Existentialism In Counselling Psychology: Staring At The Sun

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Background of Existential Therapy Existentialism surfaced in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, from a pre-war society. The harsh realities of the industrial revolution created a climate of fear and anxiety about the human condition, which made many people more receptive to existential ideas. The birth of the existential movement took place following World Wars I and II and influential philosophers such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Sartre, who were in conflict with the prevalent ideas of their time, were committed to exploring and understanding human experience. Existentialism has three main branches; Christian existentialism represented by Kierkegaard, Jaspers, Marcel and May; atheistic existentialism represented by Sartre, Camus …show more content…

His first client was a lesbian, a subject he knew nothing about, but by allowing her to lead him, he was able to gain an insight into her world. As he recounted this therapeutic experience to his peers, they were captivated, “I had conveyed the essence of my patient and our relationship in the form of an interesting story” (Yalom, 1998, pxi). Yalom has written many honest and insightful books, littered with clinical vignettes, about human mortality, which helps teach others about the particularly sensitive subject of facing the fear of death. This book (Yalom, 2011) explores the four main factors of human existence; death anxiety, isolation, freedom and meaning and provides a comprehensive guide to death acceptance, based on his own existential orientation and personal experiences of death anxiety throughout his life and how he came to terms with it. He teaches how self awareness of the inevitably of death can evoke terror, but by confronting our death anxieties and the inexorableness of our finitude can lead to transformation and being able to, “construct an authentic life of engagement, connectivity, meaning and self-fulfillment” (Yalom, 2011,

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