Being a mental health professional is not as easy as it seems. A person to understand the other person’s mental level and stability is described on the basis of the knowledge that a particular person has after studying profile behaviours of such mentally ill patients for years.
This kind of knowledge is not easily achieved, it’s the level of another person stability.
Tips to Become a Qualified Mental Health Professional:
There are several ways to handle such mental health disorders, but a person who can understand the mental illness and instability of another person’s mind can be called as a mental health professional.
And to become such a mental health professional, there are some ways which are mentioned below
1. Study bachelor’s degree:
More than emotional factors being a mental health professional there are professional factors which are considered to be a mental health professional. A person who wants to become a mental health professional need to understand that not just emotional understanding over another human being can bring one an ability to treat a mentally ill patient.
To be professional enough in this certain field, one needs to complete their bachelor’s degree in mental health and gain a value for their interest over mental health professional.
Additional value:
After completing their bachelor’s degree in psychology, a person can start working as a volunteer in certain mental health store to ensure themselves that they can carry on with their professional course of mental health.
These kinds of volunteering can bring a certain kind of value to one’s bachelor’s degree in psychology.
2. Think of the master’s degree:
After completion of one’s bachelor’s degree in psychology, to continue further with the education and their professional dream, they must think of starting a master’s degree in psychology.
These master’s degree can bring higher knowledge about mental diseases which triggers mental health of a healthy human being. Therefore, after the completion of a master’s degree on can think of going with the further process of being a mental health professional.
Additional value:
To bring additional knowledge to one’s master’s degree, a person can start applying for internships in the most reputed mental health centers to gain a professional knowledge and also these kinds of internships certify that the person interning in their mental health centers is liable of handling mentally ill patients.
3. Clinical experience:
A person who wants to be a professional mental health doctor must have a license for his / her practice. To avail, such license from government registered mental health institution, a person who wants to start his / her career needs to fulfill the minimum experience required to gain a license from these registered departments of mental health institutions.
A person who is willing to complete the minimum clinical experience to become a mental health professional will be granted by a license of such approval so that he/she can start their professional career as a mental health professional.
Minimum requirement of clinical experience:
To avail a license of government registered mental health institution, a person needs to complete 2000-3000 hours of clinical experience in such mental health institution. In short, 2 years of clinical work experience in mental health centers.
4. Hold a government license:
Once, after completion of clinical experience in such mental health institution is availed, then he/she can obtain licenses to start his / her professional practice. A government will issue such license to those candidates who is capable enough to run such mental health centers.
Most of the mental health centers provide fake license showing that their center is registered under government. To avoid such fraud in this field of work, the government needs to be sure of all mental health centers, whether they’re holding an original license from government registered mental health institution.
5. Renewal of license:
The renewal of such a license can be obtained on a yearly basis. These renewals can be held on through attending online seminars, online project works of such mental health patients or by continuing their study in psychology to gain more knowledge on this.
By continuing with their practice under psychology or by working in such mental health centers a person keeps on renewing their license without any issues from the government officials.
Additional value:
A person who received a license from the reputed government registered mental health institution can renew such license by keeping their practice or by joining such reputed professional organization which works under psychological study.
These kinds of professional organizations provide a chance of counseling mentally ill patients so that one can avail more experience over them. This helps them to be completely prepared.
Key Skills to become a Mental Health Professional:
Other than being a professional mental health analyst, a person should require some key skills to handle such mentally ill patients. Having a license over handling mental health will not favor one if he/she is not capable of handling key emotional skill. And here are some of the key skills to be required, they are as follows.
1. Compassion:
A person who is willing to become a mental health professional needs to compassionate over the pain and suffering of the patient going through. By understanding the level of his / her patient’s pain and difficulty personally, one can help him / her patient to move out of it.
Being compassionate about a patient’s pain and suffering will help a counsellor to understand the state of mind of that patient. This helps a counsellor to understand the capability of the patient’ mental strength.
2. Strong will:
Sometimes being a mental health professional can turn one emotionally weak, to avoid such breakdowns a counsellor needs to have a strong will over his / her emotional ability. A strong will can help a mental health professional to understand the stability of another person.
If a mental health counsellor fails to be stable during his / her sessions with one of his / her patients then a counsellor is not eligible to handle a mental health profession as required.
3. Being calm:
A counsellor needs to be calm enough to understand the problems of his / her patients. By listening to a patient calmly and helping them in their healing process will turn them into a positive person.
A mentally ill person thinks about negativity all the time and a counsellor can turn his / her negative thoughts into a positive element. These kinds of techniques will help a counsellor to understand the state of his / her patient’s mind.
4. Listening skills:
A mental health counsellor who is handling such a mentally ill patient should listen to what his/her patient wants them to listen. By listening to their side of the story or the problem they are going through will help them gain a trust of the patient. Once a person or a counsellor gains the trust of the patients then he/ she can be handled at their best interest.
Listening skill is such kind of skill where the other person should hear all things about that person which he/she hesitate to share it with anyone. A counsellor can make his / her patient comfortable so that they can share their issues.
5. Organizational skills:
To become a mental health professional, the counsellor needs to be perfect with their organizational skills. Organizational skill is such kind of skill where one needs to be self-disciplined to handle the problem on his / her patients. By being self-disciplined a counsellor can organize his / her patient’s requirement to the first priority.
This will ultimately help a counsellor to understand the mental health issues going on inside of his / her patient which a counsellor needs to know. By sharing such issues with a counsellor a patient will feel better about themselves and ultimately this is an achievement for a counsellor.
6. Behavioural analysis:
A counsellor who studied mental health subjects or psychology needs to understand the meaning of the other person’s behaviour. Behavioural analysis will help one to understand the state of one’s mind.
Analyzing a person’s behaviour can help a counsellor the way of his / her patients thinking. This will ultimately help a counsellor to treat him/her in a better manner.
7. Speaking skills:
A counsellor may come across such patient’s who are really quite in themselves. And to open up with such patient’s, a counsellor needs to start talking to them. By speaking about some of the things a counsellor likes to do or something which he/she experiences his / her childhood or also about his / her family and friends.
By speaking to them a counsellor can make his / her patient feel comfortable to speak about anything he/she wants to share. These kinds of speaking skills will help a counsellor to gain the trust of his / her patient.
8. People skills:
A counsellor being a mental health professional needs to study the behavioural changes of people. A counsellor needs to understand the effects of their behaviour whether it can turn positive or negative.
Because this will help a counsellor to understand the issues of his / her patient’s going through personally or professionally. Sometimes there will be issues which they don’t want to discuss, but being a counsellor it’s his / her duty to make their patient feel comfortable enough to share their issues with them.
9. Comfortability:
By comforting them into their side of the story or the problem they are going through will help them gain a trust of the patient. Once a person or a counsellor gains the trust of the patients then he/ she can be handled at their best interest.
Listening skill is such kind of skill where the other person should hear all things about that person which he/she hesitate to share it with anyone. A counsellor can make his / her patient comfortable so that they can share their issues.
10. Knowledge therapy:
A counsellor should know the treatment process of certain mental illness. As a counsellor know their patients very well, they should be aware of the treatment procedure for such patients.
Knowledge about therapy is an essential quality of an approved mental health professional where he/she knows the actual therapy, which can preferably suitable for such patients other than medications. This can ultimately help a counsellor to gain knowledge about such therapies.
11. Counseling techniques:
A person who availed all the knowledge about mental health therapy and also availed a license of such mental health professionals can be considered to understand the counseling techniques.
A counsellor should know all the details of the counseling techniques because a normal person cannot handle such techniques. A counsellor knows all the techniques of counseling, a therapy where he/she can treat a patient very well.
Final Words :
To end this discussion, we would state that being a mental health professional is not an easy job. A person needs to prepared personally and professionally before studying such professional course. Not just professional degree will help a person to study mental health study, which is psychology, but a person having emotional skill can be a perfect mental health professional.
Therefore, to become a mental health professional one needs to study some professional and personal skills to understand mentally ill patients. These professional personal skills are stated above in detail and if someone wants to study psychology, here above mentioned are the steps to follow to become a mental health professional.
