Beyond Management: Therapy’s True Goal is to Grow the Mind

Therapy’s true goal isn’t just to “manage” emotions, but to “grow the mind,” fostering a profound internal shift that allows for deeper emotional engagement and sustainable change. This article challenges superficial approaches to mental well-being.
The author, a psychotherapist and psychoanalysis patient, explains that by frustrating the desire for immediate answers, therapy cultivates the capacity to tolerate previously intolerable feelings. This crucial development creates a pause between sensing an emotion and reacting, fostering agency and transforming relationships, careers, and self-respect.
While readily available self-help remedies like mindfulness apps and adult coloring books are abundant, they often bypass the complex, underlying anxieties and unconscious dynamics that truly hinder a fulfilling life. The article emphasizes that genuine therapeutic change is a sustained journey, offering no shortcuts. For immediate comfort, a surprisingly simple solution is recommended: watching Midnight Run.