ROLLO MAY: Existential Psychology

Background of Existentialism

- Existential psychology is concerned with the individual’s struggle to work through life’s experiences and to grow toward
becoming more fully human.
- Modern existential psychology has roots in the writings of Søren Kierkegaard, Danish philosopher and theologian.
- The works of two German philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger helped popularized existential
psychology during the 20th century. Heidegger exerted considerable influence on two Swiss psychiatrists, Ludwig
Binswanger and Medard Boss. Binswanger and Boss, along with Karl Jaspers, Victor Frankl, and others, adapted the
philosophy of existentialism to the practice of psychotherapy.

What is Existentialism?

- First, existence takes precedence over essence.

- Existence means to emerge or to become, while essence implies a static immutable substance.
- Existence suggests process; essence refers to a product. Existence is associated with growth and change; essence
signifies stagnation and finality. Existentialists affirm that people’s essence is their power to continually redefine
themselves through the choices they make.
- Second, existentialism opposes the split between subject and object. People are both subjective and objective and must
search for truth by living active and authentic lives.
- Third, people search for meaning to their lives.
- Fourth, existentialists hold that ultimately each of us is responsible for who we are and what we become.
- Fifth, existentialist are basically antitheoretical. Theories dehumanize people and render them as objects, losing their
authenticity.

BASIC CONCEPTS

1. Being-in-the-world
o Existentialists adopt a phenomenological approach to understanding humanity. To them, we exist in a world that
can be best understood form our own perspective.
o The basic unity of the person and environment is expressed in the German word Dasein, meaning to exist
there.
o Many people suffer from anxiety and despair brought on by their alienation from themselves or from their world.
Alienation manifests itself in three areas:
a) separation from nature
b) lack of meaningful interpersonal relations
c) alienation from one’s authentic self
o People experience three simultaneous modes in their being-in-the-world.
a) Umwelt. The environment around us, the world of object and things that would exist even if people had no
awareness.
b) Mitwelt. Refers to relating to people as people, not as things.
c) Eigenwelt. Refers to one’s relationship with oneself. It means to be aware of oneself as a human being and to grasp
who we are as we relate to the world of things and to the world of people.
2. Nonbeing
o Being-in-the-world necessitates an awareness of self as a living, emerging being. This awareness, in turn, leads
to the dread of not being: that is, nonbeing or nothingness.
o Life becomes more vital, more meaningful when we confront the possibility of our death.
3. Anxiety
o May claimed that much of human behavior is motivated by an underlying sense of dread and anxiety.
o May defined anxiety as “the subjective state of the individual’s becoming aware that his or her existence can be
destroyed, that he can become nothing.
o The acquisition of freedom inevitably leads to anxiety.
 Normal Anxiety
 Defined by May as that “which is proportionate to the threat does not involve repression,
and can be confronted constructively on the conscious level.”
 Neurotic Anxiety
 May defined neurotic anxiety as “a reaction which is disproportionate to the threat, involves
repression and other forms of intrapsychic conflict and is managed by various kinds of
blocking-off activity and awareness.
4. Guilt
o Guilt arises when people deny their potentialities, failure to accurately perceive the needs of fellow humans, or
remain oblivious to their dependence on the natural world.
o Both anxiety and guilt are ontological, that is, they refer to the nature of being and not to feelings arising from
specific situations or transgressions.
o May recognized three forms of ontological guilt:
 a) Guilt that arises from a lack of awareness of one’s being in the world (corresponds to Umwelt), one’s
separation from nature. This is especially prevalent in advanced societies.
b) Guilt that stems from our inability to perceive accurately the world of others (corresponds to Mitwelt).
c) Guilt that is associated with our denial of our potentialities or with our failure to fulfil them. The guilt is
grounded in our relationship with the self (Eigenwelt). This is reminiscent of Maslow’s concept of
Jonah complex, the fear of being or doing one’s best.
o Like anxiety, ontological guilt can have either a positive or a negative effect on personality. We can use this guilt
to develop a healthy sense of humility, to improve our relations with others, and to creatively use our
potentialities. However, when we refuse to accept ontological guilt, it becomes neurotic or morbid.
5. Intentionality
o The ability to make a choice implies some underlying structure upon which that choice is made. The structure
that gives meaning to experience and allows people to make decisions about the future is called intentionality.
o Intentionality bridges the gap between subject and object. A man’s action depends on his intentions and on the
meaning he gives to his experience.
o Intentionality is sometimes unconscious.
6. Care, Love, and Will
o Care is an active process, the opposite of apathy. To care for someone means to recognize that person as a
fellow human being, to identify with that person’s pain or joy, guilt or pity. Care is not the same as love but it is
the source of love.
o May defined love as the “delight in the presence of the other person and an affirming of that person’s value and
development as much as one’s own.
o Care is also the source of will. Will is “the capacity to organize one’s self so that movement in a certain direction
or toward a certain goal may take place.
7. Union of Love and Will
o Modern society is suffering from an unhealthy division of love and will. Love has become associated with sex,
which lacks commitment; whereas will has come to mean power, it becomes self-serving and manipulative.
o One of the biological reasons why love and will are separated because when we first come into the world, our
needs are met without self-conscious effort in our part. But later, the blissful love we enjoyed during infancy is
now opposed by the emerging wilfulness. Parents often interpret this positive assertion of self negatively. As a
result, children learn to disassociate will from love.
a) Forms of Love
i. Sex- A physiological need that seeks gratification through the release of tension.
ii. Eros- A physiological desire that seeks procreation or creation through an enduring union with a
loved one. Eros is built on care and tenderness.
iii. Philia- An intimate nonsexual friendship between two people. It builds the foundation of eros.
iv. Agape- Defined as the esteem for other, the concern for other’s welfare beyond any gain that one
can get out of it. Agape is altruistic love, it is undeserved and unconditional.
o In summary, healthy adult relationships blend all four forms of love. They are based on sexual satisfaction, a
desire for an enduring union, genuine friendship, and an unselfish concern for the welfare of the other person.
8. Freedom and Destiny
o What is Freedom?
a) Healthy individuals are able to assume their freedom and to face their destiny.
b) Freedom is the individual’s capacity to know that he is the determined one. The word “determined” is
synonymous with destiny
o Forms of Freedom:
a) Existential Freedom
 It is the freedom of action – the freedom of doing on the choices that one makes.
b) Essential Freedom
 refers to freedom of being
o What is Destiny?
c) May designed destiny as “the design of the universe speaking through the design of each one of us.”
d) Our ultimate destiny is death, but on a lesser scale, our destiny includes other biological factors and
psychological and cultural factors.
e) Destiny does not mean preordained or foredoomed, we have the power to choose, and this power
allows us to confront and challenge our destiny.
- Freedom and destiny are not antithetical but rather a normal paradox of life.

The Power of Myth

- Myths are not falsehoods; rather, they are conscious and unconscious belief systems that provide explanations for
personal and social problems.
- May believed that people communicate with one another on two levels. The first is rationalistic language; truth takes
precedence over the people who are communicating. The second is through myths, the total human experience is more
important than the empirical accuracy of the communication.
 - May believed that the Oedipus story is a powerful myth in our culture because it contains elements of existential crises
common to everyone. These
- crises include (1) birth, (2) separation or exile from parents and home, (3) sexual union with one parent and hostility
toward the other, (4) the assertion of independence and the search for identity, and (5) death.
- May’s concept of myth is comparable to Jung’s idea of collective unconscious in that myths are archetypal patterns in the
human experience; they are avenues to universal images that lie beyond individual experience.

Psychopathology

- Without some goal or destination, people become sick and engage in a variety of self-defeating and self-destructive
behaviors.
- Psychologically disturbed individuals deny their destiny and thus lose their freedom.

Psychotherapy

- May rejected the idea that psychotherapy should reduce anxiety and ease feelings of guilt. Instead, he suggested that
psychotherapy should make a person more human that is to help them expand their consciousness so that they will be in
a better position to make choices. These choices lead to the simultaneous growth of freedom and responsibility.
- The purpose of psychotherapy is to set people free.
- Existential therapy has no special set of techniques or methods that can be applied to all patients. The therapists have
only themselves to offer, their own humanity.
- Therapy is a human encounter, an I-Thou relationship with the potential to facilitate growth within both the therapist and
the patient.
- Related Research
- Mortality salience and denial of our animal nature (terror management theory)

Critique of May

- Existentialism in general and May’s psychology have been criticized as being anti-intellectual and antitheoretical. May did
not formulate his views in a theoretical structure.
- May’s theory have explored aspects of humanity not examined by other personality theorists. His view of humanity is both
broader and deeper than the views of most other personality theorists.
- His use of certain concepts was at times inconsistent and confusing. He also neglected several important topics in human
personality like development, cognition, learning, and motivation.
- There were no operational definitions of May’s terms. He offered a variety of definitions for such concepts as anxiety, guilt,
intentionality, will, and destiny.

REMARKS

- May’s theory is rated high on the dimension of free choice.

- May’s theory is optimistic, though he painted a gloomy picture of humanity.
- May clearly favored teleology over causality. Although May recognized the potential impact of childhood experiences on
adult personality, each one of us has a particular goal or destiny that we must discover and challenge or else risk
alienation and neurosis.
- People have enormous capacity for self-awareness, but people sometimes lack the courage to face their destiny or to
recognize the evil that exist within their culture and themselves.
- Society contributes to personality through interpersonal relationships. Biology also contributes to personality.
- May’s view of humanity definitely leans toward uniqueness. Each of us is responsible for shaping our own personality
within the limits imposed by the society.