Comments on: Positive Psychology in the News: Huffington Post http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/positive-psychology-in-the-news-huffington-post/ Exploring Healthy Psychotherapy Fri, 10 Feb 2012 01:06:51 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Judith Barr http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/positive-psychology-in-the-news-huffington-post/#comment-20255 Judith Barr Mon, 27 Jul 2009 14:05:30 +0000 http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/?p=2992#comment-20255 As a psychotherapist, I am deeply concerned about the prevalence of “quick fix” modalities in our world that prevent the true, deep healing we so clearly need. On the surface, focusing only on the “good” in our lives seems attractive. However, when we look deeper, we find that all this does is bury our inner wounds (which cry out to be healed) even deeper within ourselves…only to rise again and again to the surface to haunt us. We would never consider telling a diabetic not to take his/her insulin and simply concentrate on the positive aspects of his/her life. This would be ludicrous and dangerous! But this is basically what we tell people every day, when we tell them to ignore the wounding alive inside them, and “think positive”…the wounding rooted in childhood that still affects their lives today. We all have wounds under the surface of our consciousness and as therapists, we have the responsibility both to do our own inner work and to help our clients do theirs. Anything less helps feed the abuse of power in our world. As a psychotherapist, I am deeply concerned about the prevalence of “quick fix” modalities in our world that prevent the true, deep healing we so clearly need.

On the surface, focusing only on the “good” in our lives seems attractive. However, when we look deeper, we find that all this does is bury our inner wounds (which cry out to be healed) even deeper within ourselves…only to rise again and again to the surface to haunt us.

We would never consider telling a diabetic not to take his/her insulin and simply concentrate on the positive aspects of his/her life. This would be ludicrous and dangerous! But this is basically what we tell people every day, when we tell them to ignore the wounding alive inside them, and “think positive”…the wounding rooted in childhood that still affects their lives today.

We all have wounds under the surface of our consciousness and as therapists, we have the responsibility both to do our own inner work and to help our clients do theirs. Anything less helps feed the abuse of power in our world.

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