Who would study psychology if they didn't have some kind of problem?

Chapter 568: A constantly renewed perspective; learning is endless, and knowledge is inexhaustible.
Just as Nan Zhuren was thinking about how to soothe the visitor's emotions, the visitor took a few deep breaths and actually calmed down on his own.

Human emotions cannot be maintained at a high level for a long time. Without additional external stimuli, emotions will quickly drop after reaching a peak.

In some cases, due to physiological compensation, emotions may even fall below the daily average level at this time.

The blush on the visitor's face faded like the tide, and after taking two deep breaths, she picked up the water glass in front of her and took small sips.

"Thank you, teacher. I've never said these things to anyone before, and this is the first time I've ever said them to someone. I feel much better now."

“I know I may have some problems in your eyes, but I don’t think these are problems, and I don’t want to solve them. Even if you only pay for psychological counseling to listen to what I have to say, I think it’s worth it.”

Nan Zhuren offered a polite smile.

It seems like he's been suppressing his feelings for a long time.

Just as Nan Zhuren was about to say something, she saw an ominous look creep onto the visitor's face once again.

"Now, I don't actually have those... messy thoughts about my stepmother anymore. Because I think she's really happy with my dad, genuinely happy, and I don't know why."

"I know it's absolutely impossible between us, and I don't want to bother her..."

Nan Zhuren did not feel relieved. Although the visitor's current narration was not bad, her expression was very different from her narration.

Sure enough, the visitor said the next second.

"Recently... I don't know why, but when I look at my brother—"

"I didn't originally have an older brother, but as I told you, teacher, my stepmother brought an older brother with her when she married my father..."

Nan Zhuren's pupils contracted sharply.

……

Ding-dong-

Chonghui stepped through the automatic sensor door and arrived at the company as the bell rang.

After greeting the two receptionists as usual, he went straight to the office area.

"Oh, junior brother's here too? Today—"

He was about to greet Nan Zhuren when he noticed that Nan Zhuren's expression was unexpectedly serious.

Such an expression is rarely seen on the usually serious Nan Zhuren's face. However, Chonghui is very familiar with similar expressions because he often sees them on the faces of his fellow students in the research group.

This expression often appears when encountering data that is difficult to understand or when facing an insurmountable problem.

Has our junior brother, who has always been invincible, actually encountered such a setback?

Chonghui's curiosity was piqued.

He leaned against Nan Zhuren's workstation, his gaze involuntarily drawn to the computer screen in front of Nan Zhuren.

[Search bar: What's the difference between a "stepmother" and a "stepmother"?]

“…?” Chonghui’s mind paused for a moment.

“During the consultation just now, I encountered a small problem. The client was particularly concerned about the difference in how they address each other,” Nan Zhuren said, biting his finger and looking intently.

The search page scrolls down to reveal a series of definitions, followed by various pirated novel websites with a wide variety of themes, all revolving around a single central theme.

"I don't have a very clear understanding of these two words, so I'm here to learn about them, which will also help me to delve deeper into the visitor's mind."

Chonghui nodded unconsciously: "That's true. No matter how solid your counseling foundation is, the way clients express their problems is very diverse. Sometimes it's a very simple question, but we just can't keep up with the client's train of thought... That happens all the time."

Nan Zhuren's current search also touched on Chonghui's blind spots in knowledge, so he had to agree.

Soon, Chonghui's gaze gradually became fixed on Nan Zhuren's computer screen.

"Alright." Nan Zhuren suddenly spoke, startling Chonghui awake. "My next consultation is coming up. Senior brother, don't you do consultations when you come to the company?"

Chonghui snapped out of his daze and explained to Nan Zhuren, "I have something I want to discuss with the professor, but he's not in the research group today."

With that, Chonghui sighed, "Since he's not here, I have no choice but to come over."

Nan Zhuren politely expressed his sympathy: "Thank you for your hard work, senior brother. I'll go back to work now."

Chonghui waved his hand.

Nan Zhuren went to work, and he also went to find Bai Qinghua.

dong dong dong-

The door to the boss's office was knocked open.

As soon as they entered, before Chonghui could say anything, Bai Qinghua spoke first.

"...Dahui, Liu Jiahang is gone."

"...?!"

Chonghui's mind went completely blank. He subconsciously asked, "He finally got stabbed by the visitor? Did the others get involved?"

Bai Qinghua almost lost his temper and said irritably, "Hopefully the company will do well! That guy still has consulting skills, otherwise I wouldn't have promoted him to supervisor before, it's just..."

The boss sighed and told Chonghui about Liu Jiahang's situation.

It's only been a few hours since that consultant, who seriously violated professional ethics, was fired.

Even Chonghui was unaware of this personnel change within the company.

As he listened, Chonghui's playful expression, which hadn't even faded yet, was quickly replaced by overwhelming anger: "Using the visitor's 'empathy' to secretly meet? That guy!"

The big man's muscles bulged all over. If he had been there that afternoon, Liu Jiahang might have suffered a physical attack after being psychologically assaulted by Bai Qinghua.

Bai Qinghua waved his hand to signal his apprentice to calm down: "Anyway, Liu Jiahang is gone now, but no one in our company can take his place for the time being. And your senior sister can't come back for the time being..."

Chonghui, who was still angry, immediately fell silent after hearing Bai Qinghua's words: "Teacher, you don't mean I have to take on more of the company's work, do you? I'm already working myself to the bone..."

Bai Qinghua's face showed a slight pain in his expression, but the next instant his expression hardened into a teacher's stern demeanor: "I know, I'll oversee things for you. Besides, there's your junior brother here too, so if you two... if it doesn't work out, I'll give you a bigger stipend!"

Chonghui's mood did not improve at all. He muttered to himself, seemingly convinced that Bai Qinghua was forcing him to take on more responsibilities so that he would have more time to play games.

Bai Qinghua felt his dignity as a teacher had been challenged in that instant, and immediately turned his computer screen to show Chonghui to prove his innocence. "What are you saying? I'm working too!"

On Bai Qinghua's computer screen was a Word document where characters were being typed. The document's name was displayed in the upper left corner of the screen.

"Guideline for Psychological Crisis Intervention in Common Disasters (Part Two)"

Upon seeing the document, Chonghui first glanced at Bai Qinghua with surprise, then honestly said, "I came to see you today because of this issue."

Chonghui sat down in front of Bai Qinghua: "I need some data when I'm compiling this manuscript, but the hospital is unwilling to give it to me, saying we need to go and discuss it ourselves. I brought my tablet with me; could you perhaps discuss these few issues directly with the hospital..."

As he spoke, Chonghui took out a tablet from his backpack.

"To the hospital?" Bai Qinghua blinked, as if suddenly remembering something. "Oh, your junior brother also needs to go—"

……

Nan Zhuren was unaware of what had happened in the teacher's office.

Sitting on the sofa in the consultation room, Nan Zhuren first gave herself an "emotional readjustment" to calm her emotions down.

The previous consultation had given Nan Zhuren quite a shock. Although he had recovered somewhat after a short period of rest, people are not machines after all. Even for Nan Zhuren, it was difficult to subjectively judge whether he had truly "calmed down".

To complete today's last consultation with high quality, you still need to be in your best consulting state.

After all, who knows what kind of more challenging questions the visitors might have...

Like a clear spring washing away the slight fatigue, only a clear mind remains.

Nan Zhuren blinked and sized up the visitor in front of her.

The man, wearing a fitted thin sweater indoors, has a fairly muscular physique. While not as striking as Chonghui, he still exudes a strong masculine charm overall.

His hair was neatly styled, with a slightly curled shell cut, and his beard was also carefully groomed.

"Teacher," the visitor began after a brief self-introduction, "I want to learn some... ways to control my emotions. Could you teach me?"

Obviously, you can't teach it like that directly.

Nan Zhuren gave a very professional smile: "Are you currently in a situation where you need to control your emotions?"

The visitor's expression became slightly unnatural: "There are... a lot of them around me, I feel like some of the things around me are pretty absurd in the eyes of ordinary people, like... uh... like I have a friend..."

Nan Zhuren remained expressionless, a slight smile playing on his lips.

One afternoon, this type of story beginning appeared for the second time.

Moreover, the situation this time is different from the first time.

Nan Zhuren didn't point it out, at least not directly now, but just listened quietly to the visitor's story.

Sure enough, the next second I heard the visitor frantically embellishing the details of the story: "My friend is kind of my childhood friend. I've known him since he was very young, and I know a lot about his family situation..."

The visitor adjusted his posture, glanced up at Nan Zhuren briefly, and then quickly looked away as if nothing had happened.

"His life, how should I put it... is really extreme. I was thinking that if you, teacher, could design a way to control my emotions based on his situation, it would probably be effective for me too..."

Nan Zhuren smiled and said, "If it's just a matter of taking deep breaths to calm down, then it would work for everyone. But since you've come for psychological counseling, you definitely don't need such a common method."

The visitor nodded repeatedly.

"But psychological 'emotional restraint' is aimed at a specific person's specific emotions. You can think of it as 'personalized customization.' Therefore, it does not have the universality you mentioned, that 'if it works for one person, it will also work for another person.'"

Seeing the visitor's silent expression, Nan Zhuren smiled and said, "But since you brought up 'your friend's' experience, I think it must be very important to you, and 'your friend' must have influenced you to some extent."

The visitor nodded repeatedly.

“This consultation will cost you your consultation fee, but if you’d like, you can share your friend’s story with me.” Nan Zhuren gestured with his hand.

He could certainly see through the client's superficial pretense. But in the early stages of counseling, it wasn't necessarily a bad thing to cooperate with this pretense, at least it could allow for the gathering of deeper information when the counseling relationship was still unstable.

Looking back then, there will be plenty of time to overcome this facade.

Of course, some schools of thought might condemn such behavior from visitors, but Nan Zhuren doesn't need to at the moment.

The visitor's tense expression relaxed slightly as he said, "My friend... his family atmosphere wasn't good growing up. I live next door to him, and I can often hear his father abusing him. The crying and the sound of things being smashed, it was really exaggerated."

"Um... I'm very close to that friend, so he tells me everything. When we got a little older... probably in college, he told me that he couldn't have a relationship because he found that he couldn't like girls."

“He is very disappointed.” The visitor’s expression turned serious. “He told me that he has almost no family affection and has always wanted to find love, but now he has no love either.”

"He...admitted that he lacked love, so much so that he even tested whether he was gay. Whether it's a man or a woman, as long as he can feel loved, that's enough."

At this point, the visitor shook his head, looking quite dejected: "But later... well, he later told me that during his attempts, he discovered that he had a physiological aversion to men, felt nauseous, and couldn't be gay, so he failed."

Looking at the visitor's expression, Nan Zhuren was unsure whether to offer congratulations or share in the regret and melancholy.

By the way, how did your "friend" try during this period?
Nan Zhuren asked directly, "Do you know how your friend tried it?"

The visitor's expression suddenly froze, and his eyes showed that he was lost in thought.

Then he suddenly swallowed hard a few times, as if he was suppressing some kind of physiological urge.

The visitor said stiffly, "I'm not really sure about the specifics... maybe it was some attempt at intimate gestures, but it failed. My friend ended up being heterosexual."

Nan Zhuren nodded to indicate that she understood, and then guided the conversation: "You said that your friend also needs to control his emotions, what is his specific situation?"

The visitor's expression immediately brightened, and he looked like he was about to start talking.

However, he added before speaking, "Teacher, this kind of thing... is basically psychological counseling, and since you're a male teacher, I feel comfortable talking to you about it."

This sentence is the visitor accumulating the power to narrate for themselves.

Nan Zhuren paused, suddenly having a bad feeling.

"Later, he started dating a really fierce girl, the kind who would slap him all the time. Most people would find that hard to stand, right? But he actually felt that the pain on his face made him feel much better, which had been making him feel very depressed..."

"He soon started dating an even more outrageous girlfriend..."

(End of this chapter)