My first meeting with a new person

This is not, of course, a new person, but it is someone who is new to me. The first meeting is just an introduction, to get a sense of what brings this person here at this particular time, what the problem is, how long has it been going on, etc. It is really a bare-bones introduction to someone whom I might get to know more fully. A little bit at a time, over time. Who will this person turn out to be? What I don’t think about att his time is something I have discovered over and over again—that the process of getting to know this new person changes me in some way, making me different than I was before. Who will I turn out to be? This is something that I don’t think most people who are in therapy really know—that they are not the only one who becomes changed by the process of psychotherapy.