A client recently looked at me mid-session and asked, almost jokingly,
“You’re not one of those therapists who just keeps asking how I feel, are you?”
We both laughed, but something in the question stuck with me. It felt familiar. Almost cliche. And yet, underneath the humour, I sensed something else. Maybe discomfort. Maybe frustration. Maybe a genuine curiosity about whether that’s all therapy is.
It made me reflect on that question. The classic one:
“How does that make you feel?”
It’s one of those lines that gets dragged in every pop culture reference to therapy, used in sitcoms and spoofs like it’s the only thing we ever say. And maybe because of that, a lot of clients expect it and resist it.
The truth is, I do ask that question sometimes. And sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I tweak it, reword it, soften it. But I think the reason it’s become such a loaded phrase for clients and therapists alike is because of what it asks of us.
It asks us to pause.
To turn inwards.
To not just retell the event but to sit with how it landed, what it stirred, what it meant to us.
And that can be a lot.
For some clients, it feels uncomfortable because they’ve spent a lifetime not feeling. They’ve had to stay in their heads, stay in control, stay safe. So when I ask, how did that make you feel? it can feel like being asked to walk into a dark room with no torch. Of course there’s hesitation. Of course it’s hard to answer. Of course it might come with silence, or a shrug, or “I don’t know.”
And for therapists, I think we’ve become more and more aware of how this question can land. We’re learning to ask things in different ways. We’re finding new language, more creative ways in.
What was happening in your body just then?
What did that moment stir in you?
Did anything shift inside when you said that out loud?
And that’s not a bad thing. It shows how much we care about meeting clients where they’re at.
But lately I’ve been wondering, in trying to avoid the discomfort this question can bring, are we sometimes losing something important?
Because there is something in the squirm. In the “I don’t know.” In the uncomfortable silence that follows.
Sometimes the not knowing is the work.
Sometimes the question isn’t just about getting an answer, it’s about making room for the feeling to start showing up.
I don’t think the goal is to avoid this question.
I also don’t think it should be used mindlessly.
But maybe there’s something to be said for sitting with what it brings up for both of us.
So if you’re a client reading this: I wonder, when you hear “how does that make you feel?”
What happens in you?
Is it resistance? Discomfort? Do you shut down?
Is it that the question itself feels silly or overused, or is it that it takes you somewhere you’re not sure you want to go?
And if you’re a therapist: are we, in our attempts to be skilful and nuanced and not too “textbook,” sometimes avoiding the very discomfort that might hold the work?
Are we moving too quickly to reframe, to soften, to rescue the moment instead of holding space for what the client does not yet know how to say?
Just something I’m sitting with.
Maybe something for us all to sit with.
