Why "Shrinking" gets therapy (and leadership) right
It's all about the boundaries, baby
TL;DR:
Leadership isn’t just about following rules. It’s about navigating the tension between emotional honesty and ethical responsibility. Apple TV+’s “Shrinking” shows us how therapists wrestle with this balance, and how life’s messiness sometimes forces them to adapt, push boundaries, and redefine their roles. The best therapists (and leaders) know when to follow the rules and when to let their emotions guide the way.
I don’t know about you, but I’m amused by how frustrated many people (especially therapists) seem to get about Apple TV+’s Shrinking.
Every time the show’s main character, Jimmy, does something flagrantly unethical or impulsive, I can almost hear a thousand well-trained therapists and mature adults collectively groan: “That’s so unrealistic!” “He can’t do that!” “Where are his boundaries?”
Even though I'm also a therapist (and possibly a mature adult), I don’t groan at all! I laugh.
Why? First, because the show is really funny. It helps me feel better after a long week, especially when I’m a little burned out or depressed.
But also because Shrinking isn’t really about boundaries, per se, or even about therapy. It’s about anxiety and how we respond when the stabilizing forces we rely on — our roles, routines, and relationships — get turned upside down.
Obsessed much?
Boundaries seem to be everyone’s favorite cure-all these days. They’re framed as the solution to every interpersonal, occupational, and societal ill we face. We’re told psychologically healthy people have boundaries, while those who lack them are toxic narcissists. They’re as essential at work as they are in intimate relationships, and if you struggle to maintain good ones, you’re more of a liability than asset.
But here’s the thing: It’s impossible to have “perfect” boundaries. This odd, recently discovered ideal is as unrealistic as humanity reclaiming its lost innocence or Holden Caulfield finally getting his hands on that gold ring. Life is too unpredictable, and relationships are too complex, for “healthy boundaries” to ever be a fixed, one-size-fits-all solution. And that’s because…
Life is risky!
Larry Hirschhorn’s concept of “primary risk” offers a helpful lens for understanding Shrinking’s central conflict, and its broader application to our personal and professional lives. The primary risk can be thought of as a crack in the façade of an organization’s “primary task.”
Some definitions:
Primary Task: In the Tavistock tradition, the primary task is an organization’s explicit purpose, or the central work it must accomplish to survive. For example, a hospital’s primary task is to provide medical care, while a creative agency’s task might be to develop and deliver compelling content. It’s what a business is designed to achieve and represents the rational side of organizational life.
Primary Risk: The primary risk refers to the anxiety we feel when deciding what the primary task should be in the first place. This is a strategic but also emotional choice. For a creative agency, the risk might be felt in the decision whether to purse innovative, boundary-pushing work that prioritizes creative integrity, or more traditional approaches that appeal to conservative clients. Both are legitimate options, but choosing one over the other is often influenced by unconscious and emotional forces.
When you can’t go home again
In Shrinking, Jimmy’s life is derailed by the sudden death of his wife. Overwhelmed by grief, he falls into a deep depression that damages his capacity to parent his teenage daughter and help his therapy patients. The series picks up when Jimmy recognizes how far he’s fallen and decides to rebuild his life.
This realization forces a professional (and personal) choice:
Should he stay within his traditional role, relying on professional boundaries, therapeutic models, and established norms to guide his patients?
Or should he choose honesty and emotional authenticity by sharing his struggles, speaking freely, and connecting with his patients on a deeper, more human level — even if it means breaking the rules he was trained to follow?
In essence, the primary risk Jimmy faces is whether to try and resume the predictable, traditional life he had before his wife died or redesign his approach based on what knows now through his own gut-wrenching experience — including grief he holds over the loss of his marriage and the overwhelming guilt he feels over abandoning his daughter.
The real primary risk
With this understanding in mind, concerns about boundaries and ethics fade into the background. Of course, boundaries and ethics are extremely important in real life and real therapy. But Shrinking shows us — in blatant and humorous terms — that life doesn’t follow a treatment plan.
The show isn’t meant to be a "How-To" guide for therapy; it’s about exploring what happens when life hits us hard and we can no longer ignore our emotions. Jimmy’s struggle isn’t about ignoring boundaries, but about realizing that rules and norms alone can’t fix what’s broken. For him, healing requires a radical reassessment of himself and how he approaches his work and relationships.
By shattering the therapeutic frame as thoroughly as his life has been shattered, Jimmy exposes the emotional tension at the heart of therapy and any form of authentic leadership:
How much of yourself should you reveal to truly help someone else?
He knows what he should do professionally, but after experiencing profound loss, the traditional rules stop feeling so important. In his mind, his patients don’t need a distant, perfectly composed therapist — they need someone willing to meet them halfway, even if it means crossing the invisible middle line that separates them.
Leadership is about living with risk
The deeper risk in Shrinking isn’t about when (and whether) to violate professional boundaries but choosing how to live after loss. Jimmy can’t return to the person he was before his wife’s death, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest. The primary risk he faces is whether to embrace emotional honesty at the expense of the stability and neutrality he’s trained to maintain as a therapist.
It’s a good lesson for all of us: life is messy and unpredictable, and must be contended with on its own terms.
While therapy needs to have clear rules and boundaries, Shrinking reminds us that being human can often conflict with being professional. Leadership is about navigating that same tension: balancing emotional honesty with ethical responsibility, and knowing when to follow the rules and when to adapt.
The most effective leaders, like the best therapists, recognize that real growth happens not by avoiding risk, but by engaging honestly with the messy, uncertain process of being human, both in work and in life.
Thanks for reading! What are your thoughts? I’d love to hear them and appreciate any and all feedback at this early stage in my newsletter.