It’s been a while, hasn’t it?
The kind of while that stretches in memory, layered with all the things unsaid and the silence that wasn’t quite contemplative.
I could offer you the usual litany of explanations -life happened, chaos unfolded, the therapist needed therapy, people gifted me planners, etc, etc– but you and I both know that our resistances are always more interesting than our compliance! *wink wink*
So let’s just say I was busy being human, with my spectacularly ordinary humanness.
But you’re here. And I’m here.
And there’s something almost redemptive about that, right?
So where do we start… perhaps, from the beginnings!
Three Humans Walk Into L&F…
Lost and Found has grown!! Not in the Shark Tank way- scale! expand! multiply! * eww *
But in the way a thought expands when we finally find the words for it- with intent, clarity and hope.
Three brilliant therapists have joined the L&F fold, and they’ve brought with them their own unique presence, clinical depth, and a capacity to listen to the unformed.
If you’ve been with me through the onboarding process, you’d know that it isn’t their CV (which I did not open till very late in the process) or the credentials (though those matter, obviously), it is their ability to make the patient think that drew me in!
It’s Shruti’s ability to hear what one’s not saying, Mihika’s attunement with the patterns one’s drawn to like a moth to flame, and Akshita’s capacity hold the contradictions one brings to the clinic- I want to change but I’m terrified of changing, I need closeness but closeness feels unbearable, I know what I should do but I can’t seem to do it. It’s reassuring to witness their work.
You know where to find them, right?! (→ here)
And, here’s the thing about having a team, it splits you in ways you cannot fully get a grip of. Suddenly I’m not just the therapist in the room- I’m also the supervisor trying to hold someone else’s clinical uncertainty, the colleague debating theory over chai, the person who has to remember that payroll exists. This multiplication of roles is disorienting, and seldom confusing for everyone. But it’s also, and I’m surprised to admit this, deeply joyful. There’s something profoundly un-lonely about it.
also, I can finally use ‘we’ in my writings without it referring to just me and Anar!
What else?!… LinkedIn!
Ahh, we’ve been conducting experiments on our LinkedIn.
I spent days scrolling through that damn platform of performance and envy, wondering if I’m doing life wrong. Like it’s 9am and I haven’t achieved anything today?!!
Why can’t I just fall in love with LinkedIn, like a ‘normal professional’?, I have questioned myself periodically.
The closest I have come to an answer is, for me, it feels like showing up to a costume party in my athleisure- vaguely embarrassing, and set up for failure.
That blue thing is the superego’s canvas, where every post feels demanded by a particular gaze- thou must perform unambiguous professional virtues, and garnish it with the obligatory humility. *in robotic voice*
So well, we’ve decided to move away from the “thrilled to announce, delightful to share, humbled to reflect”, to the “you know what?!”. About failures. About reckonings. About wonderments. About being a therapist at a strange organisation called “Lost and Found?”. Our LinkedIn is the pre-ChatGPT era inviting you to read and think, not read and applaud! * eww, never *
Lastly, we’re soon to be three!!!
Three years of this thing we’ve built… half by intention, half by accident that happened between me and you. Every time someone wrote to me “I thought I was the only one who felt that way” or ”You made me think of this paper I read…” or “I didn’t get you?!”, something became more than mine.
So the plan is to curate something to mark three years that actually acknowledges this inevitable collaboration. It wouldn’t be a celebration for its own sake, but a gesture toward the fact that ideas only live between people. That psychoanalysis, at its best, is a dialogue, not a monologue. That there’s a corner for everyone in this field.
Details are coming soon!
Meanwhile, is three too young or too old to be where we are?! *enters anxiety*
| Postscript You might be wondering where I’ve been. The truth is- here, but not here. Writing, but not writing. Caught in what I can only experientially describe as literary psychosis- repeating and binding stories in my head, that only I can see.You probably weren’t holding your breath waiting for this newsletter, which makes it easier to return with quality, over simple noise. There’s freedom in that- in returning without fanfare, in writing because you have something to say!Perhaps, it’s my way of saying, Thank you for reading… for being patient with the gaps. Thank you for staying long enough, with the good enough. |
| P.S. If you’re looking for a therapist, our roster has expanded. New minds, new possibilities. Check the details. P.P.S. Anardana says ‘hello!’ as she basks in the sun and uninterrupted omnipotence… already working on the next newsletter! |
