How Does Therapy Help? Why Talking Actually Works

People sometimes ask me: how does therapy actually help? How can talking solve my problems? In a nutshell, therapy can really improve your life, and it does that through several different but interrelated ways. Here's how talking therapy works.

It helps you cope with life's challenges

First, therapy can help you cope better with the many challenges life inevitably brings. Life is tough, and we all face distress of some kind at some point such as illness, loss, relationship breakdown or trauma. We can't control those events. But what we can do is develop more strength, more power and more freedom in choosing how we respond to them, and so reduce the distress they cause.

It helps you make real changes

Therapy can also help you make important changes to your life; change is difficult. Often people find themselves stuck in a rut and can't see a way out. Therapy can help you identify the aspects of your life that are making you unhappy or blocking you in some way.

Those negative aspects of our life aren’t obvious. We're so immersed in our own lives that we can't see the wood for the trees. Therapy helps you gain more clarity, so you can see what's really going on beneath the surface.

It helps you understand yourself - and others

A key part of that process is nurturing more understanding of yourself: what makes you tick, and what triggers you. Self-knowledge is the crucial first step to making positive change. And that self-knowledge is about you as an individual, because we're all unique, but also as a human being.

Clients find it really enlightening to learn more about how the human brain, mind and body work, and how they interact. These are vital lessons we tend not to learn at school. I find that this knowledge makes clients feel a bit less alone, so they stop beating themselves up for their behaviour or reactions to life, as though they're somehow a failure - when they’re not failures at all. They are often just acting or reacting in a very human way.

It gives you a place to be completely honest

Finally, the therapy room is often now the only place where we can truly be ourselves, share our innermost thoughts and be completely honest. 

Some people initially challenge that contention claiming they can open up to their partner, best friend or mum. But if you think about it, your loved ones have got emotional skin in the game.

When we talk to them, we often self-censor, frequently without realising, because we don't want to worry or offend them, or reveal some of the darker aspects of ourselves we're not so proud of. And in turn, however good their intentions, those closest to us bring their own biases and baggage to the conversation. They're not impartial.

People also tell me they increasingly worry about saying the wrong thing in public. Therapy can be that one place where you can really say what you think and feel without fear of judgment, disapproval or offending someone.

A worthwhile investment in your wellbeing

So those are just a few brief ways in which I think therapy can really help. It's a very worthwhile investment in your wellbeing.

If any of this resonates and you'd like to explore further how counselling could help you, I offer a free 15-minute conversation. Please do get in touch by text, email or phone, and I'd be glad to talk things through.