healing as a hashtag

Quacks, charlatans, posers, pharisees, pretenders.

Jesus Christ reserved some of his most scathing rebukes for spiritual leaders who cloaked themselves in authority while lacking the inner wholeness required to genuinely guide or heal. Too often, helping professionals—religious or secular—offer assistance without embodying the core qualities that make healing possible: empathy, congruence, and unconditional positive regard. These are not optional ideals; they are the holy trinity of client-centered care. Without them, help can become harm in disguise.

What does it truly take to become an expert? What qualifies someone to advise others? What makes a sage, a healer, a guide? These questions linger as I’ve observed a disturbing rise in quackery and charlatanism—not only among self-proclaimed healers but also among licensed professionals who exploit their credentials for personal gain or visibility. The lines between true guidance and performative help have blurred, especially an age of increasing social media influence, where anyone with a platform can brand themselves as a “coach,” “therapist,” or “spiritual guide.” Some such coaches and guides possess little or no formal training; others do hold degrees or licenses but use them to market shallow advice, packaged aesthetics, or commodified wellness rather than authentic care. Yet paradoxically I’ve also encountered individuals without conventional qualifications—no degrees, no official titles—who offer profoundly helpful insight, deep empathy, and genuine presence. In a culture obsessed with appearances and quick fixes, the ability to help seems increasingly disconnected from credentials, and more tied to a person’s integrity, humility, and willingness to do their own inner work.

The number of people qualified to treat mental and emotional disorders has risen alongside the number of those suffering from them. Therapists and churches appear on every street corner in America, many promising healing and hope—yet our culture has never seemed more spiritually or psychologically unwell. The National Institute of Mental Health estimates that approximately one in five Americans suffers from a diagnosable mental disorder each year, a finding echoed by the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health. As James Hillman and Michael Ventura aptly observed, We’ve Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy—and the World’s Getting Worse.

Those who seek help—often from a place of deep vulnerability—are not always met with compassion. Too many are mistreated or even abused by individuals who either lack the necessary insight or use their position to exploit. We’ve all seen the harm that corrupt authority can inflict, whether wielded by a parent, teacher, counselor, priest, or king. Jesus’s warning could not have been more severe: it would be better to have a millstone tied around one’s neck and be cast into the sea than to lead a vulnerable soul astray—especially one seeking truth, love, and the presence of God

physician, heal thyself

Consumers of mental health services need to know that it is not uncommon to encounter providers who, consciously or not, misuse the spiritual energy and introspective focus required for their own healing. Rather than doing their inner work, some externalize it—projecting unresolved conflicts onto their clients and, in doing so, cause harm. This is not a new phenomenon. For decades, psychoanalysts and psychologists have documented this recurring pitfall in the therapeutic relationship.

Swiss psychoanalyst Alice Miller explained:

“When [the patient]  presents material that fits the therapist’s knowledge, concepts, and skills, and therefore also his expectations, the patient satisfies his therapist’s wish for approval, echo, understanding, and for being taken seriously. In this way the therapist exercises the same sort of unconscious manipulation as that to which he was exposed as a child. A child can never see through unconscious manipulation. It is like the air he breathes; he knows no other, and it appears to him to be the only breathable air.”

“What happens if we don’t recognize the harmful quality of this air, even in adulthood? We will pass this harm on to others, while pretending that we are acting only for their own good. [. . .] This temptation to seek a parent out among our patients should not be underestimated; our own parents seldom or never listened to us with such rapt attention as our patients usually do, and they never revealed their inner world to us as clearly and honestly as do our patients at times. Only the never-ending work of mourning can help us from lapsing into the illusion that we have found the parent we once urgently needed–empathic and open, understanding and understandable, honest and available, helpful and loving, feeling, transparent, clear, without unintelligible contradictions. Such a parent was never ours, for a mother can react empathically only to the extent that she has become free of her own childhood; when she denies the vicissitudes of her early life, she wears invisible chains.

Alice Miller, The Drama of the Gifted Child, pp. 21-22

One reason we find it so easy to see the delusions of others is that we are practiced—expert, even—at deceiving ourselves. Jesus’s admonition to remove the beam from one’s own eye before addressing the splinter in another’s remains an urgent and humbling challenge. Our perception is shaped—distorted—by our own unresolved inner conflicts. That’s what makes it so easy to suspect, blame, or even confidently know that someone else is the problem. Sometimes they are. But just as often, we are projecting what we have not dared to face in ourselves. Each of us has been, can be, and surely will again be a deceiver—however earnestly we strive to live with purity of heart.

Because self-deception is so endemic to the human experience, I’ve learned to meet my judgments of others with suspicion. Over time, I’ve adopted a kind of inner reflex: whenever I catch myself accusing someone else, I turn that accusation inward. I begin with the assumption that I might be the real culprit. I am always the Prime Suspect—first on my own list of potential frauds. More often than not, when I react strongly to another’s misstep, I’m confronting some disowned aspect of myself that has slipped past the gates of consciousness, wearing a mask that looks like someone else.

Given this, I hope that both healing professionals and those who seek their care can approach the work of healing with sober reverence. The role of the healer is not one of superiority, but of sacred service—a vocation, not a performance. Anything less is a dangerous misuse of power, one that risks not only psychological harm to others, but spiritual consequences for the healer themselves. To stand in that space without humility is to invite a harsher judgment—not just from others, but from one’s own soul.

healing is a calling

To step into the role of healer is to step into one of the most ancient and archetypal patterns available to human beings. The mythic imagination has long recognized the profound risks and responsibilities involved in presuming to heal others—let alone succeeding at it. Figures like Asclepius and Chiron embody this sacred vocation and the paradoxes it entails.

The name Asclepius, the Greek god of medicine, is thought to derive from a root meaning “mole-hero”—a curious but evocative image. I find this symbolic resonance compelling: the mole, a creature who dwells underground, suggests the healer’s descent into the depths of the unconscious, tunneling between the visible world of symptoms and the hidden terrain of the soul. Healing, in this frame, is not simply a matter of surface-level remedy, but of deep excavation. Interestingly, some mole species are also aquatic, which adds another layer: water, often associated with the Mother, the unconscious, and the primordial unknown, reminds us that the healing journey is steeped in the archetypal feminine—those aspects of nourishment, mystery, and restoration we once needed from Mother and, in adulthood, can only receive through the transcendent function or the reconciled inner self. In this way, Asclepius serves as a symbol not only of healing, but of integration—between what is buried and what is conscious, between the divine and the human.

Chiron, too, bears immense symbolic weight. His name is linked to the Greek cheir, meaning “hand,” and perhaps to the dactyls—mythical beings associated with fingers, fire, and fertility. The Dactyls were chthonic smiths said to work the molten core of the earth, forging tools and gifts from raw elemental force. This imagery speaks to healing as a creative, alchemical process: the healer mines the ore of the true self, working it through pain and transformation until it can be brought into usable form. It is a labor of both descent and emergence, requiring the steadiness of a hand that knows how to hold fire without being consumed by it.

Chiron is often remembered as the Wounded Healer, a figure many in the helping professions identify with. His wound, incurable even to himself, reflects the painful paradox at the heart of so much healing work: that our own injuries often become the openings through which we can help others. But I believe Chiron’s truest power lies not just in his woundedness, but in his sacrifice. Though immortal, he chose to surrender his life to free Prometheus and restore fire to humanity. In that act, Chiron becomes a Christ-like figure—a mediator between suffering and salvation, between mortal limits and divine grace. His example suggests that the calling to heal is not about personal mastery, but about a willingness to give oneself in service of something larger, something sacred.

finding a therapist

Because the road to wholeness is fraught with perils—not the least of which is finding a legitimate healer—the person seeking help must approach the process with discernment. In other words, the seeker must separate the wheat from the chaff. Drawing again from the work of Alice Miller, here is a thoughtful list of questions to consider when evaluating a potential therapist:

1. What made them choose their profession?

2. What is their personal and professional background?

3. What did they do before becoming a healer?

4. Can they put me in contact with people they have demonstrably provided with lasting help?

5. Is the therapist transparent, fair-minded, and willing to be on my team?

6. How does the therapist handle criticism?

7. Can the therapist admit inconsistencies?

8. What is the therapist’s behavior when they have erred?

9. Does the therapist promise me results that are realistic, or impossible?

10. Does this person seem likely, from what they have said, to respect my personal autonomy?

A therapist doesn’t need to be perfect—but they should be humble, accountable, and engaged in their own inner work. Healing is sacred territory. It requires not only skill, but integrity. The right guide will not save you—but they can walk beside you with clarity, compassion, and courage, helping you uncover the healing that was always,in some form, your own.

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further reading

How to Choose a Competent Counselor. Martha Ainsworth, 1999.

“How do I find a good therapist?” American Psychological Association, 2017. Page offers a .pdf article that can be saved or printed.

“The importance of finding a good therapist–and why it’s so difficult.” David Oliver, USA Today, 2021.

notes

Miller, Alice. The Drama of the Gifted Child: The Search for the True Self. New York: Perennial, 1997.