Many of us, especially New Yorkers, are wired for achievement and working to better ourselves. Gym routines, podcasts, self-help books, executive coaching and so on. Sometimes therapy is sought with similar motivations.
But therapy, particularly longer-term depth work, can be a very different undertaking. For some people, it might even involve learning to work a little less hard! I'll give a couple of examples to illustrate what I mean.
The Perfect Client
Many people may start therapy looking to be a very good client. They may prepare for sessions, always have a lot of deep things to say and respond thoughtfully to the therapist's interventions and curiosities. This person may have a reputation amongst their friends or family for being a good listener, very empathetic and understanding.
A therapist can be drawn into this pattern, feeling the value of the work and the level of reflection and insight. But things might not really shift. More insight may not lead to more freedom from the things that were troubling the client in the first place.
This client may have been, perhaps unconsciously, taking care of the therapist. Therapy here may involve encouraging them to be less filtered, naming that caretaking and allowing the client to be more selfish about their own needs. The work might be less about developing greater insight and more about experiencing a relationship where they don't have to be so thoughtful, accommodating or easy to be around.
While someone is unlikely to come to therapy to be more selfish, this may be the growth edge that some folks really need.
The Problem-Solver
Some folks have a strong need for control of situations and may apply this to all aspects of their lives. They may have built a very successful career in a high-pressure environment that rewards this need for control. It's a way of approaching life that may have served them very well.
Sometimes this person may come into therapy because of a setback, something outside their control that has challenged their sense of being able to manage everything. Or they may have a sense that they are not living life as fully as they would like, constrained somewhat by themselves.
This client may find therapy frustrating. While we will discuss goals at the start of the work, the sessions themselves are primarily a space for exploration. This may not feel explicit or targeted enough, perhaps too loose or too free. There may be a desire for more structure, clearer answers or a sense of measurable progress.
But part of the work may become exploring why this openness feels so uncomfortable, and gradually learning to tolerate more of this looseness, both in therapy and in the rest of life. Naming how difficult that can be is itself an important part of the work.
A Different Kind of Work
In both these examples, therapy is a place to reflect on the patterns and ways of being that may be a source of difficulty or pain. Both clients may approach therapy looking to work hard at it, either unconsciously to please or take care of the therapist, or to satisfy their need for structure and control.
These are not necessarily bad qualities. Being thoughtful, hardworking or in control may have served us very well in many areas of life. But sometimes these same qualities can become constraining.
Therapy may require working in a very different way from what you might imagine, one that can start to open up new choices and a greater sense of agency as the work deepens.
There is no perfect way to do therapy, and sometimes trying to get it right is precisely what becomes worth exploring.
