Our society is highly polarized by disagreements about political and cultural issues. Understandably, someone undergoing therapy might have concerns about what positions are held by their therapist or what response they will get if they chose to discuss their views. How a therapist handles political discussion can be useful or not for the therapy process, and may also affect a client’s sense of safety or their trust in their therapist’s judgement or character. I’d like to share how I approach this in my practice.
When a client brings up political issues, I generally avoid sharing my own opinions, except when doing so serves a therapeutic purpose. I don’t use my role to promote a political perspective.
I am open to my clients’ ideas, even if I disagree with them. I recognize that everyone’s views make sense based upon their life experience, knowledge, and individual psychological dynamics, and I accept that my own are not always correct. I want to understand my clients’ perspectives and their meaning, not impose my own.
I may invite my clients to explore whether there are any personal issues or feelings underlying their positions. Instead of using therapy to have typical political discussions, I invite them to be curious about the meaning of their views – how these views relate to their individual experience and deeper feelings. For those who are ready, therapy can be an opportunity to look inwards and understand where one’s attitudes and opinions are coming from.
No matter how valid one’s views may be, people tend to feel strongly about their positions because of deeper emotional issues related to their personal history, which may not be within their conscious awareness. For example, righteous political outrage often contains anger that is left over from unrelated past experience, or represents an attempt to address more vulnerable hidden feelings. And societal conflicts tend to unconsciously remind people of dynamics within their family of origin. Good therapy helps to uncover and clarify these things, rather than simply shoring up existing positions or engaging in political debate.
I believe that therapists have a responsibility to try to recognize their blind spots, and this includes the ways in which their own psychological dynamics influence their perspectives about the world. Therapists should inquire into the personal meaning of their own political views, especially when they feel a strong emotional charge about them, in order to maximize their self-awareness.
Therapist need to understand the reasons for their own emotional reactivity if they want to work effectively with clients whose opinions conflict with their own. In addition, it is helpful for therapists to avoid limiting themselves to an “information bubble,” in which they are only exposed to people and news sources which reinforce their existing positions, making it harder for them to understand those who think differently.
This short article provides a sense of how I work with people’s political beliefs in therapy, and the self-aware, non-judgmental approach that I think it is helpful for therapists to take. My clients can be assured that I will be respectful of their views, while also being curious about their deeper personal meaning, if they chose to discuss them.
