This month feels quietly significant for me. I’m turning 39.
Not because of the number itself, but because of what it represents, a decade of stretching, questioning, rebuilding, and becoming.
Nearly ten years ago I made a decision that, at the time, felt both exciting and unsettling: I went back to being a student. And in many ways, I never really stopped.
Since then, I’ve spent years studying, training, questioning what I thought I knew, and allowing my understanding of people, psychology, and growth to deepen. I’ve stepped into lecture halls and training rooms where I sometimes felt intimidated. I’ve studied while balancing family life, work, and the ongoing evolution of my own identity.
If you’ve ever chosen growth while holding many roles in your life, you’ll know it’s not always neat or comfortable.
But it is transformative.
This month I also completed my Postgraduate Certificate in CBT.
For someone whose therapeutic foundation is in Psychosynthesis, this was a stretch. Psychosynthesis taught me to sit with depth – to listen for the meaning beneath a symptom, to honour the whole person and their inner world.
CBT invited me somewhere different.
Structure. Clear agendas. Formulations. A focus on the present problem and measurable change.
At first, I wondered how these worlds would sit together. Could depth and structure coexist?
What I discovered surprised me.
Structure can be deeply containing.
Clarity reduces suffering.
Naming patterns often brings relief.
And evidence and empathy are not opposites.
The longer I do this work, the more I see how often we try to choose sides, in therapy, and in life.
Insight or action.
Emotion or logic.
Reflection or change.
But what if growth doesn’t live in choosing?
What if it lives in integration?
At 39, I feel less interested in deciding which approach is “right,” and more curious about how different perspectives can enrich one another.
Depth and direction.
Soul and science.
Exploration and intervention.
The real work, I’m learning, is learning to hold both.
Perhaps maturity is not about certainty, but about the capacity to hold complexity without rushing to simplify it.
And maybe the same question applies to all of us.
Where in your life are you trying to choose sides, when what you might really need is integration?
This birthday feels less like a milestone and more like the beginning of another chapter. A quiet reminder that becoming doesn’t stop.
If anything, it deepens.
