Honesty in Session

In therapy honesty plays a crucial role in building a therapeutic alliance. Being honest with your therapist is what allows them to help you build skills and accumulate knowledge to reach your goals. It is not always easy to be honest in therapy, especially when it comes to hard or uncomfortable conversations. 

Why does it matter?

Mutual Trust 

Building trust with your therapist is what allows you to feel safe and secure. A strong therapeutic alliance creates a space for you to openly share your thoughts and feelings: the good, the bad, and the ugly. Therapy is not a space where you should fear judgment or punishment for any of your experiences. Being honest helps your therapist understand you and how they can best help, and you can trust them to properly guide you. 

Effective Treatment 

When you are fully transparent with your therapist it allows them to get the full picture. Being misled by misinformation or lack of disclosure can impact their treatment plan which is built based upon your specific needs. Giving your therapist inaccurate information may lead them to guide you into working on a specific area that is not actually the root cause of the problem. It could also lead to premature discharge if you are reporting that things are improving and you are feeling better when you have not felt change. Therapists are there to guide you on your journey, their job is to help you through the hard times however long they may be. Sharing your real and true experiences, however painful or uncomfortable they may be, allows your therapist to give proper feedback and insights on shifting perspectives or implementing changes to help you. Their role is to provide guidance in making these changes, not make you feel scrutinized for mistakes. 

Life Skills 

This is also a great space to practice being comfortable with open disclosure if that is something you struggle with outside of session. Your therapist is a neutral space where you can go to feel safe despite your flaws and feel validated and supported through your honesty. Having hard conversations may not be fun, but it can get easier with practice. You can also learn a lot about yourself!