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Truest Reflections: Show Strength by Seeking Help

‘Seeking help, especially therapy, can be a really hard decision.’
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Seeking help, especially therapy, can be a really hard decision. (Pixabay)

By Barbara Hunter, Counsellor at Truest Reflections

I find this time of year to be a mixed bag of wants and needs. It’s spring - time to get the yard cleaned up, the water systems reconnected, seeds planted, purge what wasn’t needed during the winter months.

Spring is a time for renewal and new chapters. Let’s spring clean the closets, out with the old and in with the new.

Does your cleaning out just pertain to your possessions? Or does your spring clean ever include relationships - clearing out the old, maintaining the new?

It is time to change our tires from winter to all season. But do you take the time to change gears in your beliefs and motivations? Maybe even in trying something new? Or do you rely on what you already have to get you through the next season?

I find it super interesting when folks come in at this time of year as they tell me they have been waiting. I ask what were they waiting for? Many tell me they wanted to wait until the weather changed to see if anything in their life changed. Others have just been afraid to step out into the discomfort of possible change.

Deciding to get help, any help, can take a toll. It can cause anxiety, more fear of the unknown, arguing with one’s self about if help is really what they need. Then negotiations can take place in your own mind, “I’ll just wait it out a little longer. I’m okay. I can make all the changes on my own.”

Seeking help, especially therapy, can be a really hard decision. Is there anyone who can understand what I’m going through? Is this going to just be a waste of my time? I don’t want to cry anymore and talk about my story yet one more time.

Seeking help and therapy is something that many won’t do because of all the excuses, reasons, and justifications that keep folks seated in the chair of fear. Yet, it could be something that really puts those same folks on the track of recovery, self-acceptance, or a new found awareness.

What would it take to admit, “I could really use someone to talk to, to help me figure this out”? Quite often, all it takes (with all your courage and might) is a phone call. I believe we often don’t ask for what we want because something holds us back. Perhaps we have already created the outcome around what we need, and that picture serves our shadow selves that therapy isn’t for us. I wonder what would happen if I made a phone call? Just a two-minute phone call? What would I have lost? What might I have gained?

Sometimes, we need someone to hear us, see us, and help us gain clarity of what’s going on in our world. Someone to help us make sense of our feelings, our mental being, and our behaviours. Sometimes, we just need that little bit of time to gather ourselves, feel validated that we aren’t really going crazy, that what we feel is normal, reasonable and maybe even manageable.

This spring, what do you feel you need? What do you need to de-clutter or change?

Truest Reflections Counseling provides services to the Kootenays and is covered by some insurance companies. We offer free consultations to help you decide if we are a fit for you. Show strength, see help today. For more, visit www.truestreflections.com.

READ MORE: Truest Reflections: Daydreams and Decisions