The Existentialists Podcast The Existentialists Podcast

In this episode, the hosts invite you, our listeners, to encounter the fundamental conditions of human existence by providing your own response to the challenges that these conditions bring to your own life. Specifically, we are discussing how we can encounter and personally respond to the basic fact that we are here in this world: “I am here but can I be?” Moreover, we are not just here but we are alive, we experience emotions and engage with life and relationships: “I am alive but do I like being alive?” Next, we are also our unique person, distinct and different from others: “ I am myself- May I be myself?” Finally, to encounter and realize our existence we are confronted with the question of meaning: “I am here, alive, I am myself but for what, what is the purpose or meaning of my life?” As you listen to the dialogue among your hosts, we invite you to engage with these four questions: “Can I be?”, “Do I like being alive?”, “May I be myself?” and “For what am I living?”- and provide your own personal answer to these questions as a way of engaging deeply with your existence.

In this episode, the hosts discuss encountering our own moral conscience understood as a personal capacity of sensing what is right in a given situation. In contrast with moralistic attitudes or a priori prescribed percepts about right or wrong, encountering our moral conscience means encountering ourselves as persons, and trusting our own capacity to sense what is right. Listening to and following our moral conscience requires courage and vulnerability to trust our inner moral compass and our capacity to sense what is right and to do justice to what is right.

Pain, either physical or psychological, is a fundamental, inescapable human experience that typically elicits a lot of suffering, resistance, sorrow, and hopelessness. In this episode, the hosts discuss about pain as a complex, challenging human experience that involves both our body and psyche, and, at times, our spiritual life. Concrete ways of encountering pain grounded in the experience of living with chronic pain provide listeners with a felt account and practical strategies of how to turn towards pain in a manner that either opens up the possibility to find some meaning in suffering or transform suffering in acceptance and discovery of new possibilities of living amid pain.

In this episode, the hosts discuss about turning towards our body to encounter the myriad of ways in which our bodies support our existence and make possible our embodied being in the world. The engagement with the world in and through our body has been denoted by the term “embodiment”, wherein the mind and body are inextricably linked and reciprocally influence one another. In Existential Analysis, the body is understood as the primordial physical structure the provides us with space, support, and protection, as the lived body infused with emotions, vitality and sensuality, as an expression of our own unique, authentic self, and as an essential way of contributing and finding meaning in our lives. Encountering our body and cultivating a good relationship with our body is critical for living a good, fulfilled life.

In this episode, the hosts discuss about how we encounter change in our lives, our responses to change, and how we could deal with change in a more personal, intentional way. Whereas change is omnipresent in our lives and it can take many forms, some people tend to be worried about change and try to avoid it out of fear of unpredictability, of the unpleasant or painful consequences or of the destabilizing effect of change. Notwithstanding these possible outcomes that may accompany change, as human beings we are in a continuous process of change and becoming. Adopting an aversive or avoidant attitude towards change may lead to stagnation, possible underdevelopment of some capacities and increased distress or “stuckness” when we will-unavoidably- encounter change sooner or later. Hence, finding ways to remain open to change and to deal with changes in a personal, intentional way is important both in everyday life and in psychotherapy.

In this episode, the hosts discuss about encountering the transcendent broadly understood as that which is experienced as beyond oneself, greater than oneself and which usually yields an intense emotional experience ranging from awe to terror.  Rudolf Otto called this “the numinosum” and coined the name “mysterium tremendum” to denote this unique experience could be marked not only by awe and joy but also by inner trembling and fear. Various cultures, spiritual practices or philosophies refer to the transcendent as the sacred, God, the realm of deities, Being, or the “ultimate concern” (Paul Tillich). The human experience of being in the presence of something larger than oneself towards which one has an attitude of awe or reverence can occur in various circumstances during one’s life such as in front of the majesty and beauty of nature or exquisite artwork, during spiritual practices (e.g., prayer or meditation) or when confronted with an intense experience that takes one outside oneself and brings it in contact with a transcendent realm of experience. Existential Analysis recognizes the human capacity of self-transcendence and the spiritual or noetic dimension of the human beings as central to who we are as persons. The capacity to self-transcend is unique to human beings and it is intimately linked with experiencing meaning, belonging and fulfillment as well as with the sense of being connected to a larger context and purpose. While self-transcendent experiences cannot be pursued or generated by one’s own will, we can cultivate certain conditions and attitudes that may confer openness and receptivity to such experiences both in our daily life and within the therapeutic context.