Interest and trust in psychological services is gaining momentum in our country somewhat late compared to the Western world.

In the countries of Western Europe and America, psychological services have long become commonplace. Going to a specialist in soul healing has become as much a daily part of life as going to a personal training session with a trainer at the gym or an appointment with the dentist. Often in films and TV series we hear the phrases "my psychotherapist", "my psychoanalyst", "my lawyer", "my doctor".

When you talk to people and say that "I am a psychotherapist", they usually immediately answer: "Ah, you consult sitting in a chair, and the person is lying on the couch? We saw this in the movies." Or they say "I also have a friend who is a psychoanalyst" or "I myself am a psychologist with a higher education", or they ask if I am good at communicating with psychos and what pills I give them. For most people far from psychology, the words psychologist, psychotherapist, psychoanalyst and psychiatrist are lumped together, because they do not see a fundamental difference between them. All these terms are used to describe specialists who work with people who are "slightly out of their mind" or with "completed psychos", pulling from their memory one term or another that came to mind earlier. In fact, the difference between these terms is fundamental. The same as between therapists and surgeons - although both are doctors.   Many are afraid of visits to psychologists almost as much as they are to dentists. Believing that it is better to suffer heartache than toothache. This often only makes the situation worse. Therefore, as a result, working with an old problem requires much more time and money, just as old caries can lead to tooth loss.

All this usually happens, mainly thanks to fantasies about "how it will be" and "am I really that bad?". A person is afraid of the unknown, and the unknown usually scares. The image of a person with an invisible scalpel appears, which pokes into the soul and cuts, cuts or sews something there.

Often, clients are very worried about the fact that a psychologist can break something inside a person bypassing his consciousness.  In fact, no one "digs in the soul". This is precisely the meaning of psychological work - that a person himself "digs" in his life, because no one knows his life better than he himself. A psychologist works exclusively with the material that a person "brought" into the world.  Each person has a unique situation and a unique story, so recommendations and advice that she can apply to her own situation and story work best. Other people's recipes usually do not work as effectively. There are no "universal recipes". That is why it is important to understand how different specialists differ from each other - who works with direct recommendations (like doctors) and who gives pills, and who of them uses other methods.

Fear is born of the unknown. The more we know about what the work of various specialists is, the less it is and the more trust in what they do.

So what are the differences between different specialists in the field of psychology?

In order to rely on some criteria - let's take direct instructions and recipes as a rule. In contrast to direct (directive) influence, there is indirect (non-directive) influence, when the specialist does not take sole responsibility for the final result and takes a partner (equal) position in the therapy relationship.

Let's start with the profession of a psychologist.

A psychologist is what everyone who works in the helping professions is usually called.  But actually a psychologist is someone who received an education in the specialty "psychologist" at a university.  Psychologists are divided into practical and clinical.  Basically, they are taught to conduct various tests and evaluate the results of this testing. Counseling skills are usually not given in universities, but they talk a lot about the theory.

After graduation, a psychologist, relying on his theoretical training, can engage in psychocorrection, career guidance, psychodiagnostics, psychological counseling, and much more. But in principle, a psychologist works with healthy people mainly in an educational and consulting perspective. Since higher education in post-Soviet countries with a specialty in psychology is mainly reduced to the study of various theories and classifications, but they acquire little or no practical skills for conducting therapy, as well as their personal therapy during the years of study, the quality of the work of such specialists can seriously suffer. After all, the result of consultations largely depends on the development of the therapist's personality. Therefore, it is important that such specialists, after receiving formal education, undergo personal therapy and practice, so that the theory receives the depth of practical confirmation.

Such specialists are satisfied, directive in their methods - as they give direct advice, evaluate and draw conclusions about psychological health. This is most often expected from them, saying: "Advice, you're a psychologist."

Now about the frightening word "psychiatrist".

There is nothing frightening about this word. He is a doctor who received a regular higher medical education with a specialization in psychiatry. Psychiatrists are the ones who deal with the medical or psychopharmacological treatment of people who come to them for an appointment in a borderline or psychotic state (that is, usually in an extremely neglected state). They are the ones who work in special medical institutions, psychiatric clinics and psychoneurological dispensaries, which we often see in movies. Psychiatrists are taught to bring a person out of an acute state with drugs that affect the biological state body, directly related to the psyche. They also do not learn to conduct speech therapy, and in principle, their treatment and approach are very directive and not too different from the rest of the doctors. It is better not to bring yourself to such a neglected state of mind, when other help will no longer be effective. It is very important to deal with the prevention of psychological problems so as not to end up with these specialists.  But if you have already got to them, then please follow all the recommendations strictly and do not experiment with pills by arbitrarily reducing or increasing the dosage, this can have very sad consequences. Psychiatrists and psychotherapists are often confused. Psychotherapists do not prescribe pills and engage in talk therapy, unlike psychiatrists.  More on them later.

Psychotherapists.

Psyuhe - "soul" terapeo - "treatment". That is, healers of souls, in other words.

A psychotherapist is a person who, after obtaining humanitarian, medical, and sometimes technical primary higher education, has undergone special practical training in the chosen method. As a rule, the basic program of such training, sufficient for starting psychotherapy practice, takes about a year, and the master course takes about 4 years, the certification process itself according to various programs can last even longer. Why? Because such a specialist, along with theory, goes through intensive practice of working with clients. It is also mandatory to have your own personal psychotherapy and meetings with colleagues - interviews, where you can exchange experiences or receive feedback on your work, replenish your arsenal of techniques for working with various cases, and work on your weaknesses. Meetings with teachers are also necessary - supervision, where psychotherapeutic practice is carried out by an experienced specialist. All such meetings, as a rule, take place on a paid basis and are a daily practice of the psychotherapist's investment in professional development. Consultations of a psychotherapist can take place in completely different ways: online via Skype, sitting opposite each other in the office, or in a group of people, with the help of various tools - sand, toys, drawing, dance, etc. There are many methods of psychotherapy. According to various estimates, there are 400 to 600 of them in the world. Therefore, each beginner psychotherapist chooses his own direction in which he improves.  The methods of work in different approaches are very different, the theory of personality, the origin of conflict, and the theory of treatment are also different, so there are no universal specialists. Each psychotherapist is usually good at one method and sometimes (depending on how well that method allows for the integration of techniques from related methods) one or two other methods at a basic level. To date, there are only 14 methods officially recognized by the world council of psychotherapy. One of them is the method in which I work - positive cross-cultural psychotherapy. This is a method of short-term psychotherapy (consultations on the actual conflict - up to 15, and on the level of the basic conflict up to 30 sessions), which is important in our time of high speeds, where not many can afford to wait for the results of therapy for years. This method allows you to feel the results from the first consultations. It was developed by the brilliant doctor M. Pezeshkian in Germany in 1968. The essence of the method is to eliminate the imbalance of important areas of life and relevant abilities with the help of analytical methods, metaphors and parables. In 1997, the method received the prestigious Richard-Martin-Price Award for quality and efficiency research. Positive psychotherapy allows the integration of techniques from other methods at different stages of the psychotherapy process and is client-centered and psychodynamic.

Psychotherapists in general are the least directive in their work. The psychotherapeutic relationship is based more on a partnership with the client, where the therapist does not take responsibility for the client's life. Does not give direct advice and instructions, but only offers options for work and techniques, from which the client himself chooses the ones that suit him.

Consideration of psychotherapy methods brings us to the last category of specialists - the psychoanalyst.

Psychoanalyst

A psychoanalyst is a psychotherapist who chose psychoanalysis as his method of work.

A classic psychoanalyst is one who has the client sit on a couch in a darkened room and tell his associations. They are the most frequently referenced in movies, partly because they are the oldest method of psychotherapy. It was invented at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century by the great Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychotherapy as a science. The peculiarity of classical psychotherapy is that the client often does not receive emotional support from the psychotherapist, he has to "struggle on his own" - in this case, directiveness is generally reduced to "zero", so the client does not feel the support of the psychotherapist at all, and psychotherapy itself can last for years, since the method is long-term. Now the more popular "neo-psychoanalysis" where there is no longer such a rigid attachment to the couch, or classical canons of work, it integrates techniques from other methods and the psychoanalyst shows more involvement with the client. In total, there are more than 20 modern methods of psychoanalysis, their methods of work are very diverse, as diverse as the theories of their creators - students and followers of Freud. Often the term "psychoanalysis" is used in a broader sense, to describe analytical work with the psychological state of the client. In order to choose the method that is right for you, it is sometimes useful to try psychotherapy with different professionals who work in different methods, since the methods can be radically different from each other. There is now a lot of information on the Internet about the theoretical foundations of various methods. There you will also find customer reviews.  

I hope this short article helped you reduce your fear of the unknown, see the difference between imaginary "synonyms" - psychologists, psychotherapists, psychiatrists and psychoanalysts. This, in turn, will help you better understand the services that call themselves specialists in different ways - and therefore, choose the ones that are right for you. Ready to help you as a psychologist and psychotherapist online and face-to-face in Kyiv. For a free initial consultation, you can click the "sign up" button below.