Goals in therapy

Do you have goals that you and your therapist have discussed and agreed upon?
How do goals work in your therapy?
For example, do you focus on that goal and discuss it or is it just something known but you don't really focus on?

Ex-T and I didn't have goals. Well, when we terminated she said there were goals, but I was never informed. They were dumb anyways. One was med management. That's not an issue of mine, so I don't know why that was a goal.

New T and I have discussed goals. She typed them up and we both signed them. They're long-term goals like self-motivation, coping with motherhood, working on fears, utilizing cognitive coping skills, coping with grief of ex-T abandoning me, etc. She said we will check in over time to see how I'm progressing. I don't know if we will work on them directly. We've only just began actual therapy (was going over history before).

I voted other. Not specifically. Not like we sat down and composed a list of goals. But it was clear we both had some goals in mind -- more less just understood between us. They were flexible and ever-evolving as needed. My therapy was always focused on reaching those goals; however, the target kept moving at times due to circumstances in life.

Psychodynamic T and I had vague long term goals.

CBT T is very specific….we even have micro goals that lead to the larger goals. I find it helpful, but it probably sounds paternalistic to others.

I had reasons for going and the first one I see was useless about them. I use her now to say things to that it would not be good to say in general society or to keep some of my reactions away from the medical establishment treating my loved one.

We set larger goals at the start of therapy. We discussed what I want to accomplish with therapy. A better self esteem and things like that. And then there are smaller goals. But we are not too focused on that. And I glad with that. I get homework, but I can also just talk in the session, not only focused on the goals.

We had goals to start with, mainly about managing my panic disorder, generalized anxiety, and OCD. We focused on those in the beginning. But over the past 3.5 years, other things have come up, including current stuff and childhood stuff, that we've dealt with. So I can't really say we're focusing on those goals now, except that my anxiety impacts many areas of my life, so we are still addressing that. I think goals are good in the beginning, but they should be flexible.

We have had a few goals along the way, but mostly it's an evolving, fluid process that changes to focus on what I need at the time.

The second one has never said a word about goals either.

I put other as I believe my T has goals for me when I am ready, but I care less about them at the moment. I remember one specific situation in which I was talking about having a lit of anxiety about something and she said "well we can have a goal about having less anxiety, when you are ready to work on it.". As usual I brushed it off as that's just who I am and she just said that to get what I want from therapy, I need to work on changing the parts of me I don't like. The only problem is that I have no motivation to change who I am.

My goal is to make everyone think I am stable and happy. At this point in my life, I am just too tired to keep fighting.

Right now we have daily/weekly functioning goals and I check them off as I go. I was in such bad shape that I needed this to take my meds, eat, sleep, try to learn to care for myself. I have checklists like "eat breakfast," "take meds," "wash dishes." It sounds childish and stupid but I was so non-functional a few months ago I kept wondering how I was alive.

I don't have a specific goal per se but in general yes there are things I have hard time managing and I need some help in those areas. That's what I am working on

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aside of general support, I was seeing most recent T specifically for csa and trauma, so those were our goals. we talked about it regularly, and how to address it so that I felt I got further this round than I had in the past...