Getting a Tune-Up

I love my job watching people grow over time, having clients return, and sharing how they have grown and where they are struggling. My counseling model is one of co-creating. I don't tell clients how many sessions they will need to be 'healed'; I don't give them an exact action plan. While my style is direct, practical, and straightforward, I am a HUGE believer in individual process. So at the end of each session, we decide together how to move forward. Frequently, clients come to me, work through things for a few sessions, and then go out into the world and practice what we are working on. And then months, even years later, they come back to me having spiraled up to a new place on their journey. And so we chat, we work through things, and then they go out into the world to practice what we are working on. I call this the 'tune-up' model. Now and then, we all need a minor tune-up.

I love the tune-up model. The idea that as we grow, we have people that we can come back to, touch base with who know our story, know where we have been, and will hold our hand as we move to the next place. Someone who might be a few steps ahead of us or even miles ahead of us but is willing to go back in their journey and stand with us as we move forward; I am blessed and honored when clients choose me to be that person who helps them continually spiral up.

The place I see my clients and myself get stuck is when we beat ourselves up for needing more help. Because we believe that we should have fixed ourselves, we see a tune-up as a failure. While I believe we can grow, learn, and change, being permanently fixed is highly unlikely. We can find a solution. We can limit anxiety, quiet the Monger and learn how to set boundaries. We can go out into the world feeling excited and refreshed at what we have learned. And then we hit a wall, have to set a different kind of boundary or experience a Monger that knocks us to our knees. That doesn't mean we have failed. That doesn't mean we have gone backward. Instead, we have expanded to the next spiral. We have moved up to the next level, and now we are dealing with what may feel like similar issues that we had before but on a much higher (more complex) level. That place is when we need to reach out for help.

So the next time you hit the wall, and you feel like you have failed and feel like you are learning the same lesson over and over. Remind yourself that you might need a tune-up, a check-in, a helping hand to guide you to the next spiral. Remember, it is all part of the process. It is all part of learning and growing and being your best self.