This is my second go at a college education and it’s honestly gone better than I expected. When I came back to Schoolcraft, all I knew was that there had to be a better way than spending my days working retail. I knew that there were great opportunities with the Connection and through student employment. However, I never imagined that I’d be given the gift of professors incredibly talented in the field of psychology. They not only understood how to teach it to students unfamiliar with the subject, such as myself, but they also left me confident enough to pursue it as a career path.
I’ve had family, friends and peers tell me that I’m conscientious, with a talent for understanding people, connecting to them and even guiding them toward a healthy perspective by making sense of what they’re going through. With respect to the profession, I have to be mindful of my limits as a layperson before I become qualified to provide professional help. The point of a therapist is to pull whatever is troubling the patient (e.g., trauma, depression) out of them and show that they can live life freely and happily, without their troubles keeping them down.
Even when I get to the professional level, I have to understand that it’s not so much my work that fixes fear or trauma; it’ll be my guidance that helps them get through it. All help is simply that: help. People who are seeking help may not follow through because it’s up to the patient to use that help given from their own free will.
So far, I’ve been able to guide some of my friends out of dark points in their lives in ways where I don’t overreach into the realm of professional help; I just do my best and listen. Formal training goes a long way, but I’ve often noticed that the speakers have solutions in the answers they give because other people have the potential to know themselves better than I possibly can.
For now, I can rest in the knowledge that I’ve done well while staying within my limits. From this moment on, please pray that I’m always ever upward.