I want to be clear: I still believe. My faith is intact. This is not an anti-church post.
But there are specific things that a trained therapist gave me that a decade of prayer and fellowship did not — and I think it's important to say that.
Therapy gave me language. Not for my sin or my weaknesses, but for the specific emotional patterns that were running my life without my consent. Words like "anxious attachment," "emotional dysregulation," "cognitive distortion" — frameworks that let me understand WHY I kept doing the things I knew I shouldn't.
The church told me what to do. Therapy helped me understand why I was struggling to do it.
I don't think these are opposites. I think for many Nigerians we have accepted a false choice — pray more OR see a therapist — when the truth is that healing is rarely one-dimensional.
Your mind is not less sacred than your soul. Taking care of it is not lack of faith. It is stewardship.
But there are specific things that a trained therapist gave me that a decade of prayer and fellowship did not — and I think it's important to say that.
Therapy gave me language. Not for my sin or my weaknesses, but for the specific emotional patterns that were running my life without my consent. Words like "anxious attachment," "emotional dysregulation," "cognitive distortion" — frameworks that let me understand WHY I kept doing the things I knew I shouldn't.
The church told me what to do. Therapy helped me understand why I was struggling to do it.
I don't think these are opposites. I think for many Nigerians we have accepted a false choice — pray more OR see a therapist — when the truth is that healing is rarely one-dimensional.
Your mind is not less sacred than your soul. Taking care of it is not lack of faith. It is stewardship.
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