Emily Collins

About

What this work has shown me is that the content is almost irrelevant and the mechanism is everything. People arrive convinced that their particular subject matter is uniquely disturbing, and are often disappointed to learn how standard the underlying pattern turns out to be. Standard is good news. Obsessions attach themselves to whatever a person values most, which is why the specific subject varies enormously between people while the machinery driving it stays very consistent. We treat the machinery. That is why someone can be helped without my ever needing every detail of what their mind produces. My earliest clients came through school and university counseling, where I saw the same mechanism wearing dozens of different costumes. If you think your version is uniquely terrible, the mechanism says otherwise. The mechanism is treatable whether or not I ever hear the content. Your particular content is not the obstacle.