Therapy and user-experience design

Blocks and pain points

In Neurosis and Human Growth, the psychoanalyst Karen Horney claims that if unobstructed, human beings are inclined towards self-realization. The role of a therapist is therefore to help identify and remove their patient’s points of resistance, enabling them to mature naturally, rather than by trying to change their character or behavior.

In user-experience design, these “points of resistance” are referred to as “pain points,” and it is a central responsibility of the designer to identity and understand the pain points experienced by their users because they represent opportunities for improvement. These opportunities are traditionally ideated on, before selecting the most promising idea to design, prototype, and test.

Show the way, but don’t steer

I believe what makes a good designer is the same approach that makes a good therapist. Akin to how good teachers direct the attention and curiosity of their students while ensuring they learn the lessons themselves, good designers and therapists are effective at guiding people to clearly identify their points of resistance, and in doing so, help them to uncover their own solution.

To accomplish this, designers and therapists must first establish a compassionate, empathetic, and nonjudgemental space where people can share authentic experiences, and have their experiences affirmed. Each uses open-ended questioning, active listening, and emotional attunement, without introducing bias.

These strategies are necessary because it’s impossible to truly know the emotions and experiences of another. Nobody can ever truly step into someone else’s shoes. Only the individual can be an expert of themselves. They are who best understands their challenges, environment, needs, goals, desires, and all the complex intricacies that make up their daily life. It is with this knowledge that the individual can craft the best solution, one which takes all of themselves into consideration.

Build from within

That is why the best solutions are those people create for themselves. Anything externally imposed, or else made for many people, will inevitably fall short. Understanding the nuances of one’s own experiences is what makes a solution fit naturally into their lived experience—because it was made from their lived experience.

Good designers and therapists understand this. Which is they they impart their tools, mindsets, and knowledge onto others, cultivating the efficacy necessary for individuals to apply those resources within their daily lives, uncovering solutions that exists within them already.

Sources

The Gift of Therapy, Irvin D. Yalom The Timeless Way of Building, Christopher Alexander