"I can’t stay"
A young man wanted help with his increasing agitation and was having difficulty even sitting in the chair in my office. I had the idea that if he could experience the agitation fully, it would subside, and so with the best intention, I asked him to try to sit it out. After a few minutes of escalating fear, he got up and left saying he couldn’t stand the pain. He never returned.
I had forgotten Erickson’s case where a man couldn’t sit and kept pacing up and down. Erickson asked him to continue pacing, and gently mentioned the chair that he wasn’t ready to sit in yet. After some time the man was ready to sit and go into trance.
I was so embarrassed looking back and my insensitivity.
Rob
People are desperate for a back door, an escape hatch. They look to us for help. They can't manage their own support ground or titration (or don't know how or that they could). When someone smugly says to me (& I believe you were not smug), "Feel the fear & do it anyway"-'--I've learned the hard way , by trying their escalatingly stupid, re traumatizing suggestions, to add them to what I must healthfully, quickly, escape from. Perhaps that man learned self care . I've burned with dismay & regret at having subjected myself to some toxic, retraumatizing "authoritative " therapists out of "hope"...& although countering peer pressure, the demands of authority, & my own inner programming, I've managed to literally run from some at last . Some even threatened me with false, cruel outcomes . The intention to ally oneself with healing brings the right healing, as you courageously share.