That said, if the connection isn’t there, you may want to look elsewhere. You can break up with a therapist, as strange as that sounds.
And if you don’t want to start over, you can take another route. You can work together with your therapist to improve communication. Call your therapist out if you feel uncomfortable. Come up with ways that you can better communicate to be better understood. After all, it’s your life we’re talking about here. At the end of the day, therapy is about YOU.
We set goals in life. If we didn’t, we would wander around without a sense of direction. The same concept applies to therapy. However, you need to make sure that your goals are the same as the goals of your therapist.
According to the American Psychological Association (APA), clear goals should be set when therapy begins. That said, many goals take time to reach. If you feel like you’re not reaching them, ask your therapist how long he or she expects that it will take to reach those goals. Be clear in this respect.
It's OK to set timelines regarding goals. Life is about goal setting with time frames. So ask your therapist to help you lay out a plan to give you direction. Plus, you will be able to look back at those goals to determine just how effective therapy has been.
Relief is a big thing when it comes to how effective therapy is. So look for those “aha” moments. These are signs that therapy is working.