Over Thanksgiving, I went back to my home city of Sao Paulo, Brazil. I was full of what I had been learning during my first semester of grad school. In Sao Paulo, I realized anew that different methods might be needed in different contexts. One example of this was in the area of listening. In the US, it seems people feel someone is listening well if the person sits quietly while they are talking and asks good questions. In Brazil, that did not seem to go over as well. When I tried to quietly listen, it seemed I was not as engaged in the life issue as others who were more verbal in their response. When I asked the kind of questions I would naturally ask here, people were sometimes a little taken aback. For example, when I asked questions to check my assumptions, it came across as if I lacked intuitive understanding of what they were sharing. It was expected that conversation would happen more fluidly and less formally, and perhaps even that I would have strong opinions and express them. This was in an informal friendship-based context, but my experience with the counseling professions in Brazil gives me the impression that a strong sense of the "right" direction, of having the answer, is expected from the counselor, also.
As I have spent more time thinking about my interactions in Sao Paulo, I have wondered what kind of counseling approach I should take if I moved back to Sao Paulo as a therapist. Could American listening methods be useful, and even liberating, if people were told what to expect from the beginning? In other words, if a person came in for counseling and I told them that I would not give them advice, but instead was there only to ask clarifying questions that would help them make their own decisions, would that create a greater sense of empowerment? Or would it simply create estrangement? Could I adapt to a style more normal in the Brazilian environment without doing harm through foolish advice or jumping to conclusions? I believe I would have to spend more time in a Brazilian context to reach satisfactory conclusions on these questions.
Even more challenging, in some ways, in Brazil, was thinking about how to respond to physical needs. In my current internship in Pittsburgh, although part of the goal has to do with mental health, a significant piece of is to make sure they have the basic resources they need to live stable lives. On the most immediate level, this includes adequate housing, food, and clothing. On a longer-term level, it includes goals in employment, education, and healthier relationships. In every area, except perhaps the last, meeting these goals is more challenging in Brazil. There is no government food stamps program and food is more expensive relative to an average working class salary. As far as I know, there is no social security, SSI, or unemployment benefits that can provide an income to people who are not working. In terms of housing, although there are a few high rise housing projects, I have never heard of anything like HUD or Section 8. Almost all help in these areas come from the community, non-profits, and religious groups, not from the government.
So how do I apply Mazlow's hierarchy of needs in that context? Or should I even try? In a Brazilian context, sometimes the hierarchy seems to work backwards: encouraging self-actualization (the pursuit of dreams) leads to better esteem and relationships, which in turn provide the necessary community tools for safety and meeting physiological needs. Once again, these thoughts require further pondering within a Brazilian community.
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