We spend a lot of time looking at other people and judging them and we are often wrong. We also spend a lot of time thinking about how others see us, and are even more wrong .I know a lot of women who really think they are fat and will not hear otherwise no matter what their husbands say. This is not only true of women, but also of men. After graduate school I had to apply for my first grownup job. I had taught for a few years, but that was not the kind of job I thought was serious. Real teachers worked at it and thought of it as their career. I taught religion and philosophy to high school girls. I didn’t really prepare much and usually just winged it. I also dressed in the most casual way possible, had fairly long hair, lived with three other guys in a basement apartment, and thought that this was life. I still had some of the hippie “Don’t trust anyone over 30” stuff going on
Then I met my wife, got married, and finally had to get serious. So grad school happened and I had to go out on job interviews. I got a hair cut (razor cut—because that’s what I was told would make a good impression) and wore my one suit to the interviews. Now this suit was a polyester thing of beauty. I had gotten it to get married in and only worn it a few times. During grad school I had lost some weight, but that just meant I had to pull in the belt on the pants more. So I went to these interviews in all my polyester, razor cut glory. I was nervous but kept thinking that at least I was dressed right.
I had a few interviews and was offered jobs that didn’t quite fit, Then I was offered an interview I was interested in. A prominent hospital alcohol unit was looking for a social worker. The woman I interviewed with was younger than me, but had much more experience. I wasn’t sure how the interview went but somehow I did get the job and worked there for almost 20 years. It was only later that I found out she had laughed, like my wife, at my baggy polyester suit. It was a joke shared on the unit for many years.
The unit was a twenty bed 21 day inpatient program for alcoholics. It was based on what is now known as the “Minnesota” model. During the time I was there I learned a lot about individual, group, family therapy. I was sent to an additional two-year training program in family therapy, and a special program in sex therapy. I went to countless in-service and other training programs, but I can honestly say that I learned the most from the people I was there to help. Everyone of them had a story. Some of them were there to escape consequences from family, job or legal problems. Some of them just needed a place to ‘cool out’, but they all had stories.
One time one of our doctors proposed a small research project. He asked us to rate the chance for success (continuing sobriety) for each patient as they completed treatment. Now the staff was made up of medical professionals and addiction specialists. We thought we knew for sure who would make it. We did this for almost a year and then looked at our results. To our absolute amazement we were incredibly wrong.
Patients who had strong support systems, good jobs, health and real sincerity often didn’t stay sober a month. Other patients who appeared to have nothing, often turned their lives completely around. This led to one of my obvious insights in that people have to be ready to change and have to be willing to pay the price. Maybe the therapists role is to keep holding a mirror up so a person can see who he/she really is. We all know this, but an awful lot of time we forget. Sometimes the job is just to put out enough stuff to help people look at their own lives and decide what they want—like finally making a decision to throw out a polyester blue suit.