Therapy is Practice for Relationships

Back in high school when I regularly felt overwhelmed studying for SATs, semester finals, and college admission exams, my mother would often say, “I know constantly being graded and critiqued is incredibly stressful, but we live in a testing world.” And she was right. Who hasn’t experienced their fair share of judgement and scrutiny within their career and relationships?

Oftentimes when I hear my clients talk about their relationship conflicts, I wonder if they are adopting a similar mindset of keeping score, monitoring what they are doing right and what the other person is doing wrong. I suppose the idea is that the one who comes out on top deserves to win the argument. But that mentality is not conducive for building lasting relationships. As a professional therapist, my primary goal is to teach my clients the core humanistic principles that are crucial for fostering meaningful connections. And that process starts with clients practicing and honing their social skills within the therapeutic relationship.

Embracing Mistakes

In many of our relationships, a single mistake can cause irreparable damage. I cannot tell you how many clients have panicked upon realizing that they said something which gravely upset a significant individual in their lives. During those moments it is understandable to think, “I fucked up. They might never talk to me again. And it is all my fault.” It is incredibly unfortunate when these personal thoughts appear accurate to our lived experiences.

Counseling relationships are not immune to their fair share of miscommunication and missteps. Sometimes a client refrains from communicating their authentic perspective about a situation out of fear of embarrassing themselves. Likewise, the therapist may misinterpret what they heard and accidently offend their client or take a slight as a personal attack on them. Professional counselors understand that these relationship hiccups are an inevitable component of the counseling process. But whereas a client may be tempted to either undermine or disregard these tense moments of emotional disconnect, a proficient therapist sees these situations as wonderful opportunities to help their clients work through the relationship struggles that are currently plaguing their lives.

Transformative Learning

Allow me to illuminate my assertion; Suppose a client is consistently trying to build relationships, but they keep striking out. They are not certain of what is happening, and they begin to suspect that they might unknowingly be messing things up. So eventually they decide to seek out a relationship therapist to help them find a solution to their present dilemma.

Over the next few months, the client recounts their dating struggles and their repeated but failed attempts to make new friends. The therapist in turn reflects the core themes of the client’s relationship struggles and how those lived experiences have shattered their self-perception. At first the therapeutic alliance appears to be going well. The client is progressively gaining insight into how their thoughts and feelings are dictating their actions, and begins to make adjustments around how they are going about building relationships.

But then somewhere along the way something happens within the therapeutic relationship itself that mirrors the relationship pitfalls that client regularly undergoes on a daily basis. And it is in that moment where the therapist strives to initiate a difficult but hopefully insightful conversation about what is negatively impacting the client’s motivation for building significant friendships and romantic partnerships.

The therapist’s intention is not to judge, critique, or undermine their clients’ missteps but rather vocalize what they are seeing within their shared dynamic so that the client can in turn ruminate, challenge, and refine their existing viewpoints into new perspectives more conducive for fostering lasting relationships (Fall et al., 2017; May, 1960; Mezirow, 1997). If the client is open and willing to hearing their therapist’s perspective, they will most likely become more aware of their strengths, their areas of growth, and what they can do to help repair their relationships whenever ruptures manifest within both their personal and professional lives.

Conclusions

Therapeutic relationships are built upon the core humanistic principles of authenticity, empathy, and unconditional positive regard. Counselors wholeheartedly understand that people need permission to make mistakes within the therapeutic relationship in order to work through their personal struggles. My hope in relaying this information is that you will feel less pressured to be absolutely, positively, 100% perfect throughout the counseling process. It is extremely challenging to muck up therapy as long as you are making an honest effort to learn from your mistakes and focus on your areas of personal growth.

Because when you know better, you do better (Angelou, 1993).

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References

Angelou, M. (1993). Wouldn't take nothing for my journey now. Random House.

Fall, K. A., Holden, J. M., & Marquis, A. (2017). Theoretical models of counseling and psychotherapy (3rd ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315733531

May, R. (1960). Existential bases of psychotherapy. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 30(4), 685–695. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1939-0025.1960.tb02086.x

Mezirow, J. (1997). Transformative learning: Theory to practice. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 1997(74), 5–12. https://doi.org/10.1002/ace.7401