What is the future of practical psychology?

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Practical psychology is not only helping people, but also business, and its development is determined not only by the goals and values ​​of specialists, but also by the requirements of the market.

The future of practical psychology is inextricably linked with the business component of this service sector. Business expects high efficiency, quick results from practical psychology and closely monitors its spirit, rejecting absurdity, humanitarian blurring, esotericism and mysticism — even hidden ones.

It happens that businessmen are attracted to esoteric literature: sometimes with a beautiful style, sometimes with bold promises, but with close acquaintance, reality speaks better than any words. When the head of the esoteric center in a conversation complained to the businessman who invited him: “You know, we are dripping from the ceiling. We have been arranging dynamic meditations for a year now to solve this problem, but there are no results yet, ”that turned out to be enough.

One can hope that it is the business wing that will guarantee that practical psychology will have a materialistic basis, adhere to a scientific approach, and at least maintain faith in the human mind.

Unfortunately, the market for psychological services itself is pushing modern practical psychology towards other solutions. His tendencies:

• As the standard of living improves, the number of people who invent problems for themselves increases.
• Women are increasingly becoming the main consumers of psychologists’ services.
• The mood of infantilism is intensifying in society, the demand for entertainment and freebies is growing.

As the standard of living improves, the number of people who invent problems for themselves increases.

The following pattern is known: the more comfortable people’s lives become, the more often people begin to create and invent psychological problems for themselves. When you need to work from morning to evening in order to simply survive, there is no time for psychological subtleties: when people have nothing to eat, few people worry about the lack of attention to themselves. Neuroses and depression are not typical for the rural way of life, where in the morning you need to milk the cattle, go to the well for water and the toilet on the street. The more comfortable and secure life becomes in people in the city, the more often people experience neurosis and depression. The highest percentage of these psychological problems in the most developed countries of Europe, and this trend is only growing. When people have nothing to do, they create problems for themselves. As a result, the psychologist increasingly has to work with people where the problems are, in fact, far-fetched.

Women are increasingly becoming the main consumers of psychologists’ services.

And this means that requests for trainings and consultations are becoming more popular, where there is an appeal to feelings, where a woman can complain and cry, where you can talk about problems for a long time and hope that meditation with an appeal to the Universe and a dance filled with new pure energies, solve all her problems. The more feminine the audience becomes, the more in demand is the request for mysticism, interest in everything magical, appeal to ancestral memory, spirits and one or another Higher Power. And if a psychologist really needs to earn money, if he has loans that need to be paid, then the choice is often made not according to conscience, but at the request of the audience, which pays for what it likes.

The mood of infantilism is intensifying in society, requests for entertainment and freebies are growing.

Entertainment programs sell better than educational programs, freebies are more in demand than responsibility, and the installation «Doctor, lose weight on me!» sounds more insistent every year and decade. Only business remains an island of reason and common sense in a sea of ​​feelings and intuition, but this island is becoming more and more eroded. With the development of high technology, fewer and fewer working people are able to feed an increasing number of idlers, and an increasing number of people can build their lives without thinking about its efficiency. In a society of social security, a person can live quite safely without turning on the mind, without thinking about the future, while having fun with shopping, talking with friends, complaining of depression and going to an understanding psychologist.

One training teaches people to think, take responsibility, set goals, develop new skills and learn self-control, that is, really work — and people are recruited for this training sluggishly. And there is another approach, where a person is invited to sit comfortably, close his eyes, trust his unconscious, upload the problem there and wait for everything to be resolved by itself — and there are more people who want such programs.

The behavioral approach is more effective in terms of results, and the phenomenological one is more beautiful. Most of all, it educates a person in a person, creates a real life perspective for him — a personal-active approach, but it loads a person with responsibility, which attracts not many. For the majority of clients (and psychotherapists after them), a shared responsibility approach is more attractive, when the client shares responsibility for what is happening in his life between himself and someone or something else.

For example, according to a well-known hyprotherapist, in Ericksonian hypnosis, the client is responsible for the request, the psychotherapist is responsible for the procedure, and the unconscious is responsible for the result …

There would be a desire, you can always write off the responsibility for your problems: for example, on repressed emotions, on a difficult childhood, on a closed soul, polluted chakras and birth trauma. Many clients and unfortunate therapists are very inclined to this, but this is not always due to unprofessionalism. As a forced move in psychotherapeutic work, the temporary removal of part of the responsibility from the client may be justified.

From the notes of a colleague who advises women: “I often wonder if my client will hear me if I tell her: “Darling, you are furious that you simply have nothing to do in your free time, and you have never been fond of needlework, no one taught you, and it’s too lazy to start looking for a hobby for yourself. Or go to the pool, take a walk in the park. Be active! “No, this client of mine won’t want to hear that from me. She will hear in this collision, accusation, and may even be offended. Instead, say warmly, “Get the pencils. Draw! You see, you depict this house with closed windows, because your soul is closed and does not let love, joy, beauty into your world. Let’s redo the house. Let’s open the windows, paint the sun orange, this is the color of positive emotions. We will plant a tree nearby. Will we draw a child? Open your heart, create! You will succeed!” And women immediately come to life. Blooming and getting younger like girls!”

Total

Yes, the situation is really not simple. If people in the work of a psychologist are more interested not in efficiency, but in comfort and vividness of experiences, then it can be difficult for a psychologist to stay within the framework of professional ethics and not start offering not what works, but what is for sale. The vast majority of practical psychologists are honest people, but in a situation where you need to live on something and somehow earn money, psychologists are already thinking. As a result, the choice of this or that approach in practical psychology begins to be dictated not by its scientific consistency and real benefit to people, but simply by the fact that you need to earn money.

The future of practical psychology lies with a psychology that can make money. But the best psychologists will make money thinking about the long-term consequences of their work, thinking about their contribution to the preservation of people’s common sense, respect for science and trust in reason.