About the Name
Some time ago, just as it hit the ground floor, the lights of an elevator I was using went out. That meant that the door remained closed. I was the sole occupant of the elevator at that time. The darkness lasted for no longer than a few minutes but in that brief period, I wondered how long it would be before the lights came back on. I wondered if there was anything I could do to eradicate the darkness. I wondered if anybody knew where I was and that I needed help. I am deathly afraid of centipedes. The thought entered my mind: What if a centipede was in the elevator. I felt the panic and wondered if the panic button worked and if it did, whether help would reach me before the centipede did. I wondered if I screamed if anyone would hear. I thought about how important it would be for the people working to fix the problem to let me know periodically that they have not forgotten me. I thought that the darkness, though uncomfortable, would not be unbearable if I just knew that help was on the way. I could hang in there. Needless to say, I was relieved when the lights came back on. All the worrying thoughts that occupied my mind were dispelled by the reappearance of the light. I felt ok. I was ok.
I remembered that experience when I was thinking about a suitable name for this service. A few thoughts occupied my mind. It occurred to me that when I was in the elevator, I had not for a moment considered not reaching out for help and I thought about the many people who face various predicaments in life and for whatever reason, struggle with the idea of asking for help. I thought about the people who have difficulty realizing or admitting that they do need help. I thought about the people for whom the issues are so overwhelming and so personal that deciding who to talk to becomes part of the agony. I thought about others who doubt that they could ever adequately express how they truly felt or if they could, wonder whether anyone would really care. (After all, we all do have our own troubles, don’t we?). I thought about the people with a dilemma who knew that they needed help but were not sure just what they needed. I thought about what would happen to all these people if the right help doesn’t get to them in good enough time. I wondered what desperate thing they would do then to deal with that dark epoch of their life.
KTLO stands for “Keeping The Light On”. KTLO holds no claim to the authorship of this phrase. It simply has been adopted to communicate that for all the people described above, for all the people who are wondering about how they can transcend their circumstances, for all those people for whom the darkness evokes all kinds of thoughts about actual or delusory dangers, people who feel shame and confusion and anger and loss of hope, for all of them, KTLO exists.
At KTLO, the lights are on to help you notice obstacles that are slowing you down, to uncover hindrances in the path to recovery and growth and to bring to the fore all hidden or forgotten strengths, assets and other internal and external resources. The light is necessary for insight, motivation, focus and hope. KTLO keeps the light on by providing the warm, nurturing, caring and accepting environment to support you as you do your therapeutic work. So, whether you, like many persons, simply want to talk about your situation or, as others do, you want help to tease out what to do about your situation, or even if you are not clear about what you want, the lights of KTLO are on for you. Just call.