I think you are right. It is different for everyone. For me, I guess the real work of therapy was taking what I was learning about myself, about communication, about whatever and actually using it and applying it on my own outside of session. If I left all of that isolated to my therapist's office, then I was just spinning my wheels. I needed to do more than just talk about it; until I actively worked to utilize and eventually internalize all of that talk, the real work, for me, didn't really begin. It was outside of session that I did the real work.