Abstract This essay argumentatively analyses the existential therapy as a psychotherapy approach. The main focus of this essay is on the therapy’s key concepts such as their therapeutic aims, therapeutic alliance, application of the therapy to the population and evaluation of the therapy. The existential therapy has some of its strengths and limitations which were also discussed in this essay. Existential therapy is a philosophical journey rather than a structured treatment system. It is not an independent therapy that has been neatly defined with specified techniques. (journal 10) It is a sincere philosophical attempt that focuses on helping people to face their uncertainties and anxieties in life through the influence of a counsellor’s …show more content…
(book 4) When a client is able to authentically connect themselves with their real self, the awareness is greater and so is the ability to find parts of their self that have been ignored before. It is not the duty of an existential therapist to find meaning of their client’s life but to facilitate the therapy sessions that enables their client to find and create purposes and goals in their lives so that it will be meaningful and worthwhile. (journal 10) According to the existential theory, every individual are an architect of their lives and they have the potential to recognize their strengths. (book4) They are also responsible to design their life journey. Rather than blaming themselves as a victim of circumstances, an individual has to accept that they are what they choose to be. This makes existential theory an optimistic and hopeful theory. Application of the Existential Therapy Because existential therapy focuses more on philosophical issues and does not have many specified techniques, the therapy has been known to be suitable for clients’ with mild mental conditions that does not need fast or immediate recovery. Existential therapy has been proven to be effective on clients with general anxiety …show more content…
Although existential therapy highlights the main concerns an individual would face in life, the therapy lacks in structure or directions. It does not indicate any specific steps a therapist should use during the intervention period. It relies solely on therapist and client relationships thus making it difficult for recovery process to take place if these connections cannot be achieved. The treatment also has little direction from the clinician as most responsibilities come from the client. People these days also seek for therapies that are direct and time –limited and existential therapy sessions can be a lengthy process as some clients are not well versed in verbal communications or are not as expressive as some people thus making very few people to opt existential therapy as their choice. (book 4) It is also one of the biggest limitations of this therapy if a client is reluctant or unable to get involved in deep self-exploration or critical thinking of the values and meaning in their life. This is because they have very little choices as their environment restricts them from making a change in the direction of their lives. Despite being one of the most influential theory, the attention toward existential theory has declined over the years as there was more emphasis on the accountability of the treatment and growth of structured and empirically supported theories such as
My existentialism project was a radio show, hosted by myself, in which the person I was interviewing demonstrated various qualities of existentialism. Heck Ant(which is meant to be like ‘He Can’t’ as in he can’t find his purpose in life) goes through things like not being able to find a purpose in life, facing an irrational world, and having his ‘rock of life’ roll back down the hill. Heck starts by explaining that he wasn’t able to choose his major by his third year of college which is an example of somebody not being able to find their purpose in life. This is just like how in the Sisyphus model how people are constantly trying to find their purpose. Then Heck goes on to explain how the two boys go in together to buy a lottery ticket.
This therapy helps in the treatment of depression, suicidal tendency, and changes in personality, and anxiety. The educational and vocational interventions help the patients of specific needs to gain their independence in their daily lives. This further helps the people to gain the knowledge along with the accurate information about the recent conditions in such a way that they can implement the approach of self-help in development of their independent life (Johnson & Souza,
The harsh realities of the industrial revolution created a climate of fear and anxiety about the human condition, which made many people more receptive to existential ideas. The birth of the existential movement took place following World Wars I and II and influential philosophers such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Sartre, who were in conflict with the predominant ideologies of their time, were committed to exploring and understanding human experience. Existentialism has three main branches; Christian existentialism represented by Kierkegaard, Jaspers, Marcel and May; aethestic existentialism represented by Sartre, Camus and Nietzsche and Jewish existentialism represented by Buber, Yalom and Frankl. (Professor M.L.O Rourke Handout October 2016). The Humanistic version of existential therapy predominantly thrived in America, through the work of Yalom (Van Durzen,
Kierkegaard (cited by Smith, 2015) claimed that existentialism is the freedom to rule your own life. An existential hero makes his own choices independently by creating a life that is moral (Gutek, 2009: 109). This hero is also accountable for his own
According to Vos (2014), “Existential therapies are a group of psychological interventions that explicitly address questions about existence, and they assume that, by overcoming existential distress, psychopathology may be decreased or prevented” (p. 115). Existential psychotherapy is the attitude toward human suffering without a manual. ET’s main advantage is the client-therapist relationship. A shortcoming, however, is not following any set theories and relying only on the therapeutic
Physcotherapy can be described as the techniques used for treating mental health, emotional and some psychiatric disorders (Nordqvist,2009). Counselling and physcotherapy are known as the talking therapies where a therapist aims to provide a safe environment for a distressed client to talk about their problems in confidence with no judgement. In this essay I hope to discuss the humanistic approach to physoctherapy, I hope to explore this approach in dept and discover how in fact this type of therapy focuses on self development growth and responsibilities (McLeod, 2008).This therapy I feel is closest to my beliefs because it focuses on the individual reaching a level of actualisation as the therapist will focus on the client’s strengths. In
But in counselling our worldview is define by how we think about everyday matters, cause of behaviour that trigger emotional distress and problems. (Meleod, 2007) state that to be a “good” counsellor we must know our self-awareness, belief values and what our personal feeling and thoughts are, and how it can help us engage with clients in the counselling practice. While Egan state that it important for counsellor to believe in the counselling process and formed a good therapeutic relationship that allow clients to trust them and feel accepted without being judge regardless of their problem or cultures. (Egan.
An outdated and unfashionable choice. But ultimately I could not deny that of all the theories, existential theory sits most naturally with my way of seeing and being in the world. For as long as I can remember, I have been obsessed with the meaning of life. It was important for me to find my own answer and I finally decided that for me, the meaning of life is to serve. I am comforted about this insight and this past semester has confirmed for me my intentions.
Person centered therapy is founded on two basic hypotheses: each person has the capacity to understand the circumstances that causes unhappiness and to reorganize his/her life accordingly. The therapist should be genuine, in touch with what he/she is experiencing and communicate these feelings to the client when they are appropriate to the encounter. The goal of person centered therapy is to help the client become more fully functioning person. On the other hand, the specific goals are client self directed and designed partly to eliminate clients’ unhealthy need to please others. The goals of person-centered therapy can be conceptualized as a two step process, first moving away from the self that one is not, and then moving toward one’s true
Over the past one and half month, the class of PDE 502 (Counselling and Career Education) has taught me some major lessons for life in dealing with the clients in response to their emotional needs. The role of a counsellor is not unlike that of a friend where by it is nurtured by being in each other’s company, talking over everyday issues and sharing feelings. However, what sets a counsellor apart is their experience and the ability to apply counselling theories and techniques to assist people in gaining awareness, insight and explore ways of solving their own issues.
In Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life, there are scenes that trick the audience into thinking that it will give them the movie’s view on the meaning of life. The film, however, never actually gives the audience a real, serious answer to the questions that relate to life’s meaning; by doing this, the people who created the film probably wanted the audience to make up their own views and answers to life’s meanings and purposes (a loosely defined meaning of existentialism). In existentialism, existentialists reject proposed systems that have a definitive answer to the questions involving the meaning and purpose of life; they freely choose standards of values on the human condition, which asks questions, like “Why am I here,” “What does it mean to be human,” or “How should I live my life?” According to Mitchell’s Roots of Wisdom, the idea of existentialism “emphasizes the uniqueness and freedom of the human person as an individual (what makes each life a unique, personal experience) as opposed to the essence of a human being (what makes all of us alive).”
The argument Jean-Paul Sartre, a French philosopher, presents on existentialism helps to prove the foundation which is “existence precedes essence”. Existentialism is normally understood as an ideology that involves evaluating existence itself and the way humans find themselves existing currently in the world. For the phrase existence precedes essence, existence’s etymology is exsistere or to stand out while the term Essence means “being” or “to be” therefore the fundamental of existentialism, literally means to stand out comes before being. This can be taken into many different ideas such as individuals having to take responsibility for their own actions and that in Sartre’s case the individual is the sole judge of his or her own actions. According to him, “men is condemned to be free,” therefore “the destiny of man is placed within himself.”
Having a purpose to live with is one of the important things in life. It is significant because according to Viktor Frankl’s theory of logotherapy, he states that humans should be driven by the search of meanings. If one has a life purpose, it will motivate him or her to take actions, pursue dreams, and ultimately achieve success. Yet, there are circumstances wherein the search of meanings will disappear if an individual encounters feelings of pain, guilt, and death. These feelings will further add on to one’s suffering and impedes him or her to move on in life.
Andrews explain that existential crises are apart of everyone 's lives. Existential crises are normal, so a person should not worry if they experience one. She explains that people have the opportunity to determine different paths that their life could take and this causes anxiety for fear of picking the wrong one. Andrews main points in her article are to explains the different stages of Existential crises
In this semester, I have been exposed to the subject of Introduction to Guidance and Counselling which is a new field of study for me. After I have received this lesson, I can relate my experiences with what I have learned. Not only that, I also have different perspective towards after I learned this subject. The aspects that I can relate my experiences and thoughts with are the differences between advice, guidance and counselling as well as the goals of counselling.