The Myth of “Fixing Yourself”

It is almost impossible to scroll through social media, walk through a bookstore, or drive around the city without seeing an overwhelming amount of self-help and self-improvement messaging. In a culture that constantly encourages “bettering yourself,” it’s easy to believe that healing means fixing something that’s broken inside of us. These messages often imply that once we work hard enough, heal enough, or simply try enough strategies, we’ll finally arrive at a version of ourselves that doesn’t struggle. A version that is “fixed.”

But what if that idea is part of the problem?

Imagine, you’re cooking dinner when the smoke alarm starts going off. Yelling at it, unplugging it, or blaming it for being too sensitive isn’t going to stop the alarm from going off. The alarm isn’t broken, it is merely doing its job. 

Many people come to therapy believing something is fundamentally wrong with them: “Why can’t I just be happier?”; “Other people seem to manage life better than I do”; “If I heal enough, I won’t feel this way anymore”; “Something is wrong with me.”

From a therapeutic perspective, these thoughts often reflect learned beliefs, not truths. Our emotional responses, coping strategies, and patterns didn’t just appear randomly. They developed as intelligent and creative adaptations to our experiences, relationships, and environments.

What we label as “problems” are often survival strategies that once served a purpose. These strategies did exactly what they were meant to do. They helped us survive. Over time, however, they can become misunderstood as personal flaws, leading to frustration and self-criticism rather than curiosity and compassion.

In therapy, we often shift the focus from changing who you are to changing how you relate to yourself. 

Rather than asking, “How do I get rid of this part of me?” we might ask, “What is this part trying to protect me from?”

This reframing allows space for self-compassion instead of self-criticism, understanding instead of judgment, integration instead of elimination. 

Healing doesn’t mean your anxiety disappears forever. It means you recognize it sooner, respond to it differently, and treat yourself more gently when it shows up. Healing becomes less about repair and more about connection. Connection to your emotions, your nervous system, and the parts of yourself that learned to cope in the only ways they knew how. 

The goal isn’t to fix you, because you were never broken. The goal of therapy is to support you in becoming more fully yourself so that you can live with greater flexibility, self-trust, and resilience rather than striving to eliminate every struggle. Healing doesn’t have an endpoint where life becomes effortless. Instead, it’s an ongoing process of learning how to care for yourself through change, challenge, and uncertainty.

You don’t need to become someone else to heal. You don’t need to fix yourself to be worthy of support.

Sometimes the most meaningful growth happens when we stop trying to fix who we are and start getting curious about why we are the way we are. If you find yourself feeling stuck in the pressure to improve, therapy can be a place to slow down, explore your inner world, and redefine what healing means for you.