Freethink Friday: Edition 1 | What do you have in common with therapists?
I'll go first: Here's what journalists and therapists have in common.
Hello hello. It's Friday afternoon, and it feels like I've lived through the entire gamut of human emotions today, from utter despair to la-la-la-la-la-la. I woke up early morning to watch a cricket match between the India and Australia men's teams. After a horrendous start, India has come roaring back into the game. Hence my happy mood swing.
To make the day even more fun, I'm launching Freethink Fridays. Every Friday I'll ask you to weigh in on a question buzzing in my head – ranging from peskily existential to comfortingly fun. Sanity's readers are the most thoughtful I've known in my 19-year-career. You've been asking me to create more space for the community. This is one move in that direction.
Loneliness is a recurring theme in modern careers. I feel this conversation can help us relate a bit differently to our professions and see that we share many of our struggles with our cosmic colleagues (geez I love that term even if it doesn't mean anything).
I'll go first and list 11 similarities between journalists and therapists. Fair warning: Not too much to cheer about in that story.
Here you go.
👂🖋🤝 Therapists and journalists: a bond forged in blood
- Exposed daily to second-hand trauma.
- High ethical norms and far-reaching costs of failing to live up to them.
- Little public understanding of how they actually do their work.
- Vile employers/work culture.
- Terrible pay.
- Massive odds against going solo.
- Threatened by technology.
- Little help to understand how to turn tech into their ally.
- Tortuous relationship with 'neutrality'.
- Complex relationship with 'activism'.
- Big talk of how important they are for society, but zero social scaffolding.
And what do *you* have in common in your profession with therapists – whether you are a banker, a lawyer, a teacher, an astronaut, or a cricketer?
You can respond to this email or leave a comment on the website. Send me text or voice notes - whatever works for you. Most fun responses make it to this newsletter read in 50+ countries. Get 'em coming.
Next week: Sanity's 2024 Annual Report. See you then.
Join me for School of Sanity's next live session
Whether you are a writer, therapist, product person, social worker, academic, startup founder, advocate or activist, or a burnt out ex-journalist like me –
— building your own independent storytelling platform and your own audience is critical insurance in the world of work facing AI-rmageddon and apocalyptic layoffs. I wish I was better prepared for it when I took the plunge 4 years ago.
Over a 2-hour interactive live session, I will be sharing practical lessons I've learned the hard way with anyone who wants to build a livelihood as an independent, solo storyteller – whether as a side gig or as their full-time work.
If you find my work useful, share it with friends. And please support me by clicking one of the buttons below. Nothing is too small. Thanks!
