🌊 The River Between Us: A Journey into Therapy
Written by David Bolander
Date: August 29, 2025
When people ask what therapy is like, I often reach for metaphors. Not because the process is vague, but because it’s rich—layered with emotion, movement, and meaning. One metaphor that’s stayed with me comes from my years as a professional actor: the actor as a boat on a river, navigating the terrain of a script with curiosity and courage. Therapy, too, is a river. And you, the client, are the vessel.
🎠The Actor’s River
Acting taught me how to inhabit a moment—how to listen with my whole body, respond with emotional truth, and stay present in the face of complexity. You receive a script and begin to internalize its flow: where the banks narrow, where the rapids surge, where stillness invites reflection. You encounter emotional blocks, character contradictions, and moments of vulnerability. A director may offer a map, but the journey is collaborative. The structure of the script holds you, even as you take creative risks. You trust the process. You know you won’t get lost.
These lessons didn’t disappear when I stepped off the stage. They became part of my therapeutic stance. In session, I’m still listening for rhythm, for emotional cues, for the unsaid. I practice presence—not as performance, but as care.
🛶 The Counseling River
Therapy invites a similar kind of navigation. You arrive with your own story—sometimes well-worn, sometimes barely spoken. Together, we begin to explore the river of your emotional life. We notice where the current pulls, where turbulence arises, and where the banks feel safe or confining.
As your therapist, I’m not the captain—I’m the guide. I may not know the specifics of your terrain, but I’m committed to traveling it with you. I listen for the shape of your river, the emotional contours that only you can name. At the same time, I’ve learned to recognize patterns in the current—loops, eddies, and undercurrents that might be hard to see from inside the boat. Part of my role is to gently name these patterns, to help you link moments that feel disconnected, and to bring awareness to the emotional choreography beneath the surface.
We collaborate. We explore. We honor the structure of the therapeutic process—its rhythms and rituals—so that you can take bold emotional risks, knowing you won’t get lost.
🌬️ An Invitation to Begin
If therapy is a river, then each person’s current is uniquely shaped—by memory, by emotion, and by the terrain they’ve traveled. You don’t need to have it all mapped out. You don’t even need to know the destination.
You’re invited to gently dip your toes into the water and simply ask:
What does my river feel like today?
What patterns might be waiting just beneath the surface?
I’m here to travel with you.