Tales From the Couch: Part 4

Greetings and salutations!

This was an emotional session. We talked about some work stuff, which alas, I won’t go into here for various reasons. But suffice to say, it wasn’t anything I particularly needed to happen with all the other crap going on in my life.

I was asked to write a letter to Special K in which I’d say what I needed to say for closure. It wasn’t to be edited, aka, like a real letter, but a stream of consciousness to get my feelings out in an honest, therapeutic way. How I felt when writing the letter is in the entry “Special K”, so we won’t go into that here. What we WILL go into is what it lead to in terms of insights and changes of behaviour.

So, I spoke my piece and described how I felt–the hurt, and the anger towards him and towards myself. I then said that, despite my desire for closure, I wanted him to know, just in case he might change his mind. Now, I KNOW that is not going to happen. I was treated too badly as a friend to think that there were any feelings there. My openness in talking about this is probably also a huge turn off, though my therapist IS advising that I be more open about my wants, needs, desires, and to express my emotions more fully, especially when I’m angry. And I AM angry.

So, she asked me why I still had this fantasy, and I said I honestly didn’t know. I thought about it, but figured it wasn’t as simple as wanting not to be alone, or the desire to have a significant other, etc. I honestly didn’t know, and I didn’t know where to begin.

She said (and I’m paraphrasing her)…that fantasizing is a way of projecting what you think about yourself…and how happy or unhappy you are with your core being…it’s a way of seeing what you want to be which may not be based in the reality of who you are and your acceptance of that.

So I started to cry a little at this point…

Because at heart, for whatever reason, I have trouble accepting who I am and fully embracing that. Nixon walked by a portrait of Kennedy and said..”When they look at you they see what they want to be…when they look at me, they see who they are.”

I’ve always related to that quote but I’ve never really known why…Despite everything…I need to see myself in a more realistic, positive, authentic way, and be more open with my feelings and emotions as well, instead of keeping things bottled up and seeing myself in an unrealistic way.

It was a shock, because I’ve always thought I had a good sense of self. But in reality, me wishing for stuff that is never going to happen might show that I’m unhappy with things in my life, and have not yet begun to deal with them. Of course, all of this went down in the last 10 minutes of the session, so there wasn’t enough time to delve into it more deeply.

We did talk about expressing my emotions, and I AM doing a better job at expressing them, and being more upfront. Especially my emotions that rear up when I’m upset or angry. I don’t know how people in my life are going to take that, but I really have to work at being me. The REAL me.

So it was a very interesting session! While I learned something HUGE about myself, there wasn’t enough time to delve deeper into it. I eagerly await my next session, however. The key to therapy/counselling, etc, is to take the insights that one learns in your sessions and APPLY them to the real world that you’re living in. What does that mean for me? It means trying to be aware of WHY I’m acting in a certain way as I’m doing it, and trying to correct the behaviour. I think it also means being truly honest in all aspects of my life, and expressing that so I know that I’m being as authentic as possible.