Our society is highly polarized by political and cultural issues. Understandably, someone undergoing therapy might want to know what positions their therapist holds, or may feel concerned about what response they will get if they discuss their own views in therapy. How a therapist handles these issues may affect a client’s trust or sense of safety in therapy. Likewise, the way a therapist deals with political discussion can be useful or not for the therapy process.
In my therapy practice, everyone is welcome. I don’t share my own opinions about political issues, unless I think that it serves a therapeutic purpose to do so. My role is to help my clients explore their own thoughts and feelings, not to promote my own views.
The type of therapy I practice encourages self-exploration, and this can include one’s opinions about social issues. Political perspectives are highly influenced by emotions, personal experience, and psychology dynamics. Societal conflicts may evoke feelings connected to one’s personal history, including the dynamics within one’s family of origin. For those who are ready, therapy can be an opportunity to look inwards and see where one’s opinions and feelings about the world are coming from.
Therapists may do a disservice to our clients if we engage in political debate, or simply reinforce our client’s existing positions, while avoiding the deeper issues involved. The accuracy of a client’s views is less significant than the meaning of those views to the person, and the underlying emotions. No matter how legitimate we may believe someone’s views to be, if they are willing to look into their feelings and the psychological dynamics involved in their positions, they will probably gain new insight into themselves. Even when societal circumstances are very challenging, we have an opportunity to explore how they are affecting us internally, so that we can face the situation with maximal clarity and self-awareness.
In order to have a therapeutic response to our clients’ political views, therapists need to have awareness of our own emotional reactivity about politics. Therapists have an ongoing responsibility to increase our self-awareness, and this includes understanding feelings about politics that may impact our clinical work, such as our own righteousness or fear.
I believe it is helpful for therapists to avoid limiting ourselves to an “information bubble,” in which we are only exposed to people and news sources which reinforce our existing views, making it harder for us to understand those who think differently. Likewise, I think therapists should be able to accept differences of opinion and recognize that everyone’s positions make sense based upon their life experience and individual psychological dynamics. We should not have an agenda for our clients to agree with us.
Because of our polarized political climate, I’ve tried to provide a sense of how I work with these issues when they come up in therapy, and explain the introspective, non-judgmental approach that I think it is helpful for therapists to take. When my clients choose to discuss their views, I am respectful and can empathize with their concerns, while also being curious about their deeper meaning.
