Counseling Exam 2

Existential therapy is a way of thinking, or an attitude about psychotherapy, more than it is a particular style practicing psychotherapy. True or false

True

Existential therapy focuses on exploring themes such as

Morality, meaning, freedom, responsibility, anxiety, and aloneness as these relate to a person’s current struggle

The existential therapy is to assist clients in

their exploration of the existential “givens of life,” how these are sometimes ignored or denied, and how addressing them can ultimately lead to a deeper, more reflective and meaningful existence

Existential therapy is grounded on the assumption that

we are free and therefore responsible for our choices and actions

A basic existential premise is that

we are not victims of circumstance because, to a large extent, we are what we choose to be

The first step in existential therapy is

For clients to accept responsibility for their actions and their life

Soren Kierkegaard

• Philosopher concerned with angst

• Addressed the role of anxiety and uncertainty in life

• Themes: creative anxiety, despair, fear and dread, guilt, and nothingness

Friedrich Nietzsche

• Emphasized subjectivity

• Humans value their own individual “will to power”

Angst

Between dread and anxiety

Martin Heidegger

• Our moods and feelings (including anxiety about death) are a way of understanding whether we are living authentically or whether we are inauthentically constructing our life around the expectation of others

Martin Buber

• Humans live in a betweenness; there is never just an I, but always an other

• Emphasizes the importance of presence

3 functions of presence

• Enables true I/Thou relationships

• Allows for meaning to exist in a situation

• Enables an individual to be responsible in the here and now

Basic dimensions of the human condition according to the existential approach (6)

• Capacity for self-awareness

• Freedom and responsibility

• Creating one’s identity and establishing meaningful relationships with others

• The search for meaning, purpose, values, and goals

• Anxiety as a condition of living

• Awareness of death and nonbeing

We expand our self-awareness in the following areas

• Time is not unlimited

• We choose whether or not to act; inaction is action

• We choose our actions, and we create our destiny

• Meaning is the product of us being thrown into the world and living creatively

• As awareness increases for available choices, so does our awareness of their consequences

• We are subject to loneliness, meaninglessness, emptiness, guilt, and isolation

• We are basically alone, yet we have an opportunity to relate to other beings

3 values of existential therapy

• Freedom to become within the context of natural and self-imposed limitations

• Capacity to reflect meaning of our choices

• Capacity to act on the choices we make

Inauthenticity

We long for freedom we often try to escape from our freedom by defining ourselves as a fixed static entity; lacking awareness of personal responsibility for our lives and passively assuming that our existence is largely controlled by external forces

Freedom implies

We are responsible for our lives, for our actions, and for our failures to take action

Existential guilt

Being aware of having evaded a commitment, or having chosen not to choose

Authenticity implies

We are living by being true to our own evaluation of what is a valuable existence for ourselves

Intersubjectivity

Our interrelatedness with others and the need for us to struggle with this in a creative way

Emerging awareness that individuals may experience in the counseling process:

• They’re trading the security of dependence for the anxieties that accompany choosing for themselves

• See that their identity is ties to someone else’s

• They are keeping themselves prisoner by some of their past decisions

• They have control over how they view and react to things

• They are not condemned to a future similar to the past

• They are not appreciating living

• They do not have to be perfect to feel worthy

• They are failing to live in the moment

The problem of discarding old values

Clients may discard traditional values without creating other, suitable ones to replace them

Existential neurosis

The experience of meaninglessness

Existential vacuum

Emptiness and hollowness stemming from meaninglessness

Logotherapy is designed to

Help clients find meaning in life

Meaning is created out of

An individual’s engagement with what is valued, and this commitment provides the purpose that makes life worthwhile

Anxiety arises from

one’s personal strivings to survive and maintain and assert one’s being

Existential anxiety

The unavoidable result of being confronted with the givens of existence

Givens of existence

Death, freedom, choice, isolation, and meaninglessness

Neurotic anxiety

Anxiety about concrete things that is out of proportion to the situation