When you help people and that’s a part of your mission, the most challenging question is:
How much can you help and how much does a person, a couple, a family need to be able to help themselves?
At what point do you have to let the other person decide what they want to do with everything you have offered?
You can put so much in front of people but you cannot want more for them than they want for themselves.
You can’t live for someone who doesn’t want to live.
You can’t care about homework for someone who doesn’t want to go to school.
The autonomy and togetherness live side by side.
Togetherness is how much I am in there with you; the autonomy is where you ultimately get to decide what you will do with everything I can offer.
When you are in the therapy session where you work more than people themselves, it’s off.
~ Esther Perel