One of the most powerful gifts of good psychotherapy is that we have, in the therapist, someone who stands outside the closed loop of our dysfunction, who sees the possible causes of where we are stuck in ways we can’t see ourselves. The therapist is someone who has both expertise and a desire to help, someone who is trained to look for the underlying psychological causes of our pain and dysfunction, who understands the effects of untreated trauma, damaging role models, and negative beliefs, and has the skills to help free us from the tyranny of repeating strategies for survival that cause endless suffering.
The more we can open up about both the pain we have endured and the pain we have caused, and dive into the formative experiences that have left us depressed, angry, lonely, unfulfilled, and hurtful to ourselves and others, the more the therapist can help us heal the wounds that lie at the heart of our most unsuccessful and destructive beliefs and behaviors.
What makes this possible? A good therapist doesn’t judge our symptoms just as a good doctor doesn’t judge us for a tumor. They want to see us heal and they do everything in their power to help us. It can be very difficult not to judge the addict who has stolen from his family or the parent who beats their children, but therapists are not judges or juries. They are entrusted with the very sacred job of seeing beyond our most crippling wounds and worst behaviors, and remind us that our essential self is still there, no matter how dark our story may be.
We need someone to help us focus on our goodness to heal.
At the same time, healing often brings us face to face with things about ourselves that are painful to admit, challenge our self image, and may require us to drastically change our behavior or make amends to others. But a good therapist holds the light of care and acceptance around it all as non-judgmentally as humanly possible, and believes in our power to change, despite all that has hurt us and deformed our relationship to ourselves and others.
Because we need the steady light of acceptance, deep understanding, and an expectation of accountability in order to heal from all we have suffered, denied, justified, minimized and numbed ourselves out to.
And this is as true for a country as it is for an individual.
When I wrote America in Therapy, my goal was to do my very best to stand outside the closed loop of our terribly destructive partisan battles and offer a healing lens that is neither Red nor Blue– because healing is NOT a Red or Blue issue. It is a Family of America issue. I’m quite sure I was not 100% non-judgmental because none of us is. But I did everything in my power to identify the most glaring causes of America’s most destructive beliefs and behaviors and present my best version of a non-partisan road to repair.
The following quote is from America in Therapy.
“Perhaps it wouldn’t be so hard to face all the abuses in our national family if we knew the goal was not to find the culprits and hate them but to look them in the eye, tell our truths to ourselves, be fully accountable for the impact we have had on each other, and together uncover the riches in all of us we have buried. So many of us brought massive trauma with us when we came here. Along with our hopes for a new life in a new land, we also brought pain, greed, and prejudice, and we had no idea we would end up acting all that painful conditioning out on ourselves and others. We didn’t have a psychological understanding of ourselves in those days, just like I and all my clients didn’t have that understanding when we were young. But we have it now, and it’s not too late for any of us or our country to heal.”
We desperately need good therapy for our country! We need as many people as possible who are able to step outside the closed loop of our intolerance and need to dominate and help guide us back to cooperation and connection with one another.
There is no therapist or therapeutic community assigned to this role in America, and because we have not yet asked for healing as a nation, we are each left to find our own way to hold the light of love around our country while calling out its abuses.
This is a monumental job, but perhaps the only one that can save us from ourselves!
*****
“On the path to peace, we will close the gap between Love and Politics”
*****
You can find me at www.phyllisleavitt.com
phyllis@phyllisleavitt.com
*****
Click here for my free PDF The 6 Secrets for Repairing Relationships After Conflict https://phyllisleavitt.com/wp-content/uploads/The-6-Secrets-To-Repairing-Relationships_-How-to-Reconnect-After-Conflict.pd
Take the Free Conflict Type Quiz on my homepage at www.phyllisleavitt.com, find out your Conflict Type, and receive the full PDF on all the Types
*****
America in Therapy: ORDER NOW from all major booksellers, and please write a review!
A Light in the Darkness
https://www.amazon.com/Into-Fire-Road-Home-2/dp/0998800007/
0 Comments