The Therapy Culture

We live in a “therapy culture.” That means that we believe that it takes time to make lasting changes in ourselves – lots and lots of time…

The reason why we think that change takes forever is because the culture of therapy gives us very discouraging messages such as: “biography is destiny” and “the past equals the future.” The problem with this kind of “stinking thinking” is that people who believe it are stripped of any chance of developing emuna. If you follow this deterministic logic that people are compelled to repeat the past – which Freud called the “repetition compulsion” – then that’s where you’ll live – in the past! I’m sure that you can see that there is zero room for emuna here.

With emuna we free ourselves from the shackles of pessimistic deterministic psychology and remind ourselves that G-d is in charge; that everything comes from Him; and that He can change us very quickly when He thinks that it’s a “good idea.”

I’ve seen people use emuna to change beliefs that they’ve had for most of their lives in one session. Once G-d  “opened the window” for these people, their fears and other types of dis-empowered thinking changed quickly. It’s like the inner circuitry of the person suddenly gets scrambled and re-wired. They suddenly feel the confidence that they couldn’t feel before; they can think in ways that they couldn’t think before; and they can be sure that they can do things that they couldn’t do before.

I call that a break though.

Here’s an example:

Chani was so phobic of her husband that she couldn’t sleep in the same room with him. It wasn’t that she didn’t love her husband and think that he was a great guy – she did! Chani knew enough to realize that her fear didn’t make sense. Her husband was a hard-working faithful partner and loving father to their children. He was a gentle person who wouldn’t hurt a fly, and yet she was afraid to fall asleep in his presence. She also knew that her fear was rooted in an  early trauma that she had gone through with a man. Nevertheless – in 15 years of marriage, Chani had never slept together in the same room with her husband.

Chani tried various types of psychotherapy to overcome her fear. She said that although each therapy added to her understanding of the problem, she was still running out of her bedroom every night to sleep on the couch or in another room. After a number of tries, Chani and her husband decided that they were meant to “live” with the problem.

A strategy is a set of steps that one follows that have been found to get consistently reliable results. People have strategies for anything that they’ve done more than once from financial strategies, to strategies for happiness, to strategies for how to be depressed and fearful, to strategies for baking an award winning cake.

The best strategies are the ones that have worked for people who have mastered something of real value. What’s really amazing about good strategies is that even though we may not be an expert in that area yet, by following what the master does we can often learn to produce the same result in much less time. So, for example, if it took John 25 years to develop his recipe (strategy) for chocolate cake which results in consistently moist delicious cake, you and I who may not be professional bakers and don’t have 25 years of experience can produce the same results as John, if we faithfully follow his strategy. That means that we use the same type of milk, sugar, chocolate and flour that John uses; we use the same quantities; we combine the ingredients in the same sequence as John does; we bake them at the same temperature and for the same time interval as he does, and whallah – we get the same result!

In emuna coaching, we have studied the strategies that people of faith have used over the ages to break through debilitating fears and lead lives of freedom and happiness. In place of chocolate, milk and sugar we study how spiritual masters think; what they picture in their minds; what they say to themselves; what they value, what they believe in; how they use their time; how they speak and relate to others – in short we  study every aspect of their lives.

When Chani modeled some emuna strategies for living without fear, she only needed about 20 minutes to master them. She and her husband have been sleeping in the same bedroom ever since. Chani (and her husband) are so happy with this result that she has enrolled in our emuna coach training program so that she can teach emuna change strategies to her kids, her friends, and to her own clients.

If you like, you can speak with Chani yourself. She wants you or someone who you care about to know the truth about how emuna coaching worked for her. If you would like to speak with her, just email me at zevballen@yahoo.com and I’ll be happy to connect you.

Once you make the decision to leave the therapy culture and live in the emuna culture where the past is just the past, you too can unlock your true potential and live the life that you really want to live!