How many great deeds have not been done, books have not been written, songs have not been sung. And all because the creator, who is in each of us, will certainly face the “department of internal bureaucracy”. So says the psychotherapist Maria Tikhonova. In this column, she tells the story of David, an excellent doctor who spent 47 years only rehearsing his life, but could not decide to start living it.
Department of internal bureaucracy. For each person, this system develops over the years: in childhood, they explain to us how to do elementary things correctly. At school, they teach how many cells you need to retreat before the start of a new line, which thoughts are right, which are wrong.
I remember a scene: I’m 5 years old and I forgot how to put on a skirt. Through the head or through the legs? In principle, it doesn’t matter how — to put it on and that’s it … But I froze in indecision, and a feeling of panic rises inside me — I’m catastrophically afraid of doing something wrong …
The same fear of doing something wrong shows up in my client.
David is 47 years old. A talented doctor who has studied all the intricacies of the most obscure field of medicine — endocrinology, David cannot become the «right doctor» in any way. For 47 years of his life, he has been preparing for the right step. Measures, conducts comparative analysis, reads books on psychology, philosophy. In them, he finds completely opposite points of view, and this leads him into an unbearable state of anxiety.
47 years of his life, he is preparing for the right step
Today we have a very unusual meeting. The secret becomes clear in an extremely unusual way.
— David, I learned that you are undergoing therapy with another analyst besides me. I confess that this surprised me very much, it seems important to me to discuss this circumstance within the framework of our therapy, — I start the conversation.
Then some kind of psychological-optical illusion arises: the man opposite me shrinks twice, becomes tiny against the background of an expanding sofa. The ears, which previously did not pay any attention to themselves, suddenly bristle and blaze. The boy opposite is eight years old, no more.
Despite good contact with his therapist, despite the obvious progress, he still doubts that this is the right choice and begins therapy with me, not to mention that I am not the only therapist, lying to the questions that I habitually ask on first meeting.
A good therapist is supposed to be neutral and accepting, but in this case, these qualities leave me: David’s indecisiveness seems to me a crime.
— David, it seems to you that N is not a good enough therapist. And me too. And any other therapist will not be good enough. But this is not about us, past, present, future, hypothetical therapists. It’s about you.
Are you saying I’m not good enough?
— Do you think it is?
— It looks like…
“Well, I don’t think so. I think that you are an amazing doctor who yearns for real medical practice, who is cramped in the conditions of a pharmaceutical laboratory. You tell me this at every meeting.
— But I lack experience in clinical practice…
— I’m afraid that the experiment will begin with the beginning of it … Only you think that it’s too early for you.
But it is objectively true.
“I’m afraid the only thing you’re sure of in this life is your insecurity.
Clever David can no longer ignore the fact that the problem of the impossibility of choice simply takes his life. Turns it into a choice, preparation, warm-up.
“I can support you in the movement you so desire. I can support the decision to stay in the laboratory and look for the right moment. This is only your decision, my task is to help you see all the protective processes that hold back the movement. And to go or not, it’s not for me to decide.
David, of course, needs to think. However, my inner space was lit up with beams of searchlights and hymns of victory. Leaving the office, David opened the door with a completely new gesture. I rub my palms: “The ice has broken, gentlemen of the jury. The ice has broken!
The impossibility of choice deprives him of his life and turns it into a choice itself.
We devoted several subsequent meetings to work with a certain age segment of David’s life, then several significant events took place.
First, when he was 8 years old, his grandmother died due to a medical error.
Secondly, he was a Jewish boy in a working-class region of the USSR in the 70s. He had to comply with the rules and formalities much more than the rest.
Obviously, these facts from David’s biography laid such a powerful foundation for his «department of internal bureaucracy.»
David does not see in those events a connection with the difficulties that he is experiencing at the moment. He just wants now, when his nationality is rather a positive point for a doctor, to become bolder and finally live a real life.
For David, a surprisingly harmonious solution was found: he entered the position of a doctor’s assistant in a private clinic. It was a duet created in heaven: David, who was bursting with knowledge and a desire to help people, and an ambitious young doctor who participated in TV shows with pleasure and wrote books, formally entrusting all the practice to David.
David saw the mistakes and incompetence of his leader, this inspired him with confidence in what he was doing. My patient groped for new, more flexible rules and acquired a most charming sly smile, in which a completely different, established personality was already read.
***
There is a truth that gives wings to those who are ready for it: at any given moment you have enough knowledge and experience to take the next step.
Those who remember in their biography the steps that led to mistakes, pain and disappointments will argue with me. Accepting this experience as necessary and precious for your life is the path to liberation.
It will be objected to me that there are monstrous events in life that by no means can become a precious experience. Yes, indeed, not so long ago, there was a lot of horror and darkness in the history of the world. One of the greatest fathers of psychology, Viktor Frankl, went through the worst thing — the concentration camp, and became not only a ray of light for himself, but to this day gives meaning to everyone who reads his books.
In everyone who reads these lines, there is someone who is ready for a real, happy life. And sooner or later, the department of internal bureaucracy will put the necessary “stamp”, perhaps right today. And even right now.
Names have been changed for privacy reasons.