Psychotherapy

The term Psychotherapy is often used synonymously with the terms: Psychodynamic Therapy, Psychoanalytic Therapy, Analytic Therapy, Depth Therapy and Therapy. Each of these labels describes what is essentially the same process.

Other Approaches How does psychotherapy work? Finding a Therapist

Can psychotherapy help me?

You may be in crisis, overwhelmed by depression, anxiety, or a flood of disturbing feelings. You may be desperately trying to change an ongoing problem in your life, experiencing an undermining sense of isolation, struggling with feelings of low self-esteem, or trying to develop healthy and satisfying relationships. You may be eager to explore who you are, intent on trying to understand what you want and need, trying to figure out which direction to go in life, or vaguely dissatisfied with how your life has turned out.

If you are struggling with any of these issues, where do you turn for help? With all the different options available to you, how do you decide what to do? Can psychotherapy help? Why choose psychotherapy over medication, counseling, or self-help programs?

While counselors, psychiatrists, and psychologists all work with people in distress, each has a particular perspective, training, and area of expertise that may help you in the short term or with a specific issue. Only psychotherapy offers you an approach that is focused on your personal growth and healing, on helping you create the deep, lasting and fundamental changes you desire.

Psychotherapy offers you a medium and method through which you can change yourself and your life for the better. Though psychotherapy requires that you invest yourself in a process that can, at times, be intense and challenging, it offers you many opportunities that other 'treatments' do not.

What Issues Respond to Psychotherapy?

In a very real sense, psychotherapy can help you with any of life's issues. More than a treatment for your emotional difficulties and suffering, psychotherapy is also a tool for deepening your experience of life, for engaging with the challenges of living, and for catalyzing your potential. In this vein, clients have come to me with a whole spectrum of struggles including: severe depression and anxiety, difficulty asserting themselves, eating disorders, struggles due to severe childhood abuse, grief over the loss of a loved one, difficulty coping with chronic illness or addiction, a desire to deepen their relationships, feelings of not living up to their potential, and sometimes simply because of intuitions that therapy would be of value to them. The reasons for coming to therapy are as diverse as the clients who come. Overwhelming or subtle, no two reasons are alike.

Regardless of what brings you into therapy, you need to be understood as a unique person. Whether you are trying to tackle a larger issue like chronic underachieving, or a more specific one like recurring nightmares, the solution to any problem will involve the totality of who you are. Psychotherapy doesn't promise a 'quick fix', but by focusing on you as a whole person it offers you broader, deeper and more lasting changes than medication, time limited therapies and technique driven interventions.

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Other Approaches

How are psychotherapists different from psychiatrists, counselors, and psychologists?

Psychiatrists are medical doctors who use a biological paradigm to understand mental illness. Though some psychiatrists do practice psychotherapy, with most you will be diagnosed according to agreed upon criteria and treated with medications to alleviate your symptoms.

Counselors will usually offer you assistance around a particular issue such as addiction, marital conflict, or parenting. A counselor will focus on teaching you facts you don't know about your struggle or helping you learn techniques that may help you cope.

A psychologist has a university degree in psychology. While most psychologists do not work with emotional struggles at all, clinical psychologists usually use cognitive and behavioural approaches to help you figure out your issues, teach you new ways of thinking about yourself, and suggest new ways of approaching your problems. This is usually done in extremely time-limited treatments which last fewer than twenty sessions.

In contrast to these other approaches, a psychotherapist will take the time necessary to help you to get to the roots of your struggles. Psychotherapists will rarely give you advice or tell you what to do, rather, they will help you to explore the underlying, and often unconscious, issues that prevent you from living your life the way you want. A psychotherapist will work with you as you discover who you are and why you are suffering, and by doing so, help you to change in ways that are more fundamental and essential than learning new information, additional skills, or 'positive thinking'. A psychotherapist will help you heal old wounds, grow as a person, gain confidence in who you are and what you can do, and find your own unique path. [top]

How does psychotherapy work?

A psychotherapist will allow you to develop and change who you are by:

acknowledging your uniqueness and complexity,
providing you with non-judgmental understanding,
helping you discover the powerful dynamics of your unconscious patterns of behaviour, feeling and motivation,
identifying the hidden, but very real and powerful, effects of your past and present environments,
working with the important meanings embedded in your normal everyday thoughts, feelings, actions and fantasies,
facilitating the exploration of the character forming influences of your childhood,
creating a safe and empathic therapeutic relationship,
providing you with educated, skilled, honest, respectful and caring professional help.

While most psychotherapists understand these foundational requirements for change, within the paradigm there are many different theoretical emphases and treatment approaches, including: psychoanalytic psychotherapy, interpersonal, existential-humanistic, Jungian, bioenergetic, feminist, gestalt, transpersonal and more. Psychotherapists such as myself, draw on many of these models to understand and help our clients.

Can you give an example?

Say your marriage has broken up. A counselor may give you guidance on specific issues such as strategies for communicating with your ex-spouse, or techniques for controlling your anger. A psychiatrist may give you medication to alleviate your depression or your anxiety, or to help you sleep. A psychotherapist will help you look at the underlying issues that may have led to the end of your marriage. Why do you keep finding yourself in destructive relationships? What unconscious compromises did you make to maintain your marriage, and why did they break down? Who are you now that you are not married? Why do you feel so abandoned even though you chose to end the relationship? A psychotherapist can help you change some of the self-limiting or destructive ways you used to relate to your ex-spouse. You will become more aware of how you feel and the destructive patterns you are prone to falling into. You will develop a greater understanding of what you need and how to get it, and you will gain an expanded sense of possibility, so that you can work toward living in harmony with your ideals and values. These changes will enable you to create more fulfilling and authentic relationships in the future.

What happens during psychotherapy?

The exact course of your therapy cannot be predetermined. Just as everyone's life is different, everyone's therapy is different. Still, there are some commonalities in most therapies. At its most basic level, you meet regularly with your therapist in a safe, quiet place. Usually, you will begin by telling your therapist, in your own way, how you are feeling, what is happening in your life right now, and what you want to be different. Your therapist will help you explore the hidden layers of your experience - the feelings, understandings, events, and patterns that have coloured and shaded your impressions as well as shaped and limited your choices. Over time, you will work with your therapist to uncover and heal the wounds that may be connected to these limitations, and move beyond those old, often unconscious ways of being that may have resulted from them. With the help of your therapist you will take steps required to change, and you will grow towards the more rewarding and joyful life you seek. Whatever your struggle, it is always important that you allow yourself to express whatever you are thinking or feeling to your therapist, no matter how surprising or uncomfortable. In a good therapeutic relationship, if you work to communicate honestly and openly, in time, you can dare to be yourself, you can learn to accept who you are, and you can heal, grow and start to become who you would like to be. Ultimately you can find a way to flourish rather than just get by.

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Finding a Therapist

What makes a good therapist?

Good psychotherapists have many more similarities than they do differences. They are able to listen fully and carefully and to empathize with your struggles, they have a passion for their work, and fluent communication with their own intuitions, and they are able to express their understandings respectfully and appropriately. A good therapist can appreciate who you are now, while helping you become who you want to be. He isn't threatened by your strong emotions, conflict or deep pain. He is willing to be affected by you, is open to the unknown, and is willing to struggle to help you. A good therapist has grappled with the paradoxes, limitations and challenges of being human and is open to continuing to learn and grow. He is non-judgmental and will not try to impose his experiences, ideas or agendas onto you. A good therapist will engage deeply in the therapeutic process and act with authenticity and integrity.

How do I choose a Psychotherapist?

Don't be afraid to ask questions. This is a very important decision. You want to find a therapist who matches your needs, personality, and struggles. I usually suggest that my clients assess how they feel about our match after a few sessions. A mutual rapport is crucial to the work.
Ask yourself what kind of person you'd like to see. A man or a woman? More directive or more empathic? What is his particular approach or background? More importantly, what qualities are you looking for? Warmth? Intelligence? Experience? A sense of humour? I believe that good psychotherapists must balance their professionalism with their humanity to be able to provide their clients with a true opportunity for deep, life changing therapy.
Beware of danger signals. Does the therapist seem disinterested or distracted? Is he too busy talking to listen to you fully? Does he try to tell you what your own experience is? Does he think he has all the answers? Most importantly, is he ever disrespectful or invasive? I believe that everyone's path is unique. I cannot know the answers, but I can help you to find yours.
Effective psychotherapy requires effective training. My training at the Centre for Training in Psychotherapy was both rigorous and extremely thorough, and included extensive supervised work with clients.
For many reasons, it is very important that your therapist has undergone his own personal therapy. Practicing psychotherapy is a complex and challenging task and it is vitally important that your therapist know his own strengths and weaknesses so he can help you without his own issues interfering. I have had extensive experience in both group and individual therapy and understand the value and rewards of the process, as well as the courage and strength required to undertake it.
Don't forget to take practical issues into account, such as where the therapist works, what times he has available, and his fees. I work in central Toronto, five days a week, including two early mornings and three late evenings, to better accommodate the varied schedules of my clients.
Most importantly, trust yourself. What is your feeling with this person? Is he someone you feel a connection to? Does he seem to understand you? How do you feel after the session? Do you feel you have been heard? Does your therapist feel like your ally? I believe that finding a good match is one of the most significant factors affecting the outcome of any therapy.

It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look.

Henry David Thoreau