STEVEN BENJAMIN

Therapy sometimes means moving towards feelings that make us uncomfortable. A good therapist needs to understand our natural resistance to this and help people do the work that can be truly transformative. While the deepest learnings often occur when we are a bit out of our comfort zone, if feelings become overwhelming, a good therapist needs to also know how to detect this and how to engage in a way that regulates the internal landscape, before doing any more exploration. When people discover again and again that they can safely explore experientially and that any strong dysregulation can be reset reliably, trust grows and the therapy can continue to go deeper and address what most needs attention. In less clinical terms, the notion is something along the lines of "we are a team, we can slow things down, and we are in this together."