Election corruption

As long as we require politicians to finance their campaigns by soliciting voluntary contributions, we are supporting a system in which every single elected official owes more to the money men than to his electorate,  We absolutely know that the elected politician owes a debt to the contributor.  How could we possibly think that they can vote independently from their debts?  Yer we allow it, while self-righteously condemning the corruption and bias in public office, as if we didn't know what was going on.  We  are exactly as corrupt as they are.  Unless and until we are willing to stop this practice we cannot expect to have politicians in office who can genuinely vote on the issues in an unbiased way.

So let's stop complaining about corruption in a system we have complacently allowed to become corrupted right in front of our eyes.   We allowed it.  We need to stop it.  We cannot expect it to be a better system until we ourselves change what we are allowing to happen.

Starting psychotherapy

When people come to see a psychologist/psychotherapist, they have relatively little information as to what to expect, other than what they have picked up incidentally from television dramas and the like.  Some therapists like to provide as little information as possible (a tactic dating back to early psychoanalysis) in order to determine what the assumptions and preconceptions the prospective client may have.
What the patient understands and expects may have little in common with what the therapist understands.  Often patients expect that we will fix something that hurts psychologically, just as they would expect a physician to fix something that is wrong physically.  They may take a passive stance, waiting for the therapist to direct or prescribe just as a physician might.  When the therapist doesn't do that, the client has no clear idea as to what should happen next in their treatment.

Currently I am starting new patients off with a short introduction.  Of course, it begins with some questions intended to get an idea as to what might be wrong.  If the problem is a simple reduction in unpleasant symptoms, such as a recent depression or sudden increase in anxiety, I can tell them what techniques I will be using and about how long it will take.  I can tell them what the financial and personal  costs are likely to be.  I can tell them exactly what I expect them to do and the outcomes they can anticipate.  But if the problem is a more complex one, such as when the symptoms arise from conflicting values and/or a dysfunctional life style, I use a different approach.

I tell them something like the following:  I will work with you to show you how to make changes in your life.  I can't make the changes for you.  You will have to decide what kind of person you wish to become over the years. You are in charge of who you will become, and every choice you make will brings your goal closer or moves it further from you.   Sometimes people make changes quickly;  more often they need more time to make them, so I can't tell you how long this might take.  I believe that is up to you.  My job will be to get you started along that path and show you how to continue it on your own. 

 To help you make those changes, I need to know who and what you are now.  I need to know what you believe and how you behave in accordance with what you believe.   Your part in this process is to demand of yourself uncompromising honesty.  Lies or dishonesty, whether of omission or commision, will stop the process of change.  Begin by telling me about yourself, what is important to you and what doesn't work, and we'll see how it goes. 

Since new patients are frequently uncomfortable with the idea of criticising the therapist, I am hoping that you as a reader will be willing to comment as to how you might respond to this beginning to therapy.

Losing weight

Like most psychologists, I see many obese patients.  They inevitably have the same story of how they have tried to lose weight or actually lost it, only to immediately regain the weight they had so laboriously lost. 

I have come to a working conclusion as to what went wrong and what might be tried to fix the problem.  All these patients had something in common beside their overeating:  what little pleasure they had in their lives came from eating.  They had no real fun or pleasure from other sources, except such passive pleasures as watching television, playing around on a computer or reading.  When they set themselves to losing weight, they became increasingly unhappy.  The primary source of joy in their lives was shut off.  Their only positive rewards were in what seemed a distant future.

The solution to the problem may lie in the following suggestion:  We should not give up eating until we have developed another source of pleasure in our lives that is as frequent and rewarding as food.  Food is easily obtained and is always satisfying.  What will we find to replace it?  Exercising is rarely a source of joy even remotely comparable to food, so that's not going to do it.  No one prescription will suffice, because the source of our happiness and joy is peculiar to us as individuals.  We must have access to this source of satisfaction as readily as we do to food.

It's hard to lose weight.  It becomes harder when our lives are joyless.  And we can't count on joy in the future.