If you are wondering if you are a good candidate for therapy, you are not alone. These are just a few examples of concerns I have heard regarding getting started:

1. “I’m probably just over-thinking my problems.”
2. “I know what to do to get better. I know what the therapist is going to say. I’m just not motivated to do those things.”
3. “My problems aren’t bad enough to need professional help. There are people out there who need therapy much more than I do.”
4. “Nobody would actually want to hear about my problems.”
5. “It probably won’t work anyway.”
6. “It’s pretty expensive to get therapy. I’ll be fine on my own.”
7. “I’m pretty busy. I don’t think I can fit it into my schedule.”
8. “I don’t want to talk to a stranger about my personal problems.”
9. “I’m going through a lot right now. I can’t handle therapy, too.”
10. “I’ve tried therapy before, but it didn’t help.”
11. “It won’t actually solve my problems.”
12. “I’ve already been diagnosed and take medication. There’s nothing more to be done.”

In the end, the choice to get therapy is a personal one. The purpose of my writing here is not to persuade you to get therapy despite any barriers you may have, but rather to reduce unnecessary obstacles and to help you think consciously about what your values are. This encourages the intentional delegation of resources, rather than just falling into accidental habits.

First, I will address each of the potential barriers listed above, then you can decide for yourself if you feel that therapy is something you need.

1. “I’m probably just over-thinking my problems.”

This concern is a common one—it is hard to tell exactly how healthy or unhealthy we may be at times. The good news is, your problems don’t have to be especially bad in order to “deserve” therapy. Some people use therapy to get through a crisis, while others use it for maintenance and prevention. Most people are somewhere in the middle. If you feel stuck, or you have mental health goals for yourself that you haven’t reached yet, then that’s enough to know that therapy could benefit you.

2. “I know what to do to get better. I know what the therapist is going to say. I’m just not motivated to do those things.”

A major part of the therapeutic process is about exploring and understanding resistance. Therapy wouldn’t be a process if people just adapted the skills they learned about and went on their way. Although that can happen, usually there is much more going on underneath the surface. There are reasons we as humans like to hold on to being the same. Sometimes it just takes recognizing what we are trying to hold on to, and not being ashamed of that. We may find that our reluctance to change is a form of self-protection (rather than laziness or stubbornness). If we can bring to light what unconscious feelings may be motivating the resistance, it is much easier to change them.

I will also add here that there are many types of therapeutic approaches that are not primarily “solution-focused”, which this question is assuming will happen in session. Some therapies such as Motivational Interviewing, CBT, Adlerian, and Emotion-Centered Therapy do not focus on “what you could do better” and do focus on loosening up emotional resistance.

3. “My problems aren’t bad enough to need professional help. There are people out there who need therapy much more than I do.”

Therapy is meant for situations ranging from crisis to prevention/maintenance. No problem is too small for a therapist. It is rather a matter of what is worth your resources of time, money, and mental space to get help pursuing your mental health goal.

4. “Nobody would actually want to hear about my problems.”

If therapists felt that way they wouldn’t be therapists, since that is 90% of the job description. I personally love my job, and I cherish the authentic conversation and learning more about people. Therapists going through all of the financial and educational hoops to get licensed should be a testament to their desire to hear your problems.

5. “It probably won’t work anyway.”

That depends on 1) what you want it to do (AKA setting realistic goals/setting goals within your control), and 2) How receptive you are to it working. It is common to want a certain goal, but not being willing to trade what it takes to get there. For example, if a client wants to work on healing a phobia, in many cases they would have to sacrifice small amounts of safety to expose themselves to their fear, even if just in the imagination. It is not comfortable to do that. It feels better to create a life in which that fear is avoided. So, that person would have to assess if they would actually prefer to expose themselves to small amounts of fear or if they would rather stay the way they are. Luckily, there are multiple paths to reducing negative symptoms, so some will sound more natural for you than others.

6. “It’s pretty expensive to get therapy. I’ll be fine on my own.”

I can’t speak for people’s budgets! Money spending indicates a hierarchy of values. Affording therapy may not be the first financial priority for your situation. However, I will say that there are lower-priced options such as:

–Certain websites such as Open Path (who require their therapists to charge between $40 and $70 a session for individuals, interns charge $30);

–Insurance if you have it and the therapist accepts it. You would likely pay a co-pay and insurance covers the rest;

–Interns. Let me speak up for interns real quick—although it sounds like they are brand new, they have gone through at least six years of schooling to be where they’re at, and they are also quite up-to-date on current research, techniques, and best practices. There are definitely some pros to getting an intern! To find them, you can reach out to a counseling office near you and ask them if they have any interns available, because they aren’t always on the group’s website. They may be able to refer you to an office who does, if they don’t have any. There is always the telehealth option as well through sites like Open Path.

7. “I’m pretty busy. I don’t think I can fit it into my schedule.”

It could be true that maybe you are too busy. Just like money, time is also a resource that indicates your values. If it takes many hours to get food on the table, that sounds like a priority. To make it a little easier, it may be worth checking out the hours of therapists in your area, because some therapists offer time slots after 5pm or on the weekends.

 It also saves time to do telehealth to fit that hour into a busy schedule.

Another possibility is to revisit what you are spending your time on, and how much it is worth to you to give up one to two hours a week, or less.

8. “I don’t want to talk to a stranger about my personal problems.”

I get it. It can be hard, at first. Being vulnerable is hard. But choosing to push through that discomfort is where progress comes in. That person will not be a stranger for long, and they are trained to treat your personal struggles with care.

9. “I’m going through a lot right now. I can’t handle therapy, too.”

Therapy isn’t like a college course. It is supposed to augment your life, not compete with it. A therapist is there to help you process, express yourself, get your brain organized, and feel heard. Hopefully by the end of your session you will feel more capable of handling what you are going through.

10. “I’ve tried therapy before, but it didn’t help.”

That can happen, and for a lot of reasons. Sometimes we simply aren’t ready to change. Maybe there is something we must grieve, or there is something we aren’t yet willing to let go of. Maybe what you wanted help with isn’t something therapy can solve. It is up to you and your therapist to collaborate on your goals and what it will take to get there. My recommendation here is to make sure you and your therapist are on the same page when it comes to your goals and what you want from your sessions.

11. “It won’t actually solve my problems.”

That’s true. It won’t. A therapist is supposed to walk alongside you in order to provide support and guidance while you navigate what you are going through. Also, some problems are out of your control. What therapy aims to resolve is negative symptoms that are a result of your perspective or learned habits.

12. “I’ve already been diagnosed and take medication. There’s nothing more to be done.”

This one is complicated. Some diagnoses have more physical causes than others, although they all manifest physically in one way or another. Some medicines treat the illness, while others can only treat symptoms, in which case there may be other factors keeping those symptoms exacerbated.

 For example, cognitive behavioral theories suggest that depression is kept fed by negative thoughts, in which case the root cause will always be present with medication unless the cognitive work is done, too. With something like schizophrenia, medicine is more directly able to reduce symptoms. However, even with medication, we have an immense amount of influence over our brains, so correcting thoughts, processing feelings, and learning coping mechanisms can always help in aiding medication.

In general it is thought that almost all illnesses are a result of a combination of biological, psychological, and social factors. If medicine addresses the biological, then therapy addresses the psychological and even the social factors. The less fuel we can give a mental illness, the better!

How Do You Know If You Need Therapy?

Well, do you feel hopeful? Alive? Do you have energy to be interested in hobbies or your job? Do you have a positive disposition in your relationships? Do you feel like you have a sense of control over your life?

No one is going to feel happy every day of their lives, and sometimes emotional disturbance has an obvious and normal cause based on a life event. Painful emotions aren’t bad in themselves. Therapy comes in when that state of responding to something in an adaptive way starts to spread to other life areas. Maybe childhood trauma is affecting your marriage. Maybe anger you feel about your friend is affecting other relationships. Maybe how you feel about the economy is influencing your desire to do hobbies you enjoy.

Our emotions are designed to protect us from bad things, so they often start out by being appropriate and as a great tool in that initial context. It is when the emotion starts to linger and enter other areas of life, affecting your self-image, productivity, worldview, relationships, and entire outlook on life, when maybe that emotion is no longer useful, that you may want to consider an emotional tune-up.

Well, I hope this helps, and if you are interested in therapy and want get information about in-person or online appointments, simply reach out!