The dark thoughts you think nobody else has
You'd be surprised how you're not the only one who wishes to push someone off the edge.
“I cheated on my husband.”
“I have dark fantasies about the boys I teach in my class.”
“I killed a dog when I was 13, and now all I can think about is that I am a psycho.”
“I can’t get it up. I think I broke it, and I am too scared to see a urologist.”
“My mom is triggering me. How do I shut her up.”
“I want to kill myself. I even have a solid plan to leave this pathetic life without pain.”
Every therapist has a clear confidentiality clause. Here is mine: nothing leaves our session. In fact, I do not write anything in my session notes that could ever be used against you.
Strategically speaking, what you say out loud to me, that you cannot say to others, is a reflection of an inner conflict you are not consciously recognizing yet. So all of the above statements, true from reality, which I have heard more than once in my career, are not a reflection of reality. They describe subjective reality, inside that person’s psyche, not their real self or their true intentions.
That is why my confidentiality clause is bulletproof.
Some people say I am crazy for trusting humans to be naturally kind-hearted. I do not. I do not trust strangers. I have gone to Krav Maga. I have a pepper spray disguised as a breath spray on the lamp table to my right. I am not ignoring threats when I sense them. Seeing dozens of clients every week, I have never had to use my martial arts skills or the venom.
There is goodness in people and it is inherited. Granted, some people are a pile of shit and should be discarded as such. Some people do not deserve our time, no matter how sorrowful they feel for what they have done. These are not my clients.
My clients experience the dark corners of their psyche on the inside, not out there in the world. They came to be helped, to get the demons to stop, not to be labelled with a diagnosis that scars them for life.
And if your therapist is any good at what he or she does, they feel the same way. Our job is to get you out of the funk and make you stronger, so that those dark impulses are never a threat to your well-being, not inside and not outside your mind. We all have crazy dark and disturbing thoughts here and there. They do not define us. If they are repetitive, and they translate to emotional storms, then by all means, go see a therapist. Be honest. Be specific. We are not trained to judge or flinch when a worrying client is twitching on the couch, trying to verbalize a disturbing image they have in their mind and cannot let go of.
As a strategic therapist, I am trained to help you get it out of your system and keep it out, as fast as possible.
So do not think you are the only one with these violent mental images, or that there is anything wrong with you. They exist for a good reason. Once we find that reason, we can resolve it, and they will leave you alone.
Maya
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Thanks for reading my mind. I hope you enjoyed it and got inspired to speak your truth as well. Learn more about me.