One Life Only Blog – Page 2 – One Life Only Counseling Services

Are you depressed?

by Nathan Chua

No, you’re not. You are called by a name, and I don’t think your parents or guardians would name you, “Depressed!” Yes, this is kind of a play on words, but it can also serve as a reminder to you that your depression doesn’t define you. I have met a good number of clients who have come to me saying that they have been diagnosed with major depression and subsequently medicated for something they are supposed to have that causes the depression…some sort of brain disease. It no longer surprises me when clients come to me and say that they had a chat with their provider for 15 minutes and voila, they are labeled as being stricken by something that is called major depressive disorder or MDD! Sad to say you’re broken and you need some fixin’!

These conclusions are made in the service of a manual that says someone has a problem with depression when it lasts for a couple of weeks or more, plus a few other criteria listed. Most people who get such a diagnosis often end up feeling like they have very little control over their choices regarding how they want to spend their time. Much of their time from thereon will be focused entirely on getting rid of this depression. They begin to adjust their lives and expectations about their lives and their relationships around a diagnosis. People have to be careful about my feelings. They shouldn’t say anything that can trigger my depression or sense of self-worth. All of a sudden a mask is worn throughout their remaining existence.

A few words about our sadness:

I have recently shared this thought experiment about our sad feelings. It speaks about how understandable our negative feelings are. If you were in a funeral wake to visit the friends and loved ones of the departed, wouldn’t you be surprised if anyone came in without at least a tinge of sadness in their face? If you lost someone you cared for, would you think you’re abnormal for feeling sad? Wouldn’t you once in a while even after years following the death of a loved one, still feel a sadness that comes with a reminder of the person who once meant so much to you? Wouldn’t that be about just being a person who has feelings? And yet we have a system or a culture that says you only have a couple of weeks to get over your sadness.

The loop:

I remember an expert sharing that depression as we interpret it today, is not about the presence of sadness, but the unwillingness to feel sadness. The loop happens when you and I try to get rid of our feelings of sadness. This can come in many different forms. We may try to distract ourselves, opt out of activities we enjoy, ruminate about the guilt and the what ifs, and some of us even take substances. The sad news is unless you have a major brain injury or you are close to that age when you get hit by Alzheimer’s, you will experience sadness sooner or later. No amount of avoiding can help you on your way to being unable to feel. Take it from me, there are times I wake up feeling sad for no particular reason at all. That’s just the case about feelings. They visit us once in a while and they come and go of their own accord.

In short, the loop kind of looks like this, you don’t only feel sad, but also feel sad that you are sad.

It’s not what you are, it’s something you have:

You are not a walking depression. You can just observe. Take a full day without any medication and see if you will feel sad 24 hours non stop. Chances are you will find that your sadness only visits you in spurts. And when it is a longer spurt, chances are you are trying to suppress it. The problem with that strategy is that the more you try to forget about your sadness, the more you remember. Because trying to forget something only reminds you of what you have to forget!

The meaning behind the sadness:

Finally, this article won’t be complete without some kind of redemption. If our sadness were meaningless then I would be first to recommend that all of us should find ways to escape it. For example, if you were being physically or verbally abused by a partner or a guardian, this is needless pain that all of us can and should avoid. But the kind of sadness I speak about here does stand for something. Our sadness means we have lost something or someone of great value to us. We have sad feelings for a reason. We are sad for the loss of a loved one because…we loved them! If our sadness stood for something as life-changing and powerful as love, then why should we be ashamed of it?

I remember an author and psychologist mention that we have tears come out of our eyes because they were meant to be seen. I often say this to my clients, your tears today tell me something about you that any form of running away from or medicating your way out of your sadness cannot. They tell me something about you that makes me feel connected to you. You’re just as human as I am.

So next time you lose someone or something that matters to you, take a moment and look at the other side of the coin. This moment is precious because your sad feelings tell you you have lost someone precious. And for you to feel the pain of the loss, is the essence of why it is both difficult and a privilege to be part of the human species.

Your Everyday Wedding Vows

by Nathan Chua

“…for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish…”

This is for all the June brides and grooms out there!

When we hear this vow at wedding ceremonies, some of us can’t help but sense the daunting task ahead for the couple. However, what’s lost in these words involves one of the main reasons why couples don’t end up fulfilling these promises: context or changes in the couple’s contexts. Many marriages end not in particularly distressing times. I don’t have the data on this, but just by my experience in working with couples, the best of times do not shield a relationship from conflicts that may lead to separation or an unhappy co-existence.

Some changes in context come in the form of challenges to their dreams of what constitutes a happy marriage, or the rules that they thought would be followed faithfully. For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, all describe a context wherein couples commit to standing their ground and being with each other in the most trying times. These are changes in context that are descriptive of major crises that heighten the solemnity of the event. Perhaps few couples realize that the moments when there are no crises can also set their course. Maybe an in-law is coming for an unwanted visit, a child is having trouble at school, a car breaks down and a daily routine drive is disrupted. Mundane as they seem, couples who are different, will want to handle these situations differently. Ergo, we hear one of the most perplexing yet tragic complaints from couples. Their fights seem to come from nowhere. Trivial matters become issues that make or break the relationship.

We all operate differently depending on the context. I know I write better when I am in a secluded, well-lit, and quiet place. You may work better when you hear white noise from your favorite mini-component stereo system. Can you imagine how a young couple sharing a small space has to deal with the potential conflict in the context of important deadlines? In other words, there is a confluence of stressful events.

Let’s take another example of a young professional who came to like a partner who was highly responsible and hardworking as they were dating. The eventual boyfriend who she ends up marrying, was very prompt on their dates but could only devote one night a week for a date. She liked that about him as her previous boyfriend was usually just hanging around her, sleeping on the couch and occasionally, shooting drugs. In the dating context, this new guy was an oasis. That context however, changes when they begin to chart their course as a married couple. All of a sudden, that once a week date feels like a concession. The boyfriend and now husband is not addicted to drugs but addicted to work! It’s now the couch surfing boyfriend that’s the oasis. Well, at least he was present most of the time. Another example is a partner you married or committed to because he was very close and loving to his family. I remember some sayings that mothers would usually advise their daughters that however their boyfriends treat their mothers, is the way they can expect to be treated as wives. In fact, your boyfriend was so close to his mom and family, he wanted you to all live in one place. You know where this is going.

So here’s my tip for all of you June brides (or grooms) out there. Be aware that any positive quality about anything, which includes your fiance (fiancee), has a flipside not a darkside. Take social media for instance. They have a flipside depending on usage. Your partner’s most likable qualities have a flipside depending on where you are in your matrimonial odyssey together. To put it simply, not all qualities are likable in all contexts. The trick is to be aware of this and see how you can handle your differences effectively. Remember that wedding vow represents not just your contexts in crises situations, but also your everyday ones. So be more conscious of your everyday wedding vows to avert self-inflicted crises.

Why we love heroes like Waymond and Forrest

by Nathan Chua

I am no expert movie analyst or critic, so pardon me if I dwell into an unfamiliar topic for me. I recently saw the movie that won several major awards at the Oscars this year which featured a character named Waymond. I could not help but smile when I heard Evelyn (the name of the character who is his wife in the film) express her disbelief that her husband had just turned into some kind of superhero by saying to Waymond, “You? With the fanny pack?” There are now two movie characters portrayed that I can count as my all-time favorites. The other one is Forrest Gump, a character played by Tom Hanks in a film released in the 1990s.

My guess is that I am not alone in this. Key Huy Kuan who played Waymond, won best supporting actor for his role, and Forrest Gump the movie as I remember, did really well at the tills as well as the Oscars of that time. From memory, I think Forrest Gump’s success at the box office was unexpected, since most movies that did well financially up to that point were sci-fi or superhero movies. I guess the stories and message of these characters don’t go unnoticed by the public and the experts. They resonate to us in an odd way. They have something that they don’t have. So to speak.

Although I am quite sure that there are many other movies that depict such unlikely heroes, these two are for me, the most inspiring. Having been in business, I couldn’t quite understand back in the 90s why a character like Forrest Gump would make me feel so much admiration towards someone who was supposed to be just existing to survive. Since learning more about the workings of the mind from an ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) perspective, I have discovered what it is that made me gravitate to Waymond and Forrest.

There is one thing they don’t have that I have that makes them such admirable characters. It’s an ego.

Let’s do a thought experiment here:

We love our dogs. Ever wondered why? Since I work with couples a lot, I’d like to use this metaphor. If you have seen a male dog get snarly when its mate has gone off with another male dog, that’s part of their mating instinct. When the mate comes back to it or if the male dog has successfully fended off the competing male, then the couple can just go on being with each other without much of a fuss. It’s as if nothing had happened. With human couples though, it takes more time to get back to the usual interactions. We humans have a real handicap when it comes to being present with our lot in life. Any couple going through recovery from a transgression can admit that their thoughts can make them do things that don’t match the situation. They can be fast asleep and start a major fracas in bed even though they know they have important matters to take care of when the sun rises.

Another example would be if you forgot to feed your dog at the usual time. Guess what your dog will do when you finally present it with dinner? Will it snarl to show anger and frustration that you took your pet for granted? On the contrary, your dog will be extremely happy and grateful to you just hearing the familiar noises that come with dinner. Try noticing what happens if you forgot to prepare dinner for your spouse or kids. You could get an earful and maybe a night full of grumblings.

End of thought experiment.

There are subtle ways we project our egos. We can start noticing what image we want to present to the people we meet. Here’s one that may sound familiar: While you come a bit late to a party, you tell the people who welcome you about how busy you were with so many business meetings. Get it?

Waymond and Forrest are lovable characters because they just lived according to what is closest to their hearts and available to their senses:

For Forrest, it was his love for Jenny and Bubba, as well as Lieutenant Dan. Remember the scene where he punched a guy who was harassing Jenny? Once he got Jenny with him, that was all that mattered. Once he started the shrimping business and Lt. Dan came back to be his friend again, they were all that mattered.

For Waymond, it was his wish to be kind and loving to all and to have as much fun doing laundry and taxes with his wife, daughter, and father-in-law.

Both were without egos, and both with much love and wisdom that we all have at times, tucked away inside of as humans. There is a part of us that wants what Waymond and Forrest don’t have. The good news is, we do have the capacity to also not have what they don’t have. We just have to be more mindful of what it is that’s in front of us.

Fourteen Years of: “Just Call Me Nathan.”

by Nathan Chua

One thing I dislike is titles. I have always been uneasy with titles unless they were used in settings where it is necessary to set limits, respectful, honorific or makes it easier to identify the people being referred to. The counseling room has never been a place where I thought titles were necessary. One thing that I don’t want to impart to any of the people I see. is for them to view me as someone who’s got it all together somehow. I don’t want them to think that I have some kind of panacea that will answer all of life’s problems. I love the way one ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) expert put it, and I will paraphrase it here. I often use this metaphor to describe the kind of relationship I will have with my clients. I am not ahead of them nor am I on top of them looking down. We are just two people climbing up our own mountains that are facing each other. My job is to see what’s ahead of you as you climb yours and give you signals when I see what’s coming your way.

Which brings me to the point that I want to make in this article. What on earth are we doing counseling for? If you have had this question come across your mind before, don’t be alarmed. I have asked myself the same question many times before. Through more than a decade’s work, I have hypothesized about this. As a healer, I thought that my job was to relieve symptoms. As a humanist, I thought that it was to find acceptance and purpose. As a psychodynamic counselor, I thought my job was to come to terms with the past. Today however, as a behaviorist, I have come to see that counseling is about being able to handle our difficult thoughts and feelings in a more effective way.

To date, I still find behaviorism to hold the most promise in helping alleviate human suffering and promoting successful living. Please remember that successful living in this context is not about having the most financial success or the happiest existence. Successful living is about helping people live up to their greatest potential. This is not in the service of any temporary exuberant feelings nor is it about having great wealth, but about having a life that’s meaningful to the unique aspirations of every individual.

What I find hopeful in behaviorism is the goals that it establishes that are based on scientific evidence. A metaphor that ACT therapists use to describe the process is like learning to speak a new language. If we spend a long enough time using a new language, we will start to get used to it and eventually not go back to using our old language. Nonetheless, learning that new language does not mean that we completely forget the old one.

In less metaphorical language, it simply means trying out new or different ways of behaving in the face of life’s problems. There is an old ACT saying among therapists which goes like, I don’t have tricks to change how a client feels, but I have tricks to help a client live the life they want even with those difficult thoughts and feelings. Here are some examples of how this can be manifest in a life:

If you react to painful experiences by griping and ranting, then maybe try sitting with the pain with compassion and find out why it pains you. Maybe it tells you that you care about something that is life-giving and loving.
If you react to painful experiences in relationships by running away, then maybe try to learn new ways of staying put and communicating more effectively to let the other person know how important they are to you.
If you react to painful experiences by distractions like drugs, alcohol, binge watching, or even working, then maybe try to see if you’re missing out on the more important goals or relationships you had in mind before the challenges came.

I don’t know if there’s better science out there. I would like to find out. For now, it’s been quite the adventure of a search for what best serves the lives of those I see. If there is one thing that I am slowly losing while learning ACT, it’s my ego. Good riddance! I am just your fellow sojourner my friends, and that’s why I’d appreciate it if you’d just call me, Nathan.

Thank you for fourteen years. Your shared lives have made mine sweeter and more worthwhile.

Pain vs. Suffering

by Nathan Chua

There’s an old aphorism that goes, “Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional,” credited to Japanese writer, Haruki Murakami.* Have you seen a kid who was disappointed by a parent or primary caretaker who wasn’t as appreciative of a pyramid of blocks it created, and then proceeds to wipe out the masterpiece with one quick stroke of an arm? I do remember myself doing so but can’t remember what my creation was. If we look closely, we as adults sometimes revert to this way of coping with the inevitable hard feelings or the pain we get in situations at home, at work, and at random moments in our days.

I am here borrowing a series of questions you might ask yourself when faced with a challenging moment in these situations. This can help you see if you may be causing more pain on top of what is already an emotionally difficult moment. I borrowed this from a book written by experts in functional analytic psychotherapy.**

In that situation, can you notice what it is that you do in reaction to it?
If another person is involved, what do they do in response to your reaction?
What do you think it is that you do that aggravates or contributes to the problem?
Did the way you reacted show up in other places or with other people?
What is immediately rewarding about what you do?
What is it costing you in the short term?
What do you foresee will happen if you continue doing what you’re doing in the long run?
What would happen if you stopped doing what you’re doing now? What would you have to be willing to accept?
Is there a purpose important enough for you to accept or face that?

In your relationships with your partner or your family:

When people in close relationships fight, there’s usually a reason for such behaviors. Very often life’s stressors provide enough of a catalyst for differences and emotional sensitivities to be highlighted. Couples and parents often believe that their partners or children need to be exactly just like them. There is a tendency to believe that what is evident to one should be evident to the other. There is nothing wrong with these thoughts for that is a typical function of our minds. We compare and find out what should or should not be the same. However, in your attempts to change the other, what results do you notice you get? And if you didn’t do this, maybe you would have to accept that you and your kid or your spouse are different from you. Now is there a purpose here for which you would be willing to accept that?

In your relationships at work

Just like in other areas in your life, change happens at work. Let’s take for example your boss. We all hope that we have only one boss who happens to like us and the way we work, usually for life! Unfortunately, that is not, most of the time, under our control. Many decisions from within the hierarchical structure are handed down from above. So ask yourself the questions posed above. Let’s say you end up consuming hours contemplating how bad things have been since your company had a change of management. You may notice that there are short term costs involved in this behavior, like procrastinating on your work tasks. In the long term, such a habit can only lead up to you losing your job or getting bad marks on your performance. Would you be willing to accept the fact that companies change and at times your boss will frustrate or be different from you? What would be reason enough for you to accept this reality? Is it the family that you love and care about who depend on your job to sustain their needs or even lifestyles? Is it that long wished for vacation that you planned to spend with loved ones?

At random moments

You and I know that driving in a megapolis like Metro Manila can be rather challenging. Anger and frustration are easy to come by when you have to contend with multiple threats to your peaceful drive home. When you yell and scream inside your vehicle while your kids and partner are with you, what do you notice are the payoffs and both short and long term negative consequences? Has it gotten in the way of an otherwise happy ride home? Would you have to accept that at times driving in an overcrowded city can be challenging? Is your drive home important enough of a reason for you to hold your peace?

There you go my friends. Hope these examples will give you a snippet of what you can learn from what the experts have painstakingly worked to provide us with, which is the knowledge that we are not free from life’s pains, but we are free to choose how we respond to them. Will we follow old rules of thumb that have both long and short term costs to what otherwise are things we most cherish about our jobs and relationships? Or will we stop and take a step back and see from a distance what we can do differently to avert the costs and live well in the moment?

*https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/613585-pain-is-inevitable-suffering-is-optional-say-you-re-running-and

**FAP Made Simple by Holman, Kanter, Tsai, Kohlenberg

How to be successful in conflict

by Nathan Chua

I have heard it said before that couples who don’t fight, don’t talk either. The same thing can be said about families and friends. We can be so averse to conflict that we often opt out of talking about them. I often hear couples demand that their partners should have as similar wants as they do. My partner should already know what I want and asking for it will make me look pathetic. In our culture, it is quite common to see couples come to seek therapy due to the long periods where there have been so many bottled up emotions. In this article, I will share with you some things you can try to help you prevent conflicts that can either drive you apart because of a major fight, or make you imperceptibly drift apart.

Tune in to your feelings

In contrast to what most of us might believe, conflict can actually be healthy in close relationships. It’s really how we handle them that can make a difference. One way to avoid escalating conflicts is for us to tune in to the deeper feelings that are hidden in our efforts to protect ourselves from exposing our vulnerabilities. In many challenging situations, we are often unaware that we have mixed emotions. A good example to use is when we lose someone in death. Most of us believe that the only legitimate emotion that we should feel is sadness. Yes, that is true. Sadness would most likely be first on our list. But some of us end up unable to accept the grieving process believing that we are somehow defective for having other feelings like guilt, anger, or even relief at the idea that the burden of caretaking has been lifted out of us.

In relationships, it is legitimate to feel anger or irritation with our loved ones. Tuning into ourselves involves discovering the other feelings that we might be missing. Are there other feelings involved here?

See for yourself if showing just one side of you to your partners is helping you come to a resolution. If not, maybe it is time to let your partners see those other sides of you.

For some, the angry side is what the loved ones want to see. Maybe our indifferent attitude has made them think that they don’t matter. At least seeing our anger tells them they matter.

In case you lose it

Then there might be times when you just couldn’t help but go back to your old ways of handling the situation. You very well know that you’ve gone away from what you would like to be in the situation. Listen to your senses, if it doesn’t feel like you like yourself in those situations, then waste as little time as possible and make amends. Begin an open and honest conversation about it.

One thing I help couples to realize in the counseling room is that the work they do does not guarantee that they will never make mistakes. It is impossible to expect near perfection. They can accept that these are tendencies that the relationship will probably evoke in each of them when there are major challenges and changes. Couples and relatives can ask themselves one thing to recover from such ill-fated arguments. Has anything changed in what they value? Have their deepest aspirations for themselves in their relationships become different? Chances are they have not. Their values remain the same.

I recall one of Dr. Steven Hayes’ analogy of how we are in times of challenges. He reminds us of what we were like as toddlers. Toddlers fall down countless times experiencing, at times, excruciatingly painful wounds just to learn how to walk. Well, we’ve all been toddlers before. We can remind ourselves that before we had language, we kept on standing up when we fell. There were no rules that told us what we can or cannot do. The only thing we instinctively did was to stand up again and walk toward what matters to us.

Say you’re sorry and do it over again. We are all a work in progress. Perfection is not what we were built for. And that’s why we are all called simply, to be human.

Common Sense and Psychological Sense

by Nathan Chua

As I learn more in the field, I can understand why some people might have a negative view of psychology. Besides the stigma, there is plenty of material out there that can make any person think, “Do you really need a PhD to know that?” In this article, I’d like to talk about some examples of how this happens and why much of the common sense advice we hear online can at best, be heard but reflected on before implementing.

Here are some examples of very common common sense advice we all may have heard about at some point:

A common sense or logical approach to sadness or depression:

Eliminate negative thoughts! Think positive! This will work only if we eliminate a function of our thinking, which is thinking of the opposite!

You and I can test this for ourselves. Living in a tropical country like the Philippines, note what thoughts come to you when the heat and humidity become unbearable. Your mind will probably remind you of how much more pleasant the weather is in the cooler months of the year. During the cooler months, you would probably remember the impending summer months and how short-lived these more pleasant temperatures are. This is our minds’ propensity to think of opposites. For our minds to not be able to do this, we would have to damage it in some ways. Thinking positive will only remind us of the negative thinking that we were trying to avoid in the first place.

Here’s another reason why it becomes difficult for you and I to simply think positive. In fact, it can even be counterproductive. The command here is, “It is important for you to not think that negative thought.” The paradox of this command is that it makes you monitor your thoughts, specifically, your negative thoughts. So how do you know you’re successful? You’re not thinking of the…oops! In other words, simply using common sense to not think about a negative thought, already reminds you of what you are avoiding in the first place and it has taken such an important place in your mind.

This war between positive and negative thoughts is unending. One thing for certain is life will provide us with challenges, which inevitably produce negative thoughts. This is part of what we mean when we say that depression is not really due to sadness, but it is mostly about the struggle with sadness. Thinking only positive thoughts may sound logical by the process of elimination, but it leaves us in a losing war with our feelings which will only disappear if we are in a state of numbness from medication, or if we were dead..

Common sense advice on sleeping problems:

Be prepared to go to sleep! Keep it as dark as possible, with just the right temperature, and dead silence. What’s more, follow a routine of taking a warm shower or a hot bath and make sure you have comfortable clothes. The fact that you are prepared to go to sleep means you are primed and anxious for a battle with your insomnia. If you are prepared for a battle, it goes without saying that you will be awake!

I remember in the early days of my work as a therapist, I used to give one piece of advice to conquer insomnia, try not to sleep! In other words, come to an acceptance with your insomnia and you will probably be more able to sleep. So common sense advice as mentioned above may only serve more to keep you awake than it is to help you get the rest you want.

Couple advice on apologies or using formulaic sentences:

Be quicker to forgive or apologize to your partner or spouse. That’s a common statement we hear from different experts in the field. When taken as a rule for its own sake, it forgets about the different contexts that couples have. As I have mentioned before in a previous article, context does not just refer to a physical location but also people and our very own thoughts and memories. If applied without sensitivity to context, this can lead to misinterpretations and even more loops in a couple’s arguments. A quick apology can be interpreted as insincere just as a quick word of forgiveness. It’s easy to say words we don’t mean but body language is harder to disguise. This can lead to more vigilance from one of the partners and more frustration on the other. One is seen to be insincere while the other is perceived to be unappreciative, which leads to the point of them giving up on each other.

The kind of psychology I espouse is not difficult because it takes a lot of effort, it is difficult because it is tricky. As you might have experienced yourself, common sense advice can be effortful and offer more opportunities for discouragement and escalation to even bigger problems. To paraphrase a famous psychologist, we are not in therapy to do the logical thing, but the psychological thing. So next time you hear someone give common sense advice, please either think critically or try not to generalize. You may even give it a try if you wish, but also be more noticing of the results. What makes psychological sense may not be what common sense dictates, and that’s the whole point of this blog post.

Why Couple or Marriage Counseling? – What couple or marriage counseling can offer that you cannot find in workshops or self-help materials

by Nathan Chua

There have been a number of times that couples have come to me to seek therapy because it is their last option in an otherwise hopeless relationship. Oftentimes, these couples have tried seeking advice from well-meaning friends and relatives. They often may have also experienced attending group workshops or retreats. Unfortunately, at least for those who have come to my office, they do see changes but they have been mostly short-lived. Don’t get me wrong though, I have no problem having couples go to these events. They can be of some help and for some, may be the best option. In fact, I believe in the wisdom of doing one’s own research and work on becoming a better person. The only thing about these approaches that can sometimes lead to less successful attempts at fixing a relationship, and at times may even cause more harm, is the lack of context.

A Word About Context

Pardon me if “context” may sound a bit jargony for some. Put in another way, context simply means applicability of some of the rules that people learn in retreats and self-help materials. When I say group, I don’t mean group therapy, but those that we often see, where people gather to listen to a speaker and talk about targeted subject matters that come out of the talks. The application of a rule without sensitivity to context can lead to its misapplication and therefore possibly cause more harm than help.

When I use the word context also, I do not just refer to it as a place, time, or situation that a couple finds themselves in. A context in any given situation, can include people and internal mental processes. People as context means your partner or spouse is a context. I am sure you’ve heard some say that they are different people when they are around their co-workers compared to when they are with their family. Your spouse is a context. Internal mental processes are also a context. Each partner in a relationship has their own histories either within or outside the relationship. A wife who had been betrayed in a previous relationship before will likely be more vigilant of being betrayed. If there had been a past betrayal in the current relationship, the betrayed as well as the betraying partner can become sensitive to secretiveness and guilt messages respectively.

Sure, attending weekend retreats, and reading self-help books and online articles can definitely help, but there is this element of context that you and your partner have to consider. Books and group facilitators have no and very little knowledge of your context either individually or as a couple. Here is an example of how a misapplication of learned material can end up not just being of little help, but also cause even worse problems if taken out of context.

Suppose you learn from a weekend couples workshop that couples have to talk about their issues to keep the problems from festering. Yes, this can certainly help couples who are conflict avoidant. Let’s say a partner learns to follow a piece of advice culled from a weekend retreat, which is to apologize as soon as possible to their partner. Devoid of context, this essential rule may feel like sound advice. However, what if from the apologizing partner’s perspective or context, they never had the habit of apologizing. The family of origin of the offending partner had learned that just starting up a conversation is enough to serve as an apology. Given that this rule of immediate apologies is learned by both partners, expectations from the offended partner will naturally rise to a level much higher than before. Well, they did spend quite a bit of time and resources to attend the retreat!

Following a rule devoid of context can be damaging. How? Let’s suppose the apologizing partner does the immediate apology as advised. Having been reminded of this, the offended partner will notice this with greater scrutiny as to how the offending partner would make the apology. Being uncomfortable with the newly prescribed behavior, the apologizing partner on the other hand, tries to make as sincere an apology as possible but falls short of the other partner’s expectations. The offended partner can have thoughts like, my partner is just doing this because that was what was taught. It’s insincere and fake and therefore doesn’t deserve attention or appreciation. The offended partner may then choose to wait a bit longer and see how far this goes before expressing appreciation.

The apologizing partner may then attempt this several times, which from their perspective requires a herculean effort. Having not received any form of appreciation sooner, the offending partner can feel that their efforts are not working to make their relationship move back to better times in the past. They give up on doing it. The offended partner can then notice the short lived quality of the change and have thoughts about how hopeless their partner is, and that change is not likely to come any time soon or become a lasting sign of better things to come.

So to answer the question in the title of this article, couple counseling is indeed not a joke. It is hard work and is fraught with fears of having to share very personal matters to a stranger. But a counselor will have a better grasp of your contexts as a couple and as individuals. Knowing that context and how these rules can apply or not apply to you is critical to avoiding the pattern of distrust that’s shown above. Why not give it a shot?

What can help you become the New You in the New Year?

by Nathan Chua

It’s that time of year again when many of us set out to become better people. We all have this internal yearning to be the best versions of ourselves. I often use the term our existential angst, a concern that we have not been living up to what we hoped to be. What do we want to be? A kinder friend? A more responsible husband? A more fun-loving person? Much of the troubles we feel have much to do with thoughts surrounding the people we strive to be and what our current reality indicates.

But what if this striving can start instead from a very simple skill that we can learn? Maybe the question could be phrased as what is it that we could get better at, rather than what we could be. Nothing is more demoralizing than realizing that even with all the work we try to do in becoming a better person, we fail. Why is this so? For one, our minds are very good at naming things we can or can’t do when faced with different circumstances. It feels like there is an upper limit to what we can or cannot achieve. It could be someone or something that could potentially stand in the way of such goals that keeps us from doing better.

Here’s a very simple tip on what to be better at this coming year in order for you to take some steps towards your most coveted aspirations. It’s so simple you might think it’s silly. Be better at: noticing. That’s it! It’s your first step towards making the change you’ve always seemed unable to reach. It could be hard at first but you and I can get better at it, if we practice.

But you might ask, what is there to notice? What should I notice? Should I start noticing what shirt my workmate is wearing everyday? Of course not. Firstly, notice what you tend to do when something happens and then notice the results of what you do. If what you do doesn’t help your relationship with your spouse then start noticing those that do. If what you do doesn’t give you the hardworking, addiction-free child that you want, then start noticing those that do. Notice what works and doesn’t work for you and your relationships.

Then notice what goes on inside of you when these challenges come along. Notice it just for what they are. Then notice what your mind tells you they are. Are there any judgments against those very feelings that make you and I, very human? And notice also how long these feelings last. Are they there permanently? Or do they come and go as they please?

Then notice what, in those moments, are most important to you. Here is where maybe your list of becoming can come along handy. Whatever our role in life is right now, we want to see ourselves becoming the best we can be in those roles. You and I can be a spouse, partner, friend, sibling, parent, child, and so on. In every situation that presents some kind of challenge to your emotional stability, go back to what you think will be representative of how you would have wanted to handle the situation. Go back to noticing the probable consequences when you do what you do, then notice what it is that goes on inside your thoughts and feelings as you experience these challenges, and finally, notice what is important for you in the moment. Then choose your best or better course of action from there.

And why notice? If you have gone through numerous self-help books or articles lately, I think that’s what the fuss about mindfulness is. Yeah! Simply put, mindfulness is really mostly about noticing! So just start noticing more this new year. And may I go just a step further. Maybe that’s what you go to see a counselor for, to become more noticing or mindful. Try and see for yourself and notice what wonders more noticing can do for you and the people you love. Happy New Year everyone!

Making the Hard Life-Changing Decisions

by Nathan Chua

There are a few crossroads we face in life. Who to commit to in a long term relationship or when is it time to quit one, what course to take in tertiary education, where to live, what school to send kids to. These are all part of what life presents to us. Many of us can get caught up in the rigmarole of decision making. Many clients come to therapy hoping to get an expert opinion on which path to take. It is quite the common sight that clients come to therapy with the idea that they can consult as many therapists as they can, and come up with a logical and sensible decision. That search for a failsafe choice can be a red herring. Many people, and that includes me, can get really stuck for a very long time in indecision.

Clients may find themselves weighing pros and cons with an expert in therapy. Unfortunately, this normally ends up with what is called counterpliance or the client making a decision that goes in the opposite direction of what solution was arrived at with the expert, basically demonstrating what our minds do. You can experiment on this by remembering how many times you have thought about how successful a decision can be. Pretty soon, you will notice your mind reminding you about the other extreme result, which is failure. This is why, although tempting to me, I do my best to avoid dwelling on content when a client comes to me with this kind of dilemma. If I wasn’t conscious, I can get carried away by the back and forth in therapy. I avoid this because it isn’t something that the client is not able to do on their own before they come. So any kind of move in this direction will probably be nothing new for the client.

Fundamentally, our lives can flow into these situations wherein we have to choose one way or another. In a wonderful demonstration of how an ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) therapist would work with someone who is going through some difficult decisions, Dr. Steven Hayes shows how our minds can trick us into thinking that we can make a difficult decision and not be scared. The thought that hard choices should not be scary can creep into this process and paralyze us into not making them to our own detriment.

I often give my clients a perspective towards the past and the future with a question. I would ask them if they are familiar with scenes where people are gathered for one of those momentous occasions in life that are supposed to be filled with joy and anticipation. If these were indeed just full of positive feelings and happy thoughts, then why the heck do we see people crying in these instances? Isn’t that strange? Just to refresh your memory, have you been to a wedding, a graduation, a debut (an 18th birthday party)? More often than not, you and I will see people tearing up with smiles interspersing in their faces. Why is this? My client will often sit with mouth agape, not finding the right word to explain such a phenomenon. I would tell them that the body language is precisely a description of what is going on inside of them. It is a mix of feelings. It is not just purely happiness that is going on internally. There could be sadness, fear, anxiety, and many more. In other words, these are the bitter sweet moments in life. You know, the ones that are eventually etched in our memories as the most meaningful. For in life, the best moments are not the fun moments, although they can be, but they are mostly also those that are hardest.

I can still recall some of the happiest moments I had that I spent with a friend. Although there was nothing but fun and joy at the time, there was still something bitter about it. It had to end. Life is sometimes bitter sweet or has to be, bitter sweet. Otherwise, we could be missing it. Making hard decisions usually forms part of living richly and meaningfully. Being brave is not about having no fear. It is rather doing what matters to us even when there is.