#MentalHealthMatters #TherapyBenefits #SupportiveCommunity
Are you wondering why so many people turn to therapy when facing difficulties in life? Let’s dive into the reasons behind this common recommendation and explore the benefits of seeking help from a therapist. 🧠💬
Why Therapy is a Go-To Recommendation:
1. **Professional Guidance:** Therapists are trained professionals who can provide tailored support and guidance based on your individual needs.
2. **Non-Judgmental Environment:** Therapy offers a safe space where you can openly express your thoughts and feelings without fear of judgment.
3. **Effective Coping Strategies:** Therapists can equip you with tools and techniques to manage stress, anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues.
4. **Emotional Support:** Talking to a therapist can help you feel validated, understood, and supported during challenging times.
Benefits of Therapy:
1. Improved Mental Health:
– Therapy can help alleviate symptoms of anxiety, depression, PTSD, and other mental health conditions.
– It promotes self-awareness, self-esteem, and emotional well-being.
2. Enhanced Relationships:
– Therapy can improve communication skills, conflict resolution, and overall relationship satisfaction.
– It can help you navigate familial, romantic, and social relationships with greater ease.
3. Personal Growth:
– Therapy can aid in personal development, goal-setting, and creating a more fulfilling life.
– It fosters self-reflection, self-discovery, and a deeper understanding of oneself.
By addressing your mental health concerns through therapy, you can experience profound transformation and build resilience to navigate life’s challenges with greater ease. Remember, seeking help is a sign of strength, not weakness. 💪💖
So, if you’re considering therapy, know that you’re taking a positive step towards self-care and well-being. Reach out to a therapist today and embark on a journey of healing, growth, and self-discovery. 🌿🌟 #TherapyJourney #SelfCare #HealingProcess
Talking with someone who is trained and experienced in helping people deal with problems in their life is effective, yes.
That said… just like any profession… there are good ones and some bad ones out there.
Same reason you go to a doctor when you’re sick. They’re experts in diagnosing and fixing those issues.
>Is talking with someone really that effective?
It’s more than talking it out, they teach you methods to control your issues better. I had near constant depression and suicidal ideation problems for years and had it fixed in like 4 sessions with a decent therapist. It doesn’t work for everybody, but for some people it *really* does. I’d be dead without it.
It’s an easy option. Your car is broken? Mechanic. Your toilet is plugged? Plumber. Your brain having issues? Therapy. Go right to the experts.
However therapy is a very complicated subject and a lot of people really need to be in the right kind of therapy using the right methods for it to work, and no one takes well to mandated therapy because it’s punitive of seen as an attack. (This is part of the reason why men don’t take well to couples counseling. They tend to feel ganged up on and on the defensive.)
I can’t speak for everyone, but I was having intrusive thoughts about csa. It took me *years* of therapy to get to the point where I talked about it. It was IMMEDIATE relief. I confessed first to my husband, then to my therapist (within a couple days of each other).
I’ve had them like twice since, in 2 years.
Yes, talking seems to help, that’s why social media is so popular.
It can be effective yes. But you have to do the work for it too be effective.
A therapist will lead you to your own conclusions and get you to say stuff out loud that you’ve been ruminating on that you’ve never heard yourself say out loud, and you’ll have a few aha moments where you go, ‘oh that does sound weird now that I say that’
Therapists help you figure out how things turned out the way they did on a professional level. It’s like your internet being down and having an IT guy come to your home and trace the cabling to see where the break happened.
it’s an easy go to answer when someone just keeps drama dumping on you.
They’re an objective mediator and focus on diving into the nuances and processing whatever it is with you.
Laymen can confuse and damage each other (un/intentionally we wouldn’t know). And left to our own vices, well…we are good at damaging ourselves too.
just curious…….. what would you recommend to them ??
Therapists are trained in how the mind works and common ways for it to go haywire. A friend can provide comfort but will also be biased and let you get away with never growing as a person. Trauma dumping but never learning healthy ways to cope is very bad for a friendship. A therapist can teach a person to spot cognitive distortions, self-hate, and diagnose mental conditions(that may need medication).
Therapy has been proven to work so why not get therapy(and yes not everybody can afford it and may need to see many therapists before they find the one that works for them).
It does seem to be a very American thing, very unusual here in UK to have a therapist. But then it’s hard enough to get a dentist without going private
Yes, often, it makes a big difference just to have someone to talk to who is trained in dealing with emotional and mental problems – especially for people who don’t have anyone in their life who they can talk to about this stuff without complications (worrying about being judged or hurting feelings etc).
However, some therapists are terrible, and even good therapy will not solve your problems without you being willing to do the work, be honest, and put what they say into practice.
It also can’t solve problems that are caused by external factors e.g. if you are stuck in an awful job that makes you miserable, or can’t afford to move out of a home that’s a really stressful environment, no amount of therapy will fix those circumstances. They might help you gain the clarity and guidance to take more action in your life, though.
Most people aren’t equipped to deal with someone going through mental health issues, and it’s incredibly taxing to even try because it basically involves continued, intense attention towards very difficult issues someone else is having while still dealing with your own life. When someone starts to feel the weight of someone else’s mental issues, it’s pretty easy to want to offload that, and recommending therapy/getting help is the easiest way to do that.
This isn’t knocking therapy, therapy is essentially getting what I described above but from someone who is trained to deal with it and their whole job is dealing with it. In my personal experience with mental health, help from a therapist can be as simple as just having someone objective who cares about your mental health and issues, but has no stake in your life. You don’t have to worry about what they’ll think about you afterwards or whether what you tell them will impact your friendship/relationship, because they aren’t your friend. A lot of the success I personally found in therapy was saying things out loud to someone else that forced me to put nebulous thoughts into words, and doing that revealed they either weren’t at all true or were just plain stupid. They can point out things you’ve never thought of, or suggest strategies for dealing with issues outside of sessions.
It’s not just talking. There’s actual work the patient needs to do to get better. A good therapist will point out when you’re being too hard on yourself, or not hard enough. They’ll help you find your triggers and give you tools to work around the and, hopefully, get past them entirely. They’re a non biased individual that can give you a perspective no friend or family member can.Â
But, in the end, no matter how good the therapist is, if the patient isn’t honest with their therapist *and themselves* and don’t do the things the therapist recommends *even if you think it’s silly and won’t work*, then therapy will ultimately fail.Â
It’s still good to have friends or family you can talk with as well. But you can admit things to a therapist you’d *never* tell a friend or family member.Â
So many people are depressed today because of social media, whether people want to admit it or not. We’re all addicted to the dopamine and immediate gratification and seeing bad news all the time and comparing ourselves. It’s dystopian seeing things like better help profit off this. Therapy is a great tool but I think because it’s the new norm to have mental health issues due to social media it makes everyone naturally talk about it more.
People say it helps, and at one point I genuinely believed it. Nowadays…I genuinely don’t know if it works often. All the good therapists seem to either be very rare, or cost more money than I can afford on welfare. The bad ones are judgmental and often make things worse. That being said, if you get a good therapist somehow and devote yourself to treatment and getting better, then I want to believe it will work.
The couple times I’ve been to therapy I basically just talked about what was bothering me and the therapist didn’t really do anything. Like I thought they’d make some suggestions. Seemed kinda like a waste of money to me.
All animals in a sense need connection of community so yes talking to someone can help sort thru issues. It makes you feel like you’re not so alone after all. It also depends on if they’re just in it for a paycheck or really care about your well-being.
What other advice are you going to recommend? “Sorry you’re having problems just drink yourself to death”?
Because its their job
It can be if you’re truthful and there’s a purpose.
Many people seem to play out the same dysfunctional behaviors and ways of thinking over and over without being aware that they are doing it. A good therapist can help identify negative patterns. For example, I struggled with perfectionism big time and would become incredibly upset when I made mistakes at work, to the point where I was a nervous mess a lot of the time. I didn’t understand why I was so upset and anxious all the time at work, when my job was a fairly low key office gig. A therapist pointed out a) that I was doing this and b) helped me understand that, as a human, it’s normal and okay to make mistakes occasionally. It sounds silly but this was honestly brand new information to me. This is just one example of how a good therapist can help someone function better.
There are bad therapists out there, like in any profession, and it’s important for clients to stay alert and take the good/leave the bad.
I don’t think talk therapy is as effective as people who charge money for it suggest.
Otherwise, explain to me how people rehash the same shit for decades, but never feel any better.
I think people recommend ‘therapy’, because they don’t know what else to tell someone.
Tbh, recommending therapy is the only ‘polite’ answer.
I’m 100% sure there are some therapists who are very useful.
I’m also sure that saying ‘Stop being a fucking baby, and get over it!’ always goes over like a lead balloon, even if it’s what a lot of people actually *need* to hear.
🫶
It’s not effective for everyone unfortunately. And the reason it’s the go to recommendation is because most people only pretend to care, and offers of help are merely platitudes. The sad reality is the only people that care to listen to your problems are people you pay $200/hour to care.
therapists are really good at their job
Therapy isn’t that effective, no. But we’re all strangers on the internet. I can’t reach out to check in on you and talk things out, so therapy is an excellent suggestion for a stranger struggling with mental health.
It can be great or useless. There’s lots of factors, but if a single appointment could be the first step to massively improving your life, it’s worth a try.
As others have said though, therapy gets a bad rep because many people do no participate in good faith or they just get stuck with bad therapists
The majority of people who need therapy have low levels of insight, especially into themselves, which cause all kinds of social problems. They see problems where there aren’t, etc.
Unfortunately there’s a large overlap in the Venn diagram of people who lack insight and people who don’t understand/deny their emotions. Having a bit of an idea that you’re happy or sad goes a long way in being able to change your thinking/behaviors and improve your life.
You know all those maga Boomer men who are perpetually angry and don’t have good reasoning skills? They are the most in need of therapy, and a great example of what happens if you never receive it.
Because it is a generic solution that is socially acceptable and will have less side-efects than e.g. medication. A lot of times when people search for a deeper cognitive understanding of their situation, what they actually want is the feeling of being seen and heard. In the past you could go to a religious leader and feel the presence of a divine power that was integrated in the community and all aspects of everyday life. Today we mimic this by going to a therapist who supposedly will give you the same comforting feeling by understanding your existential predicament and provide you with the tools to move forward. I am saying this as an atheist, well aware of all shortcomings of past and present spiritual leaders. Sometimes talking to a counselor will help you out, sometimes it will not have any effect and sometimes it will be counter-productive. There are a lot of other ways to deal with problems of the mind, that are either not as well-known or socially acceptable (e.g. embodied practices where you treat the body to cure the mind), or that involve life-style changes requiring a lot more courage and personal commitment. In my humble opinion, routinely suggesting going to a therapist to cure all mental problems is a sign of being somewhat narrowminded 🙂
If someone is sick, you tell them to go to the doctor. Mental health is not that different from physical health. We treated mental health very different for far too long, so people now only seek help, when shits hit the fan.
It is effective for many people. Patients just have to 1) make sure their therapist is a good match for them and 2) put in the work to further their own healing process.
You know that trope that someone truly at peace with themselves could be happy even without owning anything and living in a small hut?
There’s truth to that, taking care of your mental health is way more likely to increase your happyness than acquiring more stuff. And most of your issues can be solved by yourself once you gain a healthy perspective on them.
Of course therapy will not *always* help with that but it’s a pretty safe bet