For the armchair-therapist Dwellars

[BigV]

Originally Posted by anonymous

I think mostly because I know the "truth" is really fickle for me, to the point of Heisenberg uncertainty. Name literally any emotion in response to a subject, and I can see how part of me feels that way. The moment I consider whether I feel sad about a thing, I can no longer differentiate what it would feel like to be sad about that, and what it does feel like to be sad about it. Yes, it's legitimate to feel multiple things at the same time, but feeling everything all the time is not helpful information.

--snip

First off, I'm not a therapist. You know that of course, but you also know I'm your friend. I don't know if you're "smarter" than me, probably not important in this context. Anyway....

I, too, wish to say that finding a therapist (or an outlet, like this even) is worth the effort. It's impossible to overstate the value of connecting with such an outlet. I don't know what outlet that is for you, or what therapist that is for you. But as for the difficulty of accepting the premise that the person you're "unburdening" yourself to is legit/worthy/smart/astute enough to trust with your answer that you quickly review which response you wish to elicit and choose your answer accordingly, I'd say that the answer I quoted here is a perfectly good one to give. It's true, it's valid. Sure, it's complicated and conflicted (how apropos). Give that answer, or whatever other complex contradictory answer you *do* have and see what happens.

It *is* actually telling the truth and gives the listener (like us, or like the next therapist) good, real stuff to work with. This is especially helpful for those of us that aren't smarter than you. We need all the help we can get.

Look at the result you got from giving a similarly shaped input to a pro in another field when you produced your handbooks of hypergraphia. It worked.


There's more, but I'll stop here for now.