Therapy Rocks! | 2025 Therapy Predictions

And the Body Doesn't Keep the Score..

Welcome to the first Therapy Sucks! of 2025. You might have noticed that this is actually titled Therapy Rocks! Which leads me right into my 2025 predictions.

In 2025 therapy will face a growing backlash.

If you haven’t noticed yet there is a growing backlash against therapy and the limits of therapy. The last several years we have experienced a growing therapization (is that a word?) of people and our culture. There was some logic that if we could figure out our diagnosis then all would be well. Well, if you haven’t noticed, all this IG and TikTok therapizing has not made things any better, and people are going to start looking for someone to blame. Sorry therapy. This is nothing new (see Foucault, Laing, Szaz, Fanon) but with the acceleration of social media and our culture in general it will seem like a tidal wave of shit about how therapy is a form of social control (yes, it can be), doesn’t work (not true), is white/euro centered (true, but so is your critique), etc. Expect new podcasts and social media sites doing critique 101 on therapy in 2025. In this spirit, since I am counter-culture by nature, I have changed the name of my bi-weekly round-up from Therapy Sucks! to Therapy Rocks! That’ll show em.

Growing backlash against “woke therapy.”

Recently a friend let me in on the fact that he was a member of a large and growing secret Facebook group of “anti-woke” therapists. I was disappointed to hear this, but I didn’t cancel him. And just last week I saw a post on LinkedIn where an “anti-woke” therapist made a rather poor critique of “woke therapists” who charge $150 to the supposed oppressed (I charge $200 to make the invisible visible, buddy). We should not be surprised that what is playing out in the larger culture is also now playing out in therapy culture. Expect these “anti-woke” therapists to get more vocal as the year progresses.

Side Note: I’ve been getting hate about my stuff for years. Much of it anonymous. But there is a growing dichotomy I am personally experiencing. Now I am critiqued for either being too woke, or not woke enough. Which has me thinking about one of my intellectual hero’s Bruno Latour. Latour who was accused of either being a social constructionist or a positivist. He was probably doing something right..

AI will change therapy and therapists.

If you haven’t yet, you should read my post If Your Therapy Practice is "Evidence-Based," AI Will Replace You. AI is rapidly changing all fields including therapy. The Better Help’s of the world are discovering how hard it is to scale a capitalist endeavour that requires good therapists. I get headhunters texting me or emailing me all the time. AI will solve this labor problem. For example, influencers are selling companionship with their AI avatars for a dollar a minute. Several months ago 23 yo influencer Caryn Marjorie had over 20k boyfriends via her avatar and was expected to make 5 million a month. It’s probably more now. Expect all sorts of AI avatars doing therapy in the near future.

The slow demise of psychedelic psychotherapy

At the outset much of the psychedelic psychotherapy movement was venture capital funded. And VC’s expect a return on capital, a large return. After a few years now they are running into the same problems around scale (and regulatory stuff). You will begin to see VC’s close out their positions in these endeavors and many will begin to fold. And for those smaller private operations you will see private equity come calling in an effort to roll-up the privates for a payday down the road. None of this is promising for the industry.

Instant psychology and sociology will continue to grow

Wondering what Instant Psychology and Instant Sociology (and Instant Revisonism) are? Read this article Beyond Critique I wrote with J. D’Arrigo. As our world continues to accelerate and we abandon mediation, and as TikTok and Instagram continue their world domination, expect a lot of reductionist psychology and sociology takes. Just add the critical ones to the mix.

The demise of the 50 minute therapy session.

Catching a theme yet? In out culture of increasing acceleration one casualty will be the traditional 50 minute therapy session. Nobody has time for that now. How it will change is yet to be seen, but therapists might offer a sort of “concierge” service where they are “on call” during the week. Or to push back on the isolating and individualizing nature of acceleration, therapists might offer something more in-person and communal? We will see, but hope for some creative responses.

The abandonment of therapy education programs

If you haven’t read it, please read my article The Demise of Modern Therapist Education. In a nut shell, people will continue to abandon the tuition based and license driven institutions for more creative ways of helping and healing. (See An Encyclopedia of Radical Helping launched in 2024). People are adopting more creative ways of helping without incurring hundreds of thousands of dollars in student loan debt. Expect more of this. And continuing the acceleration theme, the time required to actually get licensed will increasingly seem like climbing Mt. Everest. Twice.

Tech feudalism overrides capitalism

As a “woke therapist” I have become well versed in critiquing capitalism and its effects on those seeking my help. But there is a new danger afoot, and in some ways I think we might be focusing too much on late stage capitalism, rather than Tech Feudalism. Tech feudalism refers to a system where a small number of powerful technology companies dominate key aspects of modern life, much like feudal lords controlled land and resources during medieval times. Tech feudalism describes the monopolistic control, exploitation, and dependency created by these corporations, often at the expense of individuals, smaller businesses, and democratic institutions. Just watch the daily machinations of Elon, Bezos, Zukerberg, Sam Altman and their collaboration with Trump and it’s not hard to see this change coming. Therapists and therapy will need to adjust to how this new mode of existence will shape peoples lives.

Cracks in Trauma Culture

For better or worse, the same critical spirit I mentioned earlier, will be turned on the trauma industrial complex in 2025. You’re already seeing examples in late 2024 like this take down on what The Body Keeps the Score gets wrong. Here the writer explains how The Body Keeps the Score stigmatizes survivors, blames victims, and depoliticizes violence. While masquerading as care for survivors, it creates a hierarchy in which marginalized victims are even more marginalized. And it may be giving people inaccurate information about the impact of trauma. I don’t know, I’ve never read it. Or this wonderful interview I did with Dr. Catherine Liu who is quite critical of trauma culture and has a new book on the subject coming out in 2025. Someone smart will critique the pyramid scheme nature of many trauma informed treatments and their exploitation of therapists who want to be helpful. More to come in 2025.

Well those are my predictions for 2025. I was wrestling with something on GLP 1’s and their effects on the field but the complexity has me thinking I might tackle that one in longer form. Thank you for coming along with me here at Substack and I hope to deliver compelling ideas to you in 2025.

Happy New Year. Peace.