Hi,
Regular readers of this newsletter know that I tend to ask a lot of questions. In the past two months, I’ve asked you to catalogue all the different forms of healing you’ve tried in your life; sought your tips on how I can start to read books again; and invited recommendations on the artists and creators who are making mental health relatable and accessible for everyone.
I love doing this because what starts as a personal fascination always ends up sparking terrific conversations on shared curiosities. Sometimes, I quietly recede into the background to enjoy the chatter between our members, as happened here (you can read this conversation if you are a member).
Today, I want to introduce a new bee in my bonnet. I’ve been thinking a lot about therapy – specifically, two crucial ways in which the hoary old practice of therapy is changing right before our eyes.
#1: the politicisation of therapy
There is evidence that a form of therapy was known to the ancient Greeks, who valued the role played by "encouraging and consoling words" in healing the sick. Modern therapy as we know it really took root only in the 1940s-60s, in the wake of Freud. Here’s a good brief history of psychotherapy if you’re interested.
Today, therapy exists in various forms – cognitive behavioural therapy, psychoanalysis, eclectic therapy and so on. Now traditionally, therapists have been trained to be "neutral", even inert. A blank slate, a cipher on whom the client could project their own feelings.
"Most therapists don’t share private details about their lives with their clients eg their sexuality, whether they have children, relationship status and personal experiences from their lives," writes Nadine Moore, a psychodynamic therapist.
"This is probably more true of therapists who practice psychodynamically and psychoanalytically. This is because the theory goes that when little is known about the therapist the client can more easily project onto the client-therapist the relationship experiences that they have had before. So the client-therapist relationship mimics a relationship that has happened previously, eg a mum-daughter relationship or a sibling relationship."
Another important tenet often held by therapists is that the root of all mental health problems lies within. Hence, politics and matters of state are kept outside the therapy chamber – even though we know that the personal is deeply political and vice versa.
Let’s say Trump’s tweets give you panic attacks. Rather than discussing his toxic politics, a psychoanalyst might focus on probing whether he reminds you of a nasty authority figure from your childhood.
This is where the first of the two big shifts is happening.
In the age of Trump and his crude, divisive politics, therapists are finding it impossible to be apolitical. "Donald Trump is in the therapy room and he is blowing it up," writes Bella DePaulo, an academic affiliate at psychology and brain sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
"In striking contrast to decades of precedent, therapists are now routinely making their political opinions known to their clients. In a recently published survey of 604 psychotherapy clients from 50 states, only 32% said their therapist did not disclose their political beliefs. Thirty percent said their therapists divulged their views, and the other 38% said their therapists made their beliefs known implicitly."
Something similar happened in India in 2019, when mental health professionals loudly protested a new citizenship legislation. I explained why the entry of politics into the therapeutic space is critical in this article.
#2: the reinvention of the therapeutic space
Another traditionally important feature of therapy is the sanctity of the therapeutic space. A space should help you to achieve specific goals, says Sally Augustin, an applied environmental and design psychologist. "We are animals, after all. We do our best mental work when we feel a little bit protected."
My therapist, for instance, used to be very particular about continuity of space and setting, even rituals like drinking coffee together during our sessions. The pandemic and the switch to online sessions has demolished all this.
"Now, I have to grab whichever room in the house is free," she recently told me. "I also see clients running after their kids. Glimpses of their lives that I am not supposed to know about unless they organically come up during sessions."
So here’s today’s question: If you are a practitioner or a client, how are you coping with these vastly altered realities? Do you like the new face of therapy, or has it unsettled you?
Do reply in the contribution section under this newsletter. And please share this newsletter with those who you feel might have something to add to our discussion. Together, we might just be able to tell an interesting and important story about history in the making.
PS: If you’re struggling with post-pandemic therapy, my former therapist’s words might give you succour: "Trust the process and stay with it."
Until next week.
Would you like this newsletter sent straight to your inbox?
Subscribe to my weekly newsletter where I dismantle myths around Sanity, discuss the best ideas from our members, and share updates on my journalism.