Psychotherapy
What makes psychotherapy work?
Treatment by conversation between a therapist and a patient, and the arguments about what in it actually does the work.
FilterEveryone, all time102 from 42 people
- DH
David Heinemeier Hansson quoted
Creator of Ruby on Rails, CTO of 37signals
Their wordsYou don't have to go through life feeling this detached or deadened.
- 3 days earlier
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Clinical psychologist and clinical professor of psychiatry at UCSF
Their wordsIt is the unconscious conviction that one is entitled to special compensation in proportion to suffering and victimhood.
↗Masochism: When Suffering Becomes a Way of Lifejonathanshedler.substack.com 1st of 3 in this piece
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Their wordsThe fantasy that suffering is a claim ticket becomes a powerful resistance to psychological change.
↗Masochism: When Suffering Becomes a Way of Lifejonathanshedler.substack.com 2nd of 3 in this piece
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Their wordsThis expectation is a vestige of early childhood and the small child's experience of their parents as omnipotent-able to provide whatever is needed to make everything all better.
↗Masochism: When Suffering Becomes a Way of Lifejonathanshedler.substack.com 3rd of 3 in this piece
- 1 day earlier
- HN
Haley Nahman quoted
Writer living in Brooklyn and former Man Repeller features director
Their wordsMy general view on a partner with a challenging quality is that to make peace with it, two things need to be true: 1. They have enough wonderful qualities you value to compensate for it, and 2. They don't make you feel alone or lonely in dealing with the runoff of said challenging quality.
↗#283: My boyfriend’s insomnia has me spinning outhaleynahman.substack.com 2nd of 2 in this piece
- 1 day earlier
- AA
Awais Aftab quoted
Psychiatrist and clinical assistant professor at Case…
Their wordsAnyone selling you anything better than 'highly imperfect' in the realm of mental healthcare is a fool or a grifter.
↗Maybe Don’t Ask Your Doctor if Zoloft Is Right for Youpsychiatrymargins.com 2nd of 3 in this piece
- 1 day earlier
- SC
Sasha Chapin quoted
Writer and author of All the Wrong Moves
Their wordsThe more you drop this idea, the happier you are, and the more alien you feel.
↗Average moments of a long-term meditatorsashachapin.substack.com 3rd of 3 in this piece
- 1 day earlier
- BT
Brandon Taylor quoted
American novelist and critic, author of Real Life
Our readingThe story we tell about a life is not the life itself; life exists only in the present moment.
Their wordsThe story of a life is not the life itself. Life is in the moment.
↗labyrinthmaxxing and minotaur hoursblgtylr.substack.com 2nd of 4 in this piece
- LF
Lex Fridman quoted
AI researcher and host of the Lex Fridman Podcast
Their wordsOne of the most important for me is just how incredibly complex the human mind is, and how hard the task is of understanding & treating the nearly infinite ways it can stumble/faulter.
- 3 days earlier
- AH
Ava Huang quoted
Writer of the newsletter bookbear express, on psychology
Their wordsanything that feels like a way to get out of doing the work will come back to bite you. You have to go through yourself to get anywhere good.
↗some things I’ve learned about relationshipsavabear.xyz 1st of 3 in this piece
- 6 days earlier
- AH
Ava Huang quoted
Their wordsit is very bad to take on total responsibility for a capable adult human being; we are each responsible for our own psyche, our own life.
- 2 days earlier
- HN
Haley Nahman quoted
Their wordsOur respective choices didn't represent the right or wrong way to live, but rather two distinct approaches to living that were equally useful and utterly opposed; irreducible to prescription.
↗#281: You, with a layer of paranoia shaved offhaleynahman.substack.com 1st of 2 in this piece
- HN
Haley Nahman quoted
Their wordsthere exists a wisdom in the involuntary, and that our attempts to shape reality, however intentional, are themselves a form of unintentional expression.
↗#281: You, with a layer of paranoia shaved offhaleynahman.substack.com 2nd of 2 in this piece
- 1 day earlier
- PA
Peter Attia quoted
Physician and founder of Early Medical
Their wordsFor postmenopausal women—and women with premature estrogen deprivation for other reasons—vaginal estrogen is a safe and highly effective therapy to alleviate the genitourinary syndrome of menopause, prevent recurrent UTIs, and likely to save lives.
↗Vaginal estrogen: a potentially life-saving therapypeterattiamd.com
- 1 day earlier
- AA
Awais Aftab quoted
Their wordsThe only thing stopping the DSM is a bunch of self-imposed rules and conventions.
↗Postpartum Psychosis and Diagnostic Sclerosispsychiatrymargins.com 1st of 3 in this piece
- AA
Awais Aftab quoted
Their wordsThere is no consistency, no respect for evidence, no clear bar for when downstream implications matter and when they don't.
↗Postpartum Psychosis and Diagnostic Sclerosispsychiatrymargins.com 2nd of 3 in this piece
- 4 days earlier
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Their wordsPsychotherapy cannot help if the participants cannot work together.
↗When the Therapy Relationship Is the Problemjonathanshedler.substack.com 1st of 2 in this piece
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Their wordsIt is true that a good therapeutic alliance predicts good outcome. But anyone can develop an alliance with someone who can already form good relationships. Measures of the therapeutic alliance may simply be a proxy for the patient's preexisting capacity for healthy relationships.
↗When the Therapy Relationship Is the Problemjonathanshedler.substack.com 2nd of 2 in this piece
- 6 days earlier
- AS
Arielle Schwartz quoted
Clinical psychologist, EMDR consultant and yoga teacher in Boulder, Colorado
Their wordsIt may not be stored there, but what you're tapping into, it's not a repository of the memory, but it's part of this mind-body feedback loop where there's a sensation that your brain has an association to that might have a familiarity to a time in which you felt sad or scared.
↗If the Body Doesn't Keep the Score, What Does?drarielleschwartz.com
- 6 days earlier
- KR
Kenneth Reitz quoted
Programmer, photographer and musician
Their wordsSymbolism excels at meaning and pattern, not automatic verification. It can reveal how something feels while being wrong about why it feels that way.
↗The Mind Builds an APIkennethreitz.org 1st of 3 in this piece
- 3 weeks earlier
- HK
Henrik Karlsson quoted
Swedish essayist who writes Escaping Flatland
Our readingDeepening your understanding of a situation helps you maintain a sense of control over it.
Their wordsIt is always useful to deepen your understanding, to maintain a sense of control.
- 2 days earlier
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Their wordsWhen patients don't get the help they need, they don't come away thinking, I didn't get good treatment. They come away thinking, I am too broken to be helped. They leave more hopeless and demoralized than when they came. That is harm.
↗When Compromised Care Becomes "Best Practice"jonathanshedler.substack.com
- 3 weeks earlier
- AA
Awais Aftab quoted
Their wordsThe emotional and relational dynamics are not an intrusion upon the work of prescribing. They are a part of the work itself.
↗The Fantasy of Being "Just" a Psychiatric Prescriberpsychiatrymargins.com
- 13 days earlier
- JS
Jonathan Shedler quoted
Their wordsThe phrase "your feelings are valid" does not invite curiosity or deeper self-understanding, which is the point of psychotherapy. It is the mirror image of "stop whining and get a grip." One sounds warm and one sounds harsh, but neither deepens self-awareness.
↗Skilled Therapists Don't Say "Your Feelings Are Valid"jonathanshedler.substack.com
- HK
Henrik Karlsson quoted
Their wordsThere are many practices that promise to transform and improve us-therapy, meditation, psychedelics-, but that branding doesn't mean that they actually do much for us: it is common to see people use these techniques for years without any obvious progress on their problems.
↗How not to forget what mattershenrikkarlsson.xyz 3rd of 3 in this piece
- 4 days earlier
- KR
Kenneth Reitz quoted
Their wordsA culture that trusts only what compresses into words will treat whatever does not as either unreal or unwell.
- 7 days earlier
- SC
Sasha Chapin quoted
Our readingA person cannot expect to find lasting balance between conflicting parts of their psychology.
Their wordsThere's no reason to believe that you will find persistent balance between these conflicting elements of your psychology.
↗Without hope of resolutionsashachapin.substack.com 1st of 4 in this piece
- 2 days earlier
- SP
Sarah Paine quoted
Historian of maritime and continental empires who taught strategy at the U.S
Their wordsSanctions are like economic chemotherapy. What you're doing is presenting preventing one or two percent growth per annum even with leaky sanctions, right?
↗Sarah Paine - Why Putin and Xi can't escape geographyyoutube.com 23rd of 26 in this recording
- 2 weeks earlier
- AG
Adam Grant quoted
Organizational psychologist and professor at the Wharton School
Our readingEmotion regulation is about choosing how to respond, not about controlling what one feels.
Their wordsEmotion regulation is not about controlling what you feel. It's about choosing how you respond.
↗The Allure of Narcissistic Leaders and the Forgotten Joy of Being Ordinaryadamgrant.substack.com 1st of 3 in this piece
- 4 weeks earlier
- SC
Sasha Chapin quoted
Their wordsHaving a fulfilling Nothing practice requires an equal embrace of all present sensation.
↗Practice Nothing, the most profound of all practicessashachapin.substack.com 1st of 3 in this piece