Approach

The Approach:

The most exciting aspect of the Existential Phenomenological Approach is the emphasis on the authentic human experience being that of relationship. In the therapeutic relationship the two persons experience the possibilities in the world that are opened up by the existence of mutual love and respect. The events and perceptions within the client are made real and relevant to the present world as experienced by the client.

Obviously in a neurotic situation the encounter may not reveal these possibilities. The person may be limited by his or her past experience of relationship, or conditioned by events in the past that limit the acceptance of possibility in the future. However even in this situation there is the possibility of transcendence through the relationship Healing seems to be a necessary to authentic encounter.

Finally I arrive at the concept of risk that is implicit in the approach. In order for the therapist to be in authentic, sustaining and truth-revealing relationship with the client there has to be some openness to all possibility. It can be argued that if the therapist asks the question "Why?" he or she is trying to elicit causes - to perhaps marry experience to theory. What is more important is that any questions posed by the therapist should elicit meaning - a way in which the client can both understand and own his or her own intelligent subjective insight. Intellectualizing on reasons can often conceal and inhibit the human person from a process of 'letting go’, forgiveness and self -reconciliation; which in turns allows for the full recognition and enjoyment of the possibilities inherent in the future.

The authentic individual is more than the sum of learned, cognitive experience.

The experience for the client should be one that sets the individual free by examining the person as a subjective phenomenon. The individual should be encouraged to express what is the reality of him or herself. The client is free to own that which is revealed and engage in a process of becoming more open to the world in which we are all in relationship.

In conclusion it occurs to me that in the preceding paragraphs I have been guilty of the very thing that existentialism warns against - that of abstraction, objectifying. Instead of experiencing an intelligent but subjective view there is an exposition of meaning. I believe in the concrete healing power of relationship and authentic encounter and I believe that the existentialist would/does endeavor to elicit meaning from the relationship. This is not an imposed meaning, but elicits from the interaction between two struggling individuals who care about this bond between them. The therapists risk their own selves in the cause of nurturing, of almost 're-parenting' the other. Both partners in the dialogue try to be honest and fear rejection, an absence of care and support as well as the possibility of ‘violence'. This experience is not an objective one for either partner. It is subjective - as two human persons give of themselves in authenticity.

Thus the relationship may be even intense, but always intra-subjective.