I am optimistic – about people, about what is next, about what is possible. I believe working with a psychologist is an optimistic activity. It puts people in a room together who share the belief that things can be better. And who work to make them so.
Mine is a small practice. My service ethic is inspired by other entrepreneurs - country innkeepers; small, artisan-owned shops; and the kinds of experiences I had growing up and working in a small town hardware store with my dad. These are places where people feel warmly welcomed and where the ability of the shop owner to listen for what you want and need is something you can feel. They are also places where people know their trade and are always trying to improve it - with the people they serve in mind.
As a clinician what I do is shaped a good deal by what I want in someone who puts themselves forward to help. I want someone who is kind, sensitive, and attentive, of course. But I want more, too. More than a warm therapeutic presence, I want a clinician who is well-educated, comfortable with always cultivating expertise in their field, established, smart, and inquisitive. I want someone who will listen in a way that has them entering my story, witnessing what I describe, connecting it to other things he or she knows about me. I want someone to give me the benefit of the doubt but not be blindly affirming; to listen critically without being critical. I’d like to trust that direct answers can come in response to direct questions.
Smart and curious also means a clinician who hasn’t stopped studying - even (and, maybe especially) after decades of practice. I want someone who is willing to talk with me about the efforts I’ve made to better understand what has been bothering me. I want credit for paying attention to my own lived experience. I am grateful when an mature clinician can draw on years of experience to help me but I also want to feel seen as an entirely singular individual.
As these things come together, I want someone who can - all at once - hold “the bigger picture” in mind, stay tethered to the purposes of our meeting, be alert to possible relevant advancements in science, and be on the look out for signs of change and healing in me. I want to know that I can rely on the professional to help me find, or help me invent, solutions that fit me and my life. And, in all of these efforts, I really want someone who knows that my life is always going to be richer and more complex than I will ever have time or opportunity to express in our encounters.
As you think about whether or not to include a clinical psychologist in whatever next steps you choose for yourself, maybe this will help: I can truly say that I’ve never met a person whose “problem” was they weren’t trying hard enough. We are all doing the best we can and when that isn’t working as we’d like, talking to someone else makes a lot of sense.