One of the harder parts of counselling is knowing what to do when a client’s values feel very different from our own.
Sometimes that difference is political. Sometimes it is about relationships, identity, parenting, religion, class, gender, immigration or social issues. Whatever form it takes, it can stir something strong in the therapist: discomfort, sadness, anger, fear, or simply a sense of strain in the room.
I do not think the answer is to pretend we have no reaction. We are human before we are helpful. But I also do not think the answer is to make therapy a place where we correct clients into our own way of seeing the world. The challenge is to stay thoughtful, ethical and relational when difference feels hard to hold.
For me, that is the real question behind different values in therapy. Not, ‘Can I make myself feel nothing?’ but, ‘What happens to the therapeutic relationship when I feel strongly affected by a client’s views?’
Why different values in therapy can feel difficult
What makes this hard is not always the opinion itself. Often it is what happens in us when that opinion enters the room.
We may notice ourselves tightening. Our curiosity narrows. We feel less open, less warm, less able to stay alongside the client. We may want to challenge, move away from the topic, or steer the conversation somewhere safer. Even if we say very little, something in our presence may shift.
Clients often notice that.
They may not know exactly what has changed, but they can sense when the room feels less spacious. They can pick up a loss of warmth, a sharper question, a silence that feels different, or an energy of withdrawal. So even if a therapist never shares their own political or personal views, difference can still have a real impact on the work.
That is why this is not just a question about self-disclosure. It is a question about relationship.
Is therapy about neutrality or relationship?
I am wary of the idea that therapy is a neutral, value-free space.
Of course we should not use our role to shame, persuade or overpower a client. Therapy is not the place for a moral argument. Clients are not there to be trained into our worldview. But nor do I believe that therapists somehow leave their values, histories, identities and sensitivities outside the room.
We bring ourselves with us. The question is whether we know ourselves well enough not to act those things out in ways that limit the client.
That is why I find it more helpful to think relationally than in terms of neutrality. What matters is not only what the client believes, but what happens between us when those beliefs are spoken. Can I stay present? Can I keep listening? Can I remain interested in the client’s inner world rather than getting caught in my own reaction to the content?
Therapy does not depend on sameness. It depends on whether difference can be thought about, survived and worked with.
Curiosity is not the same as collusion
When I feel confronted by a client’s views, the most useful place for me to return to is curiosity.
Not a bland or detached curiosity, but a genuine therapeutic one.
What does this belief mean to the client?
What role does it play in their sense of self?
What fear, hurt or loyalty might sit underneath it?
How do they experience people who disagree with them?
What is it like for them to say this here, with me?
Those questions help move the work away from debate and back towards understanding.
Sometimes what presents as a fixed political or moral position is doing important emotional work. It may protect against shame. It may defend against helplessness. It may offer belonging, certainty or identity. That does not mean every belief is harmless, and it does not mean we endorse it. But it does remind us that therapy is usually trying to understand what is happening underneath the surface.
That, to me, is the difference between curiosity and collusion.
Curiosity says, ‘Help me understand what this means in your world.’
Collusion says, ‘I will avoid thinking about the impact of this because it feels uncomfortable.’
We need to be able to stay open without becoming passive, and thoughtful without becoming punitive.
Why supervision matters when values are activated
This is exactly the sort of issue that belongs in supervision.
When a client’s values stir something strong in us, we need somewhere to think carefully about what is happening. What belongs to the client? What belongs to us? What belongs to the wider culture or political climate? And what belongs to the relationship that is forming between us?
Sometimes the client’s views touch directly on the therapist’s own lived experience. Sometimes they connect with earlier wounds, moral distress, or a sense of threat. Sometimes the difficulty is not the content alone, but the way it affects the working alliance.
All of that needs reflection.
Without that space, it is too easy for our reactions to leak into the work. Not necessarily in obvious ways, but in subtle ones: a cooling of warmth, less patience, less openness, a wish to move the client away from difficult material, or a growing sense that we are no longer truly alongside them.
There may be times when personal therapy is important too. Not because therapists should be endlessly untroubled, but because our reactions deserve somewhere safe to be understood.
When limits need to be recognised
I do not think good therapy means being able to work with absolutely anyone, under any circumstances, no matter what is happening in the room.
There are times when a therapist’s capacity to remain open, respectful and genuinely useful may be compromised. There may also be situations where the therapist feels unsafe, where the client’s way of expressing their views becomes harmful, or where the therapeutic frame is no longer holding well enough for meaningful work to continue.
I think it is better to recognise that honestly than to pretend to have unlimited capacity.
There can be pressure in our profession to sound endlessly spacious, as though mature practice means being able to sit calmly with everything. I do not believe that. I think mature practice also includes knowing where our edges are, and taking responsibility for them.
That does not mean ending work lightly, or simply because a client thinks differently from us. It does mean being honest when the relationship is becoming strained in ways that supervision cannot repair, or when our own presence is no longer as clear and trustworthy as it needs to be.
Different values in therapy require reflection, not perfection
There is no perfect formula for working with different values in therapy.
What matters, I think, is whether we can reflect honestly on our own responses and stay in touch with the relationship. We do not need to agree with clients in order to work with them. Understanding is not the same as endorsement. Curiosity is not the same as collusion. And keeping our own views private does not automatically make us neutral.
In the end, the question is not whether difference will appear in therapy. It will. The question is whether we can meet that difference in a way that is ethical, relational and thoughtful.
For me, that is the heart of the work.
Different values in therapy will sometimes stretch us. They may expose our assumptions, our limits, our humanity and our blind spots. Good practice is not about being untouched by that. It is about being trustworthy with it.