Therapy is not a one-click service. And treating it like one is dangerous.

A recent article in the latest issue of Therapy Today explores the shift toward the commodification of therapy and how the sector is responding to it.

What stayed with me most was not the trend itself, but the lack of critique around it—particularly the framing of this shift as a potential opportunity for “growth,” without fully questioning who that growth ultimately serves.

We live in a one-click culture:

Same-day delivery. Dates within a mile radius. Food in 20 minutes. A cab in 2.

Speed has become the norm. Friction feels intolerable.

And now, therapy is being pulled into that same logic:

Membership models. Fast matching. Mental health MOTs. “Results” on demand.

But therapy is not a product.

Demand ≠ Need

I believe there’s a dangerous confusion happening: demand is being mistaken for genuine need.

Just because we want something fast it doesn’t mean it’s what will help us heal and grow.

The cost of fast therapy

A “fast-therapy” mindset leaves no room for:

• Frustration

• Rupture and repair

• Slow trust-building

• Staying when it’s uncomfortable

Yet these are often where the work actually happens.

Dopamine vs Healing

The dopamine hit we’re chasing—

quick relief, instant reassurance, fast results— is often the opposite of what supports growth.

Healing is rarely efficient. And it’s almost never linear.

Accessibility matters.Demystifying therapy matters.Meeting people where they are matters.

But making therapy faster and more palatable is not the same as making it more accessible.

Growth for whom?

The article doesn’t frame this shift as straightforwardly positive.

It does acknowledge the challenges and dilemmas of a rapidly changing landscape.

But what felt missing was a deeper critique—not just of how we respond to these trends, but of whether some of them may be actively harmful, not only to practitioners’ integrity and profits, but to people’s mental health.

Using tech with intention

AI, social media, and the tech shaping our culture are here to stay.

Of course we can’t just bury our heads in the sand, but we can choose how we respond.

Not to:

• Bend endlessly to trends

• Chase engagement at all costs

• Replicate the pace of a fast, harmful culture

Choosing depth in a fast world

Therapy doesn’t have to mirror the culture that burns us out and brings us to therapy in the first place.

It can be one of the few places

where slowness, depth, and relationship are still allowed, and modelled.

We need to be honest about what it takes to grow and heal:

time, patience, discomfort, and the courage to stay even, and especially, when it’s hard.