Reflective Internalization of At-Tawazun Counseling Values: A Narrative Study among Prospective Counselors in an Islamic Boarding School Context
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18326/pamomong.v7i2.7611Keywords:
At-Tawazun Counseling, Indigenous Psychology, Islamic Counseling, Personality, Poetic InquiryAbstract
Dominant personality models in counseling psychology largely reflect Western epistemologies, potentially underrepresenting Muslim subjectivity in relational and transcendental contexts. This study examined how students interpreted and reconstructed At-Tawazun values after At-Tawazun Counseling training, an Islamic counseling approach grounded in pesantren values. Using a Reflective Narrative Study design, researchers analyzed 30 poems and traditional poetic works submitted as post-training self-reflection assignments by purposively selected students at Universitas Ibrahimy Sukorejo, Indonesia. Researcher observations during training and subsequent clarificatory interviews supported data triangulation. Braun and Clarke’s reflexive thematic analysis identified four interconnected domains of an emerging At-Tawazun personality profile: spiritual-ontological foundation (ikhlas, ridha, qana'ah); tazkiyah-based self-regulation (wara', zuhud, sabar, self-vigilance); rahmanic relationality (rahmah, takdzim, wisdom-oriented communication); and social service orientation (khidmah, dakwah, social care). Participants actively interpreted and reconstructed these values rather than merely reproducing training content. The findings contribute to indigenous psychology and Islamic counseling by showing how culturally situated poetic reflections inform an emerging personality conception. These domains represent reflective meaning-making, not validated personality traits or evidence of lasting behavioral change. Structured poetic reflection may complement counselor education in pesantren settings. Limitations include the single-site, cross-sectional, post-training design and lack of an untrained comparison group. Future studies should use longitudinal, multisite designs, independent evidence, and validated measures of the proposed dimensions.
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