Why I Love the Tools

Most of you know by now that I am a psychotherapist by training (and practice). I trained at one of the most well renowned schools of Depth Psychology in the country. This means I like going deep. I like getting to the root of problems, not just focusing on surface changes. I believe deeply in the tenets and teachings of Depth Psychology. We believe in the unconscious. We believe that healing happens through bringing the memories/beliefs/feelings that are living in our unconscious into our conscious mind and then shifting underlying core beliefs that are contradictory to our authentic selves. We believe in archetypes and the collective unconscious. We think about things like the anima and the animus; the ego, id, and superego. We trust the therapeutic relationship to be a container for healing our clients’ interpersonal wounds. And I could go on and on. We use a lot of big words and important concepts in Depth Psychology that, while useful for us when we are talking about it, are often confusing to our clients.

 

Therapy conducted from a Depth Psychology perspective is profound and highly introspective. We take into account not just the client’s own life, but also the way culture, archetypes, mythology, and ancestry intersect with that life. We look at attachment, image, and dreams. We think about psyche as soul and symptoms as messages from the soul. It is a rich and for lack of a better word, ooey gooey process. I absolutely love it!

 

The problem with Depth Psychology is that the ideas are sometimes hard to talk about with clients. I found it hard to quickly create a shared vocabulary about the process that is occuring in therapy but that it is generally helpful when people have that understanding. This is where my love for the Tools comes in.

 

The Seven Tools create a shared vocabulary and a structure to think and talk about the inner process. They sound pretty straight forward when you talk about them so the ideas are easily taught/learned. I can drop a line here and there in therapy without having to do a whole psychoeducational sidebar and the point is conveyed.

 

The application of The Seven Tools, however, gets you into the same ooey gooey process as therapy. I have found that when I use the Tools with my clients that they are able to actively engage in the therapeutic process more quickly because we have a shared vocabulary and framework for thinking about the work.

 

In my clinical practice, I still use all my Depth Psychology ooey gooey goodness in session and the Tools make the work all the more powerful.

 

I also love that these are ideas that we can teach outside of the therapy room. They are so teachable/learnable that we can teach whole classes of people these ideas at once and they are able to apply them to their lives. Maybe the thing I love the most about teaching our Seven Tools classes is watching the students’ lives shift and change. I love seeing students shedding the limiting beliefs that keep them stuck and making choices that are aligned with their higher selves.

 

We hear from past students how they are able to continue to use the Tools even after the classes have finished, and how they are continuing to live their lives more and more aligned with their authentic selves. They feel more emotionally regulated and better equipped to explore the emotions when they do come up. And I love that! I love that the Tools stick with people and continue to help them long past our last week of class.

 

For someone who wants to be in service to the world the way that I do, the Tools have given me the <ahem> tools to do just that. So I am glad that you are here on our blog reading about these ideas because once you get to know them, I think you will love them as much as I do.