​There is a healing myth that says there is a destination we can travel to ...

a physical space, a building, a room, a service, a retreat, a place -

a healing space that we can travel to, to heal:

a sacred space where healing occurs. 

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And if we go there, we'll be fine.  We will be healed.  After all - we went. It'll be great. We'll bring our friends and make a weekend out of it.  It'll be great.

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When we believe in this healing myth, we first long for this place.  It is after all, a place of healing.  It's where the important stuff happens.  It happens in that place.  We sigh and wistfully tell ourselves... If only we could go there one day.  One day. We tell ourselves that, over and over again - one day.  We say: I will make time and I will go. I will go and then I will heal. Right now, I am too busy.  There is too much to do. But ... one day, I will go.  One day, I will heal.

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We may even start searching for it by going to actual places - the places we think are the healing spaces.  Our mind will try to tell us: hey - that place over there... that's where healing happens. I will go. And then, since I went, I will be healed.

 

And it doesn't quite work out that way.

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When we believe this healing myth, we try to find the sacred space in which we can heal,

as if healing will occur after we have arrived at this sacred or important, physical place... and that IS the myth.  There is no place outside of you that will heal the inside of you.

 

It's a myth. 

A fallacy. 

A cruel joke.

I don't know who started telling people that this was true:  but it was really mean.

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The truth is, that to heal the inside of you, you will need to do what we call - 'the work'.  And, It is work.

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It is work to heal ourselves.  In part, because we have to learn how.  If we already inherently knew how - it would already be done. There is no one, who chooses to suffer by deliberately not healing.  Not being healed.. feels bad. Then we have disturbances in our thoughts, as a result.  Then we do things that may not be helpful.  Then those behaviors may become habit or they may be what we thought in that moment, would be helpful, ...but they aren't in the long run. 

 

We call those symptoms. 

 

When we are not healed, we are suffering.  We have symptoms.  

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So ...fabulous. (no, not really).

...First, she says there is no place we can go for it to automatically happen, and now, we lack a skill.

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Yes.  She said that.

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But WAIT

.... there are important things to remember...

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Needing to heal, doesn't make us bad humans. 

Let me say that again:  Needing to heal does not make us bad humans.

There is no fault or blame to be assigned when you are suffering and need to heal.

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Which brings us to the important part of the story of the healing myth:

Yes, it is work.  But it is valuable work.  It is investment work. It is worthy work.​

It is work because we have to learn something. And the work that we do when we show up for ourselves, and do inside of ourselves, will - yes, not likely be something we already know how to do...

but ... Once.  We.  Learn....

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The.

Reward.

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And that's why we do it.  We, as humans, choose to do the work because of the reward.

We invest in doing 'the work' because healing does not occur when we arrive at a place- we arrive at that place, when we have done the work to heal ...and what a place, it is!

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Now, it would be unrealistic and morally wrong for anyone to guarantee you that when you heal, the results will be ... XYZ ...and everything will be fine in your life, from that point on - no matter what.  No one can make that claim.  You can't even make it for yourself.  But, we can say that when you invest in the inner work of psychotherapy to address symptoms or disturbance in mental well-being or behavior, the resulting change can be transformative. 

 

And so, when you are thinking about starting psychotherapy, that is something to consider.