
Most clients know that some of their best sessions happen when they don’t know what their therapy topic is going to be. In the absence of an external event to report, the unconscious manages to insert itself into what feels like random meanderings of thoughts in the first few minutes of the session.
There is certainly nothing wrong with talking about the events of the week in a session. But therapy’s realm is the internal. I don’t mean to say that we should start ever session talking about our mothers. The past is only relevant when it has been activated in the present. But similarly, the random events of the week are only relevant when they aren’t random, but rather linked to key issues that we have going on in our inner worlds.
Therapists are often aware of several overall themes their client is working on. A handful of examples would be:
When clients are able to track their own themes, they are able to bring in relevant dreams, key realizations in the week, experiences that brought repetitive or new feelings or thoughts to the surface. They are more likely to refer to work in past sessions to incorporate the new thoughts they have had.
Here are some tips for deciding what to talk about in sessions to get yourself delving deeper.
Life can be so incredibly rich and full. It is worth untangling some basic issues at their root to free us to engage life with openness.
Smith is an analytically oriented psychotherapist with 25 years in practice. She is additionally the Founder/Director of Full Living: A Psychotherapy Practice, which specializes in matching clients with seasoned clinicians in the Greater Philadelphia Area.
If you are interested in therapy and live in Philadelphia or the Greater Philadelphia Area, please let Full Living: A Psychotherapy Practice match you with a skilled, experienced psychotherapist based on your needs and issues as well as your and own therapists' personalities and styles. All of our therapists are available for telehealth conferencing by phone or video in response to our current need for social distancing.
In Defense of Long Term Psychotherapy ( a video blog)