Carl Rogers was an American psychotherapist and author. His books include ‘Client centered Therapy’ (1951), and ‘Becoming a Person‘ (1961).
Carl Rogers asserted that self-awareness is crucial for personal growth. He regarded critical reflection as vital for promoting learning and self-assessment, enabling us to identify and evaluate our skills and development needs. This leads to more proactive personal and professional development planning and continuing professional development (CPD). Self-reflection helps us to develop problem solving skills and find solutions in planning action for behaviour change. In reflecting on experiences, we can understand how we learn, start to observe our own progress in learning, limits of understanding, and develop more effective critical thinking skills by questioning and analysing our own and others’ behaviour. In this way, we can begin to understand ourselves and be more self-critical in a positive way.
Rogers was a particular expert on empathy (understanding other people’s feelings) and a great advocate of the importance of empathy in objective thinking, which is explained later in Reflective Practice objectivity.