Jimmy: You trust me, Sean?
Sean: (Expletive) no!
Jimmy: Doesn’t matter. I’m a psychological vigilante.
This, and countless other such exchanges, is the reason I’m hooked to Shrinking, currently streaming on Apple TV. In its third season, the show is a deep dive into the lives of, surprise surprise, shrinks. And their business of shrink-ing. I am tempted to insert terrible puns here, but let’s keep things parliamentary here, even if the present Parliament feels no such obligation.
With seriously funny lines and situations, the show reveals the other side of the couch — the triumphs, trials, and travails of those who are supposed to help us navigate the choppy waters of life. A bright Black woman with mother issues, “a White man from Pasadena” with a “resting dead wife face”, and their old mentor and boss dealing with Parkinson’s — this trinity of therapists works in ways that would make anyone shudder at first. Jimmy’s outlandish and invasive ways are juxtaposed with Paul’s more restrained traditional methods, while Gaby follows a middle path. Their therapeutic processes have hits and misses, but directionally, there is progress in their patients’ lives.
And that’s exactly what therapy is all about. I proclaim this not as a practitioner but as a patient.
Thanks to the challenges of modern living, the world of therapy is not unknown to most of us, our opinions on it notwithstanding. Social media has done its bit to first turn us into the seekers of therapy and then inundate us with nugget-sized therapeutic wisdom and tautological therapy-speak. We seek and speak therapy without even realising it. AI platforms have become popular free couches. With all this, there is Scepticism 2.0 around seeking professional help for mental health.
Contemporary therapy culture exists in a curious double bind. On the one hand, psychotherapy has been destigmatised to an unprecedented degree. The language of mental health has escaped the clinic and entered everyday discourse, allowing individuals to name experiences that were previously rendered inchoate or morally coded. On the other hand, this very diffusion has produced what Ian Hacking might describe as a “looping effect”. When psychological categories circulate socially, they reshape self-understanding in ways that may amplify distress rather than alleviate it. Therapy is neither panacea nor pathology. It is a practice whose value depends entirely on how seriously its limits are taken.
But, more importantly, there is no bad therapy, only bad therapists.
Therapy is not about being fixed by an expert armed with superior insight. It is about being met by another human who is trained enough to help, humble enough to listen, and insightful enough not to confuse their needs with yours. I have seen children battling suicidal urges turn a corner and take charge of their lives as responsible adults. I have also seen adults spending years in therapy with almost nil outcome. I have seen people doing therapist-shopping, and I have also seen people leaning, rather unhealthily, on that one therapist who validates every word they say.
When therapy fails, it is rarely because the idea of therapy is flawed. The failure may be due to many factors: the relationship was misaligned, the power misused, or the context ignored. Research consistently shows that therapist effects account for more variance in outcomes than treatment models themselves. A needy therapist is as bad news as an arrogant one. And let’s not even go to the question of qualifications, training and certifications. In our country, everyone with a tongue in their mouth is a “counsellor”.
Getting a good therapist, keeping the above in mind, is nothing less than the exercise of samudra manthan (the churning of the ocean in Hindu mythology). A dear friend of mine had a horrifying experience with her therapist, creating a serious dent in her trust in the process. Therapy is not always pleasant: It’s not easy to come into the awareness of our truths and to work on them. But it cannot be a source and site of distress, either.
I have, personally, been exceptionally fortunate to find a therapist who has helped me tide over some of the most difficult times in my life without undue approval or antipathy. I have been rapped on the knuckles for indulging in self-pity and celebrated for not despairing. I remain a work in progress, and I see my therapy appointments as a regular car service schedule. Therapy isn’t just for accidents and their aftermath. Its success lies in the moment of freedom from the couch, the moment of an empowered sense of self, minus isolation. My therapist never even “recommends” making the next appointment, even in the middle of a crisis.
Most importantly, she never uses the phrase “self-care” and its many iterations.
PS: I would certainly want my therapist to buy me ice cream one day, just like Jimmy in Shrinking.
Nishtha Gautam is an academician and author. The views expressed are personal