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Individual psychotherapy is a unique relationship situation. Two people come together for the express purpose of helping one of them find new options, new solutions, a new path through the forest of his/her life. In times past this role was filled by the shaman or priest. In modern life the psychotherapist has that privilege and responsibility.
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In many cases the problems that cause people pain and confusion are really solutions they have invented to other, often forgotten or obscured problems in their lives. And those solutions are not working. In fact, they are often creating MORE pain and suffering for the individual because they are leading him/her away from what is important or valued in his/her life.
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We live our lives on the basis of meanings that we construct to explain things that we do, others do, or that just happen to us. These meanings are built from our historical experience, our intellect, our memories, and our biological and learned reactions. That is why the same event can have a significantly different impact on two people -- or on the same person at two different times. When people seek therapy, it is because the meanings they have developed for the events of their lives are not helping them, are maladaptive, or are producing inexplicable discomfort.
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Learning this -- and then learning how to both let go of old meanings and develop new ones -- are not easy tasks. Human beings both seek change and resist it, usually resistance being the slightly stronger and more desperate of the two opposing forces. The therapist’s job is to help people through the process of exploration, decision, and change. He/She is not smarter or wiser or a guru with all the answers. Rather, he/she needs experience to be able to say, “This path, not that one, seems more promising at this point.” The therapist and the client must walk side-by-side in a collaborative effort.
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Contextualism is the philosophy that implies, among other things, that a solution or a decision or a plan varies in its success -- workability -- depending upon the context in which it operates. The primary issue in contextualism is not whether something is true or false, correct or incorrect but whether it is workable or unworkable. On the surface that sounds like pure pragmatism, but it is not. While it is useful to be able to be pragmatic at times, pragmatism itself does not help us to keep our bearings in an environment that is often confusing and unpredictable. Rather, research shows that general values, providing direction, meaning, and fulfillment, are needed by most humans. Values are like a compass helping us make decisions and behaving in ways that have a consistency and a reassurance of meaning to us. They are how we want to be and what truly matters. Thus, the context in which to evaluate the workability of our thoughts, decisions, beliefs, etc. is that of our personal values -- whatever they are to each of us. If a specific behavior or decision is consistent with staying on the direction defined by our values, then it is workable. If not then it will become unworkable as we lose our direction and gradually feel more unanchored, anxious, depressed, or worse. Within this model, then, psychological problems are NOT the sign of "something broken" They mean something is STUCK. The ultimate goal, in my mind, of therapy is to determine what is unworkable in a person's behavior and thinking and helping that person learn to be psychologically flexible. Another way of saying this is to be able to face each moment with full awareness and openness to experience, and to take action guided by individual values, even when it is hard or painful.
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Individual therapy, then, becomes the process of learning one another and finding ways of seeing ourselves in new and more useful ways. Certainly specific cognitive/behavioral techniques can help in this process, as can the ability to be mindful -- to be aware of your experience at any one moment rather than being caught up in it. All of this has to be embedded in a respect for the relationships of your life, including that with yourself. If you believe that this approach may be helpful to you, feel free to contact me to discuss it further.
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