There are a number of professional fields involving counseling – the medical doctor, a psychologist or even a psychiatrist. It is an essential part of their work to help their clients (patients) deal with their way of life with the major objective of physical and mental health in mind. They also help those suffering by counseling (among other things). It means caring for other people in a professional way. This is the essemtial “pastoral” element in their work – caring for the sake of well-being of others. There are two fields that come to my mind where this pastoral element of caring for others is involved – that of a pastor of a congregation involved in all aspects (Christian Counseling) that sometimes may also mean active crisis intervention in certain situations. The other field non-medical field is the work of a teacher – especially a teacher dealing with older and more “mature” students about to enter the hall of their own lives in preparing for it (ca.17 – 23/25 years aged students). While at college or university, they are taking basic decisions on which field to work in after graduation and what to do else in their lives ahead of them.
In the Western tradition, a teacher at that developmental stage of his/her students is mainly confined to his role of transmitting/transferring knowledge in a specialised area of study. This is a very limited and less “holistic” role as students in that period of their lives have to deal with a number of important issues in addition to mere knowledge acquisition – the first love; gradual emancipation from parental home and the parents, their views and values as well as many other existential issues of primary importance to them. In the Asian, and especially in the Confucian tradition, a teacher’s role is more than that of mere knowledge transfer and is also aimed at helping the student to grow as a person. In that sense, it is more “holistic”.
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