invisible” (van Manen, 2007, p. 22). The venture of phenomenology is not the
creation of new knowledge, but the demarcation of what knowledges are already present and
active in our lived experience.
In conclusion, the methodology I used and the features of the phenomenon of beingethical that I illuminated in chapter four point to the promise of attending to the non-cognitive,

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non-formulaic, non-abstract, and non-theoretical dimensions of being-ethical as a counsellor.
Codes of ethics, ethical decision-making models, the application of reason to sift through
complex ethical situations, and philosophical reflection remain vital to being an ethical
counsellor (Jungers & Gregoire, 2016). Yet prior to implementing codes of ethics, and other
accoutrements of ethics, we are thrown into particular situations that we approach with a
collection of preunderstandings already at work. It is this prereflective space, prior to our
decision to even engage our code of ethics or select an ethical decision-making model, that I
tried to articulate.
Methodological Contributions
Along with being a newcomer to phenomenological inquiry myself, the novel application
of Personal Phenomenology as an avenue for hermeneutic phenomenological inquiry must be
noted. Some readers may have misgivings about the use of a method that evolved from an
intervention first designed for psychotherapy, Personal Existential Analysis (PEA). Yet,
skepticism is simply one stop along the route of research methods development. The progression
from novelty to proposal to refinement to acceptance is one that takes time, reflection, and
ongoing clarification.
Personal Phenomenology, as has already been discussed previously, is a research method
spawned from PEA (Klaassen et al., 2017; Launeanu, 2019; Launeanu, Klaassen, Konieczny, et
al., 2019). As Längle (2003) asserted, the development of PEA happened on the account of
theoretical, but perhaps most importantly, concrete, situated experiences. PEA was crafted with
“theoretical reflection on the concept of person and daily confrontation with people suffering
from personal and existential deficits” (Längle, 2003, pp. 60–61). Personal Phenomenology’s
foundations in the phenomenologically informed PEA method ought to provide confidence in its

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usefulness and suitability for phenomenological inquiry. Therapy and research are distinct
practices with markedly different purposes—the former, the alleviation of suffering, and the
latter, the advancement of knowledge and understanding. Yet, both are fundamental inquiries
into being, lived experience, and meaning.
Still, the fresh introduction of PEA to the practice of phenomenological inquiry, via
Personal Phenomenology, for the purpose of research, is not without growing pains. The
pathways and essential features of a methodology, that is, methods, practices, and principles,
may not always be precisely plotted out and may only become more refined in the midst of
actual practice. I encountered this at various points in my inquiry.
How exactly was I to follow the Personal Phenomenology method? Was I to start at the
first movement of description and progress through the remaining three steps in a linear manner?
What was the best way to document the analytic process? I experimented with several different
formats from brief points to lengthy paragraphs. For several of the participants’ experiences, I
employed a more poetic form of writing—in style and physical format—to aid in navigating
myself more closely to their experience and to aid in distilling complex descriptions while trying
to maintain their phenomenological thickness and resonance.
PEA, the method that Personal Phenomenology is constructed with, regards relationship
as the central feature of personhood. Längle (2003) described relationship as inclusive of
“encounter[s] with things, experiences, with earlier experiences, and with oneself” (p. 40).
Personhood is formed in and through relationship. This relationship is comprised of dialogue
between one’s self and the world and within one’s own self (Längle, 2003). The central pivot
point in PEA is the formation of this dialogical encounter.

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Dialogue appears in Personal Phenomenology from the interviews to the data analysis
and now in the dialogue between me and you, the reader. I entered into a dialogical relation with
participants via interviews. Personal Phenomenology also uses dialogue as a key component of
data analysis. Data analysis involved both personal reflection and conversation with the research
team. This ensured the dialogical nature of Personal Phenomenology was carried through the
entire research process.
Similarly, van Manen (1990) contended that phenomenological analysis is dependent
upon practitioners establishing a strong relation to the phenomenon and, especially, those
experiencing the phenomenon. Because the phenomenon does not exist solely by itself, apart
from the one-experiencing-the-phenomenon, a relation must be established with the oneexperiencing-the-phenomenon in order to be able to access the phenomenon. Without either
relation, can we access the phenomenon and the lived experience of the one-experiencing that
surrounds it?
A concrete example of how Personal Phenomenology establishes a close relation to the
phenomenon is through deliberately embracing the researcher’s impressions towards the
phenomenon, as experienced by the participants, and the participants themselves. The role of my
impressions—that is, reactions, emotions—in data analysis was an acutely perplexing riddle to
solve. In many therapeutic modalities, a counsellor’s impressions of a client are seen as essential
sources of information that can guide therapeutic work. Can the same be said of emotions in
data analysis? Längle (2011) contended that one’s emotions are often portrayed as “obstacles to
clear and logical thinking, are only private, and even intimate” (p. 43). In the context of
research, feelings may be seen as what needs to be bracketed in order to truly get at the truth(s)
of the lived experience. To introduce emotions is to hold up a magnet to a compass. In other

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words, a researcher’s subjectivity may be viewed with vexation and disdain or may be tolerated
to a certain degree as a condition of existence but, nonetheless, something to be chastened.
However, Personal Phenomenology takes a different perspective on the role of emotions
in research. From the perspective of EA, “feelings never arise out of themselves (alone) or
arbitrarily but are stipulated by an object (real, imagined or thought). Feelings therefore always
relate to something” (Längle, 2011, p. 47). Feelings establish a relation with the participant.
Without feelings, the relation lacks vitality. Without vitality, there is no movement, that is,
attraction or rejection. The relation that feelings establish is thus characterized by an “inherent
impulse of direction” (Längle, 2011, p. 47) or a drawing towards or pushing away. The relation
is strengthened or challenged. Feelings establish a relation and thus initiate movement. This
movement becomes a response to the relation and may either strengthen the relation or weaken
it. Both lead to a new way of relating. To sum up, Längle’s (2011) maxim is instructive: “Where
there is a feeling—there is a relation” (p. 47).
Implications
Education. The classroom is frequently the first place of encounter with professional
ethics. Principle-based ethics fits neatly into the constraints imposed on educators. Principles,
standards, and procedures can be distilled and dispersed succinctly. Counselling education may
benefit from helping trainees engage how being an ethical practitioner is experienced, what it
means to be an ethical practitioner, and developing a phenomenological openness to the ethics
that are embedded in counsellors’ relationships and practices . In other words, professionals at
all stages of their career, including trainees, may benefit from encountering professional ethics
not only in didactic formats, but also in phenomenological and dialogical reflection and analysis

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of how they are ethical as a person, who they hope to become, and what sort of ethics are
implicitly present in counselling practice.
Personal Phenomenology may be applied in training settings to foster trainee’s ethical
reflection, openness to experience, alongside ethical decision-making models. Personal
Phenomenology could enrich trainees’ attentiveness to the various features of an ethically
challenging situation and to the presence and influence of their personal values. Phenomenology
could also assist trainees in identifying actions that are personally and existentially authentic in
contrast to actions that fulfill the rules for the rule’s sake or to please others. Cultivating
authentic ethical stances does not negate principle-based approaches. Rather, the cultivation of
ethical authenticity is a matter of sowing personal responsibility to principles and harvesting
mature ethical action.
Clinical practice. Clinical practice is the stage on which the drama of being-ethical
unfolds. It is in the day-to-day encounters with others, especially clients, that the essentiality of
ethics becomes undeniably evident. We are, to use Heidegger’s term, “thrown” into the world
where ethical challenges abound (Guignon, 1993a). Though thinking ethically may provide
helpful and essential understandings, it is not just through thinking but also through doing that
we know what to do (Crawford, 2015; van Manen, 2007). Finlay (2011) described the
phenomenological significance of practice succinctly: “Who we are is revealed through our way
of being with worldly things and through our doing. Objects are ready-to-hand, to be used or
produced in everyday experiential ways: one knows a hammer through hammering” (p. 50). To
put it in ethical terms, one knows what to do, ethically, through actually being ethical in ethical
situations.

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Finally, Personal Phenomenology itself may provide a model to facilitate a structured
kind of ethical reflection and openness that enhances existing decision-making models. Personal
Phenomenology encourages a phenomenological attitude for discovering fresh understandings of
ethical situations by rigorous openness to experience. The five waypoints of Personal
Phenomenology may help counsellors arrive at an existentially authentic personal stance in
ethically challenging situations. In turn, this stance can generate thoughtful, authentic action.
Further, Personal Phenomenology, like PEA, is a method grounded in the practice of dialogue
both within the person and between the person and others. Counselling is inherently a dialogical
practice regardless of the counsellor’s theoretical orientation. It may be worth considering how
the discipline’s ethical discourse may be enhanced by using relational processes to deepen
reflection and action.
Policy and organization. Counsellors are deeply embedded in institutions. These
institutions have particular structures, systems, cultures, values, beliefs, policies, and procedures.
Institutions can include public and private entities, the counselling profession as a whole,
regulatory bodies, and even the seemingly non-institutional realm of private practice. Private
practice is highly institutional, even if the counsellor is the sole practitioner and proprietor.
No matter where one is situated, each institution has a unique ethical, or moral, climate, a
concept with a lengthy history in the domains of business ethics and nursing ethics. Rodney,
Hartrick Doane, Storch, and Varcoe (2006) defined moral climate as “the implicit and explicit
values that drive health-care delivery and shape the workplaces in which care is delivered” (p.
24). Nursing ethicists continue to identify ways in which a poor moral climate negatively
impacts patients and professionals (Rodney, Buckley, Street, Serrano, & Martin, 2013).
Generating a positive moral climate begins, Rodney et al. (2013) argued, with the founding of a

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moral community, “a place where ethical values are made explicit and shared, where ethical
values direct action, and where individuals feel safe to be heard” (p. 198).
Is the climate of the counselling profession—as an institution in itself—ethically
hospitable? Is the climate of the institution in which the counsellor practices ethically
hospitable? Do these institutions provide fertile ground for counsellors to live out their ethicality
in a way that is beyond fulfilling institutional rules and regulations? Are these institutions
encouraging professionals to develop ethical authenticity, even if at times it is possible a
professional’s ethical authenticity could conflict with institutional values? Do education
programs foster a morally habitable climate in the profession in the way professional ethics is
laced through coursework and clinical training? Most importantly, is the regulatory
environment—that is, the milieu of professional associations and/or colleges—in which a
counsellor finds themselves, a habitable ethical climate? Do regulatory bodies and professional
associations enhance this climate and create an environment that is supportive of clinicians
being-ethical beyond mere compliance to codes and standards?
Research. A multiplicity of factors may shape how a person decides to act ethically and
what sort of ethical person they become. Certainly familial, cultural, religious, and political
influences shape our ethical vision of the world. There is some evidence that supports the idea
that counsellors’ theoretical orientations explicitly and implicitly shape their approaches to
ethical situations (Baer & Murdock, 1995; Gordon et al., 2016). Theoretical orientations provide
a structure for understanding human existence, particularly what is good or of value. Future
inquiries might investigate how theoretical orientations foster implicit preunderstandings of
ethics. Next, geographical location may shape a counsellors’ interpretations of ethical situations
and the application of codes of ethics (Gonyea, Wright, & Earl-Kulkosky, 2014; Imig, 2014;

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O’neill, Koehn, George, & Shepard, 2016). There were hints of the impact of locale on the
participants’ experience, namely that rural clinicians faced unique challenges of navigating dual
relationships. Finally, investigation of cultural influences on practitioner’s experiences of beingethical is also worthwhile. Tracing out the situatedness of the counsellors could deepen the
richness of our understanding of what it means to be ethical.
Limitations
Depending on the reader’s epistemological, ontological, and methodological
commitments, limitation can have two different possible meanings. As a good hermeneut, I
should say that there are many possible meanings. For example, limitations are the technical or
procedural gaps in methodology that result in gaps in knowledge, the cracks in the whole, the
missing pieces of the puzzle. Limitations may also be conditions that are uncontrollable, features
of our world such as time or others’ willingness to provide the level of depth in interviews.
Limitations may also be identified by those outside of the inquiry; interpretation reveals limits.
Limitations are sometimes posited as a project’s Achilles’ Heel, the evidence that will ruin an
inquiry. The limitations of an inquiry are not, in my estimation, reasons to outright dismiss any
or all of it. Rather, limitations are signposts of where to go next in seeking understanding.
Limitations are an invitation, a calling-forth to come closer to the phenomenon again, for the first
time with a renewed awareness of what might make our approach to the world more fruitful and
piercing.
Phenomenological inquiry is a fragile endeavour because of limitations that impact the
process of studying a phenomenon. Phenomenological inquiry, in my experience, is an amalgam
of risk, reward, and regret. Throughout the course of this project, I have been increasingly
persuaded that grief is an integral element of any sort of human inquiry into the things of the

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world. This grief recognizes the inadequacy of my efforts, the hiddenness of what I am
searching for, the pitiful attempts to express the inexpressible, and the enduring realization that
there always remains an excess that cannot be grasped. Indeed, phenomenological inquiry’s
fragility stems from the fact that the methods and tools employed in this sort of inquiry are
ultimately limited by the frontiers of my knowledge, consciousness, experience, and relationship.
To speak then of the limitations of this inquiry is more than to add an addendum required by any
program, supervisor, or discipline’s collective expectation on published research. It is to
acknowledge the very conditions in which understanding is expressed and experienced.
The researcher: A novice inquirer. As is common in much of life, the first time we take
up a practice or attempt to learn something new, there is an inevitable gracelessness to our
efforts. Without a doubt, the practice of phenomenological inquiry is a skill that begins, as all
human activities do, as series of clumsy and wobbly steps. Overtime, some stability and
confidence develop over the course of time and experience. By way of example, the majority of
the interviews were conducted in a short span of time due to self-imposed ambitions of
completing this thesis by the end of the following summer. In retrospect, this limited the
opportunity for refining interview questions and also introduced a certain amount of anxiety to
the interviews to that had to be mitigated as much as possible.
Data collection. In retrospect, I can see that though semi-structured interviews can
permit a certain degree of creative freedom, a more carefully crafted interview may have cracked
the surface and helped deepen the quality and intensity of the data. It quickly became apparent
that interviewing is an art in its own right. My future inquiries into being-ethical would benefit
greatly from further refinement of the interview process.

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Data analysis. Personal Phenomenology is a dialogical method (Klaassen et al., 2017;
Launeanu, Klaassen, Konieczny, et al., 2019). One limitation that I became aware of over time,
as I developed a better understanding of Personal Phenomenology, was that my dialogue with
participants was somewhat truncated in the course of data analysis. In retrospect, my analysis
would have benefited from further dialogue with participants. This would have aligned my
analysis more fully with the method’s underpinnings.
Sample. Six participants were interviewed for this inquiry. Though there was some
geographic variety amongst the sample, the participants were all located in British Columbia.
Psychologists, regulated by the provincial college, conduct therapy and counselling. However,
no registered or chartered psychologists were interviewed in this study. The political and legal
context of counselling varies around the world. Canada is no exception. Five provinces—
Quebec, Ontario, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Alberta—in Canada have colleges of
counselling therapists (CCPA, 2019). The absence of a regulatory framework for nonpsychologists who conduct counselling is a variable that ought to be considered in interpretation
of the findings. If this study included counsellors from a province with a regulatory college,
would the findings have been different or varied? It is difficult to say. Ethically challenging
situations could certainly vary based on the regulatory context. It is worth considering, though,
that the participants in this inquiry whose experience included the subjectively experienced
presence or actual influence of a professional association operated as if the association were a
regulatory body.
Interpretation: The circle continues. Lastly, I must draw attention to the limitations of
dwelling in the world as a hermeneut. Thus, I feel it is important to name the following: This
inquiry is an interpretation, my interpretation. Even though interpretation is essential to the

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methodology of Personal Phenomenology, interpretation is a sort of limitation insofar as
interpretations are subject to all sorts of limits. The limits of myself: my attention,
consciousness, questions, perception, emotional and rational capacities, and ability to express in
some way the things that I have come across in my inquiry. My interpretation is also limited by
the fact I looked into a sliver of human experience. My interpretation is limited by the
interpretation of others. Your interpretation of this inquiry is limited by my limits. We are
limited individually. But together, we might grasp something of greater whole. Hermeneutics,
however limited it might be, is also unlimited in that hermeneutics is never a closed system or a
practice aimed at achievement of an objective fact; it is not a highway with a definite,
predetermined destination.

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CHAPTER SIX: REFLEXIVITY

In chapter five, I indicate my use of Finlay’s (2011) definition of reflexivity. Reflexivity,
Finlay (2011) remarked, “refers to the researcher’s self-awareness and openness about the
research process” (p. 265). Here in chapter six, I would like to provide a more sustained, indepth insight into some of what appeared in my practice of this phenomenological inquiry.
Reflexivity highlights where I am speaking from as a person with my own subjectivity and
provides a window into how this relates to my work (Finlay, 2011). Specifically, I would like to
illuminate some significant insights I encountered in the process of conducting the inquiry and
the personal and professional experiences that informed the development of the thesis and vice
versa.
My Experience of Being-Ethical
Research begins with a burning question—or series of questions—that gestate within the
person. These questions sometimes spark formidable research programs and other times smolder
for lengthy periods of time and remain somewhat hidden even after an attempt has been made to
provide some answers—or at least a sense of direction to take the question in to find the answers.
Questions have to be asked by someone of someone or something else. But more pertinently, the
questions that are asked by someone—the inquirer—are questions in response to a question
asked of the inquirer by someone or something other. The others who have asked me questions
about what it means to be ethical are clients, colleagues, instructors, supervisors, mentors, other
professionals, and institutions. This does not mean that our dialogue is explicitly about beingethical. The dialogue may be about something that is not explicitly about ethics. However, over
time, I come to see that our dialogue is, deep down, really about ethics.

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What has been my experience of the phenomena under consideration, being-ethical as a
counsellor? Morality was a central feature of my experience as a child. Though relatively banal
in comparison to some conservative American-Christian communities, the religious, social,
educational, and political contexts that were particularly instrumental in shaping my view of the
world did develop a conspicuous moral anxiety.
Further education, moving my life to another country with a distinct moral terrain,
encountering peers and others from strikingly different backgrounds, taking prolonged detours
through a variety of religious communities, and being exposed to a range of human experiences,
all had a marked effect on my sense of morality. Though my moral thinking began attuned to the
complexities, nuances, and exceptions that appear in the throes of actual life, in stark contrast to
the neat, black-and-white moral theologies of my youth, the anxiety did not dissipate. As I began
my professional training, the moral anxiety morphed into an ethical anxiety, in my worst
moments, and a heightened ethical sensitivity, in my best moments.
Learning and reflecting on philosophical perspectives have contributed to this sensitivity.
However, it is in the day-to-day personal and professional encounters where I have grappled with
ethical challenges all of which that have sharpened my sensitivity even if at times, I feel dulled
by despair at the infinite demands made upon me.
In my first internship, I once counselled an individual who, after a few sessions, asked if
their partner could come to the sessions. After consulting with my supervisor, I agreed to the
client’s request but with certain conditions given that I had already established an alliance with
the client. When my client’s partner arrived for their first session, I found myself scrambling
when I realized that I did not have a hard copy consent form for the client’s partner to review and
sign. Generally, a consent form was generated through the online intake portal. I handed my

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client’s partner the consent form. This form included the client’s original intake questionnaire.
After the session, I suddenly gained insight into the fact that I had possibly breached my client’s
confidentiality. I felt the flush of shame in my face when I shared this with both my supervisor
and later my client. Though the situation was resolved—the client shared that they had read their
intake answers to their partner prior to their first appointment with me—the sense of
embarrassment I felt hardly dissipated.
Supervisory relationships have also generated a fair share of ethical conundrums. On the
first day of one of my internship placements in a rural community, my supervisor—who was offsite that day—asked me to send a client’s intake form via text message. I declined, saying I
would provide the intake form in person at our next meeting.
I once found myself in at an impasse with a supervisor as we worked to determine if there
was a legal obligation to contact the provincial public guardian after my client, an adult with
disability and chronic illness, informed me that their adult sibling had been emotionally abusive
and threatened my client with physical harm. I left my supervision session feeling frustrated. I
also had, brewing inside, a strong sense of certainty that I understood the law better than my
supervisor, and that my supervisor had not seen what I had seen in the law. What is more is the
fact that my supervisor had only been present with the client for just brief periods of time
compared to my lengthy sessions. I felt that my supervisor was farther away from the client than
I was and that this shaped their interpretation and judgement.
In some of these moments of ethical disagreements, I have made my position known. I
have advocated for a particular course of action. I have remained silent in other moments for a
variety of reasons: sometimes from resignation, despondency, fear, or a shortage of energy,
confidence, or moral resolve. At times I find myself challenged by the complexity, the ethical

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nuances, and the plurality of possible actions to take. Here I feel waves of uncertainty rushing
into me.
Even now, I experience tensions at the crossroads of where my personal ethical and moral
vision, my role and responsibilities, my professions’ ethical values and the expectations, and the
values and priorities of the institution in which I work intersect. These frictions heat up my
conscience and force me to take positions on matters that truthfully, I would rather not take a
position on. Moreover, I work in a small community in which encounters with clients outside of
the office are expected, frequent, and difficult to avoid. My work with individual clients who are
structurally vulnerable has evoked in me a growing ethical responsibility to support their
inclusion and equity. Even what I consider to be my best ethical navigation skills have been put
to the test time and again. I have charted some reliable courses through the sometimestempestuous waters of my work. I have found myself having to alter course rapidly in the face
of unexpected ethically challenging shoals. What has been demanded of me by these challenges
is my utmost attention, a careful attunement, and a heightened awareness to the many different
facets of the given moment.
As much as I may try to believe otherwise, I am not a neutral, detached, objective, and
positionless individual separate from the world. I have my own moral and ethical positions and
understandings. For this reason, it was essential to analysis that I reserved as much as possible
my judgement of the ethical aspects of the participants’ experiences. I felt concerned that my
analysis could too easily fall into the trap of assessing the rightness or wrongness of a particular
action in light of my own personal values. This is not to say that my personal values or my
reactions to the participants’ values and actions were uninteresting and unnecessary.
Sequestering my personal ethics, I attempted to situate myself where I could look at the

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participants’ experience with the foundational assumption that there was something far more
fundamental going on within the participants’ experience that might otherwise be missed if I
were to simply judge their experience against the templates of my personal moral values and of
the dominant interpretations and expressions of the values, principles, and standards of the
counselling profession.
Reflections on the Research Process
During the course of data analysis, I tussled regularly with understanding what it was that
phenomenology did as a research method. What was I doing as a neophyte researcher using
phenomenology? I could not help but shake the feeling that I needing to be doing something––
what, I could never be sure—particularly when I was in the phase of analysis. Doing an
interview seemed, at least at face value, relatively straight forward. I learned that is not the case.
Analysis, to a degree, seemed to be a somewhat murkier activity.
I found some guidance in my re-encounter with photography. Years ago, I once enjoyed
photography as a hobby. Over time, other interests and priorities, the relentless march of
technology towards more complex—and expensive—devices, and anxiety about the act of
creating shifted photography out of my sight and mind. Though I lost interest in the actual
activity of photographing, my attraction to the medium remained resilient.
While away on a writing retreat, it was a chance glance at a friend’s bookshelf that
generated a new grasp of both the practice of phenomenological inquiry and the subject of my
inquiry: the phenomenon of being-ethical. I perused Karr and Wood’s (2011) and Zehr’s (2005)
insightful texts on contemplative photography. I noticed that my interest in photography was
reigniting with each page I turned. But it was a quote from the French photographer Henri
Cartier-Bresson—renowned for his street photography—and an afternoon walk in the woods

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with my film camera that invigorated me further and ultimately catalyzed for me a captivating
relationship between photography and my learning of a phenomenological method. CartierBresson (1999) wrote:
In order to “give a meaning” to the world, one has to feel oneself involved in what one
frames through the viewfinder. This attitude requires concentration, a discipline of mind,
sensitivity, and a sense of geometry—it is by great economy of means that one arrives at
simplicity of expression. One must always take photographs with the greatest respect for
the subject and for oneself. (pp. 15–16)
An entire corpus of philosophical reflection and technical analysis of photography exists
full of disagreements and debates about the essences of photography. These are beyond the
scope of my work here. Though the metaphor of lenses is a tired metaphor, having been used
time and again to point to those elements within, or without, ourselves that shape our perception
of the world, the benefit of this metaphor for me was that it provided a concrete way of
understanding what felt, at times, like a nebulous and fluid process. Certainly, the use of
photography to help me understand phenomenology was a stretch. But it was an intentional
stretching, a pushing and pulling of language to take me further than where I had gone before
with just reading about phenomenology. Photography provided an access point for experiencing
the phenomenological attitude in a unique way.
Seeing the value of a concrete medium to show the world in fresh way, it increasingly
became an imperative for me to bring myself closer the actual praxis of phenomenology. It was
capturing my analysis, with phenomenological richness, that generated the most consternation.
Unremittingly, I would ask others, hoping for an authority to proclaim a timeless truth that
answered a vexing question, “Is my writing phenomenological?” It seemed reasonable, to me,

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that something had to take shape from all the doing that I had done thus far. Something certain
and concrete must come of all this. Otherwise, what would be the purpose of all of this work?
But, what exactly would I be making? What sort of creation I would be creating? When answers
to these questions did not meet the threshold for my desire for clarity, I would stare dejectedly at
my computer screen, my notebooks, and my transcripts, feeling trapped by my persistent
ignorance.
I utilized a few mediums throughout my data analysis and writing to help with my
process. I began with copious pages of traditional academic prose. I devised visual maps
alongside the linear lines of written word to try to guide me closer to the phenomenon. Fearful
of not “doing phenomenology correctly,” I fixated on producing enough analytic material,
chasing after an unknown standard.
Movement was made but only within a narrow range. One evening, I decided to push
away all expectation, to release myself from the phobia of writing wrongly. Poetic transcription
of several of the participants’ experiences became my exit from the purely rational analysis of
text. I alternated between spontaneous responsiveness to the text and structured, rational,
reflection. For example, as I contemplated the ethical significance of attention, I wrote the
following poetic transcription of how I understood Pat and her experience of working with her
adolescent client:
Attention.
I.
I had first supposed there were no demons to quell;
Your Carers have told me so.
But doubts gnaw,

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And then you share the terror that tears your limbs apart
Those Spectres that await with teeth
Arranged to unsheath,
Blades and spades and picks,
that slash to bits your body and mind,
Soul and bonds with others.
You know them to be there.
You have told me so.
Even if we have no name
To claim and demark these nebulous Phantoms
That have made their presence clear before.

II.
Attention: That ever-shifting, shaping, breaking, conduit
Fashioned between ‘You’ and ‘I.’
Such a structure, shared by each in existence, is
built, destroyed, and re-created in seconds of time
I hope now, and now again, that something lasting
Might rise to make a way for me to cross to You.
And You to I.
That precision, that devotion,
the concentrated composition of my heart and mind
in melodic mingling;

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my body’s absolute presence in the traces of actuality
emanating from your face:
These are that which keeps us as we keep it even but for an instant.
It is gone.
It is here.
It is far.
It is near.

III.
My attention: Attenuated by my skittish anticipation that
Should I miss
And my focus and connectedness
with the you withdraw at
a glance of the terrifying chance
Of a blade wielding beast inside,
Despite our best intent, our concentration tumbles and plummets
In yawning anxiety widened by
what-ifs, what-nexts, what-nows, what-thens;
It is hard to be with and for the Sufferer;
It is a work of art,
with such feeble concentration,
as we humans have,
to be the bringer of Relief

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in the hope of something new.

When mind and heart—fluttering and shuddering
with tensity and terror—
Leaps towards Tomorrow or the unknown error,
Fear stalks our placid estate
Where thick intention is the courier of connexion.
Suscept to infarction by great unease.
If I fail to appraise the given situation
What then?
If I miss. This.
This.
This.

This.

This.

This.
This.
This.
This.
This.
This.
What then?
I also vacillated between doubts and confidence in what I was doing, between despair and
hope in this new way of seeing, and between shame and joy at what I was experiencing. All of
these movements are captured in physical notebooks, in a collection of computer files, and
certainly in my heart and mind. Contained in these are traces, shadows, highlights, and

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fragments of a whole that I cannot, and may never, fully see from my limited vantage point.
What is developed in these pages is only one possible composition of what the light of
participants experience have revealed in the frame of this phenomenological inquiry. These
words are the positive happens when I expose what I captured on the emulsion my being—I hope
I am sensitive enough to reveal the dynamic ranges of experiences—of scenes that I have seen. I
cannot possibly say all that there is to say about the phenomenon. Composition involves the
organization of what is seen; not all that is seen can be contained in a single frame. CartierBresson (1999) offered an instructive observation, certainly not drawn from mere abstract
theorization, but from his own way of making images on the streets of France:
Things-As-They-Are offer such an abundance of material that a photographer must guard
against the temptation of trying to do everything. It is essential to cut from the raw
material of life—to cut and cut, but to cut with discrimination. (p. 24)
Thus, the limitations of inquiry and interpretation are ever present; a phenomenological
composition cannot be inclusive of each and every angle nor can it hold in focus a perfect image
of the whole. As a result, I have come to see that the proper posture towards the central concern
of any phenomenological inquiry in my mind is a posture of reverence, invoked by a sense of
being taken by richness and depth of the phenomenon.
On a similar note, van Manen (2016) commented that “it is not at all surprising that
wonder is the central methodological feature of phenomenological inquiry” (p. 5). Wonder is to
be found in the inquirer’s approach to and exposition of the phenomenon. Failure to respect, to
revere, to wonder at the phenomenon, and at the varieties of experiences that appear in its wake,
can lead us towards objectification and dogmatization. The paradox of phenomenological
inquiry, however, is that in the effort to produce something that we can call “research,” there

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must also be an effort to respect that what we are “researching” is in many ways unsearchable
and inexpressible. “A truth is to be known always, to be uttered sometimes,” wrote the poet
Khalil Gibran (2017, p. 362).
Living the Phenomenon: Encountering being-ethical from the other side
Alongside the day-to-day encounters in my professional capacities, there are moments in
which I can sense that I had entered into the phenomenon of being-ethical from a very different
approach, a more personal way than I could have ever anticipated.
s

e

t

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r

o

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CHAPTER SEVEN: CONCLUSION

We have arrived at the end of this phenomenological foray into the experience of beingethical as a counsellor. To understand the phenomenon of being-ethical, and how it appears in
lived experience, I interviewed six participants, all counsellors engaged primarily in private
practice. Each participant described an experience, or experiences, that they identified as
ethically and/or morally challenging. Deployed in this inquiry was Personal Phenomenology, a
novel approach to phenomenological analysis currently being developed within the Existential
Analytic tradition of psychotherapy.
My analysis of the participants’ experiences concluded with phenomenological writing
that appears in chapter five. Here I accentuated six features of being-ethical: Being-ethical is
realized in seeing the world as steeped in ethical significance. This leads us into the nascence of
attentiveness, both the means and the ends to being-ethical. Being-ethical transpires on moral
terrain where negotiating the proximity between ourselves and the other is a fundamental task.
Negotiating proximity can take place in a dynamic movement of coming close, distancing, and
coming close again. In proximity to the other, we are exposed by being-ethical. We are exposed
to what it is that the other carries—what they suffer—to us. Exposure can also be highly
vulnerable because of we are always being evaluated by others. Incited in us is an awareness of
third parties who may observe from afar or be intertwined in the moment-by-moment encounter
with the other who is before us. Careful and critical engagement with these third parties is a
necessary part of being-ethical. Finally, being-ethical as a practitioner occurs in decisive
moments. Though we may have opportunities to think and reflect about some ethically
challenging situations, many of these situations surprise us and require us to take swift action.

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Or we may arrive at an intersection of ethical options where we sense the direction to take with
clarity.
These features are not an exhaustive description and interpretation of the phenomenon of
being-ethical. However, these features stimulate further questions about what it means to be an
ethical counsellor. In conclusion, my hope is that counsellors, including myself, are moved to
amplify time-honoured ethical principles and the collective wisdom of the profession and its
various institutions by making these our own-most. Being-authentically-ethical can expand our
ethical imaginations and the horizons of possibilities in complex encounters in everyday life that
call for sensitive engagement and responses. To do this, we must also engage with the personal
work to deepen our knowledge of ourselves as ethical beings, that is to say, to interpret the
ethicality of our being. All of this is encouraged by heightening our sensitivity to our
interconnectedness as professionals as we profess together a shared commitment to and concern
for the genuine care of our fellow human beings.

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APPENDIX A: RECRUITMENT NOTICE

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APPENDIX B: PARTICIPANT PROFILE

PARTICIPANT PROFILE
Counsellors' experiences of ethically and/or morally challenging situations.
Ryan J. Schutt
Principal Investigator (PI)
Graduate Student, MA Counselling Psychology
Trinity Western University, Langley, BC
Note. Please do not write any identifying information (e.g. Your name, employer’s name,
location) on this profile.
Participant Pseudonym

EDUCATION
Degree - Check all that apply:

Please specify field of study:

BA or BSc
MA/MEd/MSc
PhD
PsyD
Other (e.g. Diploma, training)

YOUR AREA OF PRACTICE
What practice contexts have you worked in?
Check all that apply.

# of years

Currently
practicing here?

Private Practice (Sole Practitioner)

Yes

No

Independent practitioner in group practice

Yes

No

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Private clinic (Employee or contracted)

Yes

No

Non-profit agency or clinic

Yes

No

Yes

No

Government agency or clinic

Yes

No

Other (including other helping professions)

Yes

No

Health authority or other healthcare
institution

Please specify:

REGISTRATION
# of years
Are you a member of BCACC?

Yes

No

Are you a member of CCPA?

Yes

No

Are you a member/registrant of another
counselling, or related profession, association
or college (e.g., RN)? – Please specify:

Yes

No

CHECKLIST – For principal investigator use.
Participant profile completed.
Informed consent reviewed with participant.
Copy of signed informed for research file.
Copy of signed informed for participant.
Debriefing form reviewed with participant.
Copy of signed debriefing form for research file
Copy of signed debriefing form for participant

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APPENDIX C: INFORMED CONSENT

INFORMED CONSENT
Counsellors' experiences of ethically and/or morally challenging situations.
Ryan J. Schutt
Principal Investigator (PI)
Graduate Student, MA Counselling Psychology
Trinity Western University, Langley, BC

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The purpose of this study is to explore counsellors’ experiences of ethically and/or morally
challenging situations in clinical practice. These situations may negatively impact
professionals' well-being and professional practice, and ultimately may affect how the
professional cares for clients. Sometimes the negative impacts contribute to compassion
fatigue and burnout. The nursing profession uses the term moral distress to describe the
distress that may come when facing ethical and/or moral challenges in clinical practice. Moral
distress is considered to be a “feature of the [nursing profession’s] clinical landscape”
(Berger, 2014). However, not much is known about the presence of moral distress in
counselling professionals. This study intends to contribute to our understanding of moral
distress in counselling by exploring counsellors’ experiences of ethically and/or morally
challenging situations via hermeneutic phenomenology, a qualitative data analysis
methodology.

PROCEDURES
If you choose to participate in this study, you will be asked to review and sign this informed
consent and a participant profile. Next, you will sit down with the principal investigator who
has a series of questions and prompts to help you explore your experiences of an ethically
and/or morally challenging situation that you’ve encountered in your counselling practice.
Your responses will be recorded on a digital voice recorder. It is estimated that you will need
to set aside 1.5 – 2 hours of your time for completing the entire study. Approximately 60-90
minutes of this time will be devoted to the interview itself.
After the interview, the principal investigator will debrief with you and answer any questions
or concerns you might have. You will receive a debriefing form where you can indicate if you
would like to receive a copy of the research report. You may also indicate if you would be
willing to be contacted after this interview if the principal investigator has follow-up
questions. You may also indicate if you would be willing to review the summary and/or
findings and provide feedback. You may do so up until the thesis is submitted for internal

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defence to the MA in Counselling Psychology department at Trinity Western University. The
internal defence is expected to occur in summer 2018. The principal investigator will notify
you two weeks prior to the date.

POTENTIAL RISKS AND DISCOMFORTS
During this study, you will be asked questions that may invite you to share your personal
experience related to an ethically and/or morally challenging situation. Some of these
questions may feel personal to you or may touch on some sensitive areas. If you experience
emotional discomfort during the interview, please let the principal investigator know. You are
free to end the interview at any time or continue it at a later date. You may also withdraw
from participation entirely. If needed, you are encouraged to contact your clinical supervisor,
your own counsellor, or a trusted peer to process your experiences. The principal investigator
can also provide you with a list of counsellors whom you may contact.

POTENTIAL BENEFITS OF PARTICIPATION
Direct Benefits. You may find that talking about your experience is a helpful process. You may
find that your participation could provide clarity to or a new perspective on your experience
of ethically and/or morally challenging situations.
Societal Benefits. The findings from this study may form the basis for future research on
moral distress in counselling and hopefully bring greater insights into moral distress that can
benefit other helping professions as well. Your participation may help other counselling
professionals who read the findings reflect on their own experiences of ethically and/or
morally challenging situations

CONFIDENTIALITY AND ANONYMITY
Any information that you share during this entire study will remain confidential. To preserve
your anonymity, research forms, such as this informed consent, will not be stored with the
audio recording or the transcript of the interview. Recorded interviews will be transcribed
and identifying details such as names of persons, organizations, or cities will be removed.
Direct quotations and/or summaries of your experiences may be used in the final research
report to provide readers with a rich description of your experience. Thesis supervisors and
research assistants assisting with data analysis will receive these anonymized transcripts.
Thesis supervisors will also have access to your informed consent, participant profile, and
debriefing form to ensure the integrity of the research process.

DATA: STORAGE AND RETENTION
Storage. The interview’s recording and transcripts will be saved on a password protected and
encrypted USB in a locked file cabinet. A copy of this informed consent form, your participant

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profile, and your debriefing form will also be retained. These documents will be stored in a
separate locked file cabinet so as to preserve your anonymity. Research related materials will
be transferred between physical locations with a locked briefcase.
Retention. In accordance with departmental policy, audio recordings, anonymized
transcripts, and forms are stored indefinitely by the MA in Counselling Psychology
department. The purpose for doing so is to provide accountability and ensure the integrity of
the research study in the event that the research report is submitted to a peer-reviewed
publication. Anonymized data may also be used for future research if you give consent and
REB gives approval to conduct the research.

COMPENSATION
There is no remuneration or compensation for participation in this study.

QUESTIONS OR CONCERNS ABOUT STUDY
If you have any questions or concerns about the study itself, you may contact:
Ryan J. Schutt
Principal Investigator

Or, you may also contact the principal investigator’s supervisor:
Mihaela Launeanu, PhD, RCC
Assistant Professor, MA in Counselling Psychology
Trinity Western University
mihaela.launeanu@twu.ca

CONTACT FOR CONCERNS ABOUT YOUR RIGHTS AS A PARTICIPANT
If you have any concerns about your treatment or rights as a research participant, you may
contact:
Elizabeth Kreiter
Research Ethics Board Coordinator, Office of Research
Trinity Western University
604-513-2167
elizabeth.kreiter@twu.ca

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WITHDRAWING FROM THE STUDY
To withdraw from the study, please contact the principal investigator. You do not need to
give a reason for your withdrawal. There are no penalties for withdrawing from the study. If
you choose to withdraw from the study, a signed copy of this informed consent, your
debriefing form will be retained securely. Audio recordings and transcripts will be destroyed.
Your data will be removed from the research report and from research notes.

CONSENT
Your signature below indicates that:











You consent to participate in this study.
You understand the risks and benefits of participation.
You understand that your responses will be kept confidential
You understand that the principal investigator will take steps to protect your
anonymity during the research process
You understand that you may request to review summaries and interpretations of
your interview that will be used in the final research report up until the final report is
submitted to the MA Counselling Psychology department for an internal defence.
You understand that you may withdraw from the study at any time up until the final
report is submitted to the MA Counselling Psychology department for an internal
defence. You do not need to give a reason for your withdrawal.
You have had your questions about the study answered to your satisfaction.
You have received a copy of this consent form for your own records.

Printed Name of Participant

Signature

Date

Printed Name of PI

Signature

Date

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APPENDIX D: SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEW GUIDE

SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEW GUIDE

Counsellors’ Experiences of Ethically and/or Morally Challenging Situations
Ryan J. Schutt
Principal Investigator
Graduate Student, MA Counselling Psychology
Trinity Western University, Langley, BC

Questions regarding clinical practice
1. Briefly describe for me your theoretical orientation.
2. Briefly describe the population(s) and/or clients’ presenting concern(s) that you most
frequently work with.
Questions regarding ethically and/or morally challenging situations
3. Tell me, in as much detail as you feel comfortable, about a situation that was ethically or
morally challenging to you in your clinical practice.
4. Tell me how you felt about the situation when you first recognized it as an ethical or
moral challenge.
5. Tell me about how you felt while the situation was being resolve? After it was resolved?
6. Tell me about the impact that the situation had on you personally.
7. Tell me about the impact that the situation had on you professionally.
8. Tell me about the impact that the situation had on your therapeutic alliance with the
client.
9. Tell me about how other factors—such as colleagues and institutions—influenced your
experience of the situation.
10. Tell me about how your theoretical orientation affects your ethical perspective and
moral values.
11. Tell me about how your theoretical orientation influences your ethical decision making.
Questions prior to debriefing
1. How well did you feel prepared by your training to work through ethically and/or
morally challenging situations?

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APPENDIX E: CONFIDENTIALITY AGREEMENT

CONFIDENTIALITY AGREEMENT

Counsellors’ Experiences of Ethically and/or Morally Challenging Situations
Ryan J. Schutt
Principal Investigator (PI)
Graduate Student, MA Counselling Psychology
Trinity Western University, Langley, BC

PERSONAL INFORMATION
Last Name

First Name

Phone

E-mail

YOUR ROLE
You have agreed to provide services to the PI for this study as a research assistant.
Research assistants will assist with phenomenological data analysis in group meetings and
individual conversations with PI.

POLICIES
As a research assistant, it is important that you understand your role in maintaining the
integrity of the research process especially the anonymity and confidentiality of participants’
data. Please review the following policies. Some policies may not be related to your role:
1. The content of the conversations you have with the principal investigator, other
research assistants, and/or thesis supervisors must be kept confidential at all times.
2. You will keep all the research information shared with you confidential by not
discussing or sharing the research information in any form or format (e.g., disks, tapes,
transcripts) with anyone other than the principal investigator or thesis supervisors.
3. You will keep all research information in any form or format (e.g., disks, tapes,
transcripts) secure while it is in your possession. This includes, but is not limited to:

Using closed headphones when listening to audio for transcription if in a public
location.

Ensuring that your computer is “locked” with a main password.

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
Keeping transcribed documents and audio files in a password protected file on
your computer.

Closing research-related audio or documents when temporarily away from
your computer.

Keeping printed documents (e.g., Transcripts) locked in a secure location such
as a file cabinet.

Not sharing passwords or login information with others.
4. You will return all research information in any form or format (e.g., disks, tapes,
transcripts) to the principal investigator when you have completed the research tasks.
5. You will consult with the principal investigator BEFORE erasing or destroying all
research information in any form or format regarding this research project that is not
returnable to the principal investigator (e.g., information stored on computer hard drive).
6. You must inform the principal investigator of any breach of data security as soon as
possible.

AGREEMENT
By signing this agreement, you are acknowledging that you have read and understood your
role and its responsibilities and obligations and agree to abide by these responsibilities and
obligations. You also acknowledge by signing that have had the opportunity to ask the
principal investigator any questions that you might have.

Printed Name of Transcriptionist

Signature

Date

Printed Name of PI

Signature

Date

CHECKLIST – For principal investigator use only.
Signed copy of agreement for research assistant
Signed copy of agreement for research file