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Theory and Design in Counseling and Psychotherapy
Susan X Day , Iowa State University and University of Houston
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CHAPTER 6: Humanistic Approaches and Their
Existential Roots
Chapter Review
Humanism and existential counseling share views of human experience based on existential philosophy. Both belief systems consider the development of an independent unique self as the goal of therapy. Both locate responsibility for the self with the individual, and both trust subjective experience as the vehicle for determining the meaning of life. Reality is seen from a phenomenological perspective, where the external world is interpreted by each individual's unique point of view.
Humanists stress the basic growth orientation of each individual and describe an innate actualizing tendency that presses individuals to express their innate potential. Person-centered counseling is designed to create conditions for the client to become more aware of his true self and to learn to trust his individual reactions to life's experiences. Carl Rogers, the creator of the Person-Centered approach, wrote that the natural inner process of the individual was corrupted by conditional love, a condition in which others set criteria for gaining approval and caring. In counseling, the client gains a safe environment to examine his inner world without judgment and renews an organismic valuing process where the inner expressions of self correspond with outward reactions. Such self-acceptance is shown when the client can confidently trust his internal reactions, reflecting an internal, rather than an external, locus of evaluation. The counselor models congruence by displaying genuineness in the counseling interactions. The counselor also shows unconditional positive regard for the client's self direction and efforts to find his way. The counselor focuses on the description of the client's inner world, reflecting the feelings and meanings expressed. Such reflections reveal empathy, an understanding of the client's experience. Rogers considered congruence, genuineness, and the communication of empathy as the necessary and sufficient conditions for therapeutic change. With such counseling, the client grows to accept and value his own internal process and becomes a fully functioning person open to experience but guided by his own sense of purpose.
Existential therapy is tied directly to philosophical concepts and has few techniques uniquely associated with it. Existentialism conceives all life as meaningless until the individual determines what meaning her life will express. The freedom to determine meaning is both liberating and an awesome task, liberating in that the individual defines herself despite external mandates, but awesome in that the individual becomes truly responsible for her life and her choices. Anxiety underlies all human experience with the need to create individual meaning. When the natural pull to face the meaning of existence is denied, a pervasive guilt is experienced.
Each person stands alone in an existential dilemma where relationships can be helpful but cannot erase fundamental isolation. An existential therapist listens to the meaning the client attaches to existence, exploring the efforts to express an inner self, personal values, and purpose. As existential dilemmas become apparent, therapy helps the client determine ways to be authentic in her experience. Often clients reveal affect blocks where the client is stuck, not knowing how she feels and unable to determine personal meanings. Dissolving an overlay of anxiety, the client comes to a point where choices, true to her values and existential awareness, become clear. Such insight regarding an authentic choice can be a peak experience, an awareness of being and becoming who one really is, experienced as real in the moment.
Both humanistic and existential counselors downplay the use of assessment and diagnosis since they focus on common factors of the human experience to foster client growth. Symptoms of depression and anxiety are described as denial of the natural process of becoming authentic, a true expression of the self. Both approaches are particularly effective for clients experiencing major life transitions and for clients who persistently repeat similar difficulties and block natural experiencing. Families can also get caught in persistently negative patterns of interaction.
Critiques of humanistic counseling approaches include a lack of recognition for biochemical determinants to mental illnesses. Current research has shown the effectiveness of medications that change neurotransmissions and provide relief for physiologically based symptoms. Since the goals for Person Centered and existential therapies involve internal process changes for the client, outcomes are difficult to quantify for research. However, the core conditions of empathy, genuineness, and positive regard have been rated and have shown an impact on the therapeutic relationship. Multicultural critics have suggested that some cultures have customs where nondirective methods are not appreciated and where value is placed on the counselor serving as an authority and an expert. A final criticism of existential and humanistic counseling is that the approaches require the clients to be articulate in describing their experience, and for some people such a process is an esoteric luxury outside of their experience.
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