An Attitude of Exactitude

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We have a saying in the therapy world, “Name it to tame it.” It’s based on the idea that it’s hard to process or resolve that for which we have no language. Most of us have probably experienced the “aha” moment of finally putting a finger on what has been bothering us. For example:

• The employee with executive functioning challenges who never indicates whether they followed through on things, leaving you in the position of trying to remember what they said they’d do, but also not wanting to micromanage them, but also needing to know if they did all of their job before it causes potential chaos. You are too busy for this and it makes you want to tear your hair out. Why is this so maddening?! It’s frustrating because the weight of the responsibility to track their work is staying on your shoulders. You need them to own their work, with the explicit expectation that reporting back at regular intervals without being asked is part of that. Aha!

• You say goodbye a beloved elderly pet and though it makes sense you are sad, you are surprised at how sad and for how long. A friend observes that everything else has changed in your life since your kids grew up. The pet was your last link to that old world, marking the end not only of a companion, but an era. Aha.

It’s not just exasperation, but “weight” that needs to be given back to its proper owner. It’s not just grief for a furry friend, but for an era and a partner in remembering. In therapy a stomach knot of “jealousy” eases when we give words to our fear of abandonment and to the part of us that is on guard. A sharp-edged “resentment” softens when we give voice to the part of ourselves we gave up and name what we need to feel whole again now.

In Psychology Today, writer-turned-therapist Ross Gormley compares the power of language in therapy to that in poetry and literature. He writes:

One of the satisfactions of literature is reading a poetic passage that perfectly captures what is being described. Writers will sometimes refer to this phenomenon as “the punch of exactitude.”

Metaphors are particularly powerful, he points out. The liberal Christian theologian Marcus Borg writes, “Some things are best expressed in metaphorical language; others can be expressed only in metaphorical language” because “metaphor is poetry plus, not factuality minus…Metaphor is not less than fact, but more.”1

I think of lines like first one in Somali-British writer Warsan Shire’s poem Home: “No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark.” (The whole poem conveys so much, but I don’t recommend it for use in worship due to its references to sexual violence. Here’s how to approach that.)

Denise Levertov’s "The Avowal” also gives the punch of exactitude in its metaphors (okay, similes) of how to let go and trust when we need to:

As swimmers dare
to lie face to the sky
and water bears them,
as hawks rest upon air
and air sustains them,
so would I learn to attain
freefall, and float
into Creator Spirit’s deep embrace,
knowing no effort earns
that all-surrounding grace.

Gormley cites studies showing that precise and evocative language in therapy is correlated with better treatment outcomes. He compares the language of diagnosis to an “ultra generic story” and describes therapy as “a slow process of coloring in the rich description that such labels miss or even elide.”

With rich language and the exactitude of apt metaphors, therapy enables people to move beyond their habitual take on things, into new understanding and, often, into healing.

For example, it’s one thing to acknowledge rising authoritarianism during a service, in prayers, in calls to action, etc. But in terms of helping people cope, the diagnosis of “rising authoritarianism” is like an ultra generic story. What does a richer description sound like?

A heaviness over us every day and the brain ache of repetitive complex calculations: Should I leave the country? What if I don’t and then it’s too late? Am I crazy for thinking about this? Those who are the government’s first priority for persecution (trans people, immigrants) are already living in “the upside down,” a different reality than everyone else. Some are fleeing or trying to. Many are in hiding. Some were already snatched from their lives. In Pali, the language of Buddhist and Hindu scriptures, the word for faith is a verb. Faithe. It means to place the heart upon. What can we place our hearts upon now?

Religion, which people turned to for help and healing long before Freud super weirdly made psychotherapy a thing, is full of rich metaphors in its scriptures and theologies. We who preach are language artists, weaving ancestral stories and descriptions of human experience with contemporary knowledge and the living texts of our own lives and our congregation’s. Helping people move past vagueness, confusion, and habitual interpretations into new understanding. Giving people courage and strength.

I don’t know about you, but during fifteen years of leadership in a congregation, I got tired of hearing my own voice. Especially during periods in which I felt overwhelmed by the weight of the world, I wondered what difference my readings, prayers, and fifteen minutes of preaching could possibly make. I could not tell people how to fix things. I could not pretend to believe that everything will be okay or that this is all part of God’s plan. The same thing is true as a therapist. I don’t have all the “answers.”

Now I understand that while words cannot fix societal problems or make grief go away, they can indeed bind up broken hearts and help heal wounds. In “name it to tame it,” the “it” is not the whole forest, but the wildness of not knowing where we are, what to do, or if we are alone.

To all you language artists on bimahs and in pulpits and everywhere you go: though you may feel small, trust in the healing power of your work. Attend to it as though it is one of the ways God, or The Love That Holds All, reaches people and it will be. You can place your hearts upon that.

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P.S. Do you know that in addition to working as a therapist in New Mexico, I offer clergy coaching? If you could use some support at the intersection of person + vocation, or navigating leadership challenges, send me a message. You can also check out my coaching website.