7 tips to benefit more from therapy
When you attend therapy, it is clear that it is because you are in a complicated situation that you do not know how to drive alone and ask for help to achieve it. Therefore, it is assumed that the person is usually receptive to this change and wants to go through that transition towards greater well-being. But still there are things that arise during therapy that can be managed better . These details can accelerate or slow down the therapeutic process.
- Related article: "The 8 benefits of going to psychological therapy"
Tips for when you go to therapy
Next I'm going to plate several ideas and tips that can help you in your therapy and in the relationship with your therapist .
1. Therapy is a team effort
You have the information and the therapist has the tools, do not pretend that the psychologist does your part, or try to do his . Many times there are things that are not counted in the therapy because the person directly criticizes them as irrelevant or unimportant and sometimes they are key to getting to the bottom of the problem. Therefore, try not to save your psychologist information, everything you tell him about you can be useful so he can help you and get a better idea of how to manage your symptoms. The psychologist is not a fortune teller, you have the keys even if you do not know.
In the same way do not pretend to have all the control over the therapy, the psychologist knows how to help you, and therefore let yourself be guided in certain things or do not pretend to solve it all by yourself, he or she knows that there are things that you can not do alone and will accompany you on the trip.
2. The therapy guides you, but no one can make your way for you
Link to the previous point, but it is important. The psychologist will not take or should not make important decisions for you , or tell you what to do, just guide you to draw the conclusions and answers to your questions.
3. Change can be scary, even if it is something desired
As much as it is difficult to understand this because we are having a bad time at some point, if we have been dealing with a problem for a long time, we have also made a habit and a mental structure around it. As much as someone hates to be sad and depressed all day, that may be their comfort zone for years, so even if it is wishing, break with that suddenly will produce vertigo. You have to understand this kind of defense mechanisms, respect them and give them their time so that they can give in and the changes are made in a gradual and acceptable way.
4. Not everything will be scaled up and improves
It is very exciting to see that I am progressing and every day is getting a little better. But unfortunately this is not usually the case. The most usual thing is that you advance a little and go back a little bit. I take 3 steps and go back 2, advance 5 and low 3. It's part of the process of being well and it is necessary to count on it so that when it happens we do not fall apart and we can move forward .
5. Only the one who desists fails
Persistence and patience with ourselves is key to be able to continue in a therapy, which are usually hard and to overcome what has led us to it.
6. Starting a therapy does not mean that I am defective or have something wrong
Just as a person can not know everything and when he has a breakdown in the bathroom he calls the plumber, there are certain things that simply by having them too close to us are not easy for us to face. Everybody has problems , deaths of painful family members, events that could have affected them in life ... Asking for help to handle this kind of thing, can save a lot of suffering and of course it is a sign of great strength because I am willing to change, learn and improve facing many times to my own ghosts.
7. The things that have happened to me are important to me
We know that there are people who have suffered a lot in life, and who had very difficult situations, and sometimes we do not feel entitled to complain simply because we have not lived through such hard experiences. But the emotional wounds we have each one have harmed each of us and have affected us in some way, and recognize their importance can help us open up in therapy and deepen without judging what happens to us .
For example, sometimes in therapy people talk about their parents having overprotected them, and that this has involved a great complex of uselessness or of feeling like children being adults, which makes it difficult for them to make decisions, or feel safe to handle the problems of daily life; but at the same time they say that they can not complain, because their parents have not beaten them, nor have they punished them harshly. It is true, but their wounds are others that are affecting them, and everyone can and should handle theirs.
In conlusion
I hope these little keys will help you in each one of the therapy processes that you can go to in the future. Constancy is a virtue, and when something hurts, it only remains to fight until it stops hurting.
