Victor Frankl’s Logotherapy and Existential Dynamics
HADRIAN-V. CONŢIU, Victor Frankl’s Logotherapy and Existential Dynamics This paper presents a therapeutic method proposed by dr. Viktor E. Frankl, a meaning-centered psychotherapy called logotherapy - a therapeutic form approaching, through some of its specifi c features, the theological and spiritual vision of the Fathers (Metropolitan Hierotheos). A major cause of mental illness is, according to logotherapy, the meaninglessness of life, manifested in the form of the so called existential vacuum, a disease specifi c to contemporary world where feeling empty and helpless is a predominant state. Frankl asserts the need for an oversensitive human life, this argument originating in the limited observation of the world and all of the meanings related to it. One of the most important aspects of logotherapy is the noodynamics or “ existential dynamic in a fi eld of polar tension “, according to its author, precisely this (intrinsic) tension between what man has already done (that which is) and what he would still to have to realize (what he should become), being the indispensable condition for mental health. Logotherapy is characterized by a message of optimism and hope, Frankl’s conviction being that, despite all the pain of human life and despite of all constraints, these can not cancel freedom; it aims for the dignity of human existence, distinguishing freedom that can not be totally eliminated. KEYWORDS: psychotherapy, logotherapy, existential dynamic (noodynamics), the will of meaning, love, mental illness HADRIAN-V CONŢIU |