How to fix Amazing Amy’s soul?

So, after Amy came back to her husband it was obvious she needed therapy. I mean, I’m not a real psychologist, but I really, really want to be a true friend for Amy. I want her to feel comforted, like actually valued for her real self, and feel proud of who she is, because, yeah, she messed up but she’s still a human being. Every human has these moments of weakness, moments when you’re super vulnerable, a lot of them coming from childhood stuff that looks “small” but then, with the years, it grows in your head like this huge monster.

In the first meeting I had with Amy she came in all high and mighty, super elegant —like always— with this cold, calculating look. She was totally judging me and testing me every single second of that first conversation. At the end of the day she just wants someone she can be herself with, someone she can be genuine with, so she can finally start hugging that real Amy and leave Amazing Amy, you know, behind. Every look she gave me felt kinda condescending, like I was too dumb to understand her or to even try to put myself in her shoes. She looked at me like she already knew I was gonna disappoint her, like all the other people in her life.

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Amy’s pain comes from being this “corrected” version of herself

I told her:

“Amy, you don’t have to be the Amazing one with me, you just have to be you—with your strengths, your talents, your flaws, your vulnerabilities. With me you don’t have to pretend you’re fine, pretend it doesn’t hurt what happened, pretend you don’t have this knot in your throat that doesn’t go away even with a glass of water, pretend your dreams aren’t so violent and you aren’t that defenseless little girl again. All of that is allowed here. You don’t have to be someone else or act like someone else. Just be yourself, don’t be afraid of messing up, that’s why we’re here, to learn on the way.”

And right in that moment it was the first time I saw something human in her. Her eyes got watery, like for the first time ever she thinks someone can actually look inside her without judging or condemning her.

After that first meeting, we focused on finding the origin of the whole mess that made Amy develop this malignant narcissistic thing and the histrionic disorder, which made her super manipulative and also full of resentment toward people. And, yeah, a vengeful woman too. Talking with her I realized nobody ever asked her what she really wanted, what her true interests were. Her parents just ignored the Amy they had at home and kinda erased her until they got this corrected version of their own daughter.

Amy feels like this very tiny woman, like she has to constantly compete with a version of herself that’s always gonna be Amazing and Perfect on paper. A version that never makes mistakes and that she, even trying her absolute best, can’t reach and definitely can’t surpass. With every book her parents wrote she felt like they slapped her. She felt less loved, less valued, less appreciated every time. And that’s where her parents messed up—forcing her to be something she could never match in real life.

Amy: If I'm not Amazing, they won't see me

Behind that gorgeous figure, that cold-as-ice-ish vibe, all that superiority and condescendence, there’s this big fear hiding. Like this unimaginable terror of being ordinary, of not matching what people expect from her. Her sense of reality is totally broken, you know? If she’s not what people think she is, then she feels she’s nothing, like her life doesn’t matter. My whole intention was to show her that we can be important to people around us even with tiny good actions. They don’t have to be amazing.

Little acts of kindness—like rescuing a hurt kitten, or helping an old lady cross the street, or offering food to someone who needs it—those things have so much more value than whatever you can put in a children’s book. I wanted her to see that even if the book told something that wasn’t totally true, not everything in it had to be unreachable. There’s like 10 billion people in the world (more or less) and most of us are good, we’re helpful, we care about the people around us. That already makes us kinda wonderful.

After weeks talking she finally opened up and told me everything she did—running from her home, pretending Nick tried to kill her—was a cry for help. A desperate scream just to make someone look at her. She felt neglected. Nick just used her for sex and didn’t give her any quality time, didn’t take care of her or her feelings. Hearing her say that… honestly I felt so proud because it feels like we’re on the right path to heal her and maybe help her be, you know, a real integrated person in society someday.

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Thank you for It’s a Wonderful Life, Frank Capra

So as part of my “therapy”—yes, in quotation marks because, like I said, I'm not a shrink, I just wanna be a friend helping another friend recognize her mistakes and how to work through her traumas—I remembered It’s a Wonderful Life (1946). The Frank Capra movie. I asked her if she knew about this film and, surprise, she said no, she hadn’t seen it. So I rented it and put it in the blu-ray player for us to watch together. At first she didn’t really get the idea, she thought it was just another Christmas movie (and yes I know it’s November but whatever, I love Christmas movies). I told her it wasn’t “just another one,” that it had this beautiful message.

I wanted her to see for herself that we all make mistakes, we all do things we don’t wanna do, that life sometimes pushes us onto rocky paths that shake us emotionally. And sometimes we just can’t see how good our life actually is, how many valuable things we already have. When the movie ended I asked her a few questions:

• Q: Did you like the movie?
• A: Yeah, I liked it a lot, I really didn’t know it, but watching it made me feel peace and this closeness…I hadn’t felt before.
• Q: What do you think about George Bailey?
• A: At first I thought he was kinda dumb. He wasn’t living his life the way he wanted, he wasn’t traveling the world, he wasn’t doing his dreams. But something changed that for me, and it was when his kids were born. I felt so much tenderness for each of them. They were beautiful and, inside me, I felt something warm, again… something I hadn’t felt in my chest for a long time.
• Q: Do you have to be someone Amazing to impact other people in a good way?
• A: I always thought I needed to be extraordinary to stand out, to fill the shoes of the Amy from the books. But seeing how George just did things with common sense and humanity to help people have a home and stability… that opened my eyes. I don’t have to be admired. I just have to be me. Help when I can. Be a good citizen. Use my… recognition to do things that really have value, things that really affect people in a positive way. Not to feed my ego but to feel like I did something good in this world.

After months of conversations and confessions and this little “audiovisual therapy,” Amy finally understood that yeah, in life you can be amazing—but that life is already wonderful just because we’re here, because we share it with good people. And even if her husband isn’t what she hopes, she’ll always have people around who can support her emotionally. And she also has to give that back, so it becomes this little “virtuous circle”, you know.

Thanks so much for reading—I’m thrilled to be here, and above all, what a joy it is to talk about the things I love.