2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43
Let me tell you a secret: I am human. An ordinary, average, living person who is approaching the conditional "middle of life" mark. I am good and bad, evil and kind, gentle and rude, happy and unhappy, joyful and sad, patient and impulsive, you can go on as long as you like. I'm different because I'm alive. When it hurts, I cry, I feel sad, I suffer. When I am "bitten" I defend myself either by running away or by "biting" in response, assessing the situation and my strength, when I am happy, I am glad, exultant, admired. Is it somehow different for you? If yes, then I understand - there are different things. I believe that everything human is not alien to any person. And the human for me in my Life is paramount.
And I also have professions. Some. I am a teacher, I am a coach, I am a psychologist. I'm professional. Does this mean that my Life consists only of professions? Does this mean that year after year, day after day, minute after minute, I am a teacher, coach and psychologist? Do you even believe that it is possible to be a trainer or a psychologist around the clock? I do not believe. Moreover, since these statuses are the basis of my business, and I earn my living, my biological, human life, then I become a coach or psychologist only when there is a request for this from another person, and he paid or is ready to pay for my professional activity. Dot. The client paid for the training, I went into the gym - I'm a coach. I opened my office and sat in a chair opposite the client, who brought me money as an equivalent to paying for my and my efforts - that's it, I'm a psychologist. Does this mean that at the same time I left my human "for a walk"? Have I stopped living? Not on your nelly. I just changed my priorities. In the office, I am a professional before, but I am also a man behind that. Alive. Would you come to a mechanism psychologist? You can bring me anything into the session: your pain, aggression, joy, powerlessness, disappointment. Since I have sat down in my chair, I am ready for this both as a professional and as a person. I pass your feelings through my human, and then I transform it into a professional one, thanks to my skills, knowledge and skills. If I remove the human, I will stop hearing you, if I remove the professional, then we will "drown" together in your pain, aggression, what else have you brought me. I was taught to see bi-focally, that is, both myself and the client, without mixing him and myself in one pan, to distinguish where it is, and where it is already, or else, mine. Seeing is not about the eyes, like the organs of vision. This is about seeing "from the inside"
Now imagine if I am a professional around the clock. Always. Every minute. Take a psychologist. I am a psychologist every second. I always work. We take into account the fact that they usually work for money. Then I have to stand on the street, grab people by the hands, at the initial contact, diagnose them and drag them by the hands or hair into the office with promises to cure them and demand money from them. Have you presented? Or I was invited to visit by friends (although in this situation, it’s unlikely), and I’ll disassemble everyone into molecules, speak in terms and use therapeutic techniques. Tin, in my opinion. Or with my husband, at any of his words or actions, I will nod therapeutically, summarize, reflect, return feelings, projections and transferences. Think about how long it will take for my family life to end?
I remember when I was studying to be a psychologist, there was a lot of temptation to "stick" in this role, I wanted to train my skills. "Train even on cats." After some time, I began to notice that my friend, about to share something personal with me, began to tell me: "just don't talk to me like a therapist!" And then I realized that here it is - the opportunity to train the skill to separate professional and personal. Not sharing these things in myself, I become ineffective everywhere: neither as a person (wife, girlfriend, daughter), nor as a psychologist. It is not clear who I am, where am I, who am I with? I would not go to any professional for help if he unconsciously mixes work and personal. And he uses the working one to merge the personal or, using the personal, to push the professional. I don't need such a doctor, lawyer, auto mechanic, teacher, psychologist, coach.
If at the moment you do not see me in a white chair opposite at a specific address, do not expect unconditional acceptance from me. I am not your parent. Open your passport. Is everything written there clearly? I am Evgenia Bazunova not your mother. Therefore, if you are rude to me, I will answer, if not rudeness, then adequate to my human idea. If you unceremoniously impose your presence or opinion on me, I will do whatever I see fit to rid myself of you. If you are rudely invading my personal space, I reserve the right to act according to the situation and personal conviction. You should not try to "shit on my plate", then get in the nose and resentfully declare: "You're a psychologist!"
It is precisely because I am a psychologist that I know the value and value of my human life. I spent a lot of resources: time, effort, money, to become that Person, and then the professional that I am. And I am a person for whom his humanity is always in the first place, except for those moments when I was requested and paid as a professional. As a psychologist, it’s not worth it if I deny myself and my being everywhere. What then can I give to the other, being only, albeit professional, but still a function?
What are you with now? Stay with it.
