The Importance of Cultural Humility in Affirming Therapy

What Does Is Mean To Feel Heard In Therapy?

“What makes you feel heard?”

This was the question presented to the audience at a clinical training I recently attended. My immediate, instinctive thought was: Genuine curiosity without assumptions. As both a person and a therapist, I have come to view curiosity as an ongoing practice. Meeting others with a genuine desire to understand their experiences and worldviews helps me feel connected to them and allows me to offer that same experience in return. 

What Is Cultural Humility?

Cultural humility is often described as a lifelong process of self-reflection, openness, and commitment to learning. Unlike cultural competence, which can imply that we can become the “experts” in another person’s experience, culture or identity, cultural humility invites us to remain curious, acknowledge our own biases, and approach others with respect for the unique ways they see and experience the world. Curiosity is different from assuming we understand someone because we have worked with people who share a similar identity or experience; being truly curious requires us to recognize that every person’s story is unique, even when there are shared experiences. Culturally humble individuals remain open to real-time correction and learning, even when it feels uncomfortable. It places us in a very humbling position – one that encourages ongoing engagement, reflection, and learning. 

What Makes Us Feel Heard?

As a person of color, I have personal experiences of feeling categorized and minimized. When someone approaches me with stereotypes and assumptions, it really upsets me because it feels as if they are trying to fit me into a category. It can leave me feeling unseen, as though the person has already decided who I am before taking the time to get to know me. 

That doesn’t mean that I am free of biases. I have many of them; but if I fail to check in with myself and my own assumptions and judgments, I risk missing out on an opportunity to get to know the person in front of me and to form a meaningful connection.

Why Cultural Humility Matters

Working with incarcerated individuals allowed me to see that others also experience that feeling – feeling judged, minimized, invalidated and dismissed. Many of my clients share that they feel as if there were no safe space for them to freely express themselves without fear of being seen as weak or vulnerable. A carceral setting where ultra-masculinity is constantly reinforced forces them to create an “armor” of aggression and emotional shutdown while suppressing their most private, inner human experiences. 

When people expect judgment, they learn to protect themselves. Some become quiet and withdrawn while others become defensive or guarded. Many of these protective strategies are not signs of resistance; they are often the defense mechanisms that once helped them survive the environments where vulnerability felt unsafe or had serious consequences. Over time, however, these strategies can make genuine connection difficult. Cultural humility creates a space for people to lower those defenses by conveying that they do not need to prove, explain, or justify their experiences in order to be seen and respected.

Meeting others with curiosity while staying aware of our own implicit biases and assumptions is invaluable in affirming therapy. Without curiosity, respect, and collaboration, therapy can feel like another place filled with oppressive and biased ideas that reinforce clients’ feelings of being misunderstood, invalidated and dismissed. This might be especially true for LGBTQIA+ individuals, neurodivergent people and other often discriminated and marginalized groups of individuals. Affirming therapy is not simply about accepting differences; it involves recognizing that every person exists within social, cultural, and historical contexts that shape how they experience themselves and the world around them. 

Cultural humility allows therapists to remain mindful of these influences while avoiding the temptation to reduce clients to a single identity or experience. In this way, affirming therapy becomes a collaborative process in which therapists seek to understand clients as whole and complex human beings.

Cultural Humility in Affirming Therapy

Many people grow up in environments where certain identities and experiences are treated as the norm while others are misunderstood, minimized, or excluded. Over time, these experiences can leave individuals feeling unseen, pressured to hide parts of themselves, or reluctant to trust that other people will truly understand them. For LGBTQIA+ individuals, neurodivergent people, and those navigating religious or spiritual trauma, experiences of misunderstanding or invalidation often occur long before they enter a therapist’s office. 

Some individuals have spent years being told directly or indirectly that their identities, ways of thinking, or lived experiences are abnormal, excessive, wrong, or unacceptable. As a result, many clients enter therapy wondering whether they will need to explain, defend, or hide parts of themselves. Cultural humility helps therapists resist making assumptions about what a person’s identity or experience means. Instead, it encourages us to approach each client with curiosity and a willingness to learn from them. This shift from assuming to asking can help foster trust, safety, and a stronger therapeutic alliance.

Affirming therapy can offer individuals from those communities a space where they can freely express their identities and share lived experiences without fear of judgment or discrimination. Therapists who embody cultural humility demonstrate their genuine curiosity of their experiences and worldviews, explicitly acknowledge that the clients are the expert of their own lives and ask them to allow the therapists to understand what it is like to walk in their shoes. 

How We Can Practice Cultural Humility in Everyday Life

I believe there are two foundational pillars to embodying the spirit of cultural humility in everyday life. 

One is to start by turning our curiosity inward. That includes our identities, opinions, worldviews and biases. Self-reflection, self-awareness, and self-acceptance can open the way to being curious about the person in front of us. Practicing cultural humility also means becoming comfortable with uncertainty. It requires us to recognize that we may not always have the right words, fully understand another person’s experience, or immediately recognize our own blind spots. Rather than viewing these moments as failures or staying ignorant about hidden biases, cultural humility invites us to acknowledge them and see them as opportunities for growth. When we approach ourselves and others with compassion, accountability, and openness to learning, we create space for more authentic and meaningful relationships.

Another is to understand that cultural humility never reaches “perfection” or “completion.” It is an everlasting journey of reflecting on ourselves and the way we form connections with others. The journey of self-discovery never ends, and so does our endeavor to be able to connect with others and give them a sense of safety and affirmation.

Creating Space to Feel Seen, Heard, and Understood

So, what makes us feel heard? Personally, I deeply appreciate someone who shows up with genuine curiosity, openness to correction, and a willingness to learn about my actual lived experiences. As a therapist, cultural humility allows me to create a therapeutic space together with my clients where they feel truly seen, heard, and validated. This commitment requires embracing the humbling opportunities clients offer when they allow me to learn from my mistakes and to see what it is like to walk in their shoes. Ultimately, practicing affirming therapy means continuously reflecting on my own implicit biases, owning my mistakes, and honoring the diverse narratives my clients share.

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Kei Okada, MSW

Supervisee in social work at Divergent Path Wellness offering

Trauma-informed therapy • Cultural identity & authentic living

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