[FirePhoenix]

So, I recently started going back to therapy (my sixth therapist now), and at the end of our first session, she gave me a homework assignment.

I went away to a university for two years, but transferred to a community college for multiple reasons, including finances and just overall hating the experience I had at that university.

She wants me come to our next session with 3 positive things I learned from experiences I had while I was off at college. Honestly, I can't even come up with one. The entire experience was bad, and I told her that. I don't understand why she's having me do this - I left for quite a few reasons, after all. I don't think I'm being pessimistic about it; I can't think of a single positive thing I learned.

Why would a therapist give out homework that simply isn't possible to do?

[HealingTimes]

Because it is possible to do.
The positive could be that you realised uni wasn't what you thought it might be and youtransferred instead of putting up with that situation.

Its certainly not impossible to do and it is important to find some answers. Dont give up just because it is a little bit hard. Did you make any friends at uni? Learn any life skills?

[elliemay]

Originally Posted by FirePhoenix

So, I recently started going back to therapy (my sixth therapist now), and at the end of our first session, she gave me a homework assignment.

I went away to a university for two years, but transferred to a community college for multiple reasons, including finances and just overall hating the experience I had at that university.

She wants me come to our next session with 3 positive things I learned from experiences I had while I was off at college. Honestly, I can't even come up with one. The entire experience was bad, and I told her that. I don't understand why she's having me do this - I left for quite a few reasons, after all. I don't think I'm being pessimistic about it; I can't think of a single positive thing I learned.

Why would a therapist give out homework that simply isn't possible to do?

I know you want people to understand how horrible it was. I get that and do hear you loud and clear. You DO have a right to be heard on this issue. Misery merits compassion and should be met with empathy.

However, finding the good in it is absolutely is possible to do. Even the fact that you took the initiative to get out of the situation is a good thing about your time there.

There are always gifts even out of the worst things. Developing a sense of gratitude for those gifts can be a powerful step in promoting overall sense of well being.

[stopdog]

I would ask the therapist what the point was.

[A Red Panda]

I get how you're feeling about it. And about how frustrating T homework can be. I've let me T know loud and clear how much I've hated the things he's had me fill out and do -and how they have NOT been beneficial to me and have instead created a lot more stress.

I hated my university experience. I learned pretty much nothing academically and have zero respect for my degrees.

However. There were positives to being there. 1. I learned how I could actually feel content with my life. That happened for the first time when I was at uni as I was away from my family. 2. I tested my own resolve by staying and I passed that. 3. I paid my own way through it, and I am proud of that. 4. During those years, I challenged myself to try new foods. And discovered that I loved them.

None of them had to do much with the university itself, but during my time there I was having new experiences and things that I liked.

[Perna]

I think as A Red Panda hints, there is more to the experience than just that experience. I think your T is probably trying to broaden your thinking about your life so it is not just the experience; that is not all that was going on in your life, you were eating, sleeping, taking classes you may have passed so that you were further along at the community college when you got there than you would have been if you had had to start from scratch, etc.

I am impressed that you recognized you were miserable and did something about it! Not everyone does that, some just drop out or quit or keep going even though they hate it, etc. I think your T is trying to get you to see that your life is yours, individual, and wider than any one experience you have while in it.

Forget about what you "learned" at first, just make a list of all the experiences you can think of, the little memories (even if they are horrible) and then rank order them. Somewhere in there you will remember how good a cup of coffee tasted when you had been up all night studying or a joke someone told in the study room/a class that you enjoyed or a moment sitting under a tree in the commons when things were almost good, etc. If nothing else, you learned the sun comes up in the morning?

[(JD)]

You weren't excited to go at first, or eager for the trip or experience at all? You did not meet anyone you liked, or spoke to? None of your professors nor staff were nice to you at all? The University wasn't well cared for, pleasant to walk? There were no hang out places/restaurants that you enjoyed? You didn't like your clothes nor books nor the classrooms?

Therapy is work. This is to try and get your brain out of seeing only negative things and to try and retrain it to see the good in each experience... and for the T to help see where you are. (She may have other reasons too.)