24 Things All Therapists Learn That Everyone Should Actually Know

“Humor is necessary sometimes in order to deal with really stressful or sad things,” Powell says. “You have to be able to laugh and shrug things off.”
Even if people don’t always understand how you can find humor in a devastating situation, sometimes finding a way to laugh can help you get through it.

Coleman says that therapists also learn that people have different definitions of happiness, which would definitely be something good for everyone to know. When they don’t realize this, they turn to others to see what they should be doing, even though they might be on an entirely different path.
“They look to the therapist to provide the answers and insights and if a therapist were to see their role as providing those answers, they would be sending a signal that the person is not competent to do so, which leads to greater dependency and self-doubt,” Coleman says.

Taking breaks is so important, but a lot of people don’t recognize how much value there really is in giving yourself some time off. Powell says that a break or vacation can help you come back feeling more certain about what might be next for you or what your goals might be.

“One thing we learn as therapists is that emotions provide information and we should pay attention to all of our emotions, even if we don’t fully understand them or they don’t seem to make sense in the present,” Williamson says. “Some emotions are what we call ‘secondary emotions,’ which means we are experiencing and demonstrating one emotion on the surface, when really, we are experiencing something deeper under the surface that we may or may not be aware of.”
Overlooking emotions instead of allowing yourself to be uncomfortable or confused by what you’re feeling really isn’t helping you as much as you might think it could be in the moment. Acknowledging your emotions can help you sort through what you’re really experiencing.