Beyond Treatment. How Else Can Therapy Help You?

Some people understand quickly when they are in need of therapy. For instance, when they’re experiencing an acute emotional state, depression, phobias, panic-attacks, or personality disorders which disrupt their daily life. Many others ask themselves in puzzlement: “Do I need therapy?” There are some faint signs that you might need it, but not enough “suffering” to justify it.

I believe that therapy can be your ally beyond treatment or the help with mental conditions.

These are the ways you can utilize therapy for your own good:

Receiving Ongoing Support

Though it may seem easy for some to get support, not all supports are created equal. Therapists listen actively, being conscious of their own reactions (see my article on what your therapist is doing during the sessions) and making sure to help you keep focus without drifting, and to not lose grip. Talking in a non-judgmental and accepting space helps you sift through the whirl of your thoughts and feelings, feel heard, and understand yourself better - which brings a sense of relief, even if you don’t have an urgent problem to address.

Gaining Reflection

While we are totally capable of looking at ourselves in the mirror to see if all is good externally, we lack this capability in a mental sense. We cannot tuck out the shirt of mental processes, cannot iron the pants of emotions, or to curl the lashes of thoughts. There are numerous techniques how a therapist can reflect you, two of them are:

-Finding patterns in what you’re saying and feeling and showing them to you.
-Reacting with their countertransference, i.e. their non-verbal response (put into words, of course) to your non-verbal information that you are sharing.

Therapy can be a mirror of your psyche. Seeing and hearing yourself through your therapist is therapeutic in itself, as it reduces confusion and self-doubt.

It Helps You Uncover Buried Emotions (Which Still Affect You)

Imagine how many emotional responses you have per day. Per month. Per year. Most of us don’t notice suppressed emotions which we carry, because if we would, we wouldn’t know what to do with them. When we don’t notice them, they still impact us. For instance, unresolved anger may lead to passive-aggressive behavior. Therapy helps unpack these emotions, getting rid of negativity. Sometimes we - psychodynamically oriented therapists - employ dreams to help us do that (read my article on how dreams help us). The point isn't to analyze every feeling you've forgotten, but to release and discharge those suppressed emotions before they control you and make you act out.

It Makes the Emotions Bearable

No need to get rid of every negative emotion. Therapy teaches you how to bear intense or overwhelming emotions and feelings without breaking. You learn to be with emotions, understand them, and let them pass without being crushed by them. Your emotional container becomes deeper, and you become more emotionally resilient. Besides, therapy isn't just about negative emotions - it trains you to notice and amplify the positive ones too.

Act of Self-care

As clients, we regress in therapy, which is good because it helps us gain access to the hidden parts of our psyche. We project the figure of a caring adult onto our therapist, who takes care of our inner child. With their help, you finally hold what your younger self needed but never received - so you can carry it forward now. You meet those old misconceptions you swallowed whole as a child, and see them for what they really were. No more through the warped lens of childhood, but in the clear light of who you actually are, which will help you enjoy your adulthood more fully.

It Lowers Anxiety

Anxiety thrives on uncertainty. Therapy is predictably yours - a space where you’re not alone with the gnawing thoughts, anchored by the clockwork of your next session (every Tuesday at 3pm, or whatever our rhythm is). Even "bad" or "unproductive" sessions help. (Like how bad pizza is still better than no pizza at all.) Over time, just knowing that your therapeutic place and time exist takes the edge off. That’s the process: not necessarily the chain of breakthroughs, but grounding and creating balance and predictability in life, session after session, like slice after slice.

It Eases Loneliness

The cure for loneliness is relationship. An ongoing therapeutic relationship gives you solid ground to stand on while searching for connection elsewhere. Some people feel lonely even while in a relationship, so in this case therapy helps uncover why and what to do about it. Moreover, the steady therapeutic bond helps you develop the very skills that make other relationships possible: listening without armor, speaking without fear, and staying present when connection feels dangerous.

It Improves Inner Pacing and Quality of Life

Therapy teaches you when to brake during anxious rushed urgency, and when to accelerate through stagnation - all in a caring rhythm that neither pushes nor drags. This is mental hygiene in action: tending your unique psychological tempo.

It refines life itself: trading reactivity for presence, surface connections for depth, and self-doubt for sturdy selfhood. Along the way, you’ll meet your cast of inner characters, eg the trembling child, the frustrated adolescent, the wiser self who’s been waiting to take the wheel.

A Quick Caveat

I digress—not all therapists do that, some only want to treat, so you can always enquire how your therapist works.

Final Thought

Therapy doesn’t need to be about fixing, treating, or curing a symptom, and you don’t have to be “sick enough” to start. You just have to be human. Its range of capabilities from which you can benefit is much broader. It’s a connection with the therapist and, by extension, with yourself that can help you build on and strengthen what’s already there: curiosity, resilience, inner resources, and the quiet voice that says, “Maybe I deserve better.”

Bibliography:

1. Gabbard, G. O. (2017). Long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy: A basic text (3rd ed.). American Psychiatric Association Publishing.
2. Shedler, J. (2010). The efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy. American Psychologist, 65(2), 98–109.

Published by author on Psychology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-psychology-of-relationships-and-emotional-intelligence/202507/beyond-treatment-how-else