Confessions of a Fulfilled Therapist
May, is mental health awareness month, and many mental health professionals are often reflective of what is helpful for our clients, field of study and even within ourselves. My contribution this year is to disclose my “confessions” of how I take care of myself and find balance in the work that I love and the life that I live.
I feel like I hit the “therapist lottery” by starting early and beginning my career with the youth… it is there that I have experienced the serendipity of seeing individuals evolve and return back to treatment to work on a different set of challenges in a different season of their life.
Self care is a healing agent… I experience therapeutic moments every time I visit my hair stylist, go on a nature walk or I am on the receiving end of being heard/understood by my loved ones.
At the end of long work days, I don’t like to talk much… I am very content to be left to my own thoughts, engage in one of my favorite things, or just relax with my loved ones.
I’ve never been big on broadcasting my profession… some may assume that you are immediately psychoanalyzing them or that you are the “ideal of perfection”. In reality, outside of our life work, therapists are not always “on” and are personalities that want to encounter the broad spectrum of the human experience as a; client, customer, consumer, a parishioner… a person.
Researcher Brene’ Brown stated that: “the most compassionate people are the most boundaried people”. I wholeheartedly agree! Boundary setting is a foundational principle in mental health. In my life work, I have become more aware of the necessity of sometimes saying “no” and understand that setting limits brings true balance to my life and day.
There is no way for a therapist/counselor to have an entire plethora of every human experience. Some therapist’s may not have identical life experiences to every client that they treat, but are students of human behavior and factor continuing education as a part of our work. An ideal therapist will work to establish a healthy rapport with you, and can help you to become more self aware.
One thing that the pandemic has taught me is that happiness is truly “homemade”… My home became my haven as I discovered that; my kitchen is a delightful cafe, my living room a gym and my backyard my secret get away.
Vicarious trauma is a real thing, frequenting news or social media sites can oftentimes drain emotional energy. I believe in protecting my emotional reserves, so I only check in with the news enough to be socially responsible, and I know when to turn it off!
As I have matured, I have learned to appreciate the ‘gut hunches’ that can be emotional cues to tune into what I’m both thinking & feeling, and I make it a regular practice to NOT explain away my feelings.
I absolutely love my work, and I have come to realize that my sense of balance has been established with honoring all parts of myself. I’m happy to embrace that I am more than just a therapist and I believe that this practice makes me a better therapist for it.
To Good Health! ~Fayola