Existential Therapy

Distinctive Features

Emmy van Deurzen, Claire Arnold-Baker

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• eBook ISBN: 9781315461915
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Mental Health in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Existential Therapy: Distinctive Features offers an introduction to what is distinctive about this increasingly popular method. Written by two practicing existential psychotherapists, with many years' experience, it provides an accessible, bitesize overview of this increasingly used psychological therapy. Using the popular Distinctive Features format, this book describes 15 theoretical features and 15 practical techniques of Existential Therapy.

Existential Therapy will be a valuable source for for psychotherapists, clinical, health and counselling psychologists, counsellors, psychiatrists, and all who wish to know more about the existential approach.

Part 1

THEORETICAL FEATURES

1

A philosophical rather than a psychological approach to therapy

The aspect that most distinguishes existential therapy from all other forms of psychotherapy is that it is a philosophical rather than just a psychological approach to working with people. Before psychology as a discipline came into existence well over a century ago now, people looked to philosophy to help them understand and think about their lives. Of course, psychology has added a lot of insights and provided a lot of factual information that is invaluable to therapists, but it can also alienate them from digging that little bit deeper to connect with people’s existential concerns and issues.

Taking a philosophical approach means that existential therapists are concerned with the way in which people live, experience, imagine and think about their lives. Existential therapy takes a holistic view, seeing the individual as part of a wider world and as intrinsically connected with the other people around them. Existential therapists pay attention to the cultural and social and political background a person takes for granted and considers the physical and emotional climate and environment that surrounds them. In contrast, psychological approaches tend to focus more directly on the individual’s psyche or self. Psychoanalytic or psychodynamic approaches, for example, focus on the individual’s internal drives or forces, often thought to be unconscious, that propel the individual into behaving and acting in a certain manner. They also put considerable emphasis on the person’s past experiences. Humanistic and person-centred approaches value the relationship that develops between client and therapist in the here and now. Central to this approach is the belief that a congruent and transparent relationship where the therapist is able to give the client unconditional positive regard will enable the client to work through the difficult feelings or relationships that they have. Cognitive behavioural therapies are concerned with how to modify an individual’s thinking or behaving so that they can alleviate the individual’s difficulties and set them on a better and more realistic path. Each approach has a particular worldview and focus and therefore creates a particular kind of understanding of what causes distress in individuals and how best to help clients overcome their difficulties. In psychological approaches the cause of this distress is usually seen as lying within the individual. Existential therapy is different in all these respects. Its philosophical approach allows it to explore the client’s distress as being evidence of their problems in living. It will explore all the aspects that matter, including past, present and future or the way the person is located in time. It will combine different methods, depending on the explorations that are pertinent at any moment. It will follow the client’s lead and encourage a joint exploration whilst seeking to progress in the direction that is most meaningful to the client.

Philosophical enquiry

The philosophical aspects of existential therapy are therefore central. In some sense the therapy is a philosophical enquiry, which is posing questions about the world and investigating many possible answers. In some cases, these questions will not lead to answers but to new and better questions. Some of these questions can be quite abstract in nature as they seek to uncover an aspect of universality about human nature or the world. But most of the time these questions are also deeply personal and are about how a particular person is experiencing these aspects of human reality. Philosophy is strong in method and therefore employs particular ways of thinking and unravelling. Philosophical exploration always encourages a sense of awe about the world and wonderment about what we encounter. Philosophers embark on a process of questioning and challenging, taking nothing for granted. As Socrates (469–399 bce) famously stated, ‘wisdom begins in wonder’, and he took the view that ‘the unreflective life is not worth living’. A questioning attitude to the world and human existence allows us to think deeply about what is important to us, and how to gain insight into our lives and our world. Philosophers seek to look behind the structures that we impose on our thinking, and encourage us to set out once again on a path of discovery, in search of truth.

The value of truth

Philosophical enquiry demands openness to the subject matter and a systematic exploration that seeks to uncover the underlying principles or essences. We have to start from the assumption that everything is in question and that we begin from a position of doubt. Much of our lives may be built on prejudice and mistaken assumptions. To find true values to live by we have to be prepared to start reconsidering what is true and what is false. Plato expressed the idea that ‘Truth is its own reward’, and Confucius said: ‘The object of the superior man is truth’. For all these philosophers the search for truth was important, as it meant seeking something that was authentic and valid for each situation or fundamental to each object and experience. Seeking truth means trying to get to the core of the experience in as open a way as possible, not clouded by judgements, assumptions or interpretations.

The pursuit of knowledge

A common theme of the ancient philosophers was their focus on knowledge. This pursuit of knowledge was connected to questioning and truth, as they believed that we need to be aware of the limitations of our knowledge. Socrates believed that ‘True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing’, and Confucius stated that ‘to know what you know and what you do not know, that is true knowledge’. Knowing what we don’t know allows us to see the great wealth of knowledge and understanding available, more than we can possibly grasp. Our own attempts at seeking knowledge will always be set in perspective with the overall quest for truth, so that we are humble in the knowledge that we acquire and open to question what we know so that we can learn something new.

A well-lived life

Philosophers throughout the ages have questioned all aspects of our way of living and our knowledge, but those that are most relevant to existential therapists are those that have concerned themselves with the existence of human beings. Whilst existential philosophers will be examined in greater detail in the next chapter, some of the thinking of the ancient philosophers is still very relevant to our way of living today. For Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Confucius the pursuit of virtue was paramount to living a good life. Plato observed that ‘the greatest wealth is to live content with little’. Aristotle and Heraclites were more concerned with how our actions determined who we are. Heraclites stated: ‘The content of your character is your choice. Day by day, what you choose, what you think and what you do is who you become.’ These philosophers examined how we think about ourselves, what is important for us and what is the best way of living. There is a long line of classical philosophers, including the Stoics, who each emphasised a different aspect of how to live a good life. These are also things that existential therapists address with their clients.

Philosophy as a way to listen

Philosophy, therefore, lends existential therapists a particular lens through which to approach our lives and those of our clients. This lens fosters an open attitude to what we meet, an openness to all possibilities and all different worldviews. It also focuses our responses to life, from an acceptance of the nature of things to a questioning stance. The philosophical lens also provides us as therapists with a certain way of listening to our clients. We listen for the struggles our clients have in living, how they live their lives and their relationships, the choices they make and the values they hold, rather than listening for psychological disturbance. Existential therapists will also engage in Socratic dialogue to help clients to vocalise their values and to question their lives and way of living, in order that they might find some wisdom and set out on their own path towards truth.

2

Existential philosophy offers an understanding of what it is like to be human

Which philosophy?

The field of philosophy, or the love of wisdom, as a discipline is wide and far reaching and considers many aspects of human existence such as knowledge, morals, ethics, religion, aesthetics and metaphysics. Philosophy provides insights by thinking critically about a range of issues that are of concern to us as human beings. However, the most pertinent philosophical contributions for existential therapists come from those philosophers who focus on human existence, the existential philosophers.

Existential philosophy focuses on understanding human existence, being in general and also on the specific way in which humans live and exist in the world. Early existential thinking can be found in the works of Athenian philosophers such as Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. However, it wasn’t until the start of the 20th century, with the work of Kierkegaard, the founding father of existentialism, that existential philosophy blossomed on the European continent. This period also marked a significant change in focus towards the human sciences and the development of psychology and psychological therapies.

Existential philosophers

The four main existential philosophers that have inspired therapists are Søren Kierkegaard (1813–1855), Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900), Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) and Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–1980). However, existential therapists will also draw on the works of other existential philosophers such as phenomenologist Edmund Husserl (1859–1938), theologian Martin Buber (1878–1965), Karl Jaspers (1883–1969), Paul Tillich (1886–1965), Simone de Beauvoir (1908–1986), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961) and Albert Camus (1913–1960), to name but a few. Existential literature can also be very inspirational and novels by people like Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Kafka, Sartre, Camus and de Beauvoir are a good way to become familiar with existential concepts.

All of these authors were interested in examining human existence and their ways of being in the world, i.e. the being of human beings. They looked at the fundamental aspects of human existence that we all share (ontology), although each philosopher had their own particular focus on the aspect of living they were interested in. This means there is no one model to draw on, no blueprint for living (Deurzen, 1988). Instead, existential philosophy gives us a way, a method, for looking at human existence and the world and is based on certain philosophical assumptions:

• We are part of a world, a universe, which is much greater than ourselves.

• We find ourselves in (thrown into) a physical world over which we have little control.

• The world contains certain givens which we cannot change, i.e. our genetics, family, culture, society, geography, the laws of physics.

• We are always in this world with other people and in relation with these others.

• It is in being in relation to others that we define ourselves.

• We have particular ways of making sense of things, through language and ideas.

• We are always in search of purpose and meaning.

Existential philosophy

These philosophical assumptions provide the foundation on which we can understand our relationship to ourselves, others and the world around us. Existential philosophers, however, also examined other fundamental elements of our existence. Warnock (1970) believed the defining element that united existential philosophers was their focus on human freedom. What made the existential philosophers different from those philosophers who had gone before them was the fact that their philosophy had a practical aspect to it. Existential philosophers wanted people to be aware of what Tarnas called ‘the most fundamental, naked concerns of human existence’ (Tarnas, 1991: 389). Instead of just contemplating freedom from a theoretical perspective, existential philosophers wanted people to experience it and find meaning in it.

Existential philosophers highlighted that the only certainty we have is that we are limited in time, although the exact timing of our death is unknown to us, and this fact causes us to feel anxiety. We are also free rather than, or in addition to, being determined, both in how we make choices in the here and now regarding our values and how we decide to live and therefore define ourselves. Sartre (1943) believed we begin as nothingness and our sense of self is created through our interactions with the world and others: we are a process of becoming.

Our freedom to choose also means that we are responsible for our choices and we have to choose even though there is no way of knowing how these choices will play out in the future; this again causes us to feel anxiety. The absurdity of our existence as highlighted by Camus (1942) means that our existence and our responsibility for it are a struggle we have to grapple with, and it is through this struggle that meaning can be created. Camus concluded that it was this very search for meaning despite, and perhaps even because of, the fundamental absurdity that made life worthwhile.

How to live

Existential philosophers encourage us to confront the reality of our existence and to experience that reality, however anxiety provoking it may be. This confrontation with existence is not intended to paralyse or freeze the individual into inaction due to anxiety and worry but rather to help us to consider how to live better. For Kierkegaard (1843a) the purpose was to live life without illusion in a way that was true to the individual in relation to the infinite. Nietzsche (1895) also put responsibility back on the individual with his notion of the will to power, which motivates us. Nietzsche recognised that human beings sought to gain mastery of their environment and of themselves and that the power to change, or to live, was what inspired us to become who we are capable of being, rather than us being defined by an external being, such as a God. Heidegger (1927) wanted individuals to become aware of their being and to take awareness of the way they existed. This could only occur when we recognised our limitations, and particularly the ending of our life in death, and this required us to free ourselves from the impact of others on us. Heidegger believed that through awareness of the reality of our existence we would be able to make better and more authentic choices for ourselves as individuals as to how to live our lives. Sartre (1943) recognised the ways in which people deny the reality of their existence, by deceiving themselves about both what is the case and what is not the case. The fact of our esse...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of abbreviations
• Introduction
• Part 1 Theoretical Features
• Part 2 Practical Features
• References
• Index