The Being-Alongside Stage and the Client’s Universal Concerns

Abstract

This chapter offers a heuristic model of the phenomenological structure of existential anxiety to help therapists identify salient features of the concept in their clients’ subjective experiences, even when those are implicit in their accounts. The theoretical model is based on a broad, in-depth study of transformative life experiences, which offers a systematic phenomenological approach to explore existential anxiety. The model allows therapists and clients to identify implicit universal concerns that organize and frame the client’s subjective experience and to better understand how those concerns shape their perceived reality and cause dysfunctional defense mechanisms that might cause pain and distress.