When you think about it, cavemen or even people living in the middle ages must have been much happier than we are now. OK, so maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration. But certainly people just a few decades ago were much better off. One piece of evidence for that is that no-one was howling the “financial crisis” jargon over the heads for what feels like forever. Another, is that they didn’t seem to have the urge to run to psychologists, psychiatrists or psychoanalysts to let out their problems.
In fact it seems that as society develops, our problems become all the more complex, intense and stressful. And for that, we need to feel that someone is on our side. Understanding and offering a helping hand, at least in the form of some advice.
Perhaps, this is the reason we often resort to ‘professional help’. Because “they would know better” and offer solutions. But in reality, all they truly offer is a chance for you to release everything that is bothering you, that is tormenting your mind, that is keeping you awake at nights. They allow you to liberate all the emotions, anger and tension that you have been suppressing for so long. And they do that by simply granting you the security that they will not judge. They are there to listen and maybe tell you what they believe will help you in finding the right solution or way forth. So, in essence, they act pretty much like a Buddha would, because the answer almost always lies within you. And in the end, you are the only one who can solve your problems.
You just need to realize what makes you so frustrated, that at times it comes out as passive-aggressive, what makes you depressed, what raises your heart pressure, what is troubling your mind and most of all, why. In this search for inner peace and answers, we all wish there was someone out there who could just provide us with all the information we need to know. But unfortunately, there isn’t. And they can’t. So we still don’t know.
Whoever your psychologist is – be it a Frasier Crane character, or more like a Charlie-type in Anger Management – these people may sit through tens of sessions a day, listening to other people’s problems and in the end they themselves may need someone to vent out on. So we could at least help them in their job and try to solve these inner riddles that are causing us to crawl up in their comfy chair in the first place.
Sometimes, the answers we seek are indeed right in front of us. We just lack the courage, the strength or even the will, to truly acknowledge them.
N.B. The term “shrink” is a clipping of “headshrinker”, a US slang term that simply refers to the idea that psychiatrists have the ability to reduce or “shrink” one’s mind into an understandable concept. Thereby (if I may add) helping you grow in the process.
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There are things you realise as time passes. As you mature, as you enrich your experiences, as you widen your perspectives. You acknowledge that the world is not (always) the wonderland you want it to be, nor is it as idyllic and welcoming as you once thought it was. In fact, everything is a bit more complicated than you want to believe.
MC's Whispers 