Dr. Colman Noctor

No, but from the point of view of like, if you have something that, like, I'm having panic attacks and I want them to stop.

So you have that, there's a kind of a tangible thing to discuss.

But therapy...

most people are worried about what will I say?

Do you know what I mean?

And it's increasingly, I see people coming and they'll take out their phones and they'll say, I made a few notes here.

I'll talk to you about what's going on.

And so they'll read out some of the things that are on their mind that are bothering them.

But I suppose for me, better therapy is just a natural flow of one thing leading to the next.

And so because I work analytically, the free association of conversation often tells you much more than somebody who's coming in with a kind of rehearsed set of notes that they want to talk about.

And I know people will roll their eyes when I say that, but there's no wrong thing to talk about in therapy.

It's your therapy.

So, you know, you bring it wherever it is you wish to go.

Now, as a therapist, you're trying to look at patterns and you're looking at repeated sequences and trying to maybe make those links for that person and trying to...

I suppose, allow them some sense of understanding.

So you have to know the history of the person.

But the context of the relationship that you have with that person, what you know about them, the longer you have that relationship, the better able you are to guide them.

It's a really important part of it.

The first question I always ask, I probably would open with something that says, especially with teenagers and young people, I'd say, this is not a sentence.

You're not ordered here by a court for 10 seconds.