Why Traditional Approaches to Cultural Awareness Are Failing Your Clients

You Took Diversity Training. You Still Feel Unprepared.

Every therapist knows we are supposed to be culturally competent. We took the classes, read the books, sat through the mandated workplace diversity trainings where someone awkwardly talked about inclusion while glancing at the clock.

But here’s the problem: Cultural competence isn’t enough.

It assumes you can be “fully competent” in someone else’s lived experience. It assumes that if you know a little about a culture, you automatically know what’s best for a client from that background.

And that’s how good therapists make bad mistakes.

What Cultural Humility Looks Like in Practice

Let’s get real: Have you ever hesitated to ask a client about something because you didn’t want to offend them? Have you ever caught yourself thinking, “I should know this already,” so you just… didn’t ask?

That’s ego. That’s discomfort. That’s the part of you that still thinks you need to be an expert in every cultural nuance to be a good therapist.

But what if you stopped trying to be an “expert” on other people’s identities and started being curious instead?

Why Our Cultural Humility & Narrative Therapy Course is Different

This course doesn’t just teach you theories—it teaches you how to actually talk to your clients in a way that honors their lived experience.

You’ll learn:

• How to shift from cultural competence (knowing) to cultural humility (learning).
• How to use narrative therapy techniques to center your client’s reality instead of imposing your own.
• How to recognize bias—not just in the field, but in your practice.

This Isn’t About You—But It’s Also Absolutely About You

Your discomfort with talking about race, identity, and cultural differences? Your hesitation? Your fear of saying the wrong thing? Your clients feel that.

You don’t have to be perfect. But you do have to be willing to do better.

And when they feel that, they make decisions:

• They decide what they can and can’t share with you.
• They decide how much they trust you to actually understand their experience.
• They decide whether they see you as a safe space—or just another well-meaning but ultimately disconnected professional.

The stakes are higher than you think.

If you’re avoiding these conversations—or, worse, if you think you don’t need to have them because “you already get it”—you’re not just missing an opportunity.

You’re failing your clients.

The Truth About Being a Great Therapist

You don’t have to know everything. You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t have to memorize every cultural nuance or worry that one wrong word is going to cancel your entire career.

What you do have to do? Stay curious. Stay humble. Stay willing to learn.

The best therapists aren’t the ones who have all the answers. They’re the ones who ask the right questions, listen deeply, and make space for their clients’ realities—even when those realities make them uncomfortable.

So, are you going to keep pretending that your half-remembered grad school diversity class was enough?

Or are you ready to actually do this work?

Why Cultural Humility Matters More Than Ever

Right now, we’re watching a systemic rollback of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives across institutions. Federal actions are stripping away the very programs designed to help professionals—therapists included—navigate the complexities of race, identity, and cultural differences with more awareness. The message? That this work isn’t necessary. That we’ve “progressed enough.”

But as professional counselors and therapists, we know better.

Removing DEI initiatives doesn’t remove the need for cultural humility. In fact, it makes it even more urgent. Because when systemic support for these conversations disappears, the responsibility falls even heavier on individual therapists to ensure they are creating a truly inclusive, affirming space for their clients.

Your clients are still experiencing racism, discrimination, and cultural erasure—whether or not the policies acknowledge it. They are still deciding, in every session, whether they can trust you to see their full humanity. And without a commitment to cultural humility, you risk reinforcing the very barriers that DEI initiatives were created to address.

So, this is the moment to decide: Will you be the kind of therapist who steps up when it matters most?

Because while institutions may be backing away from this work, your clients don’t have that luxury. And neither do you.

👉 Enroll in Transforming Mental Health Diagnosis: Tools for Cultural Humility

CulturalHumility #DEIinTherapy #TheCounselorEdge #InclusiveTherapy #MentalHealthEquity