You Walk Out of Your Counselling Session Feeling Great

At 12:50pm, you walk out of the counselling office, feeling great.  Back at work, an urgent message from the boss lies in wait to remind you about that 4:30pm project deadline.  A small tendril of unease begins to worm its way through your gut, nibbling away at the post-therapy state of calm and confidence.

 

“That’s OK,” you tell yourself.  Taking a nice deep breath, you square your shoulders and get down to work.  “I’ve got this,” you remind yourself; just as you and your therapist discussed.  Slowly, tentatively, the peaceful feeling settles back in.

 

Half an hour later, you’re in the zone, laughing at the deadline.  Your phone pings, breaking your focus.  Delightful news from your spouse greets you; your youngest child started throwing up at school.  On the road, four hours away, your beloved is unable to retrieve the little sufferer.

 

This time, rather than a delicate tendril, you feel the muscular tentacle of a large octopus somehow wriggling around in your belly.  Anxiety blooms in the wake of the icy appendage.

 

You forget all about reminding yourself that it’s OK, and you’ve got this.  A brief but furious text exchange concludes that your spouse is driving a car, not piloting a jet plane.  Child retrieval is up to you.  You make apologies, leave work and race off at unwise speeds.

 

Sick child delivered to grandma’s house, you return and discover that you must have driven close enough to light speed to alter time.  You could have sworn it was 2:00pm, but all of the clocks around you disagree and insist that it is 3:45pm.

 

Feeling good is over.  “Why,” you think, “do I even bother going to therapy?”

 

Expectations vs. Reality

 

You can walk out of counselling feeling great; but if you expect that feeling to last forever, prepare for disappointment.

 

As with the scenario above, life tends to kick the stuffing out of good feelings sooner or later.  Even the smoothest and most pleasant of life circumstances, however, will not maintain a consistent positive feeling state.  Simply put, feelings are temporary.  They never last forever, and rarely for very long.  Not as simply put, feelings are our friends and all play a valuable role.  Even the negative ones serve a purpose and avoiding them completely is problematic.

 

Be that as it may, it does seem obvious to say we all want to feel good.  Apparently consumer appetite for wellness is “unlimited.”   While possibly overstated, this does underline the point.

 

However, I can’t decide whether it’s obvious to say this: even if achieving a permanent state of blissful goodness were possible, it would be disastrous.  The unlimited consumer appetite thing suggests it may not be as obvious as I think.  I dunno.  Looks like a topic for another time…

 

For now, let me say that psychotherapy is not a means to unending peace and joy.  It can help you become more adept at handling the inevitable stress, discomfort and even misery which are part of the package of life.  Counselling can also help build capacity to more quickly and efficiently return yourself to feeling good, after the unavoidable not-so-good happens.

 

Both of which are rather helpful, wouldn’t you say?