Existential Psychotherapy, Stephen Forrest

Questions

Does it really matter what kind of therapy I choose?

Yes, it does matter. Every psychotherapy tends to have a different emphasis in style, philosophy, impact upon you and implications for your place in society. Whilst it can be tempting to go for the most common therapy, it is very important to choose an approach that will fully respect you and for you to understand a little of how the type of therapy you choose will view and treat you. Two broad approaches to therapy are:

1. Psychotherapies that view your perspective as being inherently legitimate and meaningful and work with your meaning, emotions, personal history and experiences. These psychotherapies tend to emphasise the uniqueness of the individual, and importance of the therapeutic relationship as the vehicle for change. All therapies claim to do this, but few actually do in practice.

2. Therapies which require you to comply with the therapist's perspective or 'model'. Such therapies rely on the individual conforming to an authority's way of making sense of personal experiences; and tend to use standardised techniques or 'tools' which seek to modify your experiences according to that model. This is particularly true with therapies which rely on 'the clinical model'.

Existential Psychotherapy falls into the first category. It can also impart elements of 'psycho-education' and common-sense methods of managing experiences that can be learned quickly and applied in daily life.