My husband-at-the-time, knowing how special our time in California was for me, and how much I loved those trees. He purchased a poster 8 feet long and 3 feet tall of the forest and had it mounted as a piece of art that could hang in my office. Sometimes I looked up and away from the client to prepare a thoughtful response and that poster of sequoia trees was what I saw in that moment.
I loved the idea of sequoia trees in the counseling office. I’ll confess a slight addiction to metaphors—a common issue for therapists. It often works to draw connections between the world we live in and the things we are processing in therapy. I love a beautiful metaphor and the sequoia tree represents a powerful message for me. In fact, the richest lesson on relationships didn’t happen in the classroom during those years but in the forest—amongst the sequoias. They taught me so much it became a TEDx Winnipeg talk in 2018[4]
Sequoias are this incredible mix of power and beauty. You can drive a truck through the hollows of a trunk. They are amongst the oldest living things on earth. Incredible and majestic. They are also fragile.
These gigantic trees have shallow root systems. Sequoias can extend 20-25 stories tall. Remarkably, their roots are within 4-5 feet from the surface. Can you imagine? A 250-foot structure that can weigh 12 million pounds and have been standing for two millennia has roots that go into the ground not even as far as the height of an adult.
We found when we went to visit the sequoias that most of them have large fences around them, preventing people from trampling or wearing down the ground around the bases of the trees. As mighty as they are, they have extremely fragile root systems.
The sequoia trees have this incredible, intricate combination of strength and vulnerability.
Just like our clients.
Our clients demonstrate this incredible strength in saying, “I will talk about the parts of me that, because I’m avoiding, now control me as I endeavor to pretend they aren’t there.” When I see clients share their story in all its raw realness, it takes my breath away.
Let me give you one more fascinating fact about the sequoias that helps me understand the value of counseling. There is a reason these enormous trees have stood the test of time over thousands of years. They have stood tall even with the worst of whatever California storms could throw at them. There is an important reason why these trees with shallow and vulnerable root systems have survived for hundreds, even thousands of years. They grow near each other.
The root systems, which spread out 150-200 feet, and can cover an acre, intertwine with the root systems of neighboring trees. In weaving together with the roots of other neighboring trees, they give each other strength, support and stability. It is through the interconnection with one another that sequoias continue to thrive.
In effect, these sequoias are strengthened by living in community.
Just like our clients.
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We are wired for connection. For several years, I have had a half hour gig on a popular talk radio show every week. The host will interview me about a particular topic which we decide the night before. Pretty much each week, as part of explaining forgiveness, jealousy, anxiety or stress, the radio listeners will hear me say, “We are wired for connection.” It comes up as significant in almost every topic that the host, Hal Anderson, invites this therapist to talk about. The drive to be connected to others is innate to all of us.
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Picture this. Two hundred years ago there was no television. Supplies like books, games, and paper and pencil existed, but were not as plentiful as today. Electric power wasn’t common, and lights weren’t as bright as today. No computers, no movie theatres—no screens of any kind. A lot of the activities that take up most of our time now didn’t exist then.
Transportation was different, too. No airplanes. No cars. Travel was by horse and buggy. Most people lived their entire lives within a few miles of where they were born. Some might travel a long distance, but even then, would settle down. Travel was slower, more difficult and more dangerous than it is now. Moving might happen once in a lifetime.
Lifestyles were very different back then. Most folks lived a stable rural life. The agrarian lifestyle meant that often multiple generations lived on the same farmyard, and adult brothers/cousins/aunts lived at the next farmyard over.
People lived their lives with more stable connections than they do now, with more hours in the day to invest in those relationships that existed for their entire lives. Life was different.
Imagine a young husband sitting in the barn waiting for his cow to calve. Maybe the cow is having trouble, and he calls his uncle to sit with him so he can learn how to birth this calf when it’s time. They sit on bales of hay in the stall with the cow as she labors, maybe for hours. Perhaps all night. To pass the time, in between periods of silence, or a check on the cow, they visit. They’ve known each other since the young man was a child.
They talk about the weather, the cows, the crops—and over the hours, the conversation deepens. The young husband confides in his uncle that marriage is harder than he thought it would be. The cow has not yet given birth, so they have more hours to converse. Gradually, the younger man opens up about the difficulties he is having and how it seems his wife pushes him away. The uncle can hear him and reminisces aloud about his own early years of marital adjustments. The young man becomes more reassured about how some struggles are part of normal adjustment. He also gets feedback from his uncle about how he sometimes comes across harsher than he intends. The uncle further talks about what he thinks is important for women to hear and feel in the relationship.
Later in the week, this young man’s wife begins to bake some buns and remembers that she has run out of yeast. She goes over to the next farm to borrow some yeast since the store takes a couple of hours to get to, even with the horse-drawn wagon. Once there, the neighbor delights to see a friendly face. She invites her in for tea. They have a visit. They discuss the need to help each other out, using it as an excuse to visit. Helping each other out with supplies and having a visit is part of the beauty of this life. As the visit progresses, she tells this neighbor about her household, managing as a new wife in her own home. After a caring question by the neighbor, she acknowledges that she cowers in light of her husband’s pushiness. He is loud and brash and she comes from a household that speaks gently. He intimidates her. The neighbor gently knowingly chuckles, knowing how soft-spoken this young wife’s father has always been. She remembers out loud what being newly married was like for her in adjusting to a new family. The neighbor reminds the young woman about her ability to speak up and say what works for her. The neighbor reminds her who she is and empowers her to give feedback to her husband about how she experiences him.
This conversation happens because of hours spent together with someone that a person knows and trusts. The two women trust each other, having developed their relationship over time. Through the mundane connections that happened repeatedly over time with the same few people, one or two showed wisdom and spoke into difficult situations kindly and boldly. She knew who didn’t gossip. He could recall how the last time a confidence was shared, it went well. There was time to ease into delicate subjects and conversations could last well past when the candle burnt out or the tea got cold.
You can safely say that I’m idealizing the difficult lifestyle of living on a farm a few generations ago. I will take the criticism. Small communities of years ago likely got into each other’s business rather like an old-fashioned soap opera. Folks worked from sun up to sun down before falling into bed exhausted and quite possibly hungry. I don’t mean to romanticize the culture as being all, Little House on the Prairie.
However, generations ago, relationships were fewer, people depended on each other more for the heavy labor of the time, and there were fewer distractions. People’s leisure time was time spent with one other. The foundation was laid for deeper relationships over a lifetime of contact. When crisis hit, you were surrounded by people who knew
you and loved you even if they didn’t like you.
These days, you may have just moved to the city and no one person has earned the right to hear the heaviness of how hard the move has been for you. No one would understand how the losses of the move remind you of significant past events in your life because they weren’t there. You and your family may interact with lots of people all day long—coworkers, coffee shop buddies, fellow soccer parents at the sidelines, strangers in the grocery store—but you lack the deep friendships that come over years of time and conversation.
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The sequoia trees do best with multiple other sequoias around, ready to intertwine and weave their roots between others for stability. They do best in a sequoia forest, surrounded by other trees also looking around to be with others. The giant sequoias always grow in a grove.
I’m convinced human beings are a lot like sequoias. We do better when we can intertwine our lives with other human beings. The science is overwhelming: we are healthier, have better quality of life and live longer when we have meaningful connection with others.[5] Deep interwoven connection creates a stability by having others invest in us, allowing us to be vulnerable, and creating opportunities for us to invest in them by deeply hearing their stories.
When folks are transplanted from one city to another, or one lifestyle stage to another, or even one job to another, the stability found in intertwining lives is lost. A fast-paced lifestyle that doesn’t allow for the development of relationships can leave a person floundering. When life hands them difficult circumstances, they require the depth of human connection. What happens when no one can provide that connection?
Perhaps our culture allows you to have the illusion of many relationships. Many of you say hello to and exchange pleasant banter about the weather and the local sports team. You don’t even notice that these relationships are without substance and depth until your back is against the wall. When she walks out the door, or the boss tells you to suddenly pack up your desk, or your child is on life support—only then do you realize that you don’t have a relationship that can bear the weight of the pain.
When a crisis hits—mental illness, job loss, marital instability—there is flailing and thrashing with a desperate desire to pour out one’s heart.
In a crisis, the need to intertwine your roots with someone else’s becomes as necessary as breathing.
We need others all the time.
To be alive is to need to be connected to others.
Often, we become acutely aware of the benefit of being a tree in the forest of other trees when life gets challenging. We yearn to gain strength from another, to lean on another for support. We need to be needed and we need others.
We need that support not because we are weak, but because we are human. Perhaps you, in our world today, suddenly find yourself without others around you. While people abound, none are truly in a position to intertwine their roots with yours. You have no people around able to give you the real support that is vital.
A counselor is not just a therapist, but a fellow tree in the forest of humanity. A therapist has training in providing solid roots to be intertwined, even when meeting with a client for the first time.
Even before our training and expertise, counselors are fellow citizens of the human race, ready to be someone to provide stability in the hearing of a story when no one else feels safe enough. A therapist provides a safe, neutral, confidential space that can hold the pain and terror of a situation that threatens to knock you over. A therapist listens carefully, hears your situation deeply, and begins the worthwhile work with you of figuring out how to move forward. Your roots can intertwine with the counselor’s for a time, to give you the stability you need.
A therapy session certainly uses the professional skills of a therapist. But primarily, it is a human encounter where professional boundaries create an inherent safety. The therapist is someone who will sit attentively for the hour to explore your world with you. He or she will keep the conversation private. You can share the story of the painful situation knowing the therapist can handle whatever horrors the story may contain. S/he won’t change the subject or give you cheap advice.
In a world where no single other person alive is able to sit with you in a painful darkness, a therapist is able and willing to bear witness to your words, your experience and your feelings. Somehow, a story seems more real when spoken out loud. Putting your experience into words, out loud, in the presence of another human being for the first time, changes it in powerful ways.
Therapy is a place to practice root intertwining again, or perhaps for the first time. And just like the sequoias, you’ll be stronger as you intertwine your lives with others and often, a therapist is the best place to start.
19
To stop one problem that was created when fixing another problem
For years, as a single mom, I was the holder of all the keys. The keys to our house, the garage, my bike, multiple keys for each of the three workplaces I worked in, and the car. I lose things like keys easily, so I have all my keys on a carabiner which I loop onto the strap of my purse. Or rather, I used to have all my keys on a single carabiner. Let me explain.
Years ago, I was driving an old green Chevrolet Cavalier. She had lots of miles on her, but she was reliable and faithful. I live in a cold climate and a car that starts reliably in winter is something for which to be very grateful.
One day in the fall on my way to the clinic, the key wouldn’t move in the ignition. It wouldn’t budge. It was as though I put the wrong key in the ignition, so it wouldn’t do anything at all when I tried to turn it.
I had it towed to the mechanic because it wouldn’t start. He took the key I gave him and it started instantly. He started that car ten times in rapid fire, and it started every time. No problem.
Don’t you just hate that when it happens? When something that isn’t working for you performs like a charm in front of the expert?
It worked fine for a few weeks and then happened again. This time I could eventually get it started and I took it to the mechanic. He took my keys and tried it again. Thankfully, the second time he tried it, it stuck a little. The mechanic mentioned in passing that it seemed sometimes the tumblers in the steering column might have trouble lining up and they might need a little tap or jiggle to fall into place.
As cars age, we expect their little quirks and eccentricities to happen more often. I wasn’t surprised when the ignition locking happened more often and was grateful to now have the tool of tapping the steering column.
Only sometimes, the tapping seemed akin to hitting. Sometimes repeatedly. Sometimes my hand would hurt from repeated aggressive, ahem, tapping on the steering wheel to get the car so that the key would finally turn and start the car. Once I got the key turning, the car still started like a charm.
One day, to save my hand from the trauma of pounding the steering column, I grabbed the hairbrush in the console beside me. It saved my hand and allowed for even more vigorous banging on that steering column. I started to leave early to allow time for the hair brush whacking. The routine smashing of the steering column started to become part of my lifestyle. As I approached my Chevie, I often began to sing a song in my head my children had often watched on video: “Oh, where is my hairbrush?”[6]
Fall progressed into winter, and on a bitterly cold day, when I went to start my car, it wouldn’t start. The strange situation was that the key turned easily back and forth in the ignition but now the engine wouldn’t start.
In the northern climate where I live, our go to assumption is that the battery is dead because of the cold. So, I called the local Automobile Association to ask for a battery boost. Because of all the others needing a battery boost on that frigid afternoon, it was more than a two hour wait.
Eventually he came, and I explained my plight. He tried to start the car, and he wasn’t convinced that it was the battery. He asked permission to try one other strategy first. I consented. What he did next seemed l
ike some weird car voodoo.
He held out his hand for the key and inserted it into the driver's side door. He turned the key to the left as far as it would go and held it there while he counted to ten a slow drawl. Then he turned the key as far right as possible and again held it for a slow count of ten. Then he repeated this odd key dance twice more.
Have I mentioned it was brutally cold out? We were both standing there bouncing up and down trying to stay warm during this slow and seemingly pointless process. I wanted him to boost my battery and get out of there! To spend more than a minute working the key in the car door seemed ridiculous when it was the car’s engine that wouldn’t start.
However, after he completed what seemed like some slow magical key dance ceremony in the car door, he got in the car, put the key in the ignition and turned. And don’t you know, that old green Chevy started like a charm. Even in the bitter, brutal cold.
I was flabbergasted.
He explained that the weird slow and hold key turning ritual in the car door was to reset the car’s anti-theft system. He asked me, “Is there any reason your vehicle would think someone had stolen it, and therefore shouldn’t start?”
Totally innocently, I was adamant that no one had stolen the vehicle, there had been no danger to the vehicle, and I hadn’t a hot clue about why my old green car would think anyone stole it.
I drove off to complete my day, having missed the doctor’s appointment, but able to get supper on the table. Better something than nothing, right?
The next day, I put the key into the ignition and it was stuck—wouldn’t turn, at all. Motionless. So—I grabbed the hairbrush and started my steering-column-whacking routine. As I assaulted the steering wheel, the lightbulb in my brain suddenly went on bright and bold.
Hell No to Hmmm, Maybe Page 14