Short-term therapy typically lasts between 10 and 20 sessions. Here the focus is on a specific issue you would like to explore. This could be the end of a relationship or another significant life transition, such as leaving home, becoming a parent, or retiring. You might be dealing with a recent traumatic life event, such as a bereavement, an accident, or an illness. Or you might have experienced bullying, homophobia, racism, or some other violation of your self. The intention of short-term therapy is to provide a space where the thoughts and feelings associated with a specific situation or event can be unpacked and examined. There is much to be said for the experience of allowing all of those thoughts and feelings — however confused and contradictory — to be heard and acknowledged.

There is a tendency in our society for people to want to move on quickly from difficult experiences and the feelings associated with them. Many common phrases and assumptions testify to this. Perhaps you have heard others, or even yourself, say things like, “Look on the bright side”, “Find the beauty in every moment”, “Happiness is a choice”, or “Laughter is the best medicine”. Increasingly, people are coming to understand that the path to happiness does not lie in bypassing difficult feelings — the upset, the anger, the bitterness, the resentment.

It may seem paradoxical, but it appears that happiness is a consequence of honesty. When truth is spoken, acknowledged, and appreciated — however difficult, painful, and upsetting that truth might be — happiness finds its way through. Many people find a great deal of relief from the simple process of being heard and witnessed in their distress.

A lot of the people I work with choose therapy as an ongoing, open-ended process. This is sometimes referred to as long-term psychotherapy, which may last from six months to several years. Over time, we get to know each other at a deeper level, and the focus of the therapy shifts from addressing the problem you arrived with to a broader enquiry into understanding yourself and your motivations more fully. This type of therapy can be a valuable tool for unraveling deep-seated difficulties, such as thought, feeling, and behavioural patterns that you may have developed early in life but which no longer serve you. For example, patterns of anxiety and depression, people-pleasing, perfectionism, self-loathing, numbing out through addictions, shame, and low self-esteem.

Long term psychotherapy can be profoundly transformative, opening you to the fullness of your potential as a human being.

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