Is therapy for everyone?

Poste Nov. 22, 2022

By Sal McElhaney

Staff Reporter

When it comes to mental health, everyone has their own way of dealing with it. One of these ways happens to be known as therapy. But, when it comes to therapy, it brings up a question that even I have asked myself: Is therapy for everyone? 

Therapy has actually been around since about 3,500 years ago, formerly known as “healing through words.” According to https://www.talkspace.com/ , the word counseling found it’s way into Geoffrey Chaucer’s ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’ in 1386. The more formal term, known as ‘psychotherapy’, was formed in the late 1800s, which the Mayo Clinic described as “general term for treating mental health problems by talking to a psychiatrist, psychologist, or other mental health provider.” 

According to https://www.mentalhelp.net/ , it states “there is nothing in this life that is ever true of every person. There is just too much diversity of temperament, life style, economics, personal motivations, personality and so on.” What this means is that therapy is not truly fit for everyone, as everyone has their own goals that they’re trying to achieve. Sometimes, therapy isnt always helpful for those matters. Whether your goals are emotional, physical, mental, psychological, and so forth. 

It also states in this same article that “A lot depends upon the motivation to change that a client brings to the therapy. When someone is strongly motivated to change because they feel unhappy and are ready to learn there is a lot of impetus to grow as a result of treatment.” That means motivation can be a key factor that brings someone to doing therapy in the first place, that feeling of wanting to change and improve themselves as individuals. 

The last thing I shall quote from this article is that is states “It is my professional opinion that, regardless of approach, the therapist and client work in the ‘here and now’, or the present. While client history is somewhat important, present day circumstances are what are most important.” This means that therapy can have a variety of ways to being approached, but the “here and now” way of approaching it seems to be most effective, in this licensed professionals humble opinion.