Recently I heard a talk radio program where the host said (in reference to what, I cannot remember), “This is not like psychotherapy where they are trying to fix you…” I couldn’t hear the rest because I was in total shock. I knew this point of view existed, but I had never heard it said so succinctly: psychotherapists try to fix people. I could only think in little sound bites: Wait. Time out. FALSE.

It took me a couple of weeks to recover and process. So now let me say in response that I’m not interested in fixing anyone. I don’t believe anyone is broken. At the heart of it, I actually think most people fear they are broken, but are not. It’s this fear that creates a lot of problems.

As a therapist, I do not try to fix things or people. I try to normalize the human experience. I help in another way key way, too: unearthing options that have been previously undiscovered.

It’s a bit difficult to convince people that they haven’t thought of all the possible ways to deal with a thought, feeling, relationship, or situation. But you haven’t. I haven’t. It’s a big problem because people think, “What’s a therapist going to tell me that I don’t already know?” My response is actually, “Quite a bit.”

As a therapist, I’m really just a creative, collaborative generator of possible choices. I listen, reflect, try to make sure I get what’s being said. Then through dialogue and questions, I help find more options than previously considered. Some ideas I bring up, some come up from clients just by talking in a new way about their situation.

It’s not because I’m all awesomely creative that I come up with ideas. It’s really because I talk with a lot of people in a deep and meaningful way all day. I’ve started to hear about lots of ways of doing things. I also try to read and collect ideas from a broad range of sources. I’m excited everyday to learn something new and to figure out how I might apply it to my work.

Out of this desire to collect new viewpoints, I’m starting a guest post series on this blog. I’ve met some very talented people who have interesting things to say about the world of health, wellness, and being human from their own unique perspectives. I’ve asked them to share here on this blog.

Last week, I featured a beautifully-done piece by Portland, Maine writer and musician James Day Leavitt. In the weeks to come I have a great line up for you:

Aaron Bilodeau, co-creator of www.existanew.com, a project that challenges conventional notions on how to foster health, live, and be happy.

Dawn Clancy, creator of Growing Up Chaotic, a blog and radio program for those determined to SURVIVE and THRIVE despite growing up in toxicity – i.e. a childhood immersed in alcohol, drugs and physical, emotional or mental abuse. Her goal? Create a community hell bent on breaking, cracking and demolishing the cycle of dysfunction.

Lynn Shattuck, Portland, Maine writer and mother of two recently featured on Love for Lemons. She writes warm, touching, and often humorous pieces on topics such as perfectionism, parenting, and grief.

I hope you will read, share, and comment. The more we talk together, the more ideas are shared, the more options we see in our world, the easier it is to make choices that work for our own lives.

I’m pleased to offer this piece by guest writer, James Day Leavitt. (photo credit: Siobhán Butler)

I imagine my past as a long hallway, with doors along each side of the corridor. Behind some doors are my difficult experiences. Things I don’t want to see anymore.  Regrets, mistakes, animosities, hostilities, hurts and lost loves.
I don’t want to replay these things. They are uncomfortable to see. I am embarrassed and would like to start fresh, new, and unencumbered by the past. That’s why re-birth, and absolution of ones sins is so popular a concept. I’ve spent a lot of time and energy (memory energy) going back and checking the doors to make sure they are secure, locked, or at least mostly closed. I get scared they may come out and poison what I have made or are about to make my life into. Like a phobia, I can never be fully sure that all the doors are closed all the time. And in this frantic double and triple checking, it is impossible to be at ease or at one with my present experiences.

Once I begin to open these doors, one by one, and allow my forsaken, my undesirable, my forbidden pasts, or selves to flow freely, I begin the process of forgiving myself. I may even have to forgive myself for things I didn’t do, since the warped version of my responsibilities lie within my own version of blame. And sometimes that blame is wrongly placed on myself. My blame becomes regret and regret brings me back to the doors, frantically keeping them shut to prevent leakage, the slipping out of the true raw reality of past. I start to open the door to accept that these things were real in my past. That I somehow got through that time. I allow them their own space, in the time of my past. Once I can do this, I am surprised to see that not having to check those doors has freed me up to live my life again. I am shocked that those things, from my past, don’t need to rush into my current existence. They just need to occupy their own space to remind me of what I have endured. They just want to be acknowledged as having happened. On good days, they exist in my personal history, or make-up, but no longer have to infiltrate my thoughts and dreams and occupy  so much of the space I need within myself  to be present  in the moments of my life that click by, within my being, in real time.

One by one,
we live.

Second by second,
a life.

Granted within
each
moment.

Living and breathing
our
own time.

James Day Leavitt is a writer, musician and occasional painter. He was born and raised in Maine. He spent most of his 20′s in Oakland, California. He returned to Maine in 1999 and currently resides there with his wife, Katie, and two daughters, Audrey and Ida. Visit http://jamesdayleavitt.com/ for more info.

photo credit: http://homeimprovementpin.com

This is not my laundry closet. I believe what I have is more appropriately called a laundry dungeon. Still, I do love pictures of tidy, sparkling cupboards, “mud” rooms, and, of course, closets.

My house doesn’t look like one of these very lovely Pinterest images and that’s okay. Other people do have houses like this, and that’s okay too. I admire and applaud their dedication to beautifying and organizing their homes.

However, I think we need to be careful not to be too seduced by the idea of having everything be just so. We can’t expect to have every aspect of our life look like it should be documented in a magazine.

There is no such thing as perfect. Everyone intellectually knows this. Yet, somehow the striving for perfection is a big part of our lives. Well-meaning people everywhere are sold on the idea that if things are perfect, they will be safe and happy. This is the myth of perfection.

Perfection is actually a big bully that will rob you of joy, lead you to fear, and keep you feeling constantly inadequate.

The pursuit of perfection is a fear-based activity. It says things must be perfect or else something bad will happen. If my grades are not straight A’s, I’m a failure who will never go to college and will end up homeless and I’ll be a disgrace to my parents. If I don’t look perfect, I’ll never find a partner and I’ll be insignificant and die alone. If I let my kids eat something other than organic food ever or watch a couple of hours of TV, they will fail and hate me and it will be all my fault.

These sound like extreme views, but I don’t really think they are. Honest, reasonable people from my personal and professional life tell me these kinds of stories all the time. Think deep on this one. Do you buy into some need for perfection in your life?

When we aim for perfection in our lives, we will always feel let down. Being a human is not conducive to perfection. I don’t really know how we got so fond of the idea anyway.

I reject perfectionism. I’m going to eat well because it makes me feel good, but sometimes I’m going to eat something that is highly pleasing that’s unhealthy because it exists and I want it. I’m going to work pretty hard because I love what I do and want to make a living to support my family, but sometimes I make mistakes or need to take a couple of days off. I’m going to try to be attentive to my child, but sometimes she is going to fall or struggle because she is a human being.

I believe that the myth of perfection is behind a substantial and unnecessary amount of anxiety in our society. I think it leads us to fear being ourselves, puts pressure on ourselves and those around us to be super-human, and makes connecting with each other more difficult. If I don’t want to admit to being imperfect, I’m going to present myself in a false way, expect my family to live up to this as well, and certainly not admit or seek help when I falter.

I want to be myself without the burden of being perfect. I want to be authentic and connected with others. That means that sometimes I forget things and maybe my hair is messy. Maybe my child has a big stain on her shirt today. Maybe I have no clean socks. But maybe that’s a small price for putting other things that felt more important first today.

But now maybe I really do need to go and do some laundry.

I will admit, as I am often forced to do (particularly when confronted with pop culture references), that I shelter myself a bit. The truth is that I can easily lose my footing and own sense of self when I consume too much media. It is hard to distinguish what I want versus what I’m being told to want. It gets confusing and overwhelming. I have to hide, under a rock preferably.

There are some disadvantages to this strategy, namely that I stare blankly when people refer to something of which everybody else in the world is aware. I watch TV shows about four years after everybody else. There are also a number of advantages. I have started to look at certain situations from well outside of the popular conception. Sometimes I forget how far out there I am.

Health and wellness are concepts that I have come to think of very differently than the most commonly held notions. I realized this recently when I was struggling with why I was having a hard time convincing people that healthy changes are positive. Then it clicked. I started listening to why my clients didn’t want to make these changes. They would have to give something up, make sacrifices, fight cravings and urges. In short, they didn’t want to feel deprived. I don’t blame them one bit.

I don’t think health is about deprivation at all. I can see now that when most people think of healthy eating they think of counting calories, giving up delicious foods, and feeling hungry. I’ve been there too. It’s no fun. Now I think of healthy eating as consuming real, tasty, quality foods, not products developed in laboratories. Food that provides good fuel and does not leave me with cravings and feeling energy-deficient. Something with substance that leads to satisfaction. In short, I think healthy food is the opposite of deprivation. It is filling and wonderful.

It is the same thing when talking about emotional health. My clients think about what bad habits they must give up. They worry about experiencing pain should they allow their genuine feelings to emerge. I’m often thinking very differently. I think about the damage that’s done when we suppress our emotions and choose numbing over feeling. I’m thinking of ways to have quality relationships, real feelings, valuable life experiences. Emotional wellness is about being immersed in rich sensations. For me, it’s all about authenticity. It’s about allowing yourself to be real, feel real feelings, express real thoughts.

There seems to be a connection between artificiality and deprivation. How have we become convinced that “junk” food is fulfilling and that real food is depriving? When did we start believing that status, stuff, and appearance is more important than connectedness, purpose, and contentment? I think health is really our most fulfilling and natural state of being.

What associations do you have with the word “healthy”? Where do you think you learned this?

In a memorable moment in graduate school, my professor said, “A good social worker needs to walk the walk, not just talk the talk.” I knew instantly that it was true. It is helpful and necessary in my job to say things, make suggestions, offer observations, provide encouragement, and form recommendations. However, it’s not enough. I believe that a really great therapist needs to be willing to do the very things he or she endorses. It’s a worthwhile endeavor that I’m trying for, and maybe sometimes achieving.

While I certainly do not want to dominate therapy with talking about myself, I do want to at least acknowledge that I’m a human too. I have things I work on in life. I’m a fellow traveler in this journey through a complicated human existence. As much as possible, I’m trying to do the same level of reflection, self-compassion, mindfulness, and effective communication that I’m advocating for in my office everyday.

It is hard at times to lead a life that is tuned-in to ourselves and to others. To “walk the walk” in our parenting, our jobs, our relationships means always looking at how well your words and your actions are matching up. It requires a lot of patient reminders to ourselves to be aware, pay attention. You really have to give yourself credit for when you can rise to this challenge, and compassion for when you realize that you can’t do it one hundred percent of the time. So, be kind to yourself while walking out there. Tell you what… I’ll do the same.