I’m coming up on a milestone I didn’t envision for myself during the first 40 years of my life: my 150th hour of professional counseling. That’s more hours than I’ve been in a movie theater, more visits than I’ve had with all medical professionals combined, and more sessions than I’ve cumulatively done in group fitness environments.
Candidly, that therapeutic journey certainly didn’t start with confidence. I used to wear an Apple watch when I first started meeting with my LPC. As I sat in the waiting room before one of my first sessions, I looked down and noticed that my heart rate had jumped from 55 to 83.
Vulnerability scared me. It often still does. The precipice of self-revelation can and has felt like the moments in an airplane right before I jump out of it or walk out onto a biplane wing for some aerobatics. “Well. Here goes nothing.”
At the same time, the candor and freedom that happens in that sequestered space has become habit-forming for me—much as other adrenaline rushes have. I look forward to my weekly sessions, especially on weeks when conversations with family or friends have been heavy or when life has thrown me a curveball. Hours in Lindsey’s tall chair and now on her gray couch have helped me sort out my world in ways similar to and different from my daily journaling and regular prayer hikes.
Recently, one of my inner circle of friends asked me how long I was going to keep going to therapy. I’d not given it much thought until then. People go to therapy for different reasons and with different goals. Some want to work through a single issue. Others need a guided recovery from a major life event. For years now, I’ve looked at it like heading to the YMCA several days a week, going on a date night with Crystal, hiking every other Wednesday with Tommy, sitting around a fire each week with Nate, and praying with my parking teammates every Sunday morning. It’s just part of the rhythm of my life.
I’m 44 years old and still trying to figure out who I am in this world, what I want from it, and what structure I need to achieve that. I spent more than 2,000 hours in college classrooms to figure out my vocation and 10,000 hours becoming an expert in my field. I figure 45 hours a year with my counselor along with a professionally-guided retreat every few years is the least I can do to continue this journey toward wholeheartedness.
I think it’s important for my wife and daughter to see me working on myself in all facets of life, including my mental health. As part of a faith community of dudes, I want to normalize vulnerability and combat the stigma of therapy. As someone who follows Jesus, I’ve learned that I can’t be spiritually healthy if I’m not emotionally healthy. As the oldest sibling in a family that has endured decades of sustained trauma, I want to demonstrate the various paths to healing; and heart coaching is one of those primary paths.
If you’ve followed my blogs or my social media, you know I dream big dreams. I’ve written three books, visited all seven continents, and with my wife adopted a teenager. I’ve found very unique ways to absorb the world around me. My sessions with Lindsey help me sort through my motives, my inhibitions, and my fears for all of the above. She’s helped me surrender habits and hangups that get in the way of my goals.
Finally, I’ve thoroughly learned the value of telling my story. As I bring more people into my intentions and insecurities, I find co-conspirators, accountability, or both. The more I tell my story, the easier it grows to tell it. My therapist’s office is one of the easiest places for me to unzipper my heart for the first time on a topic. The stakes are lower there because I have no roles to play, no expectations to meet, and no equilibrium to maintain. Once the story is out, it’s easier to share it again with stakeholders in my life and then outward in concentric circles until the appropriate parts of them make it to book, blog, or social media readers.
So, I don’t know when my counseling sessions will end. I’m not sure now even how I’ll know this season of my life is finished. I guess I’ll recognize it when I get there. In the meantime, I’m grateful for the luxury of frequent sessions and the weights they’ve helped me drop from my shoulders. I hope others find the incredible resource that I’ve found faith-informed therapy to be.
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Images purchased from iStockPhoto.com
Stephanie Swinehart
Ryan,
I want to thank you for writing this. I read it on Friday and it resonated with me to the core. It hit me so much that I shared it on my FB and wrote a post about it. I too grew up with lots of trauma. Counseling has been a part of me for 32 years & I was in Celebrate Recovery for 10 yrs.
I have always found it hard to explain why and when I go to counseling to people. The longest stretch of time that I have been in counseling was 4 yrs every week. As I wrote in my post I go to counseling when I hit a bump in the road & I stay in counseling until I have moved past that bump. It could then be a few months or even a few years and then I will go back because of a new bump in the road. In 32 yrs I have never been able to explain it in the most simplest way, when I go and how long I am in counseling until after I read your post.
A little bit about how I began to follow you on FB just a month ago. Your name came up in a conversation with Billy Hagan and a separate conversation with Tiffany Dawn. I have been working for an auctioneer for 2 1/2 years and and few months ago I got my Indiana Auctioneer License because I fell in love with the business. Currently, I am putting together a business idea of becoming a virtual assistant for auctioneers and had conversations with both Billy and Tiffany. Your name was mentioned in those above conversations because of your marketing and social media level of expertise. So, I signed up for your emails and friend requested you on FB. And in less than a month, you wrote a blog post about counseling. Which was definitely a God moment.
There has been a few bumps in the road the last 2 months. I knew when I hit those bumps that I needed to make a phone call and schedule a counseling appointment, however with the busyness of every day life and some procrastination, I haven’t made that phone. But now because of your post, it is on my to do list for Monday am, so thank you again for your post.
I have always said, that if my story makes a difference or affected 1 persons life, then the trauma and struggles were worth it. So, I want to let you know your blog touched at least 1 person.
Ryan George
Stephanie! Thank you so much for sharing your heart with me in this place. I’m grateful this connected with you and that you have a counseling/therapy resource that is valuable to you. Best wishes on your virtual assistant goals. Next month will be 20 years of that work for me, and it has been a rewarding journey.