existential perspectives on well being
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Perspectives on Psychological Disturbance, Happiness and Emotional Well Being
Prof Emmy van DeurzenAarhus, Denmark
May 2014
9.00 - 10.30: The Existential Therapy Approach. Fundamental Existential
Dimensions of Human Living & Inherent Paradoxes and Conflicts
10.30 - 10.40: Coffee break10.40 - 12.00: Psychological Disturbances and
Suffering. How do we live with problems
with courage and a greater engagement? How do we find meaning in life when happiness is lost?
12.00 - 13.00: Lunch13.00 - 14.00: Living with Emotions.
14.30 - 15.00: Coffee break15.00 - 16.00: Happiness & Emotional Well Being
Existential Therapy:Perspectives on Psychological Disturbances, Happiness and
Emotional Well Being.
What are the human issues we are facing and how can counselling &
psychotherapy help us find the path to a better life?
www.nspc.org.ukwww.emmyvandeurzen.comwww.societyofpsychotherapy.org.uk
Facebook and LinkedIn: Existential Therapy
www.existentialpsychotherapy.netwww.icecap.org.ukwww.dilemmas.orgwww.existentialacademy.com
Emmy van Deurzen PhD, MPhil, MPsych, CPsychol, FBPsS,
UKCPF, FBACP, ECP, HPC reg
• Visiting Professor Middlesex University -UK• Director Dilemma Consultancy• Director Existential Academy • Principal New School of Psychotherapy and Counselling - London
Past Classical education Netherlands (The Hague)
Philosophy masters, Montpellier with Michel Henry (France)
Clinical psychology masters, Bordeaux with Jack Doron (France)
Doctorate in social science: City University with Alfons Grieder (London)
Worked in psychiatry for seven years-private practice since 1978, Lacanian, psychodrama and group therapy training
London 1977-78: Arbours and PA followed by Esalen, USA, Gestalt and bioenergetics
1982: created first masters in existential therapy
1985: moved course to Regent’s College
1987: first book ; founded Society for Existential Analysis
1988: merged course with RC: Prof and Dean SPC
1993-95 first chair UKCP
1996: founded New School of Psychotherapy and Counselling, prof Schiller and Sheffield Uni; now Middlesex Uni.
Books by Emmy
most relevantfor today:
2009 book on happiness
3d edition of Existential Counselling and Psychotherapy in practice orEveryday Mysteries, 2nd edition
or Skills book for intro
Existential Approach
A philosophical method for understanding a person’s difficulties in living
Enabling people to be more aware of their own existence
Through dialogue it shows the limits, paradoxes, conflicts and contradictions of life.
Existential Therapy
Talking about your troubles is only helpful if you can talk through them in constructive dialogue taking you beyond blame and shame.
No pathology
Focus on Problems in Living
Philosophical view of human existence
Aim of existential therapy.
• Enable people to tell the truth about their lives and themselves
• Help them live passionately and to the full taking authority over their destiny
• Facilitate greater understanding of the human condition and its purpose
• To think for themselves and live more freely, responsibly, passionately and compassionately
• Recognize strengths and weaknesses and make the most of both
Leave behind the dark ages of therapy : an open, collaborative
quest for truth rather than a dogmatic one
Understanding connections.
Helping persons to understand their difficulties aims at exploring as much of the web of their lives as is possible, focussing not on one particular line but on the connections between as many lines as show themselves.
(Cohn, in Existential Perspectives, 2005:226)
Asking Questions and Reflect: a search
for truth
Focus of existential therapy
Ontological questions
Addressed by tackling everyday ontic problems
Framework
Asking the BIG QUESTIONS
What does it mean to be alive?
Why is there something rather than nothing?
How should I act and be in relation to other people?
How can I live a worthwhile life?
What will happen after I die?
Existential AuthorsPhilosophers
ofFreedom
Phenomeno-logists
Existentialists Post-Structuralists
Existential- Humanists
Sðren Kierkegaard1813-1855
Franz Brentano1838-1917
Jean Paul Sartre
1905-1980
Michel Foucault
1926-1984
Martin Buber1878-1965
Friedrich Nietzsche1844-1900
Edmund Husserl
1859-1938
Maurice Merleau Ponty
1908-1961
Emmanuel Levinas
1905-1995
Paul Tillich1886-1965
Arthur Schopenhauer 1788-1860
Karl Jaspers1883-1969
Simone de Beauvoir
1908-1986
Paul Ricoeur1913-2005
Rollo May1909-1994
Fyodor Dostoyevski
1821-1881
Martin Heidegger1889-1976
Gabriel Marcel1889-1973
Jacques Lacan
1901-1981
Hannah Arendt
1906-1975
Karl Marx 1818-1883
Max Scheler1874-1928
Albert Camus1913-1960
Jacques Derrida
1930-2004
Abraham Maslow
1908-1970
Existential Philosophers
Kierkegaard Nietzsche Husserl Jaspers Heidegger Sartre de Beauvoir Buber Camus Merleau Ponty Foucault
Existential Practitioners
Ludwig Binswanger: 1881-1966.
Karl Jaspers: 1883-1969.
Paul Tillich: 1886-1965.
Medard Boss: 1904-1990.
Viktor Frankl: 1905-1997.
Rollo May: 1909-1994.
Ronald Laing: 1927-1989.
Existential Practitioners
Binswanger Boss Frankl
Tillich May Laing
Existential Practitioners
Early psychiatrists
Humanisticpsychologists
British alternative
Recent Americans
Recent British
Ludwig Binswanger1881-1966
Paul Tillich1886-1965
George Kelly1905-1967
James Bugental1915-2008
Hans Cohn1916-2004
Karl Jaspers1883-1969
Carl Rogers1902-1987
Aaron Esterson1923-1999
Thomas Szasz1920-2012
FreddieStrasser1924-2008
Eugene Minkowski1885-1972
Rollo May1909-1994
Ronald Laing1927-1989
Irvin Yalom1931-
Ernesto Spinelli1949-
Medard Boss1904-1990
Viktor Frankl1905-1997
David Cooper1931-1986
Kirk Schneider1956-
Emmy van Deurzen1951-
www.existentialpsychotherapy.net
No prescription
Existential therapy does not have to impose rules for living.
Uncover the laws of life
Recover our capacity to trust in life
Be inspired once again when we were despondent, forlorn, forsaken, desperate or confused.
Living matters. Life is short.
We don’t know how to live well or right
Living is not easy
Much of psychopathology is rooted in a lack of understanding of human existence
Meaning and Purpose
Find out what is meaningful
Find out what your purpose in life is and take it seriously.
Engage with it and work for it in truth and with dedication.
Come what may, follow your dreams and make sure your actions match your dreams.
Landscapes of our life
• Understand the Lebenswelt:the world in which we live.
How do we co-constitute the world?
Buber’s encounter
The interhuman: das Zwischenmenschlichen; the in-between is where real communication takes place (Buber, Between Man and Man, 1929).
All actual life is encounter (ibid: 62)
This is where truth is found.
In inter-subjectivity we create the world in which we live together: I-It or I-Thou.
Boundaries and consistency
When we ‘care about’ someone, what we ‘care for’ is their autonomy.
Consistent and clear boundaries lead to trust.
Living a meaningful life means to acknowledge and live within the boundaries of existence.
Directive or non directive?
The existential therapist is purposeful (directional) rather than directive. Also direct.
Non-directiveness denies autonomy and can easily lead to stagnation
A productive therapeutic relationship will be challenging to both people
Clients will value a therapist who is willing to stand with them, but who can also teach them something new about life
Good disclosure
Make sure you disclose in the client’s interest
Is there a less self disclosing way of making the point?
Answering direct questions is fine, briefly, returning to the client’s point as soon as possible
Volunteering personal information is ok when
1. Client needs example or inspiration
2. Your info is not self indulgent, but engaging
3. Is about something in the past
4. About something you have resolved
Signs of inauthentic living
referring to others for guidance about what is true or what we should do, or
being unduly influenced by the opinions of society, of the anonymous voice of the imagined ‘They’ as Heidegger puts it, or
blaming others for our predicament and not owning our responsibility for it, or
pretending that life has determined our situation and character so much that we have no choices left, or
expecting life to be perfect, fantasising about the problem-free life that is 'just around the corner' or,
trying to find out the underlying 'cause' of our difficulties in living, believing this to be the ‘solution’.
Camus: Sisyphus’ plightEnable people to tackle the important issues
There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is … whether life is or is not worth living. (Camus: The Myth of Sisyphus)
Is rolling the stone up the hill sufficient to fill a human heart?: meaning is found because of challenges, not despite them
There is no abstract ethics. There is only an ethics in a situation and therefore it is concrete. An abstract ethics is that of the good conscience. It assumes that one can be ethical in a fundamentally unethical situation.(Sartre, Notes For an Ethics:17)
Sartre’s existential ethics
Is human emotional suffering avoidable?
Or does the road of life inevitably take us through lows and into dark and scary
places?
Is happiness desirable?
Or d
oes it so
ften
us a
nd
sto
p u
s reflect o
n life
?
HUMAN CONDITION
Understanding the way in which we struggle with the human condition and how this struggle leads to the experience of depression, anxiety and psychopathology
Existential Therapy Understanding human difficulties, conflicts, paradoxes,
dilemmas, contradictions, predicaments
Working with philosophical methods, amongst which phenomenology, dialectics, maieutics, hermeneutics and heuristic methods.
Where do I come from?Scandinavian Viking, Danish aristocrat, political/religious leader banished Bismarck,
copper smith
Central European gypsy, Dutch barge skippers,
farmers, art experts, head of antiques auction
Grew up after WW2 in war torn
Netherlands
Terror of Cold War period
especially Suez crisis and nuclear threat
Classical education
Asking Questions and Reflect
How to live? What is truth? What is the ultimate value of
life?
What do we do when crisis hits?
In the whirlwind of change we need to find steadiness, persistence and
resilience: we need purpose
Nobody is spared crisis, Conflict or LOSS
Are we ever prepared for the life changing challenges?
Even if you play it safe and try to avoid catastrophes
You still need courage and persistence to brave unexpected blows of fate: many respond with
anxiety and depression
Facts: depression 2-10% of European citizens experience depression related
problems
Each year: 33.4 million Europeans suffer
Inability to feel pleasure, tiredness, worthlessness, helplessness, hopelessness and feelings of guilt
Most suicides (30-88%) related to it
60.000 deaths by suicide p.a. in the EU (2X > road acc)
Most common cause of disability in the world, strongly associated with heart disease in linear causal fashion
Total cost p/a: UK: £15 billion USA: $100 billion
Last decade: EU and WHO policy to promote mental health
Facts: anxiety
Often considered in relation to stress
Estimated 15.7 million Americans are affected each year
12% of European population at any time
The core features of GAD are chronic (>6 months) anxious worrying with symptoms of hyper vigilance, hyper arousal and tension
International study: 5.6 to 18.1% for anxiety disorders, of which GAD and panic disorder together accounted for over half of the prevalence figures (Baumeister & Hartner, 2007).
But also Phobias, Panic, OCD, PTSD, SAD (social anx)
NICE figures: cost of anxiety in EU: 41 billion Euros (2004 prices)
Long term use of benzodiazepines (Xanax, Librium, Valium, Ativan): worsens it
Size and burden of mental disorders
Most frequent disorders: anxiety (14%), insomnia (7%), major depression (6.9%), somatoform (6.3%), alcohol and drug dependency (4%), ADHD (5%) dementia (1-30%)
38.2%, i.e. 164.8 million persons affected per year.
Percentage of disorders of brain: 26.6%, headache, sleep apnoea, stroke (8.24), dementia, brain injury, epilepsy, parkinsons, ms, brain tumours (overlap)
People crave happiness and want to eliminate their
symptoms
in 2010 some 16 million prescriptions were issued for anti-depressants in the UK: a 10% rise on the previous year.
Iceland: 9%
SSRIs: Happy pills?
SSRIs as panacea especially with anxiety, but also NRIs and SNRIs
selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (Fluoxetine, Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft)
noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors (Reboxetine, Edronax, Mazanor)
Serotonine- norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor (Venlafaxine) (anxiety, ADHD)
From 2006 to 2010: 43% increase in prescriptions for the SSRI antidepressants
2009 BMJ paper titled "Explaining the rise in antidepressant prescribing’’: SSRIs are given for all sorts of problems
2000-2005: already 36% increase in SSRI
How do people end up so overwhelmed by their
emotional experience?
Despair leads to loss of self worth
Panic at coping alone leads to crippling anxiety
It significantly increases mortality
People expect to feel goodBut life is not an eternal
spring..
Unhappiness is not an illness
Many people take the view they deserve happiness
On this view, things like love, friendship, meaningful activity, freedom, human development, or the appreciation of true beauty are ‘‘merely’’ instrumentally valuable for us, i.e. they are not good as ends but merely as means to the only thing that is good as an end, namely happiness. Bengt Brulde 2006.
What happens when life is hard?
Migrant mother in USA depression 1936
Nazi occupation of Paris
Buchenwald
Auschwitz
Bia
fra 1
96
7
Survival is an issue
Resilience
How do we overcome obstacles?
How do we survive difficulties, crises, trauma?
How do we rise above adversity?
Are there personal qualities that enable a person to be resilient?
Think about times in your life when you have faced adversity, difficulty or crisis.
How did you overcome them?
KNOW YOURSELF (oracle of Delphi):
Man’s task is simple:
he should cease letting
his existence be a
thoughtless accident
Friedrich Nietzsche: The Gay Science
Reality is: we all despair!
All of us are disappointed, dissatisfied, disenchanted at times.
We get sad and depressed.
Seligman (1973) has described depression as, `The common cold of psychopathology, at once familiar and mysterious’
Holmes and Rahe scale of stressful
eventsDeath of spouse 100
Divorce 73
Marital separation 65
Jail term 63
Death of close family member 63
Personal injury or illness 53
Marriage 50
Fired at work 47
Marital reconciliation 45
Holmes and Rahe
Retirement 45
Change in health of a family member 44
Pregnancy 40
Sex Difficulties 39
Gain of new family member 39
Business readjustment 39
Change in financial state 38
Death of close friend 37
Change to different line of work 36
Change in number of arguments with spouse 35
Mortgage over $100,000 31
Foreclosure of mortgage or loan 30
Change in responsibilities at work 29
Holmes and Rahe
Other Life Events
Son or daughter leaving home
Trouble with in-laws
Outstanding personal achievement
Wife begins or stops work
Begin or end school
Change in living conditions
Revision in personal habits
Trouble with boss
Change in work hours or conditions
Change in residence
Change in schools
Change in recreation
Holmes and Rahe
Change in church activities
Change in social activities
Mortgage or loan less than $30,000
Change in sleeping habits
Change in number of family get-togethers
Change in eating habits
Vacation
Christmas alone
Minor violations of the law
Things can be a lot worse
Iraqi refugees who dare not go back home
Syrian refugees in Turkey
Reduced to standing in line
Life reduced to rubble
No safety
Sudanese refugeesno more land, water or
hope
Sami people in Lapland losing land
to mining
Greece economic crisis 2012
Suffering and learning
and the learning is always personal
9/11/01 NYC
Pain remains for fire fighter wife, 2013
Japanese girl in Quarantine after nuclear disaster
2011
Homes devastated in Alabama tornado
2011
Coffins arriving from Afghanistan at
Wootton Bassett, UK, 2011
Outdoor lessons in Aghanistan
Myanmar disaster Thai refugees,2013
Korean ferry disaster 2014
We cannot avoid all danger and all problems and need to learn to cope
It is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life.
Where you stumble lies your treasure
Joseph Campbell
Being lost and finding something
new
Heidegger’s aletheia (ἀλήθεια): truth means: unveiling the hidden
In loss we become homeless, Unheimlich and are forced to find ourselves for the first time.
Shock to one’s system of meaning.
In crisis the connections we rely on to find security and our identity are shaken up at the roots
Everything is in question and we can no longer trust in life, other people, ourselves, fate or gods
We can no longer take things for granted
On Dying: Elizabeth Kubler-Ross
denial
anger
bargaining
depression : reactive or preparatory
acceptance
hope
Laing:Breakthrough in
stead of breakdown. Loss and transition are about breakdown
of the old.
Instead of breaking down and becoming depressed it can mean we break through some block and move on to a next level.
In the process we become stronger.
We establish values that are more deeply rooted.
What meaning after crisis?
Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked.
In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible.
Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, p.172
Frankl’s way to meaning
• Experiential values: what we take from the
world.• Creative values: what
we give to the world.•Attitudinal values : the way we deal with suffering.
What are your values?
Experiential? What external experiences make you feel most happy?
Creative? What do you contribute to the world?
Attitudinal? How do you cope with suffering?
We need problems and challenges: to learn and
evolve Camus:
In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer
Happiness is nothing except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads
In darkness we learn about the
depth of lifeThe discipline of suffering,
of great suffering — do you not know that only
this discipline has created all enhancements of man
so far?
(Nietzsche, 1886/1990: 225)
Dialectics
Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.
Human evolution proceeds with constant conflict and forward movement in overcoming a previous state.
Paradoxes, conflicts and dilemmas are integrated and gone beyond.
Perhaps this is the true purpose of life and suffering: to learn, surpass and evolve.
Taoism: Yin (moon/dark/ female) and Yang (light/sun/male)
Chiaroscuro, clair-obscur, the light and shade of life
We need COURAGETillich’s Courage to Be:
Courage is the universal self-affirmation of one’s Being in the presence of the threat of non-Being(Tillich 1952:163).
Integrating non being: Paul Tillich:
1886-1965 A neurotic person can take on board only a
little bit of non-being
The average person can take on a limited amount of non-being
The creative person can accommodate a large amount of non-being
God can tolerate an infinite amount of non-being.
Making sense of life
Energy is the flow between two poles
Source: kidzoneweather.com
Dialectics: working with tension, dilemma, conflict, opposition,
polarities, paradox
Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.
Human evolution proceeds with constant conflict and forward movement in overcoming a previous states.
Paradoxes and dilemmas
are integrated
and gone beyond.
Transcendence
Thesis Antithesis
Synthesis
Dialectics
future
Thesis: my view(past )
Antithesis: your view(present)
Dialectics: transcendence in space and time
Synthesis:a wider view
Existential Space
Physical space
Social space
Personal space
Spiritual space
DESIRES FEARS VALUES
PHYSICAL life death vitality
SOCIAL love hate reciprocity
PERSONAL identity freedom integrity
SPIRITUAL good evil transparency
Human values rediscovered.
World:Dimension
Umwelt:Where and how?
Mitwelt:With what?
Eigenwelt:Who?
Uberwelt:For what?
Physical:survival
Nature:senses
Things Body Cosmos
Social:affiliation
Society:emotions
Others Ego Culture
Personal:identity
Person:thought
Me Self Consciousness
Spiritual:meaning
Infinite:intuition
Ideas Spirit Conscience
Different dimensions of human relationships at different levels of existence
Overview of conflicts, challenges and paradoxes on four dimensions
World Umwelt Mitwelt Eigenwelt Uberwelt
Physical Nature:Life/Death
Things:Pleasure/Pain
Body:Health/Illness
Cosmos:Harmony/Chaos
Social Society:Love/Hate
Others:Dominance/Submission
Ego:Acceptance/Rejection
Culture:Belonging/Isolation
Personal Person:Identity/Freedom
Me:Perfection/Imperfection
Self:Integrity/Disintegration
Consciousness:Confidence/ Confusion
Spiritual: Infinite:Good/Evil
Ideas:Truth/Untruth
Spirit:Meaning/Futility
Conscience:Right/Wrong
Dimensions of life
Paradoxes of human existence
challenge gain loss
Physical Death and pain
Life to the full Unlived life or constant fear
Social Loneliness and rejection
Understand and be understood
Bullying or being bullied
Personal Weakness and failure
Strength and stamina
Narcissism or self destruction
Spiritual Meaning-Lessness and futility
Finding an ethics to live by
Fanaticism or apathy
What stops us?The fear of truth
which is the fear of freedom Sartre’s Truth and Existence, 1989:34.
‘
Facing truth is the first step to freedom
We need to find a new path and new direction
We have to carry on and find a new way
Hold strong, even though we are
afraidSouth Sudan soldier before liberation
Prisoner defying Himmler
Show courage and defianceTank man in Tiananman Square
1989
Onto-dynamics
Learning to live in line with the laws of life
Paradox, conflict, difficulty and dilemmas are our daily companions
When crisis comes we need to have the courage to descend to rock bottom
From there we can build something better
Important to take context, political, cultural and social into account
Images of happiness
Walhalla, Utopia, el Dorado, Garden of Eden, Nirvana, Land of the Lotus eaters
What is happiness anyway?
Classic distinction hedonism/eudaimonia
Positive emotion: feeling good
Life satisfaction (Diener): an evaluation of overall picture of one’s life
Absence of problems: having a good time
Contentment or state of harmony
Elation or bliss and ecstasy
An aim which is always elusive
Problems with happiness
Nagel’s post accident situation of not having a care in the world, yet being pitied: happy fool
(View from Nowhere, 1986).
If pleasure or feeling good is the goal, then what of Nozick’s ‘experience machine’ (1974)?
Need for pleasure is addictive and undermines happiness
Pure happiness is unrealistic: not true to life.
Tree of Knowledge and Exile from Paradise: human evolution.
Kierkegaard: the Fall : tragedy or necessary and beneficial?
After Eden: knowledge of good and evil
Return to Eden is not the objective
Rather to live with consciousness and learn
EXISTENTIAL THERAPY IN PRACTICE
Greater values than happiness:
love, truth, beauty, loyalty, honour, courage, freedom.
Hedonism or Eudaimonia:
are we after ease or do we seek to live well?
www.existentialacademy.com 123
Aristotle’s Eudaimonia: value based Or a banker’ version of value: how big was your bonus?
Global map of Well Being 2006
(or affluence/prosperity)
What is the Happy Planet Index?
Global measure of sustainable well-being: the extent to which countries deliver long, happy, sustainable lives for the people that live in them.
The 2012 HPI report ranks 151 countries based on their efficiency – the extent to which each nation produces long and happy lives per unit of environmental input.
How is the Happy Planet Index calculated?
Experienced well-being x Life expectancy
Divided by Ecological Footprint
The website www.happyplanetindex.org
Well Being measured by Gallup World Poll Ladder of Life: 0-10 rating
Life expectancy: average age people can expect to reach
Ecological Footprint: WWF measure of per capita hectares of land required to sustain consumption pattern
Happy Planet Index
Can we have enduring happiness ?
Happiness and unhappiness are twins that grow up together. (Nietzsche, 1882: 270)
Dangers of complacency
1994 study Galen Bodenhausen: students in happy mood more keen to condemn their less privileged peers
Diener’s follow up study: happy kids drop out of college more, earn less later on
June Gruber: happiness good but you can have too much of it
Iris Mauss: happiness leads to lack of training for crisis
Don’t lose yourself when life is tough
The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work. Harry Golden
The art of living is to be equal to all our emotions rather than to select and cultivate only the
pleasant ones
Tuning into our feelings in order to move towards
understanding A pathway
towards the light
of understanding
We have learnt to deal in emoticons
Your own little sphere of existence
matters
Imagine a person like a sphere
That person is located in a universe with other planets,
stars, suns, moons and spheres
Sphere as a planet or a cell: micro or macro
level.
If a cell: connection with other cells, function and internal constitution are
paramount
If planet: orbit and position matter
Merleau Ponty: Visible and Invisible
Things are structures – frameworks – the stars of our life: they gravitate around us. Yet there is a secret bond between
us and them –
through perception
we enter into the
essence of the flesh
(Visible and Invisible: 220)
A fractal universe: patterns of leaf veins repeat
Going into the molecules at the quantum level: we discover whole worlds of atoms and anti-matter
Other end of spectrum: into infinity: galaxies and black
holes
Feeling our own feelings
The universe is our location
We are part of it
We are also an entire universe of our own: the
human universe
Each of us is a universe to ourselves.
You experience yourself as having a nucleus: a core, a heart or a soul
Solar anatomy
Layers of the sun
Corona, chromosphere, photosphere, convection zone, and core.
Perhaps we are more like suns, generating heat
and light
Merleau Ponty: soul
The soul is the hollow of the body, the body is the distension of the soul. The soul adheres to the body as their signification adheres to the cultural things, whose reverse or other side it is. (233)
Layers of a person’s life.
4.Physical: Umwelt
3.Social: Mitwelt
2.Personal: Eigenwelt
1.Spiritual: Uberwelt
Spiritual:Good/Evil
Intuitions, values, beliefs, purpose, meaning.Worldview/Ideas.
Personal:Strength/Weakness
Thoughts, memories, identity, freedom.Selfhood/Me.
Social:Love/Hate
Feelings, relations, belonging, acknowledgement.Communication/Others.
Physical:
Life/DeathSensations, actions, environment, body, things.
Survival/World.
Dimensions of existence
Different quality of experience at each
dimension
Befindlichkeit
Befindlichkeit, attunement, disposition or state of mind: the way I find myself. The way I am situated in the world, disposed towards it. Affectedness: an implicit understanding of the world, not yet articulated. (later: understanding and language)
In an ontic fashion every moment of our experience will be coloured by a particular tonality, or mood (Stimmung).
Emotions are our orientation.
Emotions are like the weather: never none.
They are the way we relate to the world.
They define the mood of the moment.
They are our atmosphere and modality.
They tell us how and where we are.
They show us what we want and don’t want
Learn to tune in rather than tune out.
Freedom and the brain: connectivity is
everythingThe more explicit we can make our experience the more connected we become. Each feeling left goes into
implicit rather than explicit memory. The more organized our
connections, the greater the freedom. Pre-frontal lobes, rather
than just limbic system.
Emotions and values
Emotions are always experienced in relation to
values and beliefs and principles.
They are our response to and message about our
ideologies
Ideologies, values and transcendence
Classic solutions dealing with emotions by
changing your values/beliefs It is not death that a man should fear, but he should
fear never beginning to live (Marcus Aurelius).
The un-reflected life is not worth living (Socrates)
Early therapists
Gilgamesh (Noah) 2750 BC
Dwaipayana (Krishna) 1500 BC
Moses 1400-1280 BC
Zoroaster 630 -553 BC
Lao-Tze 604- 531 BC
Gautama Buddha 563 –510 BC
Confucius 557- 479 BC
Wide range of Athenian and Roman philosophies
Plato 427 – 347 BC
Diogenes 413 - 323 BC
Aristotle 384 – 322 BC
Epicurus 341 – 270 BC
Zeno 335 – 263 BC
Cicero 106 – 43 BC
Lucretius 98 – 51 BC
Jesus Christ 4 BC – 29 AD
Seneca 1 AD - 65 AD
Epictetus 55 - 135
Marcus Aurelius 21 - 180
Socrates: 469 –399 BC
Preceded by Heraclitus 540 –480 BC
and Parmenides 515- 450 BC
Taught his students how to examine life: cultivating the love of wisdom.
Get out of the cave, in which we are chained in ignorance living amongst shadows.
Rediscover the light of truth about life.
Socrates
The unreflective life is not worth living
Aristotle
Eudaimonia: the good life : virtue ethics
Should benefit the community at large rather than only the individual
Philosophy teacher's discourse with the pupil (client) should be a co-operative, critical one that insists on the virtues of orderliness, deliberateness and clarity
Aristotelian practice
Pupils are taught to separate true beliefs from false beliefs and to modify and transform their passions accordingly
Winnowing and sifting opinions
Virtue ethics: live in line with the demon: force, power, spirit.
Epicureans
The Epicureans seek to treat human suffering by removing corrupting desires and by eliminating pain and disturbance (ataraxia).
Adjust values retaining only those that are attainable and may bring pleasure.
Relinquish the unobtainable and adjust expectations to what is realistic, so that with a slight of hand we can obtain what we think we want.
From Socrates to Epicures
Dialectical investigation and critical thinking are replaced with formulae and communal living enforces the creed.
Epicures understood something that neither Plato nor Aristotle had fully grasped, i.e., that false beliefs are often settled deep in the soul and that they may not be available for argument.
Skeptics Pyrrho of Elis (c. 360-275 B.C.)
The Epicurean view is that pleasure is the only good and we are taught to adjust our needs so as to guarantee the procurement of pleasure from small natural resources.
Skeptics: the only way to stop pain and suffering is to simply not believe in or desire anything.
So whilst Epicureans try to get rid of false beliefs, the Skeptics want to get rid of all beliefs.
Stoics: overcoming weakness
Ordering of the self and soul
Exercise of the mind
Lack of moral fibre and emotional weakness
Everything is connected, but Stoics consider that different temperaments need different approaches and that there is a critical moment (kairos) for change :
Zeno: virtue is its own reward
Stoic goal
For the Stoics the pupil's goal is to become his own teacher and pupil
In order to improve a person's life the soul must be exercised everyday, for instance by the use of logic and poetry
The objective is wisdom, the only ultimate value and virtue and leads to eudaimonia, the flourishing life: wisdom, courage, justice, temperance
The means: detachment and self-control : apathy
Spinoza-ethics
Prop.VI. The mind has greater power over the emotions and is less subject thereto, in so far as it understands all things as necessary. (under a species of eternity)
Sartre Theory of Emotions
The existence of desire as a human fact is sufficient to prove that human reality is a lack. (87)
Human reality is its own surpassing towards what it lacks; it surpasses itself toward the particular being which it would be if it were what it is. (89)
Sartre’s emotional theory
Embodied human existence mobilizes itself towards or away from that which it desires or dreads.
We can do magic in letting ourselves fall into emotion, thus transforming the world in bad faith.
Difference between reflective and non reflective emotions.
Project
Man is characterized above all by his going beyond a situation and by what he succeeds in making of what he has been made.
This going beyond we find at the very root of the human-in need. (scarcity)
This is what we call the project. (elementary objective, original intention)
(Sartre, Search for a Method:91)
Emotion classification tree Virginia Teller.
Lövheim cube of emotion
pride
jealousy
anger-despair
fear
sorrowshame
envy
hope-desire
love
joy
SadnessLow
HappinessHigh
AnxietyExcitementEngagement
DepressionDisappointmentDisengagement
Compass of emotions
evd 10
Four kinds of emotions
Threat to value: pride, jealousy, anger
Loss of value (despair, fear, sorrow):
Aspire to value: desire, envy, shame
Gain value: hope, love, joy
Four relational layers
World:Dimension
Umwelt:Where and how?
Mitwelt:With what?
Eigenwelt:Who?
Uberwelt:For what?
Physical:survival
Nature:senses
Things Body Cosmos
Social:affiliation
Society:emotions
Others Ego Culture
Personal:identity
Person:thought
Me Self Consciousness
Spiritual:meaning
Infinite:intuition
Ideas Spirit Conscience
Different dimensions of human relationships at different levels of existence
Overview of conflicts, challenges and paradoxes on four dimensions
World Umwelt Mitwelt Eigenwelt Uberwelt
Physical Nature:Life/Death
Things:Pleasure/Pain
Body:Health/Illness
Cosmos:Harmony/Chaos
Social Society:Love/Hate
Others:Dominance/Submission
Ego:Acceptance/Rejection
Culture:Belonging/Isolation
Personal Person:Identity/Freedom
Me:Perfection/Imperfection
Self:Integrity/Disintegration
Consciousness:Confidence/ Confusion
Spiritual: Infinite:Good/Evil
Ideas:Truth/Untruth
Spirit:Meaning/Futility
Conscience:Right/Wrong
1:Pride-confidence-arrogance-conceit
2:Jealousy-worry-vigilance-caution
3:Anger-hate-rage-despair
4:Fear-confusion-cowardice-alarm
5:Sorrow-misery-resignation-regretShame-emptiness-guilt-humilation:7
Envy-curiosity-aspiration-interest:8
Hope-desire-resolve-trust:9
Love-courage-commitment-vow:10
Joy-thrill-excitement-bliss:11
6. Low DespondencyDepression
Sadness
ExhilarationHappinessGladness 12:High
Upgain
Downloss
Emotional Compass
How do we experience our
world? We are lenses, prisms for light to refract.
We allow light through, reflect it, magnify it, block it, divert it. We change the tone and mood and affect the world in turn.
Tune into the feelings and moods that colour our worldview
They create different atmospheres at different times.
The colour of emotion
Depressed worldview
THE ART OF LIVING:HOW TO BE ON THE PATH OF LIFE?
Understanding our emotions is the best way towards understanding our mode of being and our values. Living with
our emotions is the path to our elemental objectives
The art of living is to be equal to all emotions rather than to select only
the pleasant ones
When the storm hits at seawe need to be prepared
pride
jealousy
anger-despair
fear
sorrowshame
envy
hope-desire
love
joy
SadnessLow
HappinessHigh
AnxietyExcitement
Engagement
DepressionDisappointmentDisengagement
Greed
Stinginess
Frustration
Disgust
PainNeed
Craving
Excitement
Lust
Pleasure
DeprivationEmptiness
SatisfactionFullness
GainSurvivalsurprise
LossThreatshock
Sensory Compass
Care
Jealousy
Anger
Fear
RejectionShame
Envy
Approval
Love
Acceptance
IsolationSeparateness
BelongingOneness
EngagementDisengagement
Emotional Compass
Superiority
Stubbornness
Defiance
Deflation
HumiliationInferiority
Anxiety
Courage
Commitment
Confidence
ImperfectionWeakness
PerfectionStrength
SuccessFailure
Mental Compass
Pride
Prudence
Wrath
Resignation
DisillusionmentGuilt
Aspiration
Hope
Resoluteness
Bliss
FutilityAbsurdity
Meaning Purpose
GoodEvil
Moral Compass
Rising above your emotions
Above the clouds the weather is steady even when it rains below.
Transcending our own situation and emotions allows us to understand our own response.
Bringing down emotional intensity: painting the world pale or in pastel shades
Anxiety as source of energy
Anxiety is life energy rather than a symptom of illness
When we face the responsibility of making something out of nothing we become anxious
Heidegger and anxiety Anxiety individualizes. This
individualization brings Dasein back from its falling, and makes manifest to it that authenticity and inauthenticity are possibilities of its Being. (Heidegger 1927:191)
Going beyond happiness
Happiness as a high is doomed: every high is followed by a low.
Constant pleasure leads to addiction and misery.
Happiness as contentment may be more feasible, but could easily lead to mediocrity and lack of awareness.
Beyond the quest for happiness is the quest for right living.
This is not just about meaning and purpose but about truth, being, nothingness, learning and evolution, dialectically integrating paradox.
Existential intelligence
Embracing existence in its contradictions and rising to its challenges.
Realizing that there is no such thing as a perfect human being.
Learning to be resilient and flexible enough to negotiate on-going paradoxes
Facing existential challenges in a personal and creative manner that allows for dialectic.
Emotional well being
An ability to creatively encounter challenges and crises.
Capacity for re-establishing equilibrium through strong, dynamic centre of narrative gravity.
Enhanced enjoyment of life, appreciation of physical world, others, self-worth and meaning.
True freedom is always spiritual. It has something to do with your innermost being, which cannot be chained, handcuffed, or put into a jail.
The Courage to Be Yourself
Making suffering meaningful
Processing is of prime importance.
Assimilate crisis and make it meaningful.
Process emotions, values, beliefs
Transcend and overcome.
Rise to the challenge
Find the purpose and meaning in the suffering
What helps? Those who have experienced trauma do better if they have good social
support.
They do significantly better if they have integrity and a sense of wholeness. (to survive trauma you either need good conscience or no conscience at all…)
The conflict or trauma has to be put to good use.
There has to be a safe place one can retreat to.
It makes a big difference whether you can take some responsibility for your fate.
It helps if you feel your trauma is in some ways a proof of your character or a building block of it.
If you can claim the crisis as part of your success rather than evidence of failure and bad character: making it count!
Resilience
Rita’s Grief
When I speak to Rita, who is grieving over her husband and small son who have perished in a car accident, the words that I say to her at first hardly reach her.
She is in a place of relative safety deep inside of herself, in a state of suspended animation behind the façade that she turns to the world. She barely engages with people at all.
Rita’s grief 2
At first it is not my words that make the link to her world, but the consistency that I can offer in being attentive and careful to not hurt her further or push her too hard.
I spend nearly half an hour in relative silence with Rita, at times formulating her fear on her behalf, gently, tentatively, checking for verification by noting her response.
Rita’s grief 3
Mostly the work consists of me letting myself be touched by her suffering and learning to tolerate her pain with her, so that I can offer reactions and words that soothe and move her forward to a place where she can begin to face what has happened to her so shockingly out of the blue. In this process she guides me and exposes more and more of her nightmarish universe to me as she perceives me as capable of venturing further into it with her.
Bringing down emotional intensity
Rita
World Physical Social Personal Spiritual
Umwelt Take interest in objects, space
Meet others
Relate to own body again
Recognize value
Mitwelt Leave dead behind
Love dead still
Find self valid
Find others valid
Eigenwelt Recover sense of self care
Rediscover love
Love self Find project
Uberwelt Make sense of disaster
Life with others is worthwhile
I am me and this matters
There is a purpose to it all
Rita
World Physical Social Personal Spiritual
Umwelt Take interest in objects, space
Meet others
Relate to own body again
Recognize value
Mitwelt Leave dead behind
Love dead still
Find self valid
Find others valid
Eigenwelt Recover sense of self care
Rediscover love
Love self Find project
Uberwelt Make sense of disaster
Life with others is worthwhile
I am me and this matters
There is a purpose to it all
Overview of conflicts, challenges and paradoxes on four dimensions
World Umwelt Mitwelt Eigenwelt Uberwelt
Physical Nature:Life/Death
Things:Pleasure/Pain
Body:Health/Illness
Cosmos:Harmony/Chaos
Social Society:Love/Hate
Others:Dominance/Submission
Ego:Acceptance/Rejection
Culture:Belonging/Isolation
Personal Person:Identity/Freedom
Me:Perfection/Imperfection
Self:Integrity/Disintegration
Consciousness:Confidence/ Confusion
Spiritual: Infinite:Good/Evil
Ideas:Truth/Untruth
Spirit:Meaning/Futility
Conscience:Right/Wrong
Dimension
Positive Purpose
NegativeConcern
Minimal Goal
Optimal Value
Physical: Health Illness Fitness Vitality
Pleasure Pain Safety Well Being
Strength Weakness Efficacy Ability
Life Death Survival Existence
Social Success Failure Skill Contribution
Belonging Isolation Kinship Loyalty
Acceptance Rejection Recognition Cooperation
Love Hate Respect Reciprocity
Personal Identity Confusion Individuality Integrity
Perfection Imperfection Achievement
Excellence
Independence
Dependency Autonomy Liberty
Confidence Doubt Poise Clarity
Spiritual Good Evil Responsibility
Transparency
Truth Untruth Reality Authenticity
Meaning Absurdity Sense Value
Purpose Randomness
Possibility Freedom
Spiritual:Integrate what has happened in world view
Improve rather than give up values, beliefs, purpose, meaning.Stick with what is true.
Personal:Allow the event to strengthen your character
Express thoughts and memories. Regain a sense of freedom in relation to adversity.Learn to yield as well as be resolute.
Social:Seek to go beyond hateful and destructive relations by isolation and avoidance till
Reconciliation is possible. Seek belonging with like minded allies.Communicate your emotions without reproach, resentment, bitterness.
Physical:Seek safety when under threat.
Trust and heed sensations of stress. Find natural environment that can soothe as well as expand your horizons.
OVERCOMING TRAUMA
How to create value in life?
Through committed and engaged action
Step by step
Diligently proceeding no matter what challenges come on your path
Steady progress comes from undaunted focus on your project
Flexibility and finding joy in the process rather than aiming for success or happiness
Our luck will change
We are united with
what we love
Help others when possible
bushfires in Victoria 2009
Make gestures of good will when possible
Pentagon Vietnam protests: flower power
Loving your Life
Loving your fate and destiny in all its manifestations (Nietzsche’s Amor Fati)
Challenges and difficulties are not the enemy, nor to be avoided but rather to be welcomed as grist for the mill and par for the course: life as an adventure.
Chiaroscuro, claire-obscure, the light and shade of life
When it is dark enough, you can see the stars. Ralph Waldo
Emerson
Eventually: Earth Rises again
1968 picture from Apollo mission
www.existentialpsychotherapy.netwww.icecap.org.ukwww.dilemmas.orgwww.nspc.org.ukwww.existentialacademy.comwww.emmyvandeurzen.comFacebook and LinkedIn: Existential Therapy
Podcast of Living with your Emotions onwww.societyofpsychotherapy.org.uk
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