Existential-Analytic Position

ROLLO REESE MAY

PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT, THEORIES, AND CONCEPTS

RICHARD M. BAÑEZ
Presenter

JENNY LYN B. CASANO, Ph.D. Cand.

Professor
 May's Existential-Analytic Position

Biography
Concepts and Principles
 What Is Existentialism?
Coverage

 Existentialism and Psychoanalysis

 Values Disintegration in Modern Society and the
Loss of Our Moral Compass
 Emptiness and Loneliness
 The Emergence of Anxiety
 The Expansion of Consciousness
Personality Development
Assessment Techniques
ROLLO REESE MAY

• born in Ada, Ohio, in 1909, and raised into a family

characterized by intense marital conflicts
• exposed to the existentialism of Kierkegaard and
Heidegger
• studied Kierkegaard’s and Freud’s views on anxiety
• obtained Bachelor of Arts degree from Oberlin
College in Ohio in 1930
• earned his Bachelor of Divinity degree Cum Laude in
1938 from Union Theological Seminary in New York
• studied Psychoanalysis at the William Alanson White
Institute of Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis, and
Psychology in New York.
• was awarded the Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology in
Columbia University
• The Meaning of Anxiety
ROLLO REESE MAY

• He served as a faculty member at the New School for

Social Research, New York University, Harvard,
Yale, and Princeton.
• He also published a number of books, including
Man’s Search for Himself (1953), Psychology and the
Human Dilemma (1967), Love and Will (1969), Power
and Innocence (1972), Paulus: Reminiscences of a
Friendship (1973), The Courage to Create (1975), Freedom
and Destiny (1981), The Discovery of Being: Writings in
Existential Psychology (1983), My Quest for Beauty
(1985), The Cry for Myth (1991), and his last major
work, published posthumously, The Psychology of
Existence: An Integrative, Clinical Experience (1995),
coauthored with Kirk Schneider.
 Concepts and Principles
What Is Existentialism?
• Existentialism: philosophy that focuses
on people’s attempts to make sense of
their existence
• People assign meaning to life and take
responsibility for their actions as they try
to live in accordance with their chosen
values
• Dasein: a person exists in a particular
place at a particular time
• A person can be conscious of, and
responsible for, his or her existence, and
can therefore choose the direction his or
her life will take
 Concepts and Principles
What Is Existentialism?
• Being: developmental process whereby
the individual seeks to realize his or her
unique set of potentials
• Ontology: branch of philosophy
that seeks to understand the nature
of being
• May disapproved of the
existentialists’ use of the term
“being” because it connotes a
substance that is static and
unchanging
• He preferred the term becoming:
process in which we ourselves are the
source of change, as we struggle as
individuals to realize our potential
 Concepts and Principles
Existentialism and Psychoanalysis
• Existential-analytic perspective:
theoretical approach to understanding
human personality that combines
elements of existential philosophy with
Freudian concepts
• Three modes of being-in-the-world:
1. Umwelt: biological or natural
environment in which human
beings exist
2. Mitwelt: world of
interrelationships
3. Eigenwelt: unique presence in
human beings of self-awareness
and self-relatedness
Concepts and Principles
 Concepts and Principles
Values Disintegration Emptiness and The Emergence of
in Modern Society and Loneliness Anxiety
the Loss of Our Moral
Compass

Healthy Healthy communal Normal

INDIVIDUALISM ORIENTATION ANXIETY

Unhealthy Unhealthy communal Neurotic

INDIVIDUALISM ORIENTATION ANXIETY

Feelings of anxiety
Living in an age of
Disintegration leads stem from loneliness
transition makes us
to negative and emptiness.
question our values
consequences. Anxiety signals an
and goals.
internal conflict.
 Concepts and Principles
The Expansion of Consciousness
• The more
conscious of
our being we
are, the more
spontaneous
and creative
we will be
• Allows us
to be more
capable of
choosing
our plans
and
reaching
our goals
 Concepts and Principles
Personality Development

Innocence: no consciousness of self

Rebellion: we seek to establish our inner

strength

Ordinary consciousness of self: some

awareness of prejudices and limitations

Creative consciousness of self: transcendence

of the usual or ordinary limits of consciousness
 Concepts and Principles
Assessment Techniques
• No primary focus on techniques; focus
instead on the person's attitudes, the
special meanings of his or her existence
 We are being imprisoned in a huge theatre.
We walk on a bare stage while some people
(perhaps our audience) are watching us and
anticipating a good performance. We tend to
create an ACT that somehow will cloak our
true nature for we want them to be engaged
and satisfied in this pretentious PLAY. We
act as dictated by the script-the blueprint of
lies and fail to foresee that we're becoming
strangers to ourselves.

The most fearful eyes

Are not embedded in any wild beast’s skull
Nor Medusa’s face
But on a mirror’s gaze.
A chance to glance ourselves
And admit our mistakes.