Existential Psychotherapy

An Existential Psychotherapy is a psychotherapy that ...

• See: Logotherapy, Death, Free Will, Moral Responsibility, Solitude, Meaninglessness, Umwelt, Mitwelt, Eigenwelt, Überwelt.

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References

2016

• (Wikipedia, 2016) ⇒ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existential_therapy Retrieved:2016-10-19.
  • Existential psychotherapy is a philosophical method of therapy that operates on the belief that inner conflict within a person is due to that individual's confrontation with the givens of existence. These givens, as noted by Irvin D. Yalom, are: the inevitability of death, freedom and its attendant responsibility, existential isolation, and finally meaninglessness. These four givens, also referred to as ultimate concerns, form the body of existential psychotherapy and compose the framework in which a therapist conceptualizes a client's problem in order to develop a method of treatment. In the British School of Existential therapy (Cooper, 2003), these givens are seen as predictable tensions and paradoxes of the four dimensions of human existence, the physical, social, personal and spiritual realms (Umwelt, Mitwelt, Eigenwelt and Überwelt). The Viennese School of Existential therapy (Längle, 2003b) describes four fundamental existential dimensions as a structural model of therapy. Their accomplishment (therapeutically endorsed by the method of Personal Existential Analysis) leads to personal existential fulfillment. It is important to note another view of Existential Psychotherapy - that life has meaning under all circumstances. Dr. Viktor Frankl, whose theory called Logotherapy includes as one of its basic tenets that life has meaning under all circumstances - even under suffering. Meaninglessness then is meaning not yet discovered. He had comprised the theory in the 1920s and actually put it to the test while incarcerated in Nazi concentration camps.

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