You Don’t Have to Wait Until It’s Bad Enough: Recognizing When to Seek Therapy

Most people are better at explaining why they don’t need help than at asking for it. This short course, built around a Mental Health Awareness talk by counselor Ian Masson, teaches you to recognize the moment when it is time to see a therapist — in yourself, or in someone you accompany. Masson names four signs: a pattern you have tried and failed to change on your own, a loved one asking you to talk to someone, recurring conflict at home or work, and any thought of death or suicide. Then he goes after the belief that keeps people from acting on any of them — the quiet conviction that because “nothing bad enough” has happened, or because others have it worse, you should handle it yourself. His answer sits at the center of the course: our suffering does not get canceled out by someone else’s heavier suffering. Grounded in Divine Mercy University’s Catholic Christian understanding of the person and enriched with both clinical scholarship and the spiritual tradition, the course is designed for any thoughtful adult who wants to meet their own need — or someone else’s — with more honesty and less shame.