When I was in my early twenties, a bachelor’s student in Tel Aviv, I felt like the whole world was opening up before me. I loved the atmosphere on campus, I was studying in two faculties, and I enjoyed jumping between them, the “both and” feeling.

Alongside all this richness, I started feeling a sense of missed opportunity — even before the era of social media, which only amplified this feeling over the years.

I felt there were so many things I hadn’t done, and I was horrified at the thought that maybe it was already too late to start now. I was surrounded by talented people in various fields at the Faculty of Arts — people who from age three knew what they wanted to do and worked toward it — and I loved everything but hadn’t specialized in anything yet.

Of all the fields, what hurt me the most was my limited experience with music studies, which amounted to a year and a half of recorder lessons in second grade. Even then, I was far from excelling (to put it mildly).

I wanted to play, I wanted to learn to read sheet music, I wanted to understand music — I was no longer satisfied with just listening.

I wanted to play the cello. Something about its size and the way it’s held against the body spoke to me. Unlike many fleeting thoughts in my idea highway, this one stayed firm and refused to go away as time passed. It hurt a lot. From the vantage point of 22 years old, I felt I was already too old to learn something new, that there was no chance I could do it, and who would want to teach someone at this stage in life, with zero experience and knowledge?

At some point, the pain of missed opportunity outweighed the fear of failure, and I decided to go for it — I decided to try.

I rented a cello at a shop on Allenby Street and found a really sweet and talented teacher, enthusiastic about the new and unusual challenge (the wonderful Tom Kelner — as far as I know, she’s been living in Berlin for a few years now, but my musician friends will correct me if I’m wrong).

It wasn’t easy. I had to redefine my goal — from “wanting to play entire pieces freely” to “knowing how to play and understand the instrument at some level.”

After a few months, I stopped. It’s hard to say exactly why in hindsight. I don’t think I gave up or broke down. The ending feels more like a feeling that I understood what it was about and achieved what I wanted — the experience of capability and the permission to try anything I want at any stage in life.

Today I understand that I was a kid! How quickly I gave up the possibility to learn something new.

If I met a cello today — I wouldn’t know what to do with it. It would probably look at me skeptically and immediately see I have no clue. I really don’t, so what? We had a short, passionate, and nice romance — and that too has value.

I’m left with the question: “What would have happened if I had continued?”

Of course, I don’t have the answer. I want to believe I could have reached a high level of familiarity with the instrument and the language, if only I had wanted to.

The therapeutic language, on the other hand, has been familiar to me since childhood, as a client. Over time, it’s becoming part of me, especially since I’ve become a therapist myself. This game of musical chairs becomes more intense — I run between the therapist’s chair and the client’s chair — and as time goes on, I understand how much the two chairs have in common.

At the beginning of every therapy session, there is that moment when that sweet girl with the cello peeks through the curtain and sends me greetings from the past. It’s the moment when the client tries for the first time to understand what they’re actually doing with me, what will happen here, how we will harness the tools and the connection between us into something helpful and healing.

This is the moment I feel my role is to teach a language. Therapy is a language — a unique situation, very different from routine, containing the essence of life experiences and a unique invitation to bring yourself authentically for a shared reflection on what was, what is happening, and what will be.

It’s a very abstract language, and in the current era, it’s becoming more elusive. That’s why it’s also very important — it invites pause, sharing, depth, and reflection in an age of fast lanes where our ability to focus and pay attention is constantly shrinking.

Every language leaves something with us to take forward. Even if we don’t reach native fluency, we gain something for life — a phrase, an experience, slang, something that stays with us and makes us feel more whole.

Therapy is a language that stays in the soul long after it ends. I know this as a client, and happily, I also hear it from clients and parents who contact me years later, marveling at the lasting impact of therapy — at the implementation of tools that helped build mental resilience and a strong self-esteem that isn’t easily influenced by external events.

I still envy the cello a bit, just as I still envy a successful play or performance where the artists are authentic and demonstrate talent effortlessly.

As time passes, I’m learning to turn the missed opportunities into sweetness, to breathe in the beauty and charisma, and to be grateful for a pleasant moment of grace — the chance to witness or participate from my special place.