# Guiding Clients Through Forgiveness: Tutu's Four-Step Model

An accessible and compassionate way to find the ability to forgive.

Forgiveness can be a transformative process for clients struggling with hurt, anger, or unresolved conflict. This one-hour practical session introduces counsellors to Desmond Tutu’s four-step path to forgiveness, offering a structured, ethical approach to guide clients toward reconciliation and emotional freedom. Through discussion, case examples, and experiential exercises, participants will explore how to support clients in navigating the stages of acknowledging harm, empathising with the offender, letting go of resentment, and embracing personal healing while maintaining professional boundaries.

This is a further workshop in the series **Enhancing Practice: CPD Lunch Hour** a regular one-hour online training session for counsellors and therapists, designed to support high-quality, reflective professional practice.

**By the end of this one-hour session, participants will be able to:**

- Describe Desmond Tutu’s four-step framework for forgiveness and its theoretical underpinnings

- Identify the emotional and relational challenges clients may face at each stage of the forgiveness process

- Apply practical strategies to guide clients through acknowledging harm, empathising with the offender, releasing resentment, and fostering personal healing

- Reflect on their own beliefs and emotional responses to forgiveness to enhance therapeutic effectiveness

- Integrate the four-step path ethically and sensitively into counselling practice, respecting clients’ autonomy and readiness to forgive

---

# Introducing Enhancing Practice: CPD Lunch Hour

Enhancing Practice: CPD Lunch Hour is a regular one-hour online

training session for counsellors and therapists, designed to support high-

quality, reflective professional practice.

Each session revisits core aspects of therapeutic work through a

contemporary lens, offering both timely reminders and fresh

perspectives on topics central to effective, ethical practice. The focus is

practical and applied, helping practitioners refine existing skills, deepen

understanding, and integrate learning directly into their clinical work.

Sessions are CPD-aligned and suitable for practitioners at all stages of

their career, providing structured learning that contributes meaningfully

to ongoing professional development — all within a convenient

lunchtime format.

Participants can expect:

- Focused input on essential practice topics

- Opportunities for reflection and professional discussion

- Practice-relevant insights grounded in current thinking

- CPD-appropriate content for learning records and portfolios

Enhancing Practice: CPD Lunch Hour supports therapists to stay

current, reflective, and confident in their work — one hour at a time.

Description supplied by the event organiser.