PSYCHOTHERAPY and EXISTENTIALISM

(Selected papers on Logotherapy by Viktor Frankl)

 

A survivor of the Nazi death camps, Frankl saw that in the case of survivors there was a relatively stronger innate will to live, in order to complete their life work, as it were - that there was a sense of meaning in their lives which allowed them to transcend their trials which others, having no such driving sense of unfulfilled meaning, through apathy gave up the struggle.  He called his philosophy LOGOTHERAPY, the LOGO based on the Greek 'Logos' interpreted as 'meaning' and also 'spirit' - thus the therapy of establishing the will for meaning for one's existence at the deepest, or spiritual, level.  In effect it is an extension of the therapies of Freud (will to pleasure), Adler (will to power) and Jung (archetypal forces) all of which employ extensive deep psychoanalysis to arrive at reasons for the client's state of being (based on past events) i.e. the "what is?" without the result being contexted as to meaning within the patient's own reason for living.

 

It is estimated that 60/70% of today's psychological problems relate directly to existential grounds, wherein the patient has 'lost' his unique, personal goal in life, or is deeply confused as to how to organize his life so as to acknowledge the goal and move towards it.  The chief dynamic of this emptiness of purpose in life is called "existential frustration", and is created by a vacuum of perceived meaning in personal existence, often manifested as boredom.  According to Frankl, the essence of human motivation is the "will to meaning"; when meaning is not found, the individual becomes existentially frustrated.

 

Philosophically, logotherapy is based on three fundamental assumptions which form a chain of interconnected links:

1.    Freedom of will

2.    Will to meaning

3.    Meaning of life,

 

Frankl's approach (and that of his 'school') is to focus the patient's attention and eventual confidence on his own self-curative powers, rather than developing a dependency on the 'external' curative powers (authority) of the doctor.  One of Frankl's techniques in dealing with anxiety, neurosis, phobias and obsessive-compulsive conditions is a technique called Paradoxical Intention, wherein the patient is taught to understand the symptom, and, in effect, ridicule it rather than fear it, to the point that the power of fear is frustrated, fear loses its power to manifest itself through involuntary actions (sweating, insomnia, stuttering, allergies and the host of phobias e.g. agoraphobia) - and through the patient ridiculing the symptom for its inability to appear on demand, the patient establishes the authority of his own will as opposed to that of the involuntary symptom which eventually 'extinguishes'. 

If there is a reversal (i.e. the patient 'jumps back into the old groove'), the logotherapist has taught the patient reinforcement techniques, e.g. not to fight the symptom, thereby making it stronger, but to ridicule it i.e. daring it to manifest (if I sweat a litre on meeting Mr. X, make me sweat 10 litres when I have to meet Mr. Y) and thereby establish who is in control (i.e. the conscious will, or the unconscious involuntary system).  By the patient learning how to assert his own self-curing will, as opposed to the involuntary fear ruling his life, either through phobias (where the patient avoids the fearful situation), or through obsessive-compulsive reaction, where the patient devotes all his attention on fighting the fear (e.g. wash hands 300 times per day); long term cure of specific symptoms was approximately 90%, with the lessons behind 'paradoxical intention' available beneficially elsewhere in the patient's life.  Paradoxical Intention technique is a practical manifestation of the overall aim of logotherapy to establish the "will to meaning within one's life".

 

A patient summarizes what, to him, was instrumental in his recovery as follows:  "If I had to sum up what got me well, I would say

1.    the confidence that this therapy works after you have presented some case histories to me and after I talked to one of your patients whom you cured having been worse than me;

2.    your teaching me to apply Paradoxical Intention in the various situations;

3.    accepting my neurosis (I am a nervous type) instead of fighting it;

4.    my change in attitude toward my symptoms.  This way I could take them out of my body and set them aside and laugh at them.  Humour has helped me a great deal;

5.    your changing my wife's attitude."  [Frankl asked her to join him in encouraging her husband to practice Paradoxical Intention and she took a humorous attitude toward his symptoms, instead of anxiously watching him to see if he became worse.] 

6.    "You made me do things and you let me talk about my symptoms.  My previous psychiatrists would get angry when I talked about them.  They always wanted me to talk about the past;

7.    the things I was so worried about and ashamed of, what I had thought was so awful, you broke them down to natural things;

8.    I never left your office confused after a session because you did not "interpret" my symptoms and give me new things to worry about.  I left many sessions happy and relieved. 

9.    I developed dependability on myself with Paradoxical Intention.  I cured myself and I learned to use Paradoxical Intention any time I need it.  I carry it always with me.  I developed no dependency on you as I did on other doctors.  If you called me to change an appointment, I would not 'die';

10.  “My willingness to be sick and dedicate my suffering to God relieved me tremendously."  (Nietzsche: "He who has a why to live (or suffer) for can bear with almost any how.")

 

 

 

 

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