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The article "The Polarized Mind in Context: Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Psychology of Political Polarization" (van BaarFeldmanHall, 2022) explores a crucial challenge to contemporary U.S. society. The article focuses on two aspects of the polarized mind: cognitive inflexibility and (exogenous) environmental factors, such as "media filter bubbles" and "biased social networks." However, there are also underlying existential-humanistic and psychodynamic factors that have been identified as elucidating the polarized mind. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

This article calls on organized psychiatry and psychology to wake up and address a major underappreciated discrepancy. This is the discrepancy between diagnostic nomenclature for therapy clients and the nonpathologizing or even glorifying nomenclature for many throughout history who are abusive, degrading, and massively destructive. While the former, typically clinical population, may be referred to as the “diagnosed” and the latter, typically nonclinical population, as the “undiagnosed,” I show how the compartmentalization of our current psychiatric diagnostic system prevents us from seeing the larger problems with mental health in our country and beyond and show that these problems require an alternative framework. Such a framework would address both that which we conventionally term mental disorder as well as the disorder of cultures, which so often forms the basis for that which we term mental disorders. I propose that the phenomenologically based framework that I call “the polarized mind” is one such alternative that might help us more equitably treat suffering, whether individual or collective.

Objective: Over the past 25 years, humanistic psychotherapy (HP) researchers have actively contributed to the development and implementation of innovative practice-informed research measures and coding systems. Method: Qualitative and quantitative research findings, including meta-analyses, support the identification of HP approaches as evidence-based treatments for a variety of psychological conditions. Results: Implications for future psychotherapy research, training, and practice are discussed in terms of addressing the persistent disjunction between significant HP research productivity and relatively low support for HP approaches in university-based clinical training programs, funding agencies, and government-supported clinical guidelines. Conclusion: Finally, specific recommendations are provided to further enhance and expand the impact of HP research for clinical training programs and the development of treatment guidelines.

This article is a slightly adapted eulogy I was invited to deliver on behalf of my dear friend and mentor, Mark Stern, who died on March 11, 2014. It was delivered on March 22, 2014, at St. Paul’s of the Apostles Chapel, 415 W. 59th St., New York City.

As I conceive it, existential psychotherapy has deep spiritual roots. Following in the tradition of existential-spiritual philosophy, I describe the nature of these roots, the implications of them for existential-integrative therapy, and a case vignette to illustrate their application. I conclude with a reflection on the importance of contextualizing and integrating existential themes into general therapeutic practice.

This article is adapted from an invited address sponsored by European Humanities University, Vilnius, Lithuania, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Soren Kierkegaard’s birth. In this article, I show how Kierkegaard’s philosophy—in particular that depicted in Fear and Trembling and the Sickness Unto Death—runs through each of my major books on existential psychology and practice, from The Paradoxical Self to my latest work The Polarized Mind. I conclude that Kierkegaard, like William James succeeding him, is one of those rare philosophers who is likely to have as much impact on philosophy and psychology’s future as he had on their past.

This article is adapted from my opening keynote address to the First International Existential Psychology Conference in Nanjing, China on April 2nd, 2010. The article begins with an overview of the history and current trends within Western (and to some extent Eastern) existential psychology. Existential–integrative psychology and the spiritual dimension of awe are proposed as two contemporary edges of those trends. Although existential–integrative psychology emphasizes cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary openness, the dimension of awe stresses the puzzled apprehension and appreciative wonder of that openness. In the second part of the article, this awe-based and integrative approach is compared and contrasted with time-honored Eastern approaches. It is proposed that although the Eastern approaches appear to emphasize the harmony (or acceptance) of being, and the Western approaches stress the mystery (or adventure) of being, the joining of worldviews holds a remarkable opportunity for a synthesis.

SYNOPSISThis article examines professional psychology's shifting paradigms throughout the last 100 years, beginning with its roots in philosophy and concluding with its recent embrace of neuroscience. The main contention of this article is that the evolution of psychology is a philosophical as much as, if not more than, a scientific issue, and that the philosophical fashions of the given times tend to influence the focus of the profession. The author concludes that given this philosophical basis for psychological engagements, existential-humanistic philosophy can and should be the leading candidate for the emerging psychology of the future. In light of its holistic aims, it is argued that the existential-humanistic point of view provides the optimal opportunity to transform professional psychology from the narrow to the broad, and from the mechanical to the awe-based.

This article summarizes my existential–integrative (EI) model of therapy, with an emphasis on the experiential level of contact. The experiential (or being) level of contact comprises 4 basic dimensions—the immediate, the affective, the kinesthetic, and the profound (or cosmic). The engagement of the experiential level of contact is contingent on clients' readiness and capacity for intensive, whole-bodied awareness; it may or may not be relevant for clients requiring more externalized (e.g., cognitive–behavioral) levels of change. The value of the experiential level of contact resides in its promotion of a profound capacity for choice. This whole-bodied capacity is elaborated, and a therapeutic case is provided to illustrate.

This article is a lightly edited transcription of an interview conducted by Kirk Schneider, John Galvin, and Ilene Serlin with Rollo May at his retreat home in Holderness, New Hampshire, in the summer of 1987. Drawing from the influence of his forefathers, Freud, Jung, Fromm, Adler, Sullivan, and Rank as well as classical mythology, philosophy, and literature, May gives a passionate explanation of existential psychotherapy and why it is so urgent in today’s “quick fix,” “gimmick-oriented” society.

This article summarizes the experiential liberation strategy of the existential-integrative (EI) model of therapy. The existential-integrative model of therapy provides one way to understand and coordinate a variety of intervention modes within an overarching ontological or experiential context. I will (1) define the experiential liberation strategy—such as its emphasis on the capacities to constrict, expand, and center psychophysiological capacities; (2) describe its salient features—such as the four stances that promote experiential liberation: presence, invoking the actual, vivifying and confronting resistance, and the cultivation of meaning and awe; and (3) illustrate the relevance of the strategy to case vignettes drawn from actual practice.

Psychology stands at a crossroads. Even more than in the time of Rollo May, psychology faces a dilemma of alarming moral and scientific proportions. On the one hand, psychology is about to become a "biologism." This is a discipline-led by the high tech, consumerist model for living-that emphasizes measurement, materialism, and efficiency. On the other hand, psychology still has a chance-mainly through humanistic and depth orientations-to be a vibrant discipline. The question is, will we take this path to become the "queen of the sciences," as Nietzsche put it, or will we jeopardize 5,000 years of arts and humanities, centuries of depth analyses, and decades of awe-inspired practice. In this article, which echoes the spirit of my great friend and mentor, Rollo May, as well as my new book, Rediscovery of Awe, I will outline the stakes in this dilemma, the players involved-from biopsychology to humanism-and an alternative, conciliatory vision that I call "awe-based" psychology. The dilemma we face today is w...

This article raises two basic questions: What is humanistic psychology's relevance to post 9/11/2001? and, Can that relevance be practically applied to daily life? To address these questions, the author elaborates a humanistic concept that he calls the “fluid center.” The fluid center is an “awe-based” consciousness exemplified by playful constraint, humble daring, and reverent adventurousness. Whereas 9/11 represented the triumph of personal and interpersonal polarization (e.g., arrogance, humiliation), the fluid center, by contrast, represents the opportunity for personal and interpersonal revitalization (e.g., openness, dialogue). To illustrate this position, the author proposes two social visions that draw on the fluid center: awe-based education and awe-based vocation. He concludes that not only can such alternatives modify institutional settings; they can radically transform lives.

This special section highlights the renewal of humanism in psychotherapy. For the purposes of this special section, humanism is defined as a philosophical perspective whose subject matter is the whole human being. In psychotherapy, humanism places special emphasis on the personal, interpersonal, and contextual dimensions of therapy and on clients' reflections on their relationship with self, others, and the larger psychosocial world. The contributors to this special section-Bruce Wampold, David Elkins, Steven Hayes, Robert Stolorow, Jurgen Kriz, Lillian Comas-Diaz, and the authors of this introduction-are each leaders in their respective therapeutic specialties: research and training, cognitive-behavioral therapy, psychoanalytic therapy, European therapy, and multicultural therapy. In the manner of a "roundtable," each contributor was asked to provide a short article on the renewal of humanism in his or her respective specialty followed by brief comments on the initial round of articles. The conclusion of these reflections is that the renewal of humanism is a viable and growing phenomenon among the leading specialty areas of psychotherapy. The corollary conclusion is that although many theoretical and practical questions remain, humanism is (1) a foundational element of therapeutic effectiveness; (2) a pivotal (and needed) dimension of therapeutic training; and (3) a critical contributor to societal well-being.