Being a therapy patient, especially in a longer-term, more exploratory treatment like psychoanalysis, requires a certain kind of courage. Those who choose this mode of healing (arguably the most expensive, open-ended and uncertain option, in many respects, of those ‘on the market’) submit themselves to a path towards the perimeter of themselves as they have come to be known, by others and by themselves. Eventually, they must heave open the rusty gate at the edge of their familiar, conscious self, step into the overgrown grass and begin their navigation of the unmapped, incoherent, shadowy outskirts of who they are.
Like Frodo and Sam leaving the Shire (and many an archetypal hero taking the first steps of their journey), the therapy patient leaves behind a context in which, despite whatever difficulties have drawn them to therapy in the first place, they have likely enjoyed some experience of fluency - a certain idea of who they are, of their place in the world, and of what they can expect of themselves and others. Eventually, perhaps unbeknownst to them, they will find themselves in a new world, a place that had long lay dormant within them.
The patient eventually (for some, almost immediately, and for others, years into treatment) begins to encounter long denied or buried aspects of themselves, that were undoubtedly buried for a reason. These places cannot be tidied up in advance to save face, like so much of us can be, and is, in our normal lives. They also face the prospect of this deeply revealing process in the company and witness of their therapist. If normal life is akin to cleaning up the house and setting the table for the dinner party, choosing who is welcome to come inside, psychotherapy can feel like a relative stranger coming your home to look through the very particular cupboards and drawers you hope no one will ever venture into. To submit to this process of showing another aspects of our inner life that we ourselves are not even sure of the true nature of, for most people, is no small undertaking.
The patient may also find that the currencies in which they have grown rich over the course of their lives to date - approval, academic achievement, good sense, popularity, status, financial wealth - are not accepted in this new world. Their demons, traumas, heartbreaks and fears cannot simply be paid off, outrun or reasoned away on an intellectual level. The patient, should they wish to continue this quest, cannot ask to speak to the manager. They cannot lock the door. They cannot ask for answers, hold the emotion. They must continue to place their feet one in front of the other in this shadowy realm, and begin to listen, so that they might pick up the dialect. They stumble over tree roots in the dark, they feel scared and exhausted, and although the therapist may provide a light along the path, they often have no idea quite where they are on the journey, for they are mapping the territory for the first time. They will also undoubtedly, at some stage, grapple with what it means to need, love, and fear their therapist, the one person accompanying them in their foreign inner landscape.
The therapy patient often must also do all of this while doing their best, outside their treatment, to carry on as normal, surrounded by friends and family who are for the most part not on such a journey, and who may be sitting cosy within the perimeter of their known, conscious selves, making life look easy. To be in and out of the dark forests of Wonderland while those around you remain in the ordinary, sunny, 3D world, can be one of the most lonely, challenging aspects of therapy.
Truly embracing the process of psychotherapy is to give up the ‘you’ you have know, to surrender the notion that you have everything figured out, to sacrifice the idea that you are certain and tough and know all the answers, and to allow another to see you and guide you, in spite of your fears of what ugliness and terror lurks within you. Why would one do such a thing, you might ask?
Well, to put in simply, there is a world beyond the Shire. For each individual willing to journey in this way, there is a greater life that is possible. This is not only awaiting each of us as individuals, but in David Whyte’s words, it is the life that belongs to the world. Although explorative therapy does not promise a particular outcome, it holds reverence for the patient’s process as a journey, with the goal of not just restoring function, but of uncovering all facets of who they are and what they are meant for. The uncertainty, the lack of a guarantee of a particular outcome, and the courage this requires, are all holding space for the unique possibilities awaiting each individual human soul.