Therapy

I just started reading this great book today. It's called Passionate Marriage by David Schnarch. It's tag line reads "Keeping love and intimacy alive in committed relationships"
Given that I'm a bit of a professional single, it is proving itself to be a very interesting read. But, as with all things, any understanding gained is a stone in the path to compassion. For how can we empathise with others if we cannot comprehend their experience?

I came across this great paragraph in the book:
When we talk about developing a fuller, deeper understanding of marriage, many people automatically think of unconscious feelings of repressed experiences. We've grown accustomed to looking at life's struggles as a reflection of unconscious processes. When we're unhappy, we look within ourselves for past traumas that incapacitate us in the present. The notion of uncovering repressed feelings has become synonymous with mental health, as if progressively stripping away facades and unearthing unconscious anxieties will liberate our innate vitality and creativity. In this view, therapy is a method of peeling away the layers of your character like an onion. Often, however, the problem is not a matter of peeling away layers but of developing them - growing ourselves up to be mature and resourceful adults who can solve our current problems.

How's that for food for thought? How long have I spent trying to understand and uncover the causes for my reactions, prejudices, beliefs and behaviours. Naval gazing. What really is it that I expect to find inside my onion? Surely by now I would have realised that inside all the layers there is no substance, just more layers. What a relief to stop peeling and start healing. There are attitudes and behaviours which form my character that I am not proud of. Interrogating the root causes of them will not instigate change.

What we need is hope. We need encouragement. We need strategies. The past holds an important place in our journeys, but it does not hold the answers. If it did, we would have found them last time we went around this mountain. People can change, mature and grow. What we need is an arm around our shoulders and a friendly point in the right direction.

Jung said that successful therapy by definition involves the meeting, interaction, and communication of two personalities. Unless the therapist brings his own personality to the fore there can be no true exchange. Two personalities, two souls, on equal ground, both alike in dignity.

I have no more answers than anyone else, yet I will one day be the one sitting behind the desk. I am no onion peeler. I do not intend to rip people bare.
What is it that I propose to offer? I will offer all that I can. Hope. Love. Compassion. Understanding. A listening ear. No answers. Just a bit of light into dark situations. Is this even possible? Does this type of therapy exist? Is it even therapy at all or is it just friendship? An art which is sorely missed in our times.