3 Things I Want You to Know About Humans
There are dozens of fascinating aspects in my job as a therapist. Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to talk about most of them because of client confidentiality. But there are three things in particular that I am learning about humans that I wish everybody knew.
First, however, I’ll share that I didn’t really know what I was getting into when I applied to the graduate program that would lead to the work I do now. Things had gotten messy for me towards the end of high school. As a result of said messiness, I didn’t think highly of myself as a student, or as a human, for that matter. In my third attempt at community college I found myself in my first psychology class. Nineteen, brutally self-conscious and under the influence of cocaine, I became irreversibly enthralled with my twelve by twelve inch, strangely floppy, questionably priced Intro to Psych book. Within those pages I found clues around the mental health issues that had led to my substance misuse. In that semester, fall of 2003, I found a subject worth studying long enough to earn a degree, and a degree worth getting my life together for.
I fast tracked through the rest of my bachelors, working through winter and summer breaks and taking as many units at a time as possible. Partying became something I fit around school and not the other way around. I had no plans for after college, I was purely absorbed in the material and excited to be making up for lost time. After watching all my supposed promise and potential as a kid get decimated during my wayward adolescent years, it was risky to indulge in the kind of fantasies afforded by a healthy sense of hope and confidence. I was still far too fragile to consciously care about my future.
As luck or fate would have it, I had an older friend — an ex boyfriend’s older sister who had kept me even when the boyfriend did not. They were seven years apart and equally gorgeous, sharing the same warm brown eyes, olive skin and generous smiles, but she was all the feminist he was not, and that which I so desperately needed. She more than suggested that I apply to graduate school. She handed me the phone, already dialed, in search of the volunteer position I would need to be accepted. Then she delivered me to my program interview, locked and loaded with the most comprehensive set of how-to-act-in-an-interview instructions an aspiring graduate student could ever need. Low and behold I was accepted, at twenty-one-years old — I was positive due only to her effort. I still didn’t know exactly what a therapist was or what they actually did, but I knew they were in the business of helping people, which sounded, well, more worthwhile than most endeavors I was aware of at the time. My self-esteem had been chronically and at times dangerously low, but I loved other people. When folks struggled, I wanted to help. Now I had the opportunity to do that.
My professional counseling classes and post degree training experience taught me how to be caring and supportive in a way that is safe and sustainable. I learned how to hold vulnerability and sit with discomfort and insecurity. I honed my ability to confront dysfunction without harming relationship. Over years of guidance and mentorship, I became seasoned in the practice of connection.
What also became clear over time was that I had signed up for a job where taking care of myself was going to be absolutely crucial. At first, I’ll admit, I was motivated to learn this self-care business out of concern for others. It was, and still is, a tremendous honor to me when clients assess and determine that I am worthy of their stories. I get to witness people being themselves in the consistently profound way they show up when sitting in a non-judgmental space. In order to be respectful and ethical around such an incredible honor, I became interested in having better boundaries around myself and my own wellbeing. In other words, I had to completely clean up the way I eat, sleep, relax, and do relationship. On a deeper level, I needed to unlearn toxic societal norms and maladaptive coping habits and relearn how to be a human in a newly inspired way. This transformation meant that I could arrive for my clients with the kind of presence that people deserve from their therapist. But this change and growth into a healthier human felt so powerfully good that it reinforced itself. I’m no longer taking care of myself only for the sake of my clients. I take the best care of myself that I can because I want to. Completely unlike my lost and aimless younger self, I care deeply now about myself in addition to others and the world we all share.
This shift in my own wellbeing has stilled the chaos in my mind, which allows me to be a more accurate mirror for the people who sit on the couch across from me. It’s the profound observations of others I’ve made from this place of relative stillness that I really wish everyone could see and know:
People are incredibly resilient. In fifteen years of service, I haven’t met a single person who hasn’t faced adversity, or what is sometimes referred to as “little t trauma”. Many people have also experienced at least one form of “Big T trauma”. But despite how challenging and often painful and scary it is to be alive, people persevere. Not only do the vast majority of folks persist throughout and long after life-altering hardship, people consistently demonstrate a powerful propensity for healing and growth. When we are safe and supported, and when we can mentally get out of our own way, our natural instinct is to evolve. I am in awe of the resilience within each and every one of us.
People are intuitively wise. Given the space to reflect on their own issues, the folks I’ve worked with — across multiple settings and including a range of demographics and populations — usually discover within themselves their own excellent advice and counsel. I thought it would be hard to sit back and wait for clients to figure out “what to do” about various conundrums. The “sitting back” I do for the sake of empowerment. But it isn’t all that hard to refrain because often all I need to say is something like “what do you think that’s about” or “what do you imagine you might do about this” and people tend to know, even when they didn’t know they would know. Not only do clients regularly demonstrate insight around more specific topics, like how to handle something or what they’ve learned from something else, but I am also regularly blown away by the inspiring, big picture perspectives individuals share with me as well. These same people who have all survived difficult, painful things are full of unshakable wisdom.
People are deeply good. Yes, there is unskillfulness, shortsightedness, and problematic behavior happening all the time. You’ve certainly witnessed some, perhaps even perpetrated a bit — I know I have. But when given the opportunity to hear someone’s whole story, even the most dysfunctional stuff tends to more or less make sense within the context of a person’s journey. Given the opportunity to sift through pokey defenses and distorted perspectives, the survivors underneath have beautiful hearts and loving souls. This seems to be true for all of us. We share these wholesome collective needs, such as love, safety, connection, belonging, and sovereignty. Below the armor folks have donned to survive the world the way it is — a world where needs are rarely all met — people are made of pure love. I’ve come to see that at our very core, love is who and what we are.
I just wish we all knew how amazing we all are. May we learn to take care of ourselves and each other in the deeply nurturing and respectful way we all deserve.