It occurs to me, once again, that I must be a bitch of a psychotherapy patient. Compared to my seasoned, white haired therapist; I know a LITTLE bit about psychology and the psychodynamic viewpoint. And I bring all of these great amounts of a little bit of knowledge into the therapy session like a child whose spine is curving under the weight of too many school books in her backpack. I want to understand, but I intellectualize too much to be emotionally present in the moment. After a lengthy session of discussing this and our recent interpersonal difficulties, I said outright, "I KNOW that I do this! I know I have this third eye looking down on us and editing my every move before I have a chance to make it so that I look smart, informed, and insightful!"
Dr. Therapist's sage-like response?
"Yeah, you should cut that out."
That is such a radical idea to me. To stop editing. To stop trying to impress. It is so radical, in fact, that I have been actively and consciously trying to do it for over 5 or 6 months now, and just realized that I'm not. I may have stopped trying to impress professors, stopped trying to manage my family of origin, stopped (at least a bit) trying to anticipate my partner's emotional responses; but I continue to try to control the therapy relationship like I'm Maria Callas' husband. You might get a great performance out of me, but ultimately I'm just going through the motions. No offence to Maria Callas, she was a passionate singer, but one has to wonder why the Caged Bird Sings.
After dissecting the issue until it fell apart, I felt better. And this week I am faced with the task of being genuinely in the moment and not over-thinking therapy. This is a challenge for someone who's background is in performance and in theatre training spent 3 months not speaking because they were learning how to read subtle-and-unconscious messages in body language. You see??? This is why I am attracted to the psychodynamic methods!
So without overthinking it too much, I think I will probably talk about having just been turned down for a research job this morning. They really wanted to hire me to work 36 hours a week for 4 months, and I can only give them 16. It's funny how I have lots of job opportunities right now for which I am now qualified, but can't take them due to time constraints. And at a time when I am wanting to leave The Org (before the layoffs). Taking a vacation is also a problem in this process. Many research assistant jobs are short-term and I have committed to going away for reading week, which is when these jobs need the applicant to be available to collect data. I need the money yet know I will sink further into twitchiness if I don't take a break in February.
Money. It's a gas...
I better get back to not overthinking it.
