The therapist and the barber

I recently enjoyed this post from Lynn's Process Notes: When Psychotherapy becomes Executive Coaching. She writes:

Ordinarily (but not always) my patients' Axis II (bonafide mental disorders) dissolve with treatment. Then I become an executive coach. Patients don't want to leave "therapy" even when I tell them there is nothing wrong with them. They like the coach arrangement, the career building or relationship support that I provide for them.

I have often wrestled with the following ethical issue: Should a therapist outline clear therapeutic goals with a client and sever the relationship when they are accomplished? Or should the patient and therapist instead come to a renegotiating point and decide on a new set of goals? I suppose it partly depends on the patient's pocket book. Seems to me the primary distinction between a psychotherapist and a coach is wound up with Maslow's hierarchy of needs, with mental health being more fundamental than the support of a coach (however invaluable that might be).

She continues:

I ask myself: What right do I have to see people who no longer have anything wrong with them?" Plenty is my response to myself. If someone wants to pay out of pocket for the coaching they receive from me, I would feel wrong to dismiss them. Instead, we discuss the situation with clear heads. There is no "EST" [empirically supported psychotherapy] designed for this phase of "psychotherapy" that I engage in, or at least not one I know about.

It is my secret (and now not-so-secret) wish to gather empirical data supporting the treatments used in spiritual psychology so they can make their way into mainstream psychology. I have anecdotal evidence coming out of my ears that these skills and practices change the lives of already healthy people. The scientist in me is hungry for research. Call it a sick affinity for academic papers, if you will, but I attempting to honor my roots and integrate them with the applied studies I am now passionate about. This is one of 48 items on my "someday / maybe" list.

So what do your therapist and your barber have in common?

I often think that currently, the therapist is taking on the role of the small town minister, or the wise old person in a community, a tribe. Maybe the therapist is taking on a role and function that the hair dresser used to fill. In my mother's generation, people went to the hair dresser every week for a shampoo. In their time in the chair, they talk about their families and all of their problems.

Before I started my first full-time job in customer service, a wise person said to me, "People just want to feel heard." Those guiding words, along with my training at USM, have made a permanent improvement in the way I listen to people. One thing I know. Whether it's a hairdresser, executive coach, or licensed psychologist, somewhere in Maslow's triangle, not sure if it's filed under love, belonging, esteem, or self-actualization really, but somewhere in there, people need listeners.

I dedicate this post to all the listeners in my life, with gratitude.