When the Session Ends: Taking Care Outside of Therapy
If you’re struggling with depression, you may have already had the experience of addressing painful material with a good therapist. That person likely made you feel seen, heard, and supported. But then the hour ended, and it was time to return to your life. You may have asked yourself: What now?
What can you do to sustain the support you just spent an hour receiving once you’re outside of session? How do you look after yourself? How do you make use of the movement that took place in session in the days that follow? How do you contend with painful feelings that may come up in the aftermath?
Wallowing…or exploring?
If you struggle with depression or poor self-esteem and have had some therapy before, the therapeutic hour might have turned out to be the first place you’ve ever felt free to say exactly what you’re thinking or feeling. It may have been the first place where it’s safe to say everything on your mind: unreviewed, unedited, unvarnished.
Once someone asked me if therapy wasn’t just another word for wallowing in emotional pain. When I heard that, my first thought was: What’s the objection to wallowing? From there, a second thought arose: Is it wallowing, or was that person actually talking about opening up to what he was feeling in the moment—as messy, hard, and confusing as it might have been?
There’s a difference. In my mind, wallowing is what many call spinning or obsessing: thinking that leads nowhere and gets you deeper in. On the other hand, exploring leads to opening. Opening leads to insight. And insight leads to action.
A safe place to say everything.
If you’ve come to therapy to work on depression or feelings of not being good enough or unrelenting pressure to please others, there’s a chance that others in your life may have had a hard time listening. Maybe they’re even pressuring you to stop. On the other hand, talking about your challenges in therapy could mean spending more time than you ever thought possible on a particular thought, feeling, or situation. “Say everything” is a phrase I love to offer as much as I love to receive it. Why? Because in therapy, it’s an invitation with acceptance, curiosity and compassion baked in. In therapy, “say everything” is the eventual goal.
Curiosity is a helpful tool.
Are you feeling more down than usual? What’s causing this particular feeling (dread, anxiety, numbness, sadness, anger, to name just a few) to be so persistent right now? Did anything happen to prompt it? When you get stuck, get curious. Taking time just for yourself to think, inquire, and hold whatever comes up, without pressure to act or do, is always a good idea.
This kind of self-questioning is often more easily done, I find, while you’re sitting in nature or talking a walk. Try it: Listening to the sounds around you makes for a different experience than turning on a podcast. Watch your thoughts. Don’t judge. If you find your mind wandering to what you’d like to have for lunch or the sound of the traffic, that’s okay. If you’re mind ping-pongs, that’s okay, too. Keep walking. Keep looking. Keep asking.
Radical acceptance makes a big difference.
Here’s the most important part of the self-inquiry I just mentioned. It involves a concept called radical acceptance, which is a fancy term for being able to look at something and say, “it is what it is.” Engaging in radical acceptance means facing what’s going on inside you squarely, while keeping a kindly and observing eye on the thoughts and feelings that are coming up while you’re observing. The hard thing about addressing harsh and judging voices is that they’re sneaky. They don’t announce themselves; you don’t usually see them coming. Those unkind voices can also be as familiar and comfortable as an old shoe. That’s because they probably once served a very important purpose. Therapy for depression is a safe place to explore those automatic thoughts and critical voices.
If you’re struggling with painful feelings linked to depression or poor self-esteem, call or text me at 213-807-6021. Let’s talk about how I can help.
Reference
Chödrön, P. (2000). When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times. Shambhala Press.
(Photo: Ruslan Sikunov)