When a person attends a psychologist, the objective is to receive a treatment that is usually arduous. Assuming that the idea is to open the emotions towards another person, who is initially unknown. Now, existential psychotherapy is created from a base that is humanistic. Being sensitive to that insecurity and looking for a way to make the patient more comfortable. Because of this, we will talk about what existential psychotherapy is about and its philosophy.
What is existential psychotherapy about?
The foundations of existential psychotherapy are concentrated in a homonymous current that is part of philosophy. Where the essential concern is oriented in the way in which every person builds his way of being and being in the world. Søren Aabye Kierkegaard has been considered the founder of this technique for understanding suffering.
Despite this, the roots of the theory of this therapy are based on the contributions of other thinkers such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Karl Jaspers, Simone de Beavour, and Edmund Husserl. Although the psychology that is used in a conventional way, is dedicated to the understanding of the thought, in the conduct and in specific occasions in the psychopathological dimensions. A branch like existential psychology focuses on the meaning that existence offers to each person.
It means that existential psychotherapy seeks to carry out a deep analysis of the biggest questions, such as freedom, meaning, guilt, death and time.
This is a discipline that was founded by psychiatrists who were largely disappointed by the use of traditional models. Some of the clearest examples were Ludwig Binswanger and Medard Boss. Quieres searched within the constructivist currents, with the aim of expressing the way in which they could understand their work.
Thus it was possible to transcend further from the negative things and the pain, to go towards the identification of all the positive aspects and the potential. Which are important elements to contribute to the development of a happy life.
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Nature of the human being
Starting from an existentialist point of view, every person is like a project that is under construction, and therefore can never be fully understood. It could also be a flexible reality and at the same time open to experience. That houses in itself all the potential to want to live and to feel an infinite range of ideas and emotions.
Neither does it refer to an isolated person, but its meaning is born as it enters a world of social relations, where it is capable of creating its own subjectivity. Existentialism is not oriented towards the human being as a biopsychosocial reality. It is more a way of contemplating the intersections between various dimensions.
Unwelt, which includes the body and its basic needs. Mitwelt, which is based on the connections that are established with others within society and culture. Eigenwelt, which is the identity of oneself within the relationship that conforms to the same self, as well as to the effects or thoughts that give it its shape. Überwelt, which are transcendental and spiritual beliefs about life and its purpose.
All these dimensions represent the basis on which the exploration of the patient is carried out in existential therapy. In such a way that the professional will ensure that a balance is established between each of them. If there is a disturbance in any of these dimensions or also in several, it will be taken as therapeutic purposes. Being in an existential psychology program that can be extended as long as the person wishes or requires.
sickness and health
Within existential psychology and from an existentialist point of view, illness and health are perceived as the ends of a continuous line in which a person could be located. Following the specific way in which she relates to others and to herself. Another of the criteria of great importance is based on adherence to the same principles and values as a guide for life.
It means that it is not a conservative vision, it is more a way of escaping from survival and looking for an existence through which it is possible to find an ultimate meaning. Health could be understood as the result of living a life that is unique. That it is guided by the genuine will and at the same time open, both to the positive and negative aspects.
Now, disease is based on everything that is opposed to health. In this case, he would lead a life that lacks authenticity, where the rest of the people are the ones who decide the path to follow.
How does existential psychology intervene in people?
The following points indicate the objectives and phases to be dealt with in existential psychology. Finally we will mention some of the most used techniques, being philosophical positions about life.
Objectives
There are three objectives that existential psychotherapy is in charge of pursuing. Restore the state of trust in people who have lost it. Expand the way in which these people perceive their own life or also the world that surrounds them. Determine a goal that is meaningful to the person.
In other words, the idea is to look for a position in life and also a direction to take. Therefore, it would be to determine all those things that make a person authentic.
stages
The process that involves carrying out an existential psychotherapy consists of three phases as well. Establish an initial contact, the phase in which the work is done and the completion part.
The initial contact phase in existential psychotherapy is where the patient establishes a therapeutic bond in which said intervention will continue. An alliance like this is based on actively listening and accepting the experiences of others. But it also includes a consensus, in which a way to evolve is established in each session. It is generally assumed that this response is found in the patient.
It begins to deepen the history of the patient when the work phase in existential psychotherapy begins. Focusing on all the concerns and grievances of the person receiving treatment. From there, an exploration is carried out that includes the four spheres of the human perspective, which define how complex reality is.
It is at that moment where I know the main objectives are established as a model. Which are the detection of all the strengths and weaknesses, defining values, examining emotional ties with important people, reinforcing autonomy and building a life project.
Now, the final part in an existential psychotherapy treatment determines the tasks that the patient must follow in his own life. Where everything that is learned must have a beginning and also a conclusion.
Techniques used in existential psychotherapy
One of the main techniques of existential psychotherapy is the so-called epoché. This is one of the concepts that comes from existential philosophy and where one of the most important foundations of therapy is summarized: Approaching the moments of life as if they were something new. While a learning attitude is assumed, where the person marvels at the present event.
Description is the second of the most used techniques in existential psychotherapy. Although for this case an exploratory analysis is carried out, allowing to obtain knowledge about things without the need to categorize them. The goal of this is to establish a curiosity in himself, as well as in social relationships. Since both make up the essence of what it truly is to have an existentialist perspective.
The third of the techniques used in existential psychotherapy is horizontalization, through which it is intended to avoid the hierarchy of power where a conventional psychiatrist was shown. And in which at one point in history the intervention proposal was created.
The relationships on which these techniques are based allow the patient to identify with the clinical figure and the role it plays. Offering encouragement to express their own truth, following a concept of therapy that is deliberately alleged from criticism and prosecution.
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Psyence
psychology and mind
existential circle