Do you have a good sense of who you are as a person? I’m sure you know who you are as a parent, or girlfriend, employee and neighbor. But do you really know yourself in an intimate way?
I think one of the intimidating worries about coming to therapy is that your therapist is going to try to change you. Or you worry that you’ll have to change in order to feel better.
Yes, some of this is true but in reality, we’re not here to change you but rather to figure out who you really are and magnify the shit out of that!
So, our therapeutic approach is really about revealing your true essence which has been buried by all the years of hurt, negative messages, self-doubt, and hurt. To deal with all of that crap you’ve been wading through your whole life, you have probably developed some pretty negative coping skills and thought patterns.
That’s where we come in!
I’m curious if you recognize yourself doing some of these thought patterns to deal with the crazy around you:
1. Black or white thinking: You think that either you gotta be perfect or you suck. You tend to think that either your life is wonderful or it’s the worst. You’re an either/or gal!
2. Catastrophizing: This is a popular one! Do you automatically go right down the rabbit hole (hey Alice!) whenever anything bad happens? For example, your boss doesn’t say hi to you in the morning with her usual smile so you automatically think “oh shit, I’m so fired, I don’t know why I thought I could do this job, now I’m going to be humiliated and embarrassed and how the hell am I going to be able to pay my car payment next week???” Yea. You know who you are …
3. Personalization: This is when you think anything that happens around you is directly because of you. The cashier at Giant that was rude to you? That’s because she thinks you’re an ass because you didn’t bring your bags with you. Or that fight at the holiday dinner at your sister-in-law’s? That’s because you didn’t see it coming and redirect the conversation before it headed south. You’re always comparing yourself to everyone around and looking for evidence that you don’t measure up.
I’ve listed these examples to show you that we all develop these kinds of thought patterns over the years to help us manage what’s happening to us and around us. Figuring out what specific tools/patterns/habits you’ve taken on, is the first step in peeling back the layers to seeing the real YOU.
The girl that you remember who loved swinging on the swings, hiking to the creek at your grandma’s, making homemade cards, taking in the sunsets.
The you who used to be open and trusting, who was excited about life, who loved taking chances!
Let’s find you again!
We’re super skilled at seeing YOU, at hearing YOU, at appreciating YOU, and at reminding YOU that you don’t need to change who you really are! You just gotta figure out what you’ve been using as a mask and shield to protect you and begin rewiring your brain and your habits in order to settle into the fabulous bad ass person you’ve always been! We got you … schedule here to begin getting back to YOU!
