Many people assert that money and financial success are the most important things to them. However, as we experience our final moments of life, it is rarely the number of dollars that we are most concerned about leaving behind. Don’t get me wrong. Financial success and abundance often paves the way to a life of extravagance, ease, and the best money can buy in the way of health care, lifestyle, power, and much much more.

Perhaps balancing the many things that are most important to us is as important as “what” matters most. Love without being able to pay the bills isn’t such a great thing. Then again, loads of money, with no one to love or share adventures with is bankrupt as well.

If you find yourself at the center of complaint-central, you have ceased to keep your eye  on what matters most to you. Common complaints are that our spouses don’t understand us, or the romance has gone out. We complain that our children are rude and thoughtless, we complain that our parents are critical, demanding, or perhaps that they don’t really care about us. The problem is that these complaints exist outside of us. We live in hope that “they” or “it” will change or get better. The thing is, while we are “waiting for it to get better”, life is passing us by, and we have given up our power to live our lives passionately and fulfilling on our dreams. As long as “it” or “they” have to get better, we have sabotaged ourselves. We are justified lying “in wait”. What if we look at  ourselves and consider “what matters most to me”?  When we ask ourselves this simple question, and begin to take action, we embrace and direct our fortunes and destiny.

Try it. Ask yourself every day if you are doing and experiencing what matters most to you. Start a list, and ask others in your life what matters most to them. Get interested and pay attention to yourself and those around you. This is not a dress rehearsal. If you tell yourself you will get to your dreams “someday”, consider that “someday” is not a date on the calendar.

Get clear on what matters most to you, and take action. Pull, that which matters most to you, toward you everyday in big and little ways.

It’s remarkable to me, that in the 21st century, psychotherapy is often viewed with disdain or contempt. There are so many cliche misconceptions about therapy, many of which reflect a fear of the unknown muddled with prejuduice.  Common is the image of a detached clinician, seated in a chair with pad in hand, taking copious notes, as a frazzled human-being who talks to imaginary voices lies on a couch spouting non-sequitors, screaming or crying irrationally, and doing so for the duration of their lives.  Although there are many schools of thought within the pscyhotherapeutic world, there is general agreement that most people who connect with the right therapist for them, gain a great deal. Therapy is a venue for sorting out one’s thoughts and feelings in a safe and mindful milieu. In my practice, the focus is on working out the problems which keep many people from really engaging in, and passionately loving their lives. Many people experience times and places in life where they are clear that they are not achieving what they want, they aren’t having the kinds of relationships that they want, nor are they experiencing the fulfillment, happiness, love, and/or satisfaction that are intrinsic to the yearnings of being human . Why is it that every day you have the same arguments with your spouse? When did that red-hot passion with your lover seem to just disappear, and how come watching television at the end of the day has become more important than connecting with your family? When did you get so bored or angry? Why are your children sad, rude, lying, or act like they are entitled to whatever they seem to want from moment to moment? Are your teenagers on drugs, driving drunk, or having indiscriminate sex? How come no matter how many friends you have, you still feel lonely and dissatisfied? There are also critical life-altering moments that leave us paralyzed and lost like being diagnosed with cancer, having a miscarriage, or the fatal car accident we just found out that our loved one(s) was/were in.

Psychotherapy is an opportunity to hear yourself think in the presence of a professional guide. It is an opportunity to break through the ordinary pain we tolerate, and to heal the extraordinary suffering and anguish that at times are inescapable along the journey of a lifetime. We live in a society which, over recent decades, has increasingly placed a high value on personal and private achievement which are not necessarily bad things. However, western culture has become preoccupied with being soloists and highly competitive, maintaining a game face above all. We have become focused on making sure we look good, often at the sacrifice of being caring and connected.  Inter-reliance and dependence are often viewed as weakness. We have become very critical and judgmental. The outcome is that when a good family is suffering because their child  is out of control, or a couple known as pillars in the community is having marital difficulties which threaten to tear them apart, there is a societal pull to keep it private and try to survive it without the “embarrassment” of having to “air the dirty laundry”. The thought of talking to a professional brings a sense of imagined shame and distress, rather than recognition that the sheer act of talking might bring tremendous relief. Stereotypes and prejudice cripple many people from reaching out and prevent them from pursuing even a  consultation.

There are many types of psychotherapy: behavioral, cognitive, psychodynamic, psychoanalytic, existential, etc. I tend to work from a contemporary analytic model. If you want to be told what to do, I’m not the person to see! In a typical session with me, the primary rule is that you talk about whatever is on your mind without pre-screening. Although we cannot erase your past, we can come to understand and work through the influence that past events have had on how you experience your current life. Therapy in my world is not about telling anyone what to do or how to do it. Rather it is about providing an environment in which you can speak candidly and hear your voice, and together we can sort out your thoughts, feelings, and assessments, and develop new solutions and approaches that align with your values. I have recently had friends and acquaintances who have called me in the face of having had stillbirths, been diagnosed with invasive stage four breast cancer, and having teenagers who have crossed into the land beyond defiant and oppositional. They are beside themselves and can barely think. I can be there for them as their friend, but I can also hear their need and desire for quality psychotherapy; to talk, be understood,  to understand, to regain or experience newly their personal power, to heal, to discover how therapeutic “mindfullness” is a mighty road to happiness and fulfillment .

Psychotherapy is like having an emotional and intellectual personal trainer. It is often hard work and poignant. It is evocative and provocative. It engenders trust and teamwork. It results in recognizing how you have covered and armored the perfect, whole, and complete you that you were born as; not fixing some imperfect and shameful you— these were your inventions. I do not have a list of answers and to-dos for my patients.  I have skills at listening, thinking psychologically, caring, and communicating, and over time you develop these skill such that I become obsolete. In therapy everything is grist for the mental-mill. Everything is to be understood and thought about and processed. As you gain greater mastery in recognizing your blind-spots and bringing understanding, your need for  therapy lessens. Ultimately, it takes being willing to engage at a deep and, at times, very vulnerable level. Psychotherapy is nourishment for the mind and soul. It is a builder of  confidence and the capacity to be understanding. Our relationship as client-therapist becomes a template for understanding all your relationships. There is no reason in our world of abundance, why anyone should ever have to suffer alone. Therapy walks you from a place of pain and/or suffering to a place of mastery, love, happiness, and full self expression.

Therapy: Treatment intended to heal or relieve.

Who doesn’t want that?

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Your comments and ideas are welcomed!

Briar