Therapy should be a highly personalized, or individualized, process. Therapy delivered in a “one size fits all” approach simply is not as effective and doesn’t take into account the individual’s experiences, struggles, or personality factors. 

We often receive calls asking about the type of services that we provide. More precisely, we are asked, “what will happen in individual therapy?” or “how will the sessions go?”

It seems many potential clients may expect for us to tell them that they can anticipate a set of things occurring during their individual sessions, or even exactly what will take place each session. To an extent, this is true in that the first one to three sessions typically is when your therapist is getting to know you, understanding what exactly brought you in for therapy, and developing a plan for how you will work together (this is, however, an ongoing process throughout therapy).

However, beyond that general expectation for the beginning of therapy, therapy should be personalized to the person. Individual therapy really shouldn’t ever look the same for more than one person. This is because every person is unique and their particular struggle is also unique. Applying a one-size-fits-all approach is not nearly sufficient at addressing an individual’s unique set of factors that brought them into our office in the first place.

For this reason, we work with each client to understand them and facilitate therapy sessions that are tailored to that person.

It seems most people actually are surprised, but relieved, to hear that we can’t exactly answer the question of “what will happen” in their therapy session simply from a first phone call. Once learning and realizing that this is because the process is highly individualized and tailored to them, the potential value of therapy really begins to set in.

Individual vs. Group Therapy

The tailored, personalized aspects to individual therapy are why some people truly prefer and opt for individual sessions over group therapy. However, let’s be clear, group therapy is a highly effective modality of treatment that possesses its own set of benefits that individual therapy can’t offer (the perspective of others, feeling connected to others with similar experiences/thoughts/emotions, etc.).

However, if you are looking for an open platform where the focus is on you, what you want to change in your life, and with treatments and methods that are specific to what you want to have different in your life, then individual therapy is the route to go.

WE’RE HERE TO HELP

At Tampa Therapy, we are committed to providing a relaxing, healing, and non-judgmental environment to support you on your journey to mental and emotional growth and health.  If you want things to be different, you have to change them. But those changes have to be directed at what YOU are experiencing, and not a generalized approach. Our therapists are highly-skilled at helping people make important changes in their life and effectively address the symptoms you are experiencing.   Give us a call or email us today to start the process of making important changes in your life.