Our initial task as client and therapist – our work during the first few sessions - resembles cartography. I begin, like a map-maker, drawing a square or a rectangle, then sketching the outlines of landmarks visible from afar – the mountains, the sea, the rivers. In limning a life, the prominent features are obvious – where [...]
Posts Tagged ‘psychotherapy’
Mapping the soul
Posted in Thoughts and Musings, tagged cartography, compass, dislocation, fantasy, Freud, initial question, lost, maps, psychotherapy, therapists, vacation on April 4, 2012 | 3 Comments »
Your inner little twerp
Posted in AskThePeople'sTherapistSeries, tagged ADHD, awareness, best self, Id, inner child, OCD, personality, Pleasure Principle, psychotherapy on February 22, 2012 | 2 Comments »
I received the following letter regarding humankind’s on-going battle with its own impulses: Hi Will, I really enjoy reading your blog, you give great insight. I have often been told that I need to focus (I do not have ADHD or any other attention disorder).My problem or what others see as a problem is that [...]
Talk therapy vs type therapy
Posted in AskThePeople'sTherapistSeries, tagged authentic contact, body language, facial expressions, Group therapy, psychotherapy, talk therapy, talking, writing, written word on January 25, 2012 | 3 Comments »
This month’s question for The People’s Therapist gets to the heart of how psychotherapy – “talk therapy” – actually works: Why is psychotherapy conducted exclusively face-to-face, rather than in writing? I find that I express myself much more clearly and precisely in writing, after having had the chance to ruminate on my response — it’s [...]
Unbalanced
Posted in AskThePeople'sTherapistSeries, tagged balance, psychotherapy, regression, relationships on December 21, 2011 | 2 Comments »
I received the following letter concerning the tricky business of maintaining a relationship: Dear Will, I’m a recent law school graduate studying for the bar exam. I just got into another argument with my boyfriend of four years, and I’m feeling frustrated and upset. Our relationship tends to break down when I’m going through a [...]
Stay away from the Pet Cemetery
Posted in AboveTheLaw series, tagged group psychotherapy, Pet Sematary, psychotherapy, selling out, Stephen King, zombies on March 2, 2011 | 33 Comments »
There’s a terrific opening scene in Stephen King’s novel, “Pet Sematary.” I don’t read a lot of Stephen King novels. That’s not because I dismiss his skill as a writer. It’s because they scare the hell out of me. In this one, the main character is a young doctor. He’s on his first day at [...]
The ex from hell
Posted in AskThePeople'sTherapistSeries, tagged boundaries, confidentiality, Group therapy, psychotherapy, trust on January 22, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
An intriguing question from “A”: My boyfriend’s ex has gone through therapy one on one and in a group setting. She now thinks she can diagnose and help anyone. In her mind she is “helping” but in reality she is being intrusive, causing more problems, trying to find out secrets. I see this as someone who is in [...]
It’s only chemical
Posted in Thoughts and Musings, tagged amygdala, brain, cortex, depression, endorphins, neural pathways, neurons, psychiatric drugs, psychopharmacology, psychotherapy on January 5, 2011 | 5 Comments »
I get asked this all the time: “What if it’s only chemical?” Good question. Why talk to a therapist if you can take a pill and be done with it? Freud was intrigued by the possibility. According to Peter Gay, in Freud’s late work, “Outline of Psychoanalysis:” “[he] speculated that the time might come when [...]
Separated at birth?
Posted in AskThePeople'sTherapistSeries, tagged awareness, consciousness, psychotherapy, relationship, transference, transference reaction on December 22, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
An interesting question that touches on some basic Freudian theory: I’ve been reading your blog for the past few months and I really enjoy it. I hope you can help with this problem that has completely stumped me. Eight years ago I left an abusive relationship. In general things are much better now, I don’t [...]
Patients say the darndest things!
Posted in Intriguing Patients, tagged funny things, jokes, patients, psychotherapy on July 26, 2010 | 4 Comments »
A therapist colleague recently agreed with me that the funniest things we’d ever heard were told to us by our patients. Summer break (and the week of the bar exam) seems like an appropriate time for a laugh. So…without further ado…here are some of my patients’ funniest utterances from the past few years: (An Arab [...]
Popping pills at the office
Posted in AboveTheLaw series, Thoughts and Musings, tagged anti-depressant medication, anti-depressants, erectile dysfunction, neurotransmitter levels, pharmaceutical industry, psychotherapists, psychotherapy, sexual side effects, side effects on March 10, 2010 | 18 Comments »
A New York Times article from a few weeks ago holds enormous potential ramifications for lawyers bent over their desks at big law firms. The tentative conclusion of the piece was simple: if you are dealing with minor depression, or in fact, with anything other than massive, serious depression, popping anti-depressant pills is probably a [...]
Alone in a crowd
Posted in AboveTheLaw series, tagged alone, big firms, isolation, law firms, psychotherapy on March 3, 2010 | 49 Comments »
Last week I did a first session with a typical client – a young lawyer worried about starting at a big firm. I couldn’t do real psychotherapy with this guy. Some lawyers are like that – they don’t trust anyone enough to open up. It was more like an awkward coaching session. When I tried [...]
This is your brain. This is your brain on psychotherapy.
Posted in Thoughts and Musings, tagged brain, evolution, lizard, mammal, psychotherapy on January 27, 2010 | 4 Comments »
How does psychotherapy actually work? Good question. The answer is interesting and has to do with how your brain works. The basic idea of psychotherapy is that you take emotional content from a primitive part of the brain and bring it to another more sophisticated, thinking part, where it can be examined and understood. Here’s [...]
Rub my belly
Posted in Thoughts and Musings, tagged Buddha, Buddhism, Freud, Gautama Buddha, India, Journey to the West, People's Therapist, psychotherapy, Siddhartha, Silk Road, Xuanzang on January 18, 2010 | 2 Comments »
Two famous pilgrimages: The Journey to the West – the legendary voyage of the Buddhist monk, Xuanzang, to India to bring the Sutras back to China and establish Buddhism there. Another, less celebrated Journey from the East – Freud’s parents, Ostjuden (Eastern Jews), emigrating in a horse cart from the ghettoes of East Galicia to [...]
The Walrus was John
Posted in Intriguing Patients, tagged borderline pattern, Freddie Lennon, John and Yoko, John Lennon, Julian Lennon, Middle Path, People's Therapist, psychotherapy, Sean Lennon, Stability, Yoko Ono on January 16, 2010 | 1 Comment »
By all accounts, anyone who knew John Lennon learned to expect the unexpected – and sometimes the unpleasant. That’s just how John was. One minute soft and tender. In a blink, harsh and cruel – with a legendary acid wit that didn’t seem quite as witty when it was turned on you. The man who [...]
Tiger Woods has a session with the People’s Therapist
Posted in Current Events, Intriguing Patients, tagged living like a child, People's Therapist, psychotherapy, Tiger Woods on January 16, 2010 | 2 Comments »
It seems like Tiger Woods could use a visit, doesn’t it? Everyone agrees he’s had a rough month. So let’s go there. What if Tiger showed up in my office? What could the People’s Therapist do to help? Patients often show up at my door when they’re in crisis. Many people feel – wrongly – [...]
What’s all this about a “people’s” therapist?
Posted in About This Site, tagged Freud, Group therapy, Lena Furgeri, Louis Ormont, People's Therapist, psychotherapy, sliding fee on January 15, 2010 | 3 Comments »
This blog responds to two BAD things and one GOOD thing about psychotherapy. First, the BAD things. It’s expensive: I slide my rate down to whatever you tell me you can afford. And I mean it. (If you don’t believe me, it’s on my website: www.aquietroom.com.) I’ve seen people for $200 per hour and [...]
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