“After sleepless nights, I feel so sad that I just want to cry all day.”
“And that’s OK. Allow yourself to cry as much as you want.”
“Sometimes I feel so exhausted that I just want to lie on the floor with my eyes covered in or do anything.”
“Then do exactly that.”
“I shouldn’t be saying this, but this last week I was so lazy and didn’t feel like working at all. My work seemed like a pile of nonsense.
“Why shouldn’t you be saying that? That’s how you’re feeling and that’s perfectly normal.”
These were the responses from my therapist in a few situations that made me surprised. Yet, these responses were so normal, so natural, so kind and loving that I surprised myself by being surprised (very meta, I know).
But here is the thing…
I used to be a “high performer”. I spent many years in academia and competitive environments. I immigrated to the US, got my Ph.D., and a merit-based green card for my research achievements. I also used to be a self-help junkie always in search of ways to make myself better, faster, stronger.
If I told someone that I’m feeling down or unmotivated, the response I would expect is something along the lines that I should get my shit together, do 20 jumping jacks, put a smile on my face, and keep going. Even though only a few people explicitly told me that, influenced by the culture of academia, self-help, and our productivity-obsessed society, I deeply integrated such crazy responses. That’s how I started talking to myself. I prided myself on my ability to bounce back from negative emotions fast and keep bulldozing through life.
In 2020 everything changed. I was crushed under the wave of major depression and insomnia. I had several panic attacks. It became clear that I needed professional help.
I thought that I needed a quick fix. After all, I was a TM devotee, I did yoga, journaled regularly, and read endless self-help books. In my view, I was in better condition than most people. Yet, I was messed up a lot more than I thought so a quick fix couldn’t do the trick.
It turns out, just because you’re conventionally successful, skinny, well-read, productive, and obsessed with personal development, it doesn’t mean that you’re not messed up. It doesn’t mean that the way you are living, working, treating yourself in others is good or sustainable. It doesn’t mean that you’re not deeply unhappy and insecure.
When people tell me ‘Oh, I don’t need a therapist’, I always cringe. (Usually, in conversations about someone’s aggressive partner or a control-freak mother, people tell me that’s not them but the other person that needs therapy. ‘I am the normal one! It’s the other person, I am telling you!’).
However, we live in a dysfunctional society so we’re all dysfunctional individuals. Some of us are more some of us less. Some of our dysfunctions and destructive behaviors are actively approved and encouraged (like overwork). Some dysfunctions are looked down upon. In any case, we all probably need a therapist. Even my therapist has her own therapist.
Psychotherapy is expensive and unaffordable for many, myself included until recently. And that makes me sad because people who need it the most are often those who can afford it the least. But it’s worthwhile exploring your options.
- If you are a student there may be free counseling or therapy at your college.
- If you work for a corporation, there may be resources available.
- Services like Betterhelp can also be great.
- Even if you can’t afford therapy now maybe you can plant a seed in your mind that you want to do it someday.
In this post, I’m sharing my perspective on working with a psychotherapist for over a year. If you are on the fence about trying psychotherapy, you can learn from my experience. More than anything, I want to illustrate how differently therapists think about life and work and self-care compared to our society and self-help culture. I hope that this post will make you gentler with yourself.
Consider the Context
Unlike self-help that provides generic advice (typically written by white, male well-off authors), therapists will fully consider your particular situation so any advice they give will be specific to you.
The advice I’m sharing below must also be viewed in my specific context: overly disciplined, perfectionistic person, with fears and insecurities about her own value, trying to prove herself through intellectual pursuits, overworked, burnt out. The advice for a person who is, say, flaky, unable to stick to a job or relationship or pay bills on time would be different.
While listed tips are specific to me, these examples are only illustrations of how we are pushed not to do what’s best for us. Here is the list of seven tips my psychotherapist gave me that counteract personal development and our culture in general.
1. “However you feel, it’s OK”
My therapist told me time and again that I can come to therapy in any condition no matter how bad. She encouraged me to keep bringing uncomfortable emotions and situations and didn’t allow me to run over them. Negative emotions make me feel uncomfortable and I want to get done with them as soon as possible. But my therapist always tells me to slow down and look more closely.
Self-help culture obsesses over “positive” emotions. Endless books have been written about the pursuit of happiness, following your bliss, raising your vibration. “Negative” emotions make us confused. There is an attitude that the good emotions should be felt and bad emotions fixed. If you are sad, it’s your fault and it’s up to you to fix it. If you are unmotivated, you need to get your act together and get your mojo back.
Self-help culture perpetuates over-reliance on oneself to create and choose their experience of life. That works nicely until one hits a brick wall and faces the complicated emotions that can’t be ignored and tweaked in simple ways.
Emotions work in funny ways and, as humans, we are here to feel a full range of emotional experiences. Not only the good stuff, not only the bad stuff, but everything. Feeling all your feelings is the best way to get authentic human experience, heel, and develop empathy towards yourself and others.
2. “Your depression is a gift.”
My therapist told me this over and over and I used to roll my eyes. Of course, I saw my depression not as a gift but a burden. I wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible and continue my productive life. But my therapist helped me see this differently. (Also, note that here I’m not talking about chronic clinical depression or trying to romanticize mental illness. I am talking about the periods of deep sadness and their value for our evolution.)
Psychotherapists do not view depression as an ailment that should be medicated and pushed away. Medication can be excellent support, but the point is that depression should lead to further exploration. Marianne Williamson says that depression is the immune system of our mind, that, when activated, signals a big disbalance in our lives. So, what is the root of this disbalance?
For me, one big cause was burnout. After pushing without enough rest and emotional support, I have exhausted my deepest resources. I lost the touch with who I am and what I truly want. When our bodies and minds can’t get our attention for a long time, the system will just shut down in a way that can’t be ignored. For me, that was depression.
Our society values the seasons of blossoming fruiting and harvesting (in other words producing), but not the phases of rest, recovery, and “fertile void”. But we all face exhaustion, loss, desperation. It’s natural, it’s human. And if we have the courage to be stuck for a bit and sit with it, we can learn a lot. And that is truly a great gift.
3. “Do what you feel like doing.”
Self-help literature differentiates between amateurs and pros. Amateurs do what they feel like doing, while the pros do what’s planned and on the calendar. Pros don’t rely on inspiration and emotions, they do their shit every day, rain or shine, pandemic or not. If it’s on the calendar it must be done. I lived like this for years.
Yet, when I wasn’t well, I couldn’t do my regular routines and habits, regardless of whether they were on the calendar or not. After sleepless nights, I was able to do very little. I recently told my therapist that I lost my zeal for writing and she said: “That’s OK you don’t have to write. Don’t push yourself.”
I know many people who struggled with weight loss and experienced profound relief when a therapist told them that no, they don’t have to lose weight, even though it’s universally considered a good, ever-present goal. (We should all always want to lose weight, right?)
Giving ourselves permission to tweak our plans, adjust, go with the flow, helps us develop internal intelligence and give ourselves what we need when we need it. That’s very different from blindly sticking to habits in regimes prescribed by a famous author even when those regimes stop working for us.
This is not to say that discipline is wrong, far from it. However, a person on the brink of exhaustion after being crazy disciplined needs to learn an alternative- going with the flow. It enables healing, it sparks curiosity, it’s gentle, it’s an essential skill.
4. “Listen to your body first.”
When I write something on my to-do list, I feel pressure to get it done. But when I had health problems, my energy was not always the same. For women, it can get more complicated with our hormonal cycles- we are simply not the same throughout the month.
Self-help culture will tell us to build habits, to wake up at crack of dawn, set bold goals that push us forward no matter what. And while all these things can be good, there are periods in our lives when we just don’t feel it. Our bodies say ‘no’. I reached a point of exhaustion by pushing forward towards arbitrary goals, so pushing more only exhausts me further.
My therapist encouraged me to set my alarm clock for a later time. She didn’t think that waking up at 5:30 am was the most virtuous way to live your life. She told me to skip my morning routine after sleepless nights, to stop meditating on the days when I didn’t feel good. She asked me to check in with myself and see how I feel every time I tackle a new task. She encouraged me to sense when I need a break and take it when I need it.
Many of my colleagues pride themselves on sitting through the full day of meetings without moving away from their chairs. Following unhealthy habits and ignoring the needs of your body is a common practice in successful work but the body can and will take revenge.
Checking in with your body needs to be part of a sustainable work style. Kate Northrop has the rule “Body first, business second” that propels this way of thinking, which is so positive to see.
5. “Being highly energetic doesn’t have to be good”
For my entire life, I prided myself on being a highly energetic person. Our culture values people who are always on the go, who do it all with gusto and find time to go to a party and post for Instagram in fancy clothes. I was one of those people and I lived for that praise.
Yet, being always on the go, while fun and desirable, can be exhausting and distracting. For years, I didn’t have time to get my act together and figure out what I truly want because I was always so busy. Plus, by considering myself a highly energetic person, I never bothered to preserve my energy because there was always more from where that came from. Until there wasn’t.
Psychiatric assessments for insomnia will flag you if you feel great and full of energy after sleepless nights. That can be a warning sign of manic behavior, maybe not a full-blown mania but many of us can fall into manic patterns. If you’ve deliriously jumped from one thing to the next, pushing like crazy and then going to a party after a busy day and saying: “Oh, this is just how I roll…”, you know what I’m talking about.
I thought my therapist will be impressed by how highly energetic I am. She was anything but. Sure, the ability to be fast, disciplined, and focused is good, but taken to the extreme, it’s detrimental. When you’re always on the go, you neglect the needs of your body and soul. You don’t have the space to meet yourself and others where they are. You have no space to heal and recover.
Taking it down a notch, allowing yourself to be sluggish, grumpy, powerless is good and healing.
6. It’s OK if you lose it every now and then
When my sister told her team during a team-building event that she was dealing with anxiety, no one believed her. She always seemed composed and organized. When I told my collaborators that I’ve been going through the rough patch with depression and insomnia, they found it hard to believe too. My boss said that my performance was outstanding so she would have never guessed that I’ve been struggling.
The old me would have been so proud of this. “I was going through a major shit and no one noticed! How strong and professional I am!”
Of course, I wasn’t bringing my true self to my work. I had to work hard to maintain the perception of my professional, impeccable self. True, being organized and professional is important but so is being authentic in speaking your truth.
The good news is that after the pandemic, our standards for what’s professional are shifting. Maybe now see each other a bit more as humans and less like robots. Maybe now we feel that it’s OK to show up as you are and bring more of yourself to various environments.
When I started therapy, I always apologize to my therapist if I started crying but she encouraged me to cry whenever I felt like crying and whenever the opportunity arises. She sensed that I held my tears back for a long time in order to maintain my stoic professional persona. Holding back takes a lot of energy (and even aggression). Showing your emotions even in front of others can be OK. Of course, you don’t want to lose your shit all the time, but showing up as a robot is problematic, too. I often think that others can’t handle my emotions (even my therapist), but more often than not, people are kind, empathetic, and willing to help.
In short, allow yourself to be where you are, feel what you feel, do what you feel like doing, take a nap when you feel like napping. Let self-help and productivity demons take nap too. You already know what’s best for you.
Before you go…
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