Three uses of therapy

It's difficult to summarise what therapy is about because everyone experiences it differently.

For some, therapy is about having a space where they can feel heard and supported. I've written elsewhere about how the simple experience of being listened to can have a huge impact. When I started my therapy training, I was amazed to discover that something as simple as listening could be so powerful. Sadly, being a good listener is a rare skill. If we tell someone we've just been on holiday to Thailand, a typical response is ‘Oh, I went to Thailand once...' and they start telling us about their holiday! It's rare for someone to say: ‘How interesting. Tell me more!' So, therapy is a place where we can feel listened to and empathised with: we are validated, this feels good, and we start to feel better about ourselves.

For others, therapy is about gaining insight. A good question to ask in therapy is: ‘What keeps happening?' Often, there are patterns in our lives that keep being repeated. ‘Why do I always have to have the last word in an argument?' ‘Why do I keep dating people who don't listen?' ‘Why do I struggle to put my plans into action?' Etc.. Therapy can help us to identify these patterns and explore how they got set up. Usually, we developed ways of being in the world while we were growing up. Young children are like sponges: they absorb the world views of their caregivers, believing everything they say and copying how they tackle life. So, if a family doesn't speak about feelings or isn't very good at resolving disputes, the child will follow suit. Learning about our habits and patterns is essential if we want something different to happen in our lives.

This brings us to the third function of therapy, which is about change. This is tricky territory because change is difficult and the process can be challenging. It seems that people prefer the familiar to the unknown: better the devil you know! Even when something isn't working for us, we seem to prefer this to venturing into the unknown and trying something different.

If I change, who would I be? If I started to believe different things or think in different ways, would I recognise myself and could I cope with that? This is why change tends to be a slow process: if we changed overnight, it would be a disorientating experience. So, we tend to change in small steps. After all, we're changing patterns that we've been practising for years. Some patterns were set up in childhood as a way of coping with our particular home environment. For example, if whenever we made a suggestion our parents criticised us then, after a while, we will decide it's easier to keep quiet. Later in life, it is no surprise that we would struggle to put ourselves forward or voice an opinion. Although it's the adult changing the pattern, there might be a child-part inside that is still afraid.

Therapy can bounce around the three functions described here, even within the same session. There's no right or wrong way. The therapist and client can talk about what's going on and decide together how best to proceed.

By Mike Brooks, Counsellor & Psychotherapist