16/03/2026
There is a tendency to look at mental health struggles as neat categories that you can apply specific therapeutic techniques to or psychotropic medication, with the outcome: “person fixed”.
In his article on Substack, psychologist Jonathan Shedler explains why applying what I might call non-curious, superficial thinking to a person's mental struggles, such as anxiety, does not work.
Shedler says:
“The problem is not really the individual psychiatrists, who are generally well intentioned. Psychiatry training programs have become overwhelmingly diagnosis- and medication-centered. It is a consequence of multiple forces: a broken healthcare system, the outsized influence of the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, a culture that is psychologically uninformed, and the bizarre disconnect between what patients need and health care incentive structures. These forces push providers and patients toward one-size explanations and treatments.”
I dare say, what Shedler points out, may also happen in Australia.
My experience as someone who has worked for almost a decade in various roles with people who have severe mental health struggles and disabilities, and in a sector where helpers sometimes also have their mental struggles, is that we are all diverse human beings with all sorts of different layers and stories to our histories, inner lives and cultures.
And my opinion is, that therapy that is not coming from a curious stance and that does not look/work beyond diagnosis (which is really just a checklist to allocate insurance or, in Australia, 10 sessions under Medicare) is often not helpful or meaningful in the long term.
If you ask skilled mental health professionals they would say that 10 sessions or monthly therapy is not adequate and especially not if the struggle a person has is something that has persisted for decades.
Why one-size explanations lead to the wrong treatment.
