therapist – The Healing Modalities

To heal.

“We’ll never be okay if we don’t talk about what hurts.” – Ashley Ford (https://www.ashleycford.net/bio)

I heard this quote mentioned on a podcast I listened to and it resonated with me. So often, we talk about everything BUT what really hurts.

We bottle up our emotions and wonder why we feel so much resentment, powerlessness, guilt, or shame.

Sometimes we don’t even tell ourselves the truth about what really hurts us because it’s “easier” not to think about it. But then not thinking about it actually makes our lives harder in some ways because we disconnect from our truth – and from ourselves. We hide from ourselves or tell ourselves it’s not a big deal, that we need to get over it, that we’re “stronger” than this.

I think what helps us feel stronger is when we tell the truth and actually talk about it instead of denying it to ourselves. Talking to trusted friends or family members might feel supportive. Or talking to a therapist, counselor, or coach might feel safer – someone more objective and who has tools to hear us and empower us to move forward.

For me, seeing a therapist regularly to talk about what hurts was one of the most empowering things I’ve done for myself. When I let myself be vulnerable and saw that someone else could hold space for that vulnerability, I allowed myself to then learn to hold space for myself in that way. I allowed myself to be more vulnerable with myself and then with others. I stopped hiding myself so much and this is what also allowed me to be more authentic and aligned with who I am. I started to feel okay with who I was.

One revelatory truth for me during therapy was, “I am okay . . . I have always been okay . . . and I will always be okay.”

Your turn: What hurts have you been denying or hiding from yourself? How might talking about them help you? Who is someone that you can talk to?

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For you.

I was in therapy for the first time 8 years ago in January 2016. (I can’t believe it was that long ago now!) I realized I needed to talk to someone after going through emergency open heart surgery that saved my life – and also uprooted it.

I’d been living in Manhattan for three years and happened to be back in San Francisco when I got admitted to the hospital in April 2015. I’d been experiencing symptoms for a month at that point, but because back then, I didn’t know how to listen to or understand my body, I wasn’t aware of what was happening or how serious the situation was. I was used to pushing through things. But all that changed after the surgery and I had to recalibrate what was physically possible for me in my body.

I didn’t initially realize it, but I had attached a lot of my identity to work – I was someone who could work 12-14 hour days and get things done no matter what. I physically couldn’t do that anymore. So I felt lost, like I didn’t know how to live in my life any longer. I’d been so used to operating in a certain way for so long: go, go, go, do, do, do.

Because I was “being successful” while doing that.

One of the first revelatory things my therapist and I talked about was what my definition of success was. What did success mean and look like to me? Up until then, it had been unconsciously defined for me, by colleagues, society, media, peers.

Success had looked like making a certain amount of money, having a certain job title, living a certain lifestyle, having that type of car, having these types of clothes, living in a certain neighborhood, eating at those types of restaurants, being “busy” as a sign of worth, stress as a “status” symbol, doing all the things while doing all the things.

Honestly, when I think about it now, I see how exhausting it all was. I can’t imagine going back to that way of living “successfully.”

I had to redefine what success looked like to me post-surgery, in my new state of being in my body. Sometimes success looked like showing up for therapy sessions after being in pain the day before. Sometimes it looked like setting a boundary with a family member. Sometimes it looked like telling the truth to myself. Sometimes it looked like celebrating a new insight that I’d learned.

My therapist empowered me to define what success looked like to me then, through a new perspective, through an internal lens of my own perception and how I felt in my body, not an external lens of other people’s perceptions while disregarding myself.

Doing that took a lot of pressure off – pressure I didn’t even realize I was putting onto myself. Doing that also helped me feel more connected to myself and my life. It helped me show up the way I wanted to for myself, instead of the way I thought I needed to for others. And my definition of success continues to evolve.

How many of us are allowing other people or things to define what success means and looks like for us? Let’s start redefining it for ourselves based on who we want to be, how we feel in our bodies, and how we want to show up for our lives.

Your turn: How might redefining success for yourself be valuable to you? How might redefining success change the way you prioritize things? How do you want to redefine what success means and looks like for you?

Here are three questions to consider in redefining success for yourself:

1. Do I love who I’m being?
2. Do I love what I’m doing?
3. Do I love who I’m doing it with?

Tag: therapist

Talk about what hurts

When you redefine “success”