Everyone's Doing The Work

Everyone knows there are certain topics avoided in mixed company. (Money. Religion. Politics.)

In Los Angeles, therapy isn’t one of them.

Around here, bringing up our experience with therapy is on the same level of fluffy small talk as chatting about the weather (especially since our perfectly stable weather gives us very little material to talk about).

So, naturally I’ve found myself having some version of the same conversation about therapy with Friends, family and even acquaintances over the last few weeks. Not a single one was debating whether therapy works. That would be a tough sell in LA, where even our dogs can have emotional therapists now. What stood out to me, though, was that everyone seemed to have different ideas of what therapy is actually for.

A family member even put words to what everyone was dancing around during one conversation: How long is “normal” to be in therapy these days?

And the more I listened, the more I noticed the answers seemed to line up almost perfectly by generation. Not an exact science, but close enough.

My grandparents’ generation? Therapy was somewhere between unimaginable and unnecessary. It wasn’t exactly dinner table conversation unless it was gossip, usually about someone everyone agreed was so detached from reality they may as well have been living on another planet. Like Mars. Or Malibu.

My parents’ generation generally viewed it as a resource for getting through something specific. A divorce. Grief. A particularly difficult season. You went, worked through it and hopefully reached a point where you no longer needed to go.

Then there’s my generation.

A lot of people I know don’t really talk about therapy as something you finish. It’s just...part of life. Like going to the gym or the dentist. Or the Hollywood Farmers’ Market to see your tomato guy.

We talk about attachment and communication styles to help us become stronger partners. And boundaries and healing childhood wounds before having children ourselves. All with the ultimate goal of breaking generational patterns and becoming more self-reflective than the generations before us.

To be fair, Los Angeles isn’t exactly an unbiased sample size. Working on yourself is practically a civic duty. We don’t just have therapists. If I had a dollar for every person I’ve met who swears by their life coach, medium, chakra aligner or spiritual advisor, I could probably retail-therapy all my problems away on Melrose.

Personally, I’ve dabbled in enough of everything myself to believe there’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Different self-help strokes for different folks. If something genuinely helps you become a healthier, happier version of yourself, I’m all for it.

But somewhere in the middle of all these conversations, I found myself asking the most therapy-coded question imaginable: How does this make me feel?

Physical therapy usually has an end goal. Speech therapy often has milestones. Even couples therapy is usually centered around working toward something specific together.

Today, it almost feels like we’ve created an entirely new category of therapy. One that’s less about getting through something and more about continually working on yourself. Less like recovering from an injury and more like going to the gym. Ongoing. Preventative. A regular investment in your well-being.

And what’s wrong with that?

There’s something I really admire about our generation’s willingness to keep doing the work. I think of a Friend of mine who’s been seeing a therapist once or twice a month for several years. She’s wildly successful, deeply self-aware and holds herself to an incredibly high standard (as most high performers do). She once told me that therapy is her luxury. A protected hour where she gives herself permission to slow down and untangle all of the mental noise that comes with living life at full speed.

I also have a Friend who started therapy as part of preparing for motherhood. Not because she expected to be perfect, but because she realized there were certain habits, reactions and patterns she’d rather unpack now than pass on to her future kids. How cool is that?

I think there’s power in being the Kourtney Kardashian of your family—the one who’s always nudging everyone toward a little more self-growth and awareness. Even if it occasionally annoys the hell out of those around you, there’s something undeniably admirable about refusing to settle for emotional stagnation. About believing growth isn’t reserved for moments of crisis.

And sure, we may be the more self-absorbed generation, but that isn’t always a bad thing. It also means we’re the most emotionally self-aware. We talk openly about mental health. We encourage people to ask for help. We want to understand ourselves better and pass a little less baggage on to the next generation.

At the same time, for many people, the goal isn’t to stay in therapy forever. It’s to eventually feel confident navigating life on their own. I recently came across a Bustle article about a woman whose therapist encouraged her to “graduate.”

Graduate.

I couldn’t stop thinking about that word. Of course, I imagine a great therapist should genuinely want their clients to feel strong enough to leave if—and when—that’s what feels right. To feel equipped to navigate life without regular guidance if that’s what they’d prefer. Another Friend of mine turned to therapy for the first time during a painful divorce. It carried her through the hardest, rawest two years of her life. Once she was back on her feet, she graduated.

Isn’t that success too?

Maybe that’s where the great therapy divide really lives. Some see therapy as a destination. Others see it as a lifestyle.

Some people seek therapy to work through a specific chapter of life. Others live with circumstances that benefit from long-term or even lifetime support. Some leave and come back during different seasons. Others find that having an ongoing space to process life makes them happier and healthier.

One celebrates resilience after making it through something incredibly difficult. The other celebrates the ongoing commitment to becoming the healthiest version of yourself.

I can see the beauty in both.

Neither path sounds inherently better than the other. The only version that worries me is the one where we stop healing and growing altogether.

Mental health isn’t linear. There isn’t a universal finish line. Whether therapy lasts six months, six years or the rest of your life, the goal is the same: to keep moving forward. Whatever that looks like.

If that’s happening, I’d say you’re doing just fine.

—Your Friend