Life’s Frame of Reference

Therapy isn’t about getting rid of the bad necessarily. Instead, therapy seeks to help one appreciate the stories within us, of both hardship and elation. Through challenges, we see our own strengths. Through cheer, we see our own values. Therapy moves you towards loving yourself and your journey, giving you confidence to create your life as you wish for it to be. William Shakespeare even wrote: "The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together: our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our own virtues." Our worst moments shape us, and in fact, they may help us become better people. Sometimes after enduring pain, a person will walk away with a greater sense of resilience, appreciation, assuredness about their own values and character, or even a sense of purpose or meaning. We need not create those moments - they find us eventually. However, we can gain a sense of peace by reframing them from a larger perspective. What feels good only feels that way because we have experienced worse. What feels bad only feels that way because we have experienced better. Life’s ups and downs give us a frame of reference, through which we embrace more gratitude and growth.

"The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together: our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our own virtues."

~ William Shakespeare