[2] Person-centered therapy seeks to facilitate a client's actualizing tendency, "an inbuilt proclivity toward growth and fulfillment",[3] via acceptance (unconditional positive regard), therapist congruence (genuineness), and empathic understanding.
[citation needed] Rogers also claimed that the therapeutic process is, in essence, composed of the accomplishments made by the client.
[18] Although client-centered therapy has been criticized by behaviorists for lacking structure and by psychoanalysts for actually providing a conditional relationship,[6] it has been shown to be an effective[clarification needed] treatment.
[23] Rogers believed that a therapist who embodies the three critical and reflexive attitudes (the three core conditions) will help liberate their client to more confidently express their true feelings without fear of judgement.
To achieve this, the client-centered therapist carefully avoids directly challenging their client's way of communicating themselves in the session in order to enable a deeper exploration of the issues most intimate to them and free from external referencing.