Things I learned from therapy
My mental health journey has been transformative over the past few years, involving a combination of self-learning and introspection through psychotherapy and a variety of therapeutic activities, including meditation and drama classes. I experienced a new dimension of personal growth, especially in emotional growth and building authentic relationships, which have been underdeveloped for many years of my life. Being proactive in this journey, rather than a passive recipient of therapy has especially helped me. This brief article honestly does not do justice to how much I have gained through my journey (emotionally and socially, not kilograms haha), but I will do my best to summarise three big lessons among my numerous takeaways.
Lesson 1 - Universal Human Needs & Self-Love
Through psychotherapy, I learned that our choices in life are driven by universal human needs [1] - certainty, variety, significance, connection, love, growth and contribution. Satisfying love, growth and contribution helps us to meet all other needs. Our needs are satisfied through conditions/rules we set for them, strongly influenced by our natural biology and social conditioning since young. Exercising self-love means meeting our needs through healthy and sustainable conditions within our control, to promote our happiness and well-being.
Ancient wisdom enlightened me with time-tested guides about conditions within our control. The Bhagavad Gita from Hinduism [2] points out that our actions are within our control, and actions can influence results, but we can't fully control results in the complexities of life. Aiming to meet our needs through a strong attachment to results is not healthy and sustainable, driving our ruminations, emotional insecurities and dysfunctional relationships, undermining our well-being. [3] This deluded attachment comes from the maladaptive core belief that many of us have internalised since young – that we are never enough [4] unless we achieve certain results that fit our social constructs. Interestingly, when our attachment to controlling results is freed, wholesome results arise as natural by-products, drawing from the ancient Taoist concept of Wu Wei - 无为. [5]
As I reflected honestly on my needs and grew my self-awareness, I found that since childhood, my conditions for my needs were largely not within my control. For example, my condition to satisfy my needs of certainty and significance was that I could only be certain that I was worthy enough if I achieved praise-worthy results. My self-worth was fragile, at the mercy of external circumstances. I frequently ruminated about my inadequacies and felt insecure. I know I am not alone, from my experiences in group sharing sessions like Calm Circles [6], along with the National Youth Council’s finding [7] of progressive decline in self-worth among Singaporean youths over the past decade.
Growing my understanding of self-love taught me that we can meet our needs through simple actions that are healthy and sustainable, instead of being results-dependent. For example, love can be satisfied through expressing gratitude and being present with ourselves and others. Growth can be satisfied through regular commitment to activities that help us grow into healthier and happier people. Contribution can be met by sharing lessons from our health journeys with others. In addition, affirming myself with the fact that I am already enough as my core belief - to be loving, to grow into a better human, and to contribute goodness for myself and others - for my needs of certainty, significance and love helped me develop an inner sense of security.
Lesson 2 – Internalising Healthy Core Beliefs Through Meditation
I learned that entrenched core beliefs underlying our attachments can be changed for the better, to help us grow emotionally, but not merely through an intellectual exercise using logic or sheer willpower. Instead, we need to bring our minds to a state of relaxed alertness [8] that allows new, healthy core beliefs to sink in beyond our conscious minds. A review study by the National University of Singapore [9] has shown that meditation practices that activate the parasympathetic nervous system help bring the mind to this state.
Sarah Blondin’s guided meditations [10] for self-love helped me greatly in changing my maladaptive core belief - “I am never enough” - embedded beyond my immediate consciousness for many years, into “I am enough”, as I worked on my needs. Try these meditations if you like, you can concurrently engage your body [11] such as hugging yourself, or placing your hands over your heart, to activate your parasympathetic nervous system. Your inner calm will grow with daily practise.
Lesson 3 – Drama Classes Complement Psychotherapy
Doing bold moves - behaviours that counteract avoidance and withdrawal [12] - was another important part of therapy to address my maladaptive thoughts and insecurities, alongside meditation. However, implementing bold moves in the real world straight out of therapy could feel like a HUGE jump. Thankfully, I discovered that drama classes offer a safe space to experiment before implementation in the real world.
Since young, I habitually avoided experiencing emotions deeply, especially withdrawing from discomforting emotions. Dismissing emotions led me to develop many emotionally distant and superficial relationships. Therapy and drama taught me that growing emotional connection with others to build authentic relationships required me to connect with my own emotions [13] first.
Drama gave me a safe space to pilot being present with emotions in myself and others, feeling them deeply, growing my emotional strength through visceral experience. [14] With this newly acquired inner strength, I felt increasingly comfortable sitting in with the emotions of others, enabling me to build deeper relationships consequently.
I hope these three lessons from my journey help you. As I increasingly embraced the fact that I am enough - to love, grow and contribute, I experienced a growing sense of personal freedom and richness across many of my relationships. I am ending off by sharing one of the world’s longest studies of adult development [15]as a bonus for you reading till here. I wish you happiness and well-being in life.
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References:
[1] Cloe Madanes, “The 6 Human Needs For Fulfillment”, http://cloemadanes.com/2016/10/12/the-6-human-needs-for-fulfillment/, 2016
[2] Kathirasan K, “Dealing with uncertainties in Hinduism”, https://www.instagram.com/tv/CEbC8ROhBGe/?igshid=MDJmNzVkMjY%3D, BeingBeings.mag, 2020
[3] Ying Song, Zhenzhi Zhao, “Social Undermining and Interpersonal Rumination among Employees: The Mediating Role of Being the Subject of Envy and the Moderating Role of Social Support”, https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/14/8419/htm, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2022
[4] Brené Brown, “The Power of Vulnerability”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCvmsMzlF7o&ab_channel=TED, TED, 2011
[5] “EASTERN PHILOSOPHY: Wu Wei”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvZi7ZV-SWI&ab_channel=TheSchoolofLife, The School of Life, 2016
[6] https://www.calmcollective.asia/calm-circles, Calm Collective
[7] “YOUTH.sg: The State of Youth in Singapore 2021 - Youth and Their Strides Towards Flourishing”, Part A: Subjective Wellbeing, Section A2: Self-Esteem & Self-Efficacy, https://www.nyc.gov.sg/en/initiatives/resources/national-youth-survey, National Youth Council, 2021
[8] Bessel van der Kolk, “The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma”, Chapter 19, Penguin Books, 2015.
[9] Ido Amihai, Maria Kozhevnikov, “The Influence of Buddhist Meditation Traditions on the Autonomic System and Attention”, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26146629/, National Library of Medicine, 2015.
[10] Sarah Blondin, https://soundcloud.com/liveawakepodcast, Live Awake podcast
[11] Benjamin Weinstein, “How to Practice Soothing Touch”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKi1s5zygts&ab_channel=HappinessisThailand, Happiness is Thailand, 2022.
[12] “3 Common Myths About Exposure Therapy”, https://www.instagram.com/p/ClqpzgmLwVo/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link, Institute of Mental Health Singapore, 2022
[13] Brené Brown, “Brené Brown on Empathy”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Evwgu369Jw&ab_channel=RSA, The RSA, 2013
[14] Bessel van der Kolk, “The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma”, Chapters 18 & 20, Penguin Books, 2015.
[15] Liz Mineo, “Good genes are nice, but joy is better”, https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2017/04/over-nearly-80-years-harvard-study-has-been-showing-how-to-live-a-healthy-and-happy-life/?fbclid=IwAR1nB29Qb3jvWd0ME3K4rbWLJTzzHR17TLfqNSHpQqUf-AdEXDXaPmaHsWE, The Harvard Gazette, 2017