22. The General Cause of People's Problems and How We Get Stuck in Them

When a new client comes in to see me for their first session, I ask what problems bring them to therapy and how they hope to benefit from counseling. They share their problems and often state that their goal for counseling is to know why they are the way they are. When hearing this, I tactfully try to help them grasp that knowing where our problems stem from is almost impossible to assess since there are millions of things that have happened in our lives that contribute to who we are and how we feel.

I attempt to guide people to recognize that even if we could determine the cause of why we are experiencing our life challenges, that would not make a difference in changing our current problems. As I have shared in other Articles, I work with changing patterns and programs at the unconscious level, where I believe change is possible - not through conscious mind understanding.

Even so, in this Article, I would like to explain my understanding of the general “cause”, contributing factors of people’s life challenges and a framework of how we get stuck in problem states. This is a useful step in finding a path forward into new choices and creating the life we want.

When we are babies, we do not have the ability to meet our emotional needs and are totally dependent on those around us to help us get our needs met. If we get what we need fully and unconditionally from our parents and caretakers (I do not know of anyone who ever has), we would develop inner strengths and resources in knowing we are loved, safe, peaceful, and okay within ourselves, developing ways to get our inner needs met from within.

If we don’t get what we need, we develop patterns, beliefs, and behaviors to try to get our needs met from parents and others. We develop adaptive mechanisms to cope with our life difficulties. This is coded in the unconscious as a survival mechanism and becomes a "program" we operate from, carrying this pattern into our adult relationships! When we don’t get what we need, we try harder, doing the same things to try to get our needs met. The unconscious mind is not logical or rational. It does what it does and if it doesn't work, it does more of it. This is how we get stuck in a rut and running in our hamster wheel, going faster, getting nowhere. This is the basis of dysfunctional relationships.

Here is an example to illustrate: A common pattern I observe with clients is they are caught in trying to be the caretaker of others and feel they never get their own needs met, reporting feeling depressed and “empty.” At a young age they probably learned to be a caretaker to a parent as an attempt to be loved or get some other core need met. This strategy most likely did not get them what they needed, however the pattern prevailed - getting caught in trying to do it more. It is a difficult pattern to carry into adulthood, since it is not anyone else’s job to help us feel loved or have other core needs met. Often if they do, we won’t believe it anyway.

People learned to feel they were responsible to make things work in their life and kept using these ineffective attempted solutions to try. The tendency is to then carry that pattern into adult relationships, unwittingly communicating to their partner that they are never good enough and do not deserve to get what they want (much less, not knowing what that is). Then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and continues to be what they attract, create in their lives, and believe about themselves.

Eventually, people get to a place where past coping mechanisms are not working and even causing problems. We do things to try to get rid of our past coping mechanisms. Low and behold, they hold on tighter. When caught in this trap, there seems no way to escape, a crisis often ensues, and people seek out professional help.