Being a psychologist and radical honesty

Is it galvanising or deleterious? Could I get into trouble as a professional? "I" am not a therapist. A project that's beyond the personal.

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I can relate to Chiron’s desperate seeking of relief. In fact, I’ve made a profession of it!

I’ve been dabbling in various healing arts for decades. My apothecary includes psychology and all its ‘brands’ of such, as well as yoga, energy medicine, spiritual practices, mysticism and more - explored in the name of healing and tending my suffering. At the same time, I actively impart what I’ve learned to others so that they may get relief too.

We are moving into ‘wounded healer’ territory here.

Quote by me, from the article Stirring the Mythic Pot

Being an open book

I’ve mentioned before how, since forgetting to cancel my subscription to Audible, I’ve been on a mission to make my way through the library. I’ve moved on to Henri Nouwen’s "Wisdom for the Long Walk of Faith”.

I’d never heard of Nouwen until a short time ago (I think Richard Rohr mentioned him). Nouwen was a prolific published author, Catholic priest, and psychologist who taught, wrote about and offered spiritual direction. I became curious about him because aside from what he taught (valuable) it was also who he was as a leader and guide. Which was a human, who was radically honest about his personal and faith struggles, including mental illness, sexuality and desire.

He was an open book, so to speak, and followed a practice of “exposing or sharing [his] own woundedness as context for others to find meaning”.

I’m not quite an open book, but I do a fair degree of personal sharing. The intention is that my experiences are helpful or catalysing for others. Now that I have Nouwen’s language for it as “context for others to find meaning”, I feel naming it as this helps to perhaps justify it further. (My need for justification is not lost as a question to poke at)

Is sharing deleterious or galvanising for therapy?

This kind of therapist-professional disclosure isn’t a unique approach, though. But as a potential boundary issue, it’s a vexing one for psychologists.

image source unknown, via Pinterest.

I am a big appreciator of iconic psychiatrist Irvin D. Yalom. In his book The Gift of Therapy, he dedicated 3 short chapters to how therapist disclosure (with caveats) within individual and group therapy dynamics is potentially galvanising for therapy. The implication is that it’s used to the degree that’s useful to the client, i.e. does the client appreciate or benefit from the share or not?, and also how comfortable it is for the therapist, which paradoxically means that the therapist may find it very uncomfortable to share or not share private information, but to do so or not, is ultimately good for the dynamic. So it’s not a flippant act, but done consciously and with discernment. Psychologists/therapists might not always get the balance right.

Yalom places himself on the high end of the disclosure continuum, as would I.

But this doesn’t account for the kind of disclosure I’m doing in my articles, for instance, outside the therapeutic container.

It’s flagging a professional problem

photographer Laurence Winram.

It butts up against what’s expected and soon to be required of psychologists with the new Code of Ethics that prohibits the public sharing of personal opinions, which may discredit the profession and does not meet evidence-based practice (e.g. if you didn’t know, tarot and dreams do not come under evidence-based approaches).

Fellow psychologist Kate Finazzi wrote a great commentary on the new Code, where she articulates some shared concerns about the profession of psychology in Australia.

As always, the Code is open to interpretation, but if I’d been worried about getting into trouble before, due to over-sharing or openly practising in a way that isn’t pure scientist practitioner - I should be more worried now.

The thing is, I’m not that worried. Is the trickster doing their work through me, maybe?

The new Code is merely agitating my beef with the psychology profession and my ambivalent relationship to an identity of “psychologist” or “therapist”. While I am proud of my position and value the rich foundation of knowledge and teaching that underpins the profession, it’s heavily flawed. The tip of which authors Watkins and Shuman explain as “a colonial, ethnocentric Euro-American psychology posing as universal”. Understanding this sits very uncomfortably with me, but I’m not yet sure what to do about that.

You are not your profession

I haven’t identified with ‘therapist’ for a few years now. A spontaneous “awakening” to the fact that “ “I” was not a therapist” hit me like a bolt of joy and a soft expansion in my head during a mundane moment walking to my practice (when it was still bricks and mortar) about 5 years ago. I burst out laughing and felt light and silly with the existential truth of “I” and “therapist” being irrelevant to each other.

This may not come as a surprise to some of you who have followed my journey for some time, as with this revelation has come many experiments with what it means to continue working as a therapist. I’m still figuring that one out.

Much is being stirred, and the disparate threads are more congealing and coagulating than weaving a clear tapestry. But coagulo is still a vital part of the alchemical process, I suppose.

A gruesome representation of ‘coagulo’ from the Alchemical text Splendor Solis, 1582.

It’s not personal

It encapsulates a lot of things I’ve spoken about recently, including “wanting a personality transplant” (dismemberment ↑↑↑?), reimagining suffering and woundedness, and developing a new relationship to joy and feeling. This again feels linked to the boundaries of taboo and trickster energy, which I’m re-seeing as a vital lesson to learn as I move into a new life Passsage and ‘version’ of self as an emerging crone.

The ties with the broader and beyond personal Rites of Passage project are apparent. This project is my attempt at exploring some of the contextual blindspots of Western psychotherapy - to incorporate the symbolic, the archetypal, the collaborative and dialogical.

The project has been on a very low simmer for a while, but is warming up, and I’ll share news soon. Hint: A revamped and more accessible Initiated Woman Gatherings will precede the work. Stay tuned.

That’s it for now. Thanks for reading. I appreciate you taking the time.

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Mendy XX

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References mentioned/used:

Nouwen, H. J. M. (2006). Spiritual direction: Wisdom for the long walk of faith (M. J. Christensen & R. J. Laird, Eds.). HarperOne.

Watkins, Mary, and Helene Shulman. 2008. Toward Psychologies of Liberation. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Yalom, Irvin D. (2002). The Gift of Therapy: An Open Letter to a New Generation of Therapists and Their Patients. Revised edition. New York: Harper Perennial.

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