Author | Sophie Luo

This world is full of different voices that keep telling us who we are, trying very hard to feed us with their worldview/value systems and ultimately to win our heart and loyalty. Every counselor/therapist has his/her own worldview and provides counseling based on that particular worldview. Here are two typical voices (worldviews) that we hear. Which one do you listen to? And how does that impact your own life and how you see the world?

Voice I (A Declaration of Self-esteem in a Culture Emphasizing Self-esteem)

I AM ME
In all the world, there is no one else exactly like me
Everything that comes out of me is authentically mine
Because I alone choose it – I own everything about me
My body, my feelings, my mouth, my voice, all my actions,
Whether they be to others or to myself – I own my fantasies,
My dreams, my hopes, my fears – I own all my triumphs and successes,
all my failures and mistakes because I own all of me,
I can become intimately acquainted with me
By so doing, I can love me and be friendly with me in all my parts
I know there are aspects about myself that puzzle me,
and other aspects that I do not know
But as long as I am friendly and loving to myself,
I can courageously and hopefully look for solutions to the puzzles
and for ways to find out more about me
However I look and sound, whatever I say and do, and
Whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time
is authentically me
If later some parts of how I looked, sounded, thought and felt
turn out to be unfitting, I can discard that which is unfitting,
keep the rest, and invent something new for that which I discarded
I can see, hear, feel, think, say, and do
I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive,
and to make sense and order out of the world of people
and things outside of me
I own me, and therefore I can engineer me
I am me and I AM OKAY

– Virginia Satir *

* Virginia Satir was a pioneer and leader in family systems therapy. In two national surveys of psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, and marriage & family therapists, she was voted the most influential therapist.

Voice II (Biblical Counseling)

Q. What is your only comfort in life and in death?
A. That I am not my own, but belong –
body and soul,
in life and in death –
to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ.
He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood,
and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.
He also watches over me in such a way
that not a hair can fall from my head
without the will of my Father in heaven;
in fact, all things must work together for my salvation.
Because I belong to him,
Christ, by his Holy Spirit,
assures me of eternal life
and makes me whole-heartedly willing and ready
from now on to live for him.
Q. What must you know to live and die in the joy of this comfort?
A. Three things:
First, how great my sin and misery are;
Second, how I am set free from all my sins and misery;
Third, how I am to thank God for such deliverance.



– Heidelberg Catechism

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