Who Are You? Does Anybody Know?

There's a private self most of us keep under lock and key, and parts of it stay hidden even from the person who owns it. We spend our lives finding out who we actually are, piece by piece. The moment you let anyone step inside that guarded space, including yourself, you stand exposed. That exposure carries real stakes. People have ended their own lives over the sting of rejection, sometimes rejection by others, sometimes a verdict they passed on themselves. So what is it about you that feels impossible to accept? What can't you say out loud, or even think, because it seems too dangerous to touch?

Years ago there were encounter groups everywhere, and plenty of them were led by people with no business running group therapy. Confrontation was the house style. Participants got wounded, sometimes in the mind and sometimes in the body, when they were pushed to name the worst about themselves or when a buried secret got dragged into the open. On occasion a person was turned loose at the end of a session to manage the aftermath with no help at all. The responsible, well-run groups never operated that way. They stayed present once the session closed, ready to deal with whatever surfaced, there to catch people before they dropped too far.

Why do we decide we're beyond acceptance? Somewhere back in childhood, who taught us that we were defective for some reason and that the defect had to stay hidden? Unconditional love answers the whole question. Name a sin that forgiveness can't reach. We keep building walls, brick by brick, to stop anyone from drawing near enough to spot the unacceptable thing we're sure lives inside us. There's something freeing about saying it aloud. You may even find that the thing you carried did no harm to anyone, whatever you believed back when it happened.

Consider the families who have forgiven the person who killed their child or their relative, families who then pulled that same person into their own circle. Those stories are hard to absorb. If they can reach that point, what exactly is stopping you? What sort of arrogance insists that you, out of everyone who has ever done wrong, are the one case that doesn't earn forgiveness or unconditional love? Unconditional love means what it says. No conditions.

And if faith is part of your life, where do you get the standing to inform God that your particular failings put you past the reach of acceptance? Enough said. Step aside; somewhere out there is a person in rougher shape than you. If you doubt it, go read about satanic ritual abuse. On second thought, skip it. It can get under your skin.

The real aim of psychotherapy is to build a bond between patient and therapist sturdy enough to hold up under any confession the patient brings. A therapist who has been at this work long enough has already heard everything. Whatever you're carrying won't rattle them. That confession, far from closing things out, is often the point where the therapeutic relationship truly starts.