Therapy Has Many Different Styles

Hello and Happy New Year! It has been a while since my last blog; but I am back in the routine of things and will be posting more regularly.

One thing that I am not sure if people understand when they go to see a therapist for any reason is that therapists can come from different theoretical orientations and do therapy vastly different.

Some therapists focus on only solving the problem and will work on only solutions. Other therapists will think that therapy is more of a process and that there are underlying reasons for problem areas that you may not be aware of. Another one can focus more on cognitive thoughts and thought processes that are negatively affecting your life. And yet others can focus more on proper emotional processing to better handle stressors.

There are therapist that only do one or the other and then there are yet others that may use a certain one after they assess and meet with you and use the one that they feel will best suit you. I tend to fall in the latter, but my main orientation is more focused on processing emotions (letting your body experience what it needs to) and making the connection between emotions and cognitions which is called Experiential Therapy or Humanistic Therapy.

When meeting with a therapist for the first time, you may want to ask what orientation they come from and what style of therapy they tend to do and see if that sounds like it would be a good match for you.