ABSTRACT
It is important to appreciate that your clients may make different interpretations of particular rational concepts than the meaning implied in such concepts. In Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT), rational means flexible, non-extreme, self-enhancing, empirical and logical. To clients, however, the term may mean unemotional, robot-like, a state to be avoided rather than to be desired. If you have established an effective process of reflection with your client, then you can discuss the different meanings of the word 'rational'. The language you use with your clients serves as an activating event which they will interpret and evaluate. At the evaluative level, a client may disturb themselves about a word that you use for idiosyncratic reasons. The Therapeutic alliance theory argues that if therapeutic change is to be enhanced you and your client need to speak the same language. In working towards a common and therapeutically useful language with your clients, you need to assess their intellectual and verbal abilities.
