Should Therapists be More Human? | Glenn Roberts

How personal should therapists be?Should helping professionals maintain emotional distance — or is genuine human connection part of what makes therapy healing?In this episode of Compassion in a T-Shirt, I speak with consultant psychiatrist, writer, and editor Dr Glenn Roberts about one of the most important questions in therapy, psychiatry, and helping work: how much of ourselves should we bring into the room?Beginning with Carl Jung’s powerful idea of the wounded healer — “The doctor is effective only when he himself is affected” — we explore what it really means for clinicians to be touched by the suffering of others without becoming overwhelmed.Glenn offers a rich and compassionate perspective on the bridge between the personal and the professional. We discuss vulnerability, emotional openness, supervision, personal therapy, professional culture, and the difference between healthy boundaries and emotional barriers.This conversation also touches on the depersonalising effects of modern healthcare systems, the unintended costs of highly competitive training cultures, and why warmth, kindness, and compassion may be among the most therapeutic qualities a clinician can bring.We also venture into the emerging world of AI therapy, asking whether something fundamentally human is lost when care becomes entirely impersonal.One especially moving part of the conversation is Glenn’s reflection on the late Mike Shooter — former President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists — whose openness about his own depression became a important source of hope during Glenn’s own difficult period, and helped inspire the creation of his remarkable book, Personally Speaking.If you’re a psychologist, psychiatrist, therapist, doctor, coach, helping professional — or simply interested in compassion, human connection, and what makes healing possible — I think you’ll find a lot in this conversation.In this episode, we explore:• Carl Jung’s wounded healer and what it means in real clinical work• Why being “affected” may be essential to therapeutic effectiveness• Vulnerability, authenticity, and emotional presence in therapy• Professional boundaries vs emotional disconnection• The hidden costs of competitive training cultures• Supervision, personal therapy, and practitioner self-development• Recovery-oriented care and learning from lived experience• Why patients often value kindness more than technical expertise• AI therapy and whether human connection can be simulated• Building warmer, more compassionate teams and servicesTimestamps:00:00 Welcome and the big question00:42 Meet Dr Glenn Roberts and Personally Speaking02:51 Carl Jung and the wounded healer06:51 What does it mean to be “affected”?10:45 Training, vulnerability, and professional culture19:56 Supervision and personal therapy23:09 Boundaries without barriers26:10 AI therapy and the missing human element29:36 Recovery, lived experience, and service-user wisdom36:02 Warmth, compassion, and cultivating better teams42:53 Mike Shooter and a powerful personal story49:40 Practical reflections for cliniciansIf this conversation resonates, please like, subscribe, and share — it helps more people discover these important conversations.Links:Find Dr Roberts’s book Personally Speaking here:https://personally-speaking.com/If you would like to learn more about compassion focused therapy, you can find Dr Stan Steindl's book The Gifts of Compassion here: https://www.ausapress.com/p/the-gifts-of-compassion-how-to-understand-and-overcome-suffering/Say hi on social: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drstansteindlTwitter/X: https://twitter.com/StanSteindlInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr_stan_steindl/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stan-steindl-150a5264/Website: https://www.stansteindl.com/YouTube Video URL: https://youtu.be/r7nM12grS-E*Affiliate Disclaimer: Note this description contains affiliate links that allow you to find the items mentioned in this video and support the channel at no cost to you. While this channel may earn minimal sums when the viewer uses the links, the viewer is in no way obligated to use these links. Thank you for your support!Video hashtags:compassion, psychotherapy, psychology, psychiatry, mentalhealth, woundedhealer