There are many nuances in life and few clear answers. I often find myself somewhere between reflective and pensive. Although they both imply the same action, they are subtly different. Reflective is more about thought and pensive about the emotional response to that thought.

Today we hear a lot of urging to seek therapy, help with our emotions. Counseling is recommended and sometimes even court ordered. It remains a foreign concept to me, nothing I would be interested in doing. Emotional advice? No, I don’t think that would work, at least not with me.

There are those folks that are susceptible to such things as therapy or indoctrination, whichever you choose to call it. I’m not one of them; my mind isn’t easily changed. Yeah, some call it being stubborn or ignorant. I tend to stay the course, as the saying goes.

My thinking is that those easily swayed fail to understand the difference between pensive and reflective. Those folks tend to rush to the response, feeling a need to act immediately. The reflective person does not. You cannot change the past, but you can reflect upon it, learn from it.

Of course, being reflective involves being pensive. You do have to guard against getting stuck there, in that pensive state. It’s depressing. It’s the reason so many therapies involve taking chemicals to alter your “mood.” Yeah, I’m happy now.

I’m quite certain there are professionals that offer a far more complicated explanation than I am offering, those with their degrees in psychology and sociology. I’ve only had a discussion with one of those professionals and I wasn’t impressed.

In fact, I offended him by asking him who decided on his mental state. That was in response to him asking me, do you have any questions? He assured me he was peer reviewed. It was an interview before being assigned to being a Navy recruiter. I got the job.

My thinking is this. People are looking for someone or somewhere to place the blame. If I attend counseling, have sessions with a professional and do as I’m told, I have someone to blame. The professional is protected by saying, it wasn’t a failure on their part, it was a relapse. More therapy is recommended.

The objective of therapy is to redirect the response to pensive thinking, alter that emotional response. I believe you don’t need a therapist for that. All you need to do is understand the difference between the two. A state I call, reality. Or, as the kids say today, get real! Same as, get over it!