What is therapy designed to do exactly? This question can be irritatingly complicated; the answer can be dizzyingly circuitous.
On a broad level, one possible response is this: therapy is supposed to help those who feel as though the life they are currently living is significantly worse then the life they feel they are capable of living. Most people struggling with mental maladies are tormented by a burdensome level of awareness with regard to this fact: they can see happiness slipping through their fingers, but cannot see how to stop it. This gap between the person's actual and aspired life can be understood as the difference between a mentally healthy and mentally unhealthy story.
Ted, the lovable and relatable protagonist of "How I Met Your Mother" teeters between both stories. In other words, he seems to know what will make him happy (love and marriage), and he possess all the basic psychological skills or means to this end (kind, pragmatic, generous nature), and yet he finds himself time and again in unhappy territory. Ted would change this if he could - after all, who wants to be unhappy - but he, quite simply, cannot. He is derailed by elements of the mentally unhealthy story (i.e. maladaptive tendencies, traits, patterns, etc.).
It's almost as if Ted's life story is, at times, authored by a secret, maladaptive "Ted" operating within the real "Ted" but outside the bounds of awareness or control. This maladaptive "Ted" can be conceptualized as a sort of perceptual bubble. To varying degrees we all possess such a bubble. This is one of the many reasons we feel a natural connection to Ted. We see him tripping over himself on the way toward happiness in the same vague way we sense ourselves stumbling toward happiness. This perceptual bubble that envelopes Ted (and all of us) envelopes him in comfort and protection , especially in times of heightened threat and anxiety. The upside is that we don't lose our minds and drown in an overwhelming rush of fear. The downside is subconscious blindness. We do not see ourselves with the unblinkingly clarity we need to enact growth. Living within this bubble is a recipe for short-term contentment at the expense of long-term, sustainable well-being (I don't know about you but I'm choosing the latter every day of the week).
Therapy is about gently but effectively popping this bubble.
Last week's episode of "How I Met Your Mother" witnessed Ted in self-induced, bubble popping mode.
First a little background on Ted. If you haven't watched the show, you need to know that Ted is, in general, living out a mentally healthy story. He is successful at work (architect), connected with others (strong group of friends) and comfortable with self. You also need to know that Ted has had his heart broken. A few years ago he was abandoned at the altar by Stella, the love of his life.
Fast forward a few years (or seasons) and he's seemingly recovered from this interpersonal trauma, and yet he finds himself in a funk. He knows what his mentally healthy story is - finding "the one," a woman with whom he can love, marry, and share a family. And yet the story he keeps finding himself stuck within is significantly less healthy - a revolving door of superficially satisfying, but ultimately unstable relationships.
This most recent episode is about emotional baggage. According to Ted, every girl in the dating pool carries excessive amounts of it. As such, Ted announces to his friends that Royce, his current girlfriend, only seems perfect right now. Inevitably, he believes, her baggage will come out. And he will be ready (he's not about to be left at the altar again). Later that night Ted goes on a date with Royce and hyper-vigilantly examines the environment for any signs of relationship-dooming personality flaws. He so expects baggage, that he comically confuses non-baggage with baggage (i.e. when Royce mentions that she works for PORN: Partners Offering Recreational Nutrition, Ted hears that she works in the porn industry).
Next, they go see a new hit movie, "The Wedding Bride," where he is shocked to learn the story is loosely based on his life. Tony, the man Stella left Ted for at the altar, has produced a satirical version of what really happened. In reality, Ted was a loving boyfriend and a committed fiancé. In the end, he was victimized by an ex-boyfriend who seemed harmless, and a girlfriend who denied her true desires. And this distorted cinematic portrayal upsets Ted. It upsets him so much, in fact, that he shouts at the characters on screen and insults the audience for laughing at punch lines. Most importantly, he gets upset at Royce, deciding to break up with her because she liked the movie.
What is going on? The mentally unhealthy storyline is unfolding rather rapidly and vividly. We can imagine the next plot twist. Ted might feel confused that he's alone, yet again. He might get angry that he's confused and alone. As these feelings coalesce, life can become significantly painful, and he might make impulsive but understandable decisions like vowing to avoid further discomfort in the future by swearing off dating and, by extension, his big-picture values and hopes.
But then a funny thing happened...the bubble popped. He realized that although the version of Ted presented in "The Wedding Bride" is comic farce, his "upset" response is very real. He looks at that (something a clinician would facilitate). He questions, examines and thinks about himself in such a way that he soon finds himself standing outside his perceptual bubble looking in. He does for himself what a therapist helps others to do. He chooses reality over comfort, and the result is a clearer, richer picture of self. He realizes that he has "left at the altar" emotional baggage.
Identifying and accepting his own emotional baggage instantly teaches him to accept the emotional baggage of others. Now, he is psychologically freed up to live the mentally healthy story. He chases after Royce, repairs his interpersonal rupture, and commits to dating her in the kind of open-minded, fully focused and highly motivated way that facilitates the mentally healthy story. And whether this story will include Royce or not remains up in the air. What is certain, however, is that such a story must involve this new, bubble-popping Ted.
