Why I Love Being a Psychotherapist

I am sometimes asked why I am still a practicing psychologist at an age after most therapists have already retired.. The short answer is that I love my work and feel blessed that I chose this profession. I write this blog article with the hope it will inspire other psychologists and therapists to continue to grow and get as much joy out of doing this work as I do. Here are some of the reasons I am still practicing. Note that these points apply mostly to work with long-term clients. I like working with many short-term clients too, but that will wait until another blog posting.

F irst, I see the work of a psychologist as endlessly growthful. Every year brings more development in newer forms of therapy and added development in many older ones, at least in their methods. I love learning new ways of understanding and dealing with certain issues clients bring to our sessions.

Second, I see each client as a new, unique adventure. There has never existed anyone like him or her in my office, I have often, through the years, quickly thought at times that I have figured out what is wrong with a specific client, but am delighted to find out I was wrong and having to change my views. This requires a degree of non-defensiveness and humility. I am known for the former, not so much for the latter when communicating with other therapists!

Third, I love focusing on the quality of contact with most of my clients and helping them to learn how they may be avoiding contact with me. Practically all of my clients through the years learned they can't trust most other people, particularly authority figures that remind them, albeit unconsciously, of past caregivers. Hence they won't trust me at certain levels until we have met for awhile and I have helped them traverse their negative organizing principles through me about other people, particularly those in authority. And I use the term "levels" because different negative organizing principles arise at different points in the therapy.

This issue of trust is, of course, a continuum, from very fearful and mistrustful at one end, to very trusting and willing to be vulnerable at the other end. Of course, as Bob Stolorow has pointed out, while negative expectations and fears arise at certain points in the therapy, positive yearnings for resources they didn't get but have needed and still need, also arise in the therapeutic relationship.. These are usually of a childlike nature, the result often being shame, and their yearnings must be dealt with delicately and tactfully.

Fourth, I am delighted to learn from my clients, for they are all different from me in varying way. For example, I have had a number of African-American clients, both male and female, through the years. I have, of course, learned from TV, books, movies what it is like to live in our country as a black person. But having first-hand contact and learning about the subtle assaults on their dignity most black people experience every day has deepened my knowledge. And being a white person, able to empathize with them, has been enormously moving to me. Similarly, I have learned from Asian and Iranian clients about how important family is and how different their views of independence and individualism are from Westernized American culture. I at first viewed certain Iranians when I was practicing in LA as “enmeshed,” but then realized I was pathologizing what is a normal cultural norm for them. In order to help them, I needed to decenter from this viewpoint and see their problems from their perspective.

Fifth, I view each client's symptoms the way a detective in a mystery novel searches for the meaning of each clue, seeing it as the inevitable organizing principles or, in Gestalt Therapy terms, creative adjustments that person had to learn to make in her or his life, usually in childhood.. Viewing their symptoms in this way, rather as “defenses,” is much more helpful to them in working through them.

Sixth, I see myself as a participant in the interactions between my clients and me, truly believing that the therapy relationship, whether with an individual, a couple or a group, is what Gestalt therapists have termed a relational field. I am not a blank screen or an objective authority figure in the relationship with a specific client. Instead, who I am is partly a function of all my past experience that has shaped my own organizing principles and my dynamic view of that client as it changes during the session. . And who my client is with me is a function of their past life experiences that have shaped their organizing principles and who they perceive me to be in that session as it unfolds. But this also means that I need to sense what role a specific client needs to see me in. Some need to idealize me, others need to see me as a trusted equal, others need to see me as an audience while they tell me how wonderful they are. I try to have the kind of self that Heinz Kohut describes a good therapist needing: supple, resilient able to change, and strong.

Finally: This may sound a bit arrogant, but I think I am making a contribution to my community and my country by the work that I do with individual clients, couples and supervisees. I donate money to various causes in which I believe, but I no longer go on marches, rallies or demonstrations. I see, however, many of my clients becoming more successful, creative, more socially active and kinder to their loved ones and people in their communities. I delight in the cooperative role I have played with them in their growth.

As always, I look forward to comments about these views, positive or negative.