Each day, she plodded through meetings and details while going home to the end of her relationship to a man she loved but could no longer live with. Jerry wasn't abusive, (that would have made it easier); he'd just stopped growing. She wanted more. Though they'd sought out couples counseling, it became clear that the next step was not marriage (perhaps that's why it had taken so long to even think about that), but something else. She thought it might be the end.
As we began to talk, she realized that she'd continued trying to expand her life as though none of this inner life was happening, trying to connect with people she and they knew together as a couple, but this didn't feel authentic. Not fully. And, this was partly because she'd been living half her life in her head. Staying with Jerry, she realized, was not true to who she was, nor who she could be, but the thought of leaving him produced similar feelings of despair and anxiety. Who was she? What was her life without him? She'd always written poetry and had been an English major in college, but she'd left that to create a life with Jerry, and a livelihood of business, which felt stabler to her at the time. But, what had she given up? And, if she tried, could she bring this energy back into the relationship? Would there be room for her?
In Humanistic-Existential therapy, one focus is on what creates meaning for your life. Who are you? What gives your life meaning? What do you want for yourself, beyond things? Where is the balance between expansion and constriction of energy? Greater involvement in life is of the essence.
Part of the therapy's focus is for therapist and client to both be present to what is going in the the client's life as well as what's happening in the room. As noted Existential-Humanistic theorist and author, James Bugental writes, "presence is the quality of being in a situation or relationship in which one intends at a deep level to participate as fully as [one] is able."
As a therapist, I ask myself, "How much should I talk vs share my thoughts? Will talking increase expansion and is this helpful to the person who's sitting across from me? Is it time to share or is it time for the person, if I'm quiet, to find some silence, space, or treasure inside herself?"
Many clients feel the need to constrict themselves and their emotions before feeling expansive. As we enter Autumn, the amber season, the time of turning from warmth to coolness, sunlight to shade and dark nights, this is a time of turning inward, feeling the areas of our lives that are cold and need to be warmed. Within this turning within, there is an awareness of choice and of freedom. What do you choose for your life?
Marie realized that she'd given up her quiet in favor of talking, but the talking with Jerry had no content, no place to go -- further. She began to listen to herself, to write more, to take long walks to gather her thoughts, mulling them over throughout the week, writing about them and bringing them to therapy, like treasures. She described therapy as a sort of "crawl space, maybe a hole... but it feels right" Some place where she could stay hidden until she was ready to come out. She realized that she needed to go slow, even put her head down, metaphorically, to allow for enough energy for all the ways she hoped to change, and was changing. An incubation period. Therapy, in this way, became a hidey-hole. A way of turning inward so she could hear her thoughts more clearly.
Sometimes, nesting or nestling in, is necessary to hear your inner thoughts and to make changes. Constriction may be needed before expansion of your vital energy can be savored and shared with others. I think of this almost like the stuffed animals that my dogs bury in the backyard to save for later, tasting better than before now that the soft fluff flavor is deepened by the toasty flavor of backyard dirt. ;)
As Marie changed, so did her need to stay hidden. She described feeling, "more myself." She experienced increased energy in general. Not the frantic energy of before, but something more fluid and vital to who she was. She began to write more, and talk from the center of herself, with presence. I could really feel her with me when we talked. Her relationship with Jerry shifted as did her relationship with friends and family. She described feeling more alive and awake.
While this was and continues to be a process for Marie, there is a centering, a place that you can come to, in the middle of yourself, if you listen to what needs to be heard. It's from this place of stillness that beautiful ways of being begin to bloom.
**** Think now:
What in your life needs shelter?
This could be an aspect of your life or a skill you're trying to develop.
Could going slower with intention and awareness create greater room for its arrival? Sometimes softening about the pressure, the need for a certain timeline helps.
As you bring to mind/body/heart an area of your life you're trying to make peace with, imagine you have a secret enclave to go to. Make it lovely and safe: a comfortable sofa, your feet up, a warm drink easily within your reach. And, now in your mind's eye and in your heart, give yourself all the time you need, all the gentleness you might desire, to turn inward.
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* Permission to write about this therapy anecdote was received by the author.
Heather Schwartz, Psy.D. is a relational (aka Humanistic), and mindfulness-oriented psychologist in Portland, Oregon who delights in seeing adult clients seeking full self wellness.
