Edit: so please also help me understand this- if a person doesn’t have family and friends to support, sounds like therapy won’t really help this person unless they change their living conditions, or they relapse?
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The psychological basis for therapy is simply to bring thoughts into existence. It doesn’t matter what the focus of the particular person seeking therapy is, the core principle is being able to take what you perceived as truth through your internal thoughts and bring them physically into the world through speech.
Why do you think every other person who gets past the level of tipsy/buzzed ends up talking to themselves in the mirror at some point and then feeling emotional after the self pep talk (who knows maybe this is just me)? It’s because the simple act of speaking your thoughts into existence, on a psychological level, gives them more weight and significance. Now you can have someone else – the therapist/counselor – experience those thoughts/words in a completely non-biased way and offer advice based on that experience. You also are able to now view those thoughts/words in a new light/perspective without them being automatically intertwined with your personal beliefs/biases when they exist as solely thoughts in your head.
This is also why therapy can seem so negative/daunting to some – everyone and I mean EVERYONE – has those thoughts we feel should only exist as thoughts and never be shared with anyone. The good news is, we are biased heavily towards ourselves as humans and that circle of thoughts we think we should never share with anyone else is A LOT smaller than we might normally think.
If you struggle with any sort of mental stress it’s never a bad idea to seek someone – professionally or not – to share your thoughts with and bring them into reality so they can be addressed and helped if needed.
Personally, I think it helps to get an outside perspective of your thoughts and feelings and to change the idea that they are facts. Also to recognize patterns of thought – what your automatic response is to certain situations and recognizing it helps to change it
You can’t change the things that happen to you, but you can change the way you think about the things that happened to you. In many cases, the pain you feel doesn’t actually come from what happened, it comes from how you perceived it, so changing your perception can reduce the pain you feel.
There are lots of types of therapies, they all work slightly differently. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is the biggest one people hear about. What that means is that a therapist works with you to help you understand how your thoughts, behaviors, and feelings interact with one another. Sometimes there’s a breakdown between theses three, which leads to issues in all three areas. A therapist helps identify and fix these.
You learn that you’re not alone and isolated. You get to hear about similar stories where others came out the other side and thrived. At the very least you can garner some sort of hope for the future.
I am a licensed therapist, and I’ve been to therapy myself. In my opinion, the best therapy comes from learning new skills/tools: new ways to think, do, or feel. In this regard, you can begin to employ these skills/tools outside of sessions. Best of all, if you get stuck, your clinician can help you “troubleshoot” why the said skill might not be working, correct misconceptions, and ultimately make it work for you.
All of the answers here are great, but I want to offer more of a neurological perspective.
From the time we’re born, our brains look for patterns and form connections. The more our brain sees a certain pattern, the stronger that connection gets, and the brain will recognize that pattern more easily. The more easily the brain recognizes the pattern, the more frequently it sees the pattern, and the stronger those connections get. It’s a cycle.
For some people, the connections that have become really strong aren’t helpful. These might be connections like, “when I drink, I don’t feel sad” or “if I am not perfect, people will dislike me” or “if I flip the light switch three times, then my family won’t die.” These connections can lead to behaviors that are dangerous, either emotionally or physically.
This is where therapy comes in: therapy can help people break those connections and form new ones. When a person does cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), they’re asked to identify the dangerous or negative behaviors they’re engaging in. Then, they’re asked to become aware of the beliefs they hold about themselves and about those behaviors- to identify those strong connections that aren’t helpful. Next, they’re asked to identify negative or inaccurate thinking that’s present in those connections- is it actually true that if you’re not perfect, people will dislike you, or is it possible that people can love you even if you’re flawed? This allows the patient to “break” the connections their brain has made. Finally, the patient is asked to replace those old connections with new ones that are more positive or useful- in the example of someone who is struggling with perfectionism, this might be something like, “I am worthy of love even when I mess up”. The more the patient repeats that new connection, the stronger it will get and the weaker the old one will become, until eventually the new connection replaces the old one.
To answer your follow-up question in your post, this process is much easier to do if a person has people around them who are supportive of their therapy process, and if they’re not in an environment that triggers the unhealthy connections they had. For example, if a person has smoked their entire lives, there are lots of things in their environment that might trigger a desire to smoke. Maybe they always smoked while drinking coffee in their kitchen, so now coffee and their kitchen both trigger a desire to smoke- those things are all connected in their mind. Maybe they always smoked with the same person, so now that person triggers a desire to smoke. Maybe that person keeps offering them cigarettes even though they made the decision to quit. Breaking those connections is easier when those triggers aren’t present.
I’ve had the worst experience with therapists over the course of 20+ years. I recently went to see a therapist due to anger management, and I’m expressing all this trauma and rage I’m dealing with, we’re talking about some pretty dark shit here. She was very engaged and was great at listening, but her advice was completely pointless. She handed me some candy and said “Next time you feel angry just put this in your mouth and it will help you calm down.” I stopped seeing her after that.
Most of my therapists either just say “Mhmm mh, I see. And how does that make you feel?”. I’ve even caught one drawing swirls on his notebook while pretending to jot stuff down.
I’ve come to the realization that therapy just isn’t for me. I’ll just do the healthy thing and suppress everything until I explode and drive my car off a bridge.
Hi, my source is my last 8 years of mental health including long periods where I wasn’t allowed medication and thus relied on therapy (and other stuff) to stay alive. I also answered a similar question a while ago using my favorite analogy so I’m copying it here:
Here’s the thing, depression is different for everyone, and depending on what kind of depression you have will determine what you need to cope with it.
My go to analogy is this: your brain is a lamp that only lights up when you are pushing the button. There are lots of ways to push the button, including tried and true methods (eating right, getting adequate sleep, etc), and more exciting methods (doing fun things, accomplishments, doing sexy stuff). But sometimes we don’t do things that push the button, or some methods don’t push the button like they used to. This is where we utilize therapy. Therapy is for identifying and changing self destructive behavior, which can be really big stuff like binge eating or really small stuff like procrastination. This helps us find new ways to push the button or helps things that stopped pushing to start pushing again.
Sometimes though, you push the button but the lamp doesn’t light up. You can find 10,000 ways to push the button, but you aren’t getting the benefits because the connection isn’t there. Sometimes you need to change the lightbulb or make sure the lamp is plugged in. This is medication. Notice, that even if you fix the connection you must still push the button to turn the light on. Medication does not push the button all the time, it just makes it so when you do push the button the light is able to turn on. There is absolutely no shame in taking medication, it is just restoring the function that would otherwise be lost, similar to wearing contact lenses or taking insulin injections.
No matter what, I hope you seek out a medical professional and listen to them. Definitely see a therapist, and possibly see a psychiatrist. Best of luck!
You have things that you don’t know. So you go to school to find new stuff about native language, mathematics, biology and what not.
Therapy is the same, but about yourself. You need a teacher to guide you through this learning.
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