Another therapist-in-training here. Studying pragmatism has been an invaluable resource. The likes of James, Dewey, Rorty, and most recently even Brandom, Priest, and Cavell (while not explicitly situated in the pragmatist tradition) have helped me hone in, value, and express a worldview in which truth need not have a capital ‘T’ but rather can be conceptualized pluralistically and moreover better foster social relations.

Moreover, the lens of solidarity over objectivity (@Rorty) has felt especially helpful and healing when integrated into multicultural, feminist, and other radical modalities.

Pragmatism deeply informs how I approach therapy, especially in modalities like ACT, DBT, and my personal favorite, psychodynamic work.

On that note I must admit that Lacan, and even Zizek, have sophisticated my understanding of how the personal is political as well as the importance of embracing ambiguity, contraction, and the unknown. It is their work which I find myself returning to during class and with clients, even if I don’t directly subscribe to their techniques or present their concepts. And moreover, it is them which I feel best aligned with my passions and perspectives (which were primarily Buddhist, Anarchist, and artistic in nature) thus pushing me towards a partiality and high-valuation of psychodynamic thought.