Existential Learning Theory
1. What does personal freedom mean to you? Do you believe you are what you are now largely as a result of your choices, or do you believe you are the product of your circumstances?
2. Are you able to accept and exercise your own freedom and make significant decisions alone? Do you attempt to avoid living with freedom and responsibility? Are you inclined to give up some of your autonomy for the security of being taken care of by others?
3. Do you agree that each person is basically alone? What are the implications for counseling practice? In what ways might you have attempted to avoid your experience of aloneness? How has this concept been a source of strength for you?
4. To what extent do you believe that unless you take death seriously life has little meaning? What are the implications of this notion for the practice of therapy?
5. What specific things do you value most? What would your life be like without them? What gives your life meaning and a sense of purpose?
6. Have you experienced an “existential vacuum”? Is your life at times without substance, depth, and meaning? What is this experience of emptiness like for you, and how do you cope with it?
7. What are your reactions to the existential view of the importance of the client–therapist relationship? What strengths do you see in this view of the therapeutic relationship? To what degree are you open to challenging and changing your own life?
Second part
Now comment on the following: What are some of the most important contributions of psychoanalytic thinking to the understanding of human nature and psychopathology? What aspects of the theory and practice of psychoanalytic therapy are most criticized? What is your personal “feel” for this theory? In what ways Adlerian therapy is similar to and different from the traditional psychoanalytic approach?
