Growth and Discomfort in Therapy

Written by Kathleen Cogan, M.A.

After approximately  two years of personal therapy with my counselor,  I had a session dedicated to what we would call my internal “friction.” You may know this feeling as internal conflict, turmoil or just plain anxiety.   I reached a point in my growth where I was able to withstand quite a bit of internal friction or conflict. However, I was unaware that this would ultimately be a very good thing. In fact, when the friction would surface I thought it was a sign I was regressing. In these moments  I experienced it as a struggle or rather deep frustration that  I was still struggling. How could this be? After all this work?

After talking through this visceral and emotional struggle for a few minutes, I stopped and really looked at my counselor. She was smiling. and said words I will never forget: “This friction is where all the growth happens.”  She elaborated: in this internal conflict or friction new emotions, behaviors and affect arise. As old patterns die, new ones began to sprout, causing friction.

My counselor during graduate school echoed similar reflections to me: there is nothing to “figure out.”  Rather most events happening in my life, needed to be felt through, not interpreted.  Psychologist and psychoanalysis,   Philip Bromberg,  refers to as “living through the mess.”

 In short, the way to changing how you feel is going through the discomfort. It is in the process, the relationship between client and counselor. It is not in grand insights or interpretations of the counselor. It in the rich, nuanced relationship between client and counselor.

It was through my relationships with these counselors, I was able to have a different experience with my internal friction. We were able to re-work my past and reorganize my internal world. Together we explored not only my experience of this friction but my history, and how as a young child, made sense of myself through the actions and behaviors of those adults around me. Or as another psychologist and psychoanalyst, Peter Fonagy summarizes well: where my parents able to reflect my inner experiences and respond accordingly?

For me and I am sure most of the clients I work with, the answer is not so black and white, but lies somewhere in shades of grey. Regardless,  whatever did or did not happen to you in childhood it can be repaired within the counselor/ client relationship.  So, stay with the process. Keep going back to your counselor. We don’t have all the answers but I promise, we will walk alongside you for as long as you need.  

If you’re interested in continued growth, contact us today to see if adult therapy would be right for you.

References

Philip M. Bromberg (2010).  Minding the Dissociative Gap, Contemporary Psychoanalysis, 46:1, 19-31, DOI: 10.1080/00107530.2010.10746037

FONAGY, P., & TARGET, M. (1997). Attachment and reflective function: Their role in self-organization. Development and Psychopathology, 9(4), 679-700. doi:10.1017/S0954579497001399