CHAPTER 11

EXISTENTIAL THEORY
ROLLO MAY

I. Overview of May's Existential Theory

Existential psychology began in Europe shortly after World War II and spread to the United States, where
Rollo May played a large part in popularizing it. A clinical psychologist by training, May took the view
that modern people frequently run away both from making choices and from assuming responsibility.

II. Biography of Rollo May

Rollo May was born in Ohio in 1909, but grew up in Michigan. After graduating from Oberlin College in
1930, he spent three years roaming throughout eastern and southern Europe as an itinerant artist.
When he returned to the United States, he entered the Union Theological Seminary, from which he
received a Master of Divinity degree. He then served for two years as a pastor, but quit in order to
pursue a career in psychology. He received a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Columbia in 1949 at the
age of 40. During his professional career, he served as lecturer or visiting professor at a number of
universities, conducted a private practice as a psychotherapist, and wrote a number of popular books
on the human condition. May died in 1994 at age 85.

III. Background of Existentialism

Sren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher and theologian, is usually considered to be the founder of
modern existentialism. Like later existentialists, he emphasized a balance between freedom and
responsibility. People acquire freedom of action by expanding their self-awareness and by assuming
responsibility for their actions. However, this acquisition of freedom and responsibility is achieved at the
expense of anxiety and dread.

A. What Is Existentialism?
The first tenet of existentialism is that existence take precedence over essence, meaning that process
and growth are more important than product and stagnation. Second, existentialists oppose the artificial
split between subject and object. Third, they stress people's search for meaning in their lives. Fourth,
they insist that each of us is responsible for who we are and what we will become. Fifth, most take an
antitheoretical position, believing that theories tend to objectify people.

B. Basic Concepts
According to existentialists, a basic unity exists between people and their environments, a unity
expressed by the term Dasein, or being-in-the-world. Three simultaneous modes of the world
characterize us in our Dasein: Umwelt, or the environment around us; Mitwelt, or our world with other
people; and Eigenwelt, or our relationship with our self. People are both aware of themselves as living
beings and also aware of the possibility of nonbeing or nothingness. Death
is the most obvious form of nonbeing, which can also be experienced as retreat
from life's experiences.

IV. The Case of Philip

Rollo May helped illustrate his notion of existentialism with the case of Philip, a successful architect in
his mid-50s. Despite his apparent success, Philip experienced severe anxiety when his relationship with
Nicole (a writer in her mid-40s) took a puzzling turn. Uncertain of his future and suffering from low self-
esteem, Philip went into therapy with Rollo May. Eventually, Philip was able to understand that his
difficulties with women were related to his early experiences with a mother who was unpredictable and
an older sister who suffered from severe mental disorders. However, he began to recover only after he
accepted that his "need" to take care of unpredictable Nicole was merely part of his personal history
with unstable women.

V. Anxiety
People experience anxiety when they become aware that their existence or something identified with it
might be destroyed. The acquisition of freedom inevitably leads to anxiety, which can be either
pleasurable and constructive or painful and destructive.

A. Normal Anxiety
Growth produces normal anxiety, defined as that which is proportionate to the threat, does not involve
repression, and can be handled on a conscious level.

B. Neurotic Anxiety
Neurotic anxiety is a reaction that is disproportionate to the threat and that leads to repression and
defensive behaviors. It is felt whenever one's values are transformed into dogma. Neurotic anxiety
blocks growth and productive action.