Knowing vs. Doing

When the pandemic started, I remember feeling like I was out of my depth as a therapist. I didn’t know what was happening or how to navigate the intensity of the fear and incredibly difficult decision making processes that we had to now consider.

The irony for me is that many of my conversations focused on basic care. I wasn’t blowing people minds with insight they had never heard or science that made them feel better. I was extending compassion and care and reminding them to breathe and sleep. To eat as nutritiously as they could and reach out for comfort and support.

The continuous conversation was, “Yeah, I know I should.” And my response was always, “Yeah, but are you?” It’s been a weird recognition about the dissonance of what we know is healthy, and makes us feel better, and our difficulty accessing those behaviors, especially in time of duress.

So we know, and the issue is not knowing, it is doing. And the doing has it’s own language - we have to start small, and be compassionate with ourselves because behavior changes happen slowly over time. The good news is we are always capable of taking small steady steps in the right direction.