Take a second to imagine that your brain is a sponge. Yes, you read that correctly. A sponge. Throughout the course of a day, week, month, or even throughout the years, our brain absorbs all sorts of information. This information can be helpful for us as it can keep us alive.
However, on the other hand, this information can also be detrimental to our physical and mental well-being. Unfortunately, our brain is not always good at sifting through the incoming content and ensuring that it is relevant. Due to our brain’s over activity, we tend to carry a lot of emotional baggage that we need to work through at some point in our lives.
A psychotherapist helps us sift through our emotional baggage, and help us determine what we need to carry forward in our lives and what needs to be left behind.
Below, we outline the top seven benefits of psychotherapy:
Benefit #1: Helps Manage Depression
Depression is the most common mental illness which impacts many people. Unlike bouts of sadness, depression is characterized by pervasive feelings of sadness, hopelessness and lethargy. It also leads to a lack of appetite, sleep issues, and feelings of apathy.
The benefits of psychotherapy can address the underlying issues that lead to depression in a private and safe environment. They help clients look at their thought patterns in greater detail, while providing insight into new ways of thinking. Psychotherapy can help people get back to their regular lives.
Benefit #2: Helps Address Anxiety
Helping to address any anxiety is another benefit of psychotherapy. Anxiety is another common mental illness, which tends to go hand-in-hand with depression. Individuals with anxiety become exuberantly worried about many factors, most of which are out of their control. Unlike bouts of stress which we all experience, anxiety is ongoing and detrimentally impacts one’s life.
The benefits of psychotherapy include helping individuals with anxiety gain perspective about their anxieties in relation to larger hurdles in life. They also help them work through strategies to overcome the fear that plagues those suffering from anxiety.
Benefit #3: Provides Support for Compulsions and Obsessions
Psychotherapy also benefits individuals who suffer from obsessive compulsive disorders. These disorders overtake an individual’s entire life as they force them to repeat certain actions throughout the course of the day. Psychotherapists help disentangle the causes that are underlying these behaviours. They also help provide strategies for how to avoid performing these behaviours and how to relieve stress without them.
Benefit #4: Assists with Addiction Issues
Psychotherapists help address a range of addiction issues, ranging from drugs and alcohol to gambling and online shopping. Psychotherapists help uncover the issues that led to the addiction, and also propose strategies to help mitigate the urges. Often times, therapists will help replace harmful behaviours such as drinking and gambling with healthier habits.
Benefit #5: Addresses Relationship Issues
We all have certain struggles within our relationships. Psychotherapists can help their clients improve their relationships through suggesting strategies for how to open up communication between your loved ones. Psychotherapists also help people gain a better perspective of how to address issues that arise, and they also help clients deal with them appropriately. Furthermore, psychotherapists can include one’s family or partner in the session as well, which helps address communication issues head on.
Benefit #6: Maintains Support
The most important aspect of therapy is that it provides ongoing support for a client, despite whatever they are going through. Indeed, psychotherapists are there to guide their clients, but they are also there when a greater need for support arises. What is important to keep in mind is that one does not require a life crises event in order to receive ongoing support.
Support is pivotal when one is making key changes in their life, when they are trying to work through their goals, or when they are making difficult decisions about their relationships. We all require support in order to grow and become better.
Benefit #7: Help Process Negativity
Negativity is a huge part of our lives. Although we often tend to try to eradicate it or minimize it, it is necessary to accept its significance. Negativity gives us “reality checks” and also helps us stay out of potentially dangerous or uncomfortable situations. In other words, negativity is not all bad. However, if thoughts of negativity, sadness or a lack of confidence overwhelm your every decision or action, consider visiting a therapist. A psychotherapist can work through your negative thoughts and help you process everything in a healthy way.
You go to a fitness trainer to improve your physical fitness. You go to a dentist to maintain your teeth. You go to a physician for your ailments. Conversely, you must go to a psychotherapist to help maintain your mental well-being. Seeing a psychotherapist is as crucial as seeing any other healthcare provider because psychotherapy has the means to entirely transform your relationships, goals, and your life.
