With May being Mental Health Awareness Month, we have asked several friends of SOLA to write pieces that speak into various related topics. We hope this series brings awareness to caring for our and others’ mental health needs, knowing that God cares for our bodies and souls.
When is it appropriate for you to seek professional counseling? Depending on the social and cultural circles you’re a part of, people may have vastly different answers to this question. In some circles, having a therapist or a counselor is like having a personal trainer or a financial planner. It is simply having one more professional who can provide a service with an expertise in the area of mental health. Having a therapist is a cultural norm, and as long as one can afford such a service, it’s seen primarily as a net positive.
In some traditional honor-shame cultures, however, there may be a social stigma attached to counseling which leads people to put off seeking professional help In my experience counseling people from a range of ethnic backgrounds, I’ve found that Asian Americans tended to endure pain and suffering for much longer before they finally decided that it was time to pursue counseling. There was a general sense that Asian Americans treated pain and suffering as the norm, so there was a higher threshold to clear before they sought help. This is not to say that Asian Americans necessarily had a greater capacity to tolerate pain and suffering. But it seemed to say something about their baseline for pain and normalization of pain, and they seemed slower to take steps toward meaningful change.
When to Ask For Professional Help
When you live with such a mindset, it’s hard to determine when it’s appropriate to seek help. The default is to keep pushing yourself and to tell yourself that you’re fine. Discerning when proper care is needed becomes unclear. And it’s easy to misjudge the timeliness for when professional help could have been helpful.
What I am suggesting is that it’s okay for you to see a doctor about your knee pain before there’s a need for surgery. It’s okay to see a dentist for checkups before a root canal becomes necessary. And it may be appropriate and helpful to seek a counselor before the pain becomes unbearable.
Once you have given yourself the permission to acknowledge pain and suffering you can begin to discern when professional counseling can be helpful. Here are some occasions when it might be appropriate for you to pursue counseling. The first three are common and vary in seriousness, but the others are appropriate, too.
- “I have a crisis.” You’re experiencing intense emotional distress, psychological upheaval, or overwhelming life circumstances that require immediate intervention and support from experienced and professional care providers.
- “I feel stuck.” You’ve tried to get help and resolve the issues, but the issues continue to persist (or, are getting worse). And there’s not been much progress. You feel stuck, and don’t know what to do.
- “My life is hard” or “I’m overwhelmed with everything.” Perhaps, you’re not facing a crisis of any sort, but your lived experience is such that life is generally overwhelming. You’re faced with persistent pressures and burdens, and you’re just trying to survive, day by day.
- “I want to focus on a particular problem.” You’ve identified a specific issue you want to address with your counselor, whether it has been long-held (from the past), recurring, and or newly developed (e.g., I recently learned about my significant other’s sexual past, and I’m really impacted by it.).
- “I don’t have any particular issues, but I think counseling will be good for me.” Things are generally okay in life, but you’re proactively seeking to have better self-awareness, greater clarity and perspective on situations, and general wisdom, etc.
All of these situations may be appropriate occasions to seek counseling. And when possible, it can also be helpful to seek out mature Christian friends, pastors, and spiritual leaders who are willing to walk with you, and invite their wise counsel into your life.
Our Need For Wise Counsel
Part of the stigma associated with counseling in traditional cultures may be due to a misplaced sense of shame in acknowledging our need for outside help. But the essence of the gospel is that we are all in need of help, and the more we can normalize that in our communities, the healthier we can become.
One helpful way of looking at counseling is seeing it as having a wise conversation partner. The book of Proverbs recognizes the value of having multiple counselors and advisers, for different people can provide different insights and perspectives on our situation (Proverbs 15:22, 20:18). When we converse with wise people, we ourselves grow in wisdom (Proverbs 13:20). And heartfelt counsel from someone who cares for us is likened to the sweet fragrance of perfume that brings delight to our hearts (Proverbs 27:9).
None of us have all the resources we need on our own to adequately face everything life throws at us. God has made us for community and to invite wise conversation partners into our lives. Finding a professional counselor is only a more formalized and structured way of pursuing that.
After you’ve been able to discern whether and when to seek counseling, where do you begin searching for a counselor? How do you know what kind of a counselor you want to work with, and how do you discern whether a counselor is a good fit? Part 2 of this article will address how to think about what you want to get out of counseling and how to go about finding the best counselor fit.
Photo Credit: Paul Weaver