Today more than ever, more people are considering long-term therapy as they realize how crucial it is to take care of their mental well-being.

Just as you take care of your physique by exercising or your car by regularly servicing it, Dr. Lynn Winsten of Berkeley, CA, along with many other researchers and therapists, have proved that your mind needs regular care to ensure you’re mentally stable and resilient regardless of the curveballs the world and circumstances throw at you.

Unfortunately, most people only seek therapy when mental anguish and turmoil have overcome them to the point that they can’t function optimally at work or in their daily relationships. The truth is that mental instability can get in the way of enjoying even the greatest successes in life.

That’s why it’s not uncommon to find people who society views as successful living in misery despite their privilege. As a society living in a world that’s becoming more unpredictable by the day, it’s imperative that we hold therapy in higher esteem and that we proactively rather than reactively take care of our mental well-being.

Dr. Lynn Winsten of Berkeley, CA, has dedicated her life to helping people see the beauty in their lives and retain their happiness through the most challenging times. She’s passionate about using her skills and expertise to aid people in regaining and maintaining their mental stability in every situation.

While therapy has been perceived as a one-time corrective measure for people struggling with instability, this post explores the benefits of making therapy a routine exercise, just like we do medical checkups.

Reasons to Consider Long-Term Therapy

Psychological health might not be as emphasized as exercising, which improves your appearance, but that doesn’t make it less important. Studies show that your mental health impacts your appearance to other people and can send signals that either attract or repel them from you.

There’s no doubt that life is unpredictable. However, therapy equips you with the mental fitness you need to pivot in all circumstances so you don’t crumble under pressure. Below are some benefits of long-term therapy.

Teaches You Essential Coping Skills

When the inevitable difficult times come around, few things will help you glide over the difficulty than impeccable coping skills. Sometimes, you don’t get the promotion you’ve worked so hard for despite seeming like all the stars are aligned in your favor.

Other times, driving makes you anxious, while the sickness or loss of a friend or loved one will easily throw you off balance. During these periods, you’ll need as many coping skills as you can master to help you sail through unscathed.

Investing in long-term therapy enables your therapist to continually impart their knowledge to help you gain the skills you need to stay sane in trying times. Therapists undergo training that helps them nurture and develop your coping skills – skills we all have but that are suppressed most of the time and need to be rekindled.

Nonetheless, it’s essential to understand that coping skills will differ from one person to the other. For instance, if you’re a writer, your coping mechanism might be journaling or writing poetry or music. Similarly, another person might be more into aromatherapy, which means bubble baths may work better at helping them overcome mental instability.

Everyone is built differently, so it’s only logical that your response or coping mechanisms will differ from your loved ones. Just as coping mechanisms differ across individuals, so do the techniques.

Often, a therapist will also teach you coping techniques that might not be as innate. A cognitive behavioral therapist, for instance, might teach you the power of proclamations and affirmations.

In other cases, a therapist will help you review how you interact with others. At the same time, another will encourage you to treat yourself in a more deserving and accommodating manner – all skills that will improve your mental stability.

Dr. Lynn Winsten is skilled in multiple therapy techniques and creates hybrid and custom modalities to fit an individual’s needs. Regardless of her methods, long-term therapy with Dr. Winsten aims to bolster your strengths, bettering your coping mechanisms and response to varying circumstances.

Improves Your Social Interactions

Oftentimes, especially when our mental health is impaired, we barely recognize its negative impact on our relationships. It’s not uncommon to snap, and name-call loved ones during an argument when we’re mentally anguished, only to forget our utterances when things cool down.

While you might not remember what you said in a bout of anger or even mean it, your loved one might take it to heart and retain it for years to come. Alternatively, if you’re a person who hides what you’re going through, you might have a hard time being assertive with the people in your life.

The work of a therapist such as Dr. Lynn Winsten is to help you balance how you conduct your social interactions and communication. Most importantly, a therapist can help you ask and get answers to complex questions to improve your perspective of your relationships and how you deal with them.

At the end of the day, living a fulfilling life is highly dependent on the relationships you cultivate, so it pays to learn how to do it calmly, collected, and empathetically.

Boosts Your Happiness

Few things are more fulfilling than happiness. Yet true happiness is notoriously elusive, leading many people to look for it in external pleasures such as buying a fancy car or chasing money and fame. The truth is, the happiness that comes from material things is fleeting at best, and the fulfillment rarely lasts as long as you imagined.

Fortunately, continuous therapy makes it possible to find longer-lasting happiness and fulfillment. How? Typically, a therapist will help you explore your past, present, and future. This is an essential part of therapy as it helps you understand yourself.

Self-understanding might not lead to self-acceptance, but it’s a stepping stone to embracing your authentic self.

Analyzing where you’ve come from, where you are, and where you’re going helps you and your therapist create a roadmap to lead you to self-acceptance and self-compassion by overcoming past trauma. Ultimately, this enables you to handle the lows of life with grace and optimistic there are better things to come.

Enhances Productivity

Through boosting sustainable happiness, therapy is also potent at enhancing productivity. When you’re happy, your body gets a chemical advantage. As the brain processes positive emotions, it releases dopamine and serotonin, feel-good hormones that fire up the brains learning centers.

As a result, you can focus more and for more extended periods, improving how much you can do without burning out. In a world where we barely have enough time to do everything on our plate daily, techniques that boost your moods, increase productivity, and ultimately help you cope with today’s fast-paced lifestyle are crucial.

Nonetheless, a boost in your moods doesn’t always imply increased productivity. However, working with a therapist also helps you identify obstacles preventing you from performing optimally. If perfectionism, overthinking, low-self esteem, and other mental barriers get in the way of your performance, a therapist can help you find a solution.

Similarly, a therapist can help you correct negative habits such as procrastination and poor prioritization, which will positively impact your output if you follow the techniques you agree on. Learning how to improve productivity will boost your self-esteem and self-worth and improve your relationships at home and at work.

Teaches You Essential Stress Relief Techniques

The world we live in is choke-full of stressors. Fortunately, working with a therapist allows you to identify situations and circumstances that stress you to find the best solutions. Some of those solutions include learning body and mind-calming techniques such as:

• Deep breathing
• Progressive muscle relaxation
• Guided visualization

Besides teaching you these and more stress-reduction methods, a therapist can also bring in concepts such as radical acceptance that are unfamiliar to you. Radical acceptance is a coping technique that helps you realize when things are beyond your control, helping you accept there’s nothing you can do and thus reducing your mental anguish.

Although these lessons will be instrumental for the rest of your life, regularly working with a therapist helps you improve exponentially and learn emerging techniques to keep your mind centered.

Still, Dr. Lynn Winsten of Berkeley, CA, notes that perhaps the biggest benefit of long-term therapy is having a professional who can be your sounding board. Therapists are trained to listen, empathize, and validate your feelings. However, this doesn’t imply that they agree with you.

On the contrary, their role as a sounding board is to show you that you’re important, your feelings are real, and that someone understands you.

This social support has been proven to improve mental health by soothing the mind and promoting psychological health. Continuous therapy is instrumental as a tool that helps you reach your potential and consistently allows you to surpass what you thought was possible.

While long-term therapy will continue impacting your mental wellness positively, there is no set timeframe for how long you should seek counseling. Still, if you’re keeping your body healthy by watching what you eat and exercising or your car running by servicing it, why not keep the most important asset you have, your mind, in the best possible shape?

Whether you’re going through a hard time professionally, with your relationships, or struggling to make crucial decisions, contact Dr. Winsten to book therapy sessions that will equip you with the skills you need to overcome the mental obstacles you’re facing.