You’re Too Smart For Therapy

Do you have issues in your life you may need help working through? Are you an intelligent person with ambition, but lack motivation? Have you done lots of research on self-development, listened to hours of podcasts on psychology, and heard recommendations to go to therapy, but still aren’t going? You may be too smart for therapy.

This happens in other fields as well. For example, my father was a doctor and a brilliant man. He contributed to medicine in a lasting way; in fact, had he lived, I think he would have won a Nobel Prize. And though this man was a well-respected physician and researcher, you know what he was terrible at? Going to the doctor himself.

If you are reading this article, and other articles through Self-Knowledge Daily, you probably know a lot about psychology. You might even know more than a therapist, but it’s not just credentials and knowledge a therapist can provide. It’s perspective.

My father didn’t go a to a doctor for over 10 years, until he had to be rushed to the emergency room for renal failure. Fluid secretions had been pooling in his stomach for over a year. Dad had noticed his abdomen was growing, but he diagnosed it as weight gain. He said later he had assumed the belly pouch was just what happened when you got older. So, instead of going to the doctor, he went on a diet. This just made him weaker.

He had a preconceived notion about himself: he was prone to weight gain, so this was just his body. Had he gotten the perspective of another physician, even a physician that wasn’t as good of a doctor as him, he might still be alive today.

Another doctor could have noticed what dad was too close to see, and that’s what I understand therapy to be: a fresh perspective. A therapist is a collaborator, a mirror, and an advocate for you. Self-therapy can be wonderful, but it’s difficult to see yourself the way another can see you.

A therapist is a collaborator, a mirror, and an advocate.

Most importantly, when you are on your own, your progress is slower. You aren’t going to live forever. If anything can help you live a better life now, why would you delay? My dad was suffering for a year before he sought help, with something a physician could have noticed and treated quickly. One-on-one therapy is more efficient than going it alone.

You might very well be smarter than all the therapists in the world, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have something to offer you. Life is short, get the help you need and deserve now.

This is the second article in a series. Part 1 can be found here.