Look deep into my eyes

Insight into the cause of your problems is a good starting place for feeling better, but it's not going to change your life. Action is.

The New York Times had a neat op-ed this morning saying basically that, which I've been thinking forever, now. I am therapy and meds' number one fan, but you've gotta take those as tools and run with them. The op-ed talks about a young man who had been through therapy and understood the basic causes of his troubles with life; his early problems with his parents were to blame. But, "When he became depressed, though, this insight added to his pain as he berated himself for failing to stand up to his father and follow his own path." Exactly! It doesn't help you to just know the background, you've got to do something with that knowledge.

Julie and my old therapist have both asked me what my plans are for therapy. I had no idea. I mean, I've spent 15 years in therapy, and I'm pretty sure I'm angry and know why, but what good is talking about it all the time? I've forgiven my mom for a lot of things, and my dad, too. A fourth step was, I'm sure, easier because of all the work I'd already done. But the past few years I've been using therapy as a tool to deal with the day-to-day. Is that the right use of it? Where should therapy take me now?

There are some basic goals for therapy: crisis management (which we're kinda in right now), coping strategies (check), long-term pattern changes (good idea), symptom-reduction (check), self-examination (check), and prevention of relapse (which goes with the crisis for me).

Right now, I'm definitely in crisis management and prevention of relapse. But once I've got a job, meds, and a sponsor, where should we go from there? I suppose it's just taking those character defects from step 4 and working through them. Does that make any sense?