Therapeutic Truth

February 6, 2008, 2:00 pm; posted by
Filed under Articles, Chloe, Featured  | 2 Comments

Therapists have a bad rap. They get called names like “shrink” or “quack.” They’re accused of charging obscene rates for little or no work. People think they just mess with people’s heads and create neuroses to get clients to return. The worst thing I’ve heard anyone say about therapists, though, is that they’re significantly responsible for the degradation of Western society.

And the guy who said that is a therapist.

Speaking from an expert psychotherapist’s perspective, Dr. William Doherty writes in his book, Soul Searching, that from the inception of therapy, the trade has focused on the individual — stressing questions like, “What is this doing for you?,” “How is this benefiting you?,” and “What are you getting out of this relationship?” He gives examples of a therapist who told clients to stop volunteering in the community because he saw altruism as an unconscious attempt to fill a hole in the client’s life, of others who told divorced or separated couples anything from, “You need to think about yourself for a change — abandon the kids,” to “Take him for all he’s worth! You deserve it!”

These examples are frightening. Psychotherapists have taught their clients that the most important person in the world is oneself. People must act in their own interest. We can see how ingrained this lesson has become ingrained in our society.

But Dr. Doherty brings good news also. The subtitle to his book is “Why Psychotherapy Must Promote Moral Responsibility,” and it’s a herald to a new method sweeping the field — morals-oriented therapy.

Doherty wants therapists to be up front with their clients not only about their virtues (what a single person holds as important), but also about morals, which he defines as applicable to everyone. That’s right — absolute truth.

Examples include confronting ex-husbands about the way they manipulate their ex-wives or hurt their children, or doing the same to women who use their children against their ex-husbands. You can imagine how little these people want to hear what Dr. Doherty has to say to them; therapists who practice morals-centered therapy run the risk of being fired by clients who don’t particularly want to hear, “Why don’t you consider how your actions are affecting other people?” But Doherty’s examples tend to end with the clients growing as individuals, and more importantly, as members of a community.

This is exciting to me because this book, and most of the field of therapy, is secular; yet it’s moving towards thinking in terms of other people, of morality, of absolute truth. Therapists are coming to the conclusion that an individualistic life approach doesn’t work. The only way people can lead mentally healthy lives is through the good old Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have done to you.”


Comments

2 Comments to “Therapeutic Truth”

  1. Erin on February 7th, 2008 4:31 pm

    Amen. Hand me that book.

  2. Chloe on February 7th, 2008 7:32 pm

    It’s all yours!

Leave a comment!