10 Most Popular Myths About Psychotherapy, And Their Exposure

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

1) MYTH: Psychotherapy makes us strong, stable and invulnerable and no one will be able to offend us, anger, scare, etc.

Reality: On the contrary, in the course of therapy your sensitivity increases significantly, and in some situations you become more open and vulnerable than before therapy, because now you have the courage to take risks and open your feelings to other people. But the risk is often justified. People are becoming more open to you.

2) MYTH: Psychotherapy makes us calm, balanced, tolerant, accepting other people as they are.

Reality: Since (see above) our sensitivity increases, we become more discriminating in our contacts, connections, yes, actually in the people around us … And it is not at all a fact that we love and accept everyone. Therapy does not make us tolerant, but more conscious. But with awareness you have a choice, whether to show this very tolerance at a given moment or well.

3) MYTH: In the course of therapy, we change and the world around us also changes.

Reality: Of course, I would like this, but this is not always the case. Often the reason for divorce, for example, is the rapid development and personal changes of one of the spouses, while the other simply cannot keep up with him. Or a person who has undergone therapy is surprised to notice that now fewer people understand him and speak the same language with him. And when you start communicating with loved ones, analyzing everything out of habit, you notice some discomfort and misunderstanding on their part)) And the words of “untreated” friends: “don’t worry that you are complicating everything so much” become something like red rag for the bull.

4) MYTH: Psychotherapy is work and work, and therefore my work should be appreciated. Since I try to improve relations with people, work on myself, invest time, money, energy, then the world should repay me a hundredfold, people will appreciate my efforts, they will try for me as well as I try for them.

Reality: but here stop - you receive therapy only for yourself and this is your choice! No one is obliged to appreciate your efforts in this direction, and if they do, it is a gift to you.

5) MYTH: Psychotherapy is a set of secret esoteric knowledge that will be transferred to you by a sorcerer and magician - a psychologist, along with a secret key to all doors. And in each situation you will now have a solution algorithm.

Reality: your psychologist is only an accompanying person, only a companion who accompanies you on the way to yourself and often in therapy you have more questions than answers. But there is a skill to find these answers yourself. So your therapist is not a fish, but only a fishing rod.

1. MYTH: After psychotherapy, there will be no more quarrels and conflicts in my life.
2. conflicts have been and will be, but you will have the skill to resolve them more constructively, the skill to notice and defend YOUR boundaries, but also to see and respect the boundaries of the OTHER.

6) MYTH: Psychotherapy is always a path to success, to the heights of a career, to complete financial and family well-being, to scientific and creative discoveries.

Reality: not always. I know of many cases when, in the course of therapy, a person realized that he was doing the wrong thing, that he was living in the wrong family, and that in essence he needed very little. Such a person can leave a high-paying, but hated job, sell his own business and go on a trip around the world, moonlighting as a freelance, live in rented small apartments and be happy.

7) MYTH: After undergoing psychotherapy, I will be able to openly declare my feelings and needs everywhere and always and to everyone.

Reality: not everyone, not always and not everywhere is ready and wants to know about your feelings and satisfy your needs. The appropriateness of your choices and behavior is a skill that can be developed in psychotherapy and, again, used according to choice in the right place and at the right time. You can, of course, openly declare your feelings to your boss at work … but only once)).

8) MYTH: In the process of psychotherapy, I will finally learn to show aggression. HURRAH!!!

Reality: and how does it help you? In fact, it will help, of course, let off steam, and this is important, but … in real life, in the process of therapy, you learn not only to express aggression, but to be aware of the need behind it. This is the skill to master in the first place.

9) MYTH: Relief comes only through pain. This means that a psychotherapist must make pain during work, then it will become easier later. Reality:therapy is not only pain and suffering, but also an interesting journey full of secrets, discoveries, and tears and laughter and various completely different experiences of a very wide and powerful range.

The author of the material: Alina Firsel.