A common question I get is…
… What is the difference between MFT (Marriage and Family Therapy) from all the other types of mental health professionals out there?
Marriage and Family Therapists are systems oriented therapists where most other mental health professionals focus on individual pathology or symptoms. As Gehart (2014) in Mastering Competencies in Family Therapy articulately says, “Systemic therapists are known for their ability to see the big picture at all times. Even when a client presents with an individual issue, such as depression or anxiety, systemic therapists always view it within the larger relational contexts in which the symptom makes sense. The systemic therapist is never flustered and never views one (disorder, psychosis, or problem) as more “serious” than another or more an “individual” versus a “family” problem. Instead, all behavior is simply a means of communicating that makes sense within a particular relational system, with each person in the system doing the best he or she can. Thus, they always refrain from blaming one member of the family for a problem. Systemic therapists are able to stay focused on interconnection of meaning and communication, on the dance between people, rather than get lost in the labeling and unidirectional thinking of individual pathology. They carefully attend to how behavior is always shaped by complex webs of relations within the family, community, and larger society. They view much of what the average person might consider an “individual problem” as part of a much larger set of interactions, of which the problem is only a small part. Their nonpathologizing, nonblaming view offers clients a refreshing and often liberating new way to think about their situation. After all, they are pragmatic, always considering whether their interventions were useful or not, and if not, figuring out what might be.”
As a marriage and family therapist, I creatively think of the big picture of relational dynamics in play that influence each individual in the system and how to best support the whole system to create holistically healthy patterns of interaction with oneself and others.
Feel free to reach out to me if you are interested in learning more!
