“Find out who you are, and do it on purpose.” (Dolly Parton)
Therapy as Compliance
A colleague recently posted on social media that therapists are the “soft cops” of oppression, purposed on helping people comply with our unhealthy culture.
If you know me at all, you know how pissed off that made me.
After my initial surge of undifferentiated obscenities, I used my techniques, got off my last nerve and vetted myself. Is that what I’m doing? If not, are there ways that what I do plays along with that agenda? I will keep looking out for it, but so far, I am instead feeling gratitude for the part of me that has rebelled against that idea since before I even started my training.
In my initial counselor training, we were encouraged to be “tabula rasa;” a blank slate upon which a client may project whatever they need to project in order to work through their healing. I tried. I really did.
But again, if you know me at all…
Therapy as Reclamation
The more I sat with my beautifully diverse (in every aspect) clients and the more I observed my own resistance to the assumptions embedded in my training, the more I understood the implications of the uni-cultural view upon which my field was built. In response, my credo has long been, “err on the side of love.”
By “love” I do not mean the squishy, happy feelings. In Loyola’s Pastoral Counseling program, we were encouraged to understand ourselves and our clients in terms of “the way of being, the way of understanding and the way of intervening.” Over the years, I have grown into embracing that as the guide for helping people in a way that profoundly respects each person’s unique make up and experience. In my mind, that is love.
Therapy as Love
That kind of love creates emotional generosity: When we live in a state of honesty and shamelessness with ourselves, (embracing guilt as a teacher and flushing shame as the worthless concept that it is,) we can just be ourselves. If we can just be ourselves, we have room for others to be themselves too.
That kind of love militates against complying with the unhealthy demands of the culture around us. Here a a few brief examples:
When the culture demands that we over-work, over-give, under-sleep in order to serve its endless greed for more production, the culture is wrong, not the people who are making themselves physically and soul sick in an effort to meet the demands.
When a person shuts down to heal from being exploited, the person is not “disordered;” The person is having a healthy response to unhealthy demands.
When a kid is refusing to engage in school, is combative and breaks the rules of their environment, they are not “disordered;” They are telling you that something is very wrong and they feel powerless to change it. Our job is not to label them with a diagnosis and make them comply. Our job is to understand what’s hurting them and to strategize ways to heal the system that is harming them.
Being empowered to speak honestly about the difference between what the culture tells us we should think, do, feel, and our lived experience is healing not just to us, but to the culture itself.
Therapy as Resistance
In the current environment, we are all looking for ways to stay centered and calm in the midst of very real threats. This calming is not so that we will be more malleable or accepting of the unacceptable. As I posted in January, “I am not calm because the threats are not real; I am calm because the threats are very real.”
From a place of center, a place of calm, we have the capacity to tap into our greatest strength and our most strategic responses. We have access to the full body of our creativity, our prioritization, and the values that we are fighting for. When we can be in that state for ourselves we will naturally empower those around us as well.
When we have room for ourselves in this way, we have room for others. When we are not caught in the illusion of scarcity, we can connect meaningfully in community and combine our strengths and resources freely with others. We can see and live in “the oneness of all things,” as unique beings in an interdependent biome.
This way of being is in direct opposition to the individualistic, fear-based movement that is indiscriminately blowing up our government agencies, harming countless members of our human family.
Fear v. Centeredness
Fear is short-sighted. Centeredness can see the long game.
Fear is rigid and reactive. Centeredness is stealthfully flexible and responsive.
Good therapy promotes centeredness and a deep respect for truth. Good therapy helps us own ourselves and bring our gifts without concern for approval. We know our worth and celebrate the gifts of those around us. Good therapy makes us available to connect with others in community without compromising who we are, maximizing the gifts of all.
Good therapy is resistance.