Cultivating The Gray: The Beauty Of (Temporary) Confusion In Therapy

Have you noticed that when it comes to assigning value, we prefer black or white? Something is good, or it’s bad. “That’s a good movie; she’s a bad friend.” Especially in today’s climate, this mindset seems to be the default. We love our certainty.

One of the goals I have as a therapist is to gently dismantle that habit by offering additional perspectives, essentially complicating an issue before resolving it. If a client and I are sifting around in the gray for a few sessions, I know we are on the right track. 

This black and white thinking comes up most frequently around “negative” traits, when a client comes in who finds her own behavior problematic, relentless, or annoying. For example, she might complain that she is “a people pleaser” and does not want to be, as she sees those people as weak, exhausted, and pandering. The attitude is: “This is bad; I want it gone.” 

The first item on the agenda might be to DISRUPT this belief that it’s BAD. We work to de-stigmatize the “problem” so that we can build space around the idea, creatively assess its function and purpose, and ultimately work with it. One way of doing that is to simply CHANGE THE WORD or definition. In this case: what about “people serving?” Does that connote a different, more neutral meaning? Yes, right? You feel differently about that. “People serving” is doing something for someone else because you want to help them. You want to make them happy, and yeah ok, you may very much enjoy their opinion of you after you’ve done so. Fine! This is altruism. This is generosity. This is a kind of connection. Of course the original “people pleasing” definition is still there too. But can’t it also be this new thing?

We may also ACKNOWLEDGE THE BENEFITS of the behavior. In this case, “people pleasing” or “people serving” can help you to make others smile and allow you to feel important and loved. 

And thirdly, we CONTEXTUALIZE the behavior. Use it as a flag to indicate where the self-investigation needs to happen....we can dig a little deeper and gain some more understanding about how you came to be this way. Why we crave what we crave, and why we do what we do to satisfy our desires. Why is this a habit that feels familiar? Where did it come from? What happened in your family, growing up, when you served others (probably good stuff!)? Were you, are you, wanting connection, approval, and community? Does providing this service to others give you those things, even for a moment? Is this enough? What feeling would you like to have instead?

Therapy is a great place to explore people-pleasing (or serving) tendencies, as well as other “negative” traits, which I promise to help you complicate sufficiently (just before we move towards the goals of freeing you from these habits and learning how to redirect that energy to serve you in a way that feels better and is all around more helpful for you and loved ones in your life)!! 

I offer a free 30-minute consultation session which gives both myself and potential clients the chance to decide whether we would be a good therapeutic fit. If you’re curious about this work, you’re welcome to email me at sarah.iaccarino@gmail.com to start this conversation.

Sarah Iaccarino, Registered Associate Marriage and Family Therapist,

Employed and Supervised by Hallie Gnatovich-Gates, LMFT #52775

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