SEVEN PAPERS ON EXISTENTIAL ANALYSIS ... - Wagner College

Will had been restlessly dodging the influence of eros. I have since concluded that this is the
case for everyone whose existence has lost its context, whose existence is bereft of eros.
Moreover, following Laing (1967), in one of his essays in The Politics of Experience, I have come to
believe that this is the case for nearly everyone living in the postmodern world, where the
humanizing force of eros is evaded, perhaps in prinicple even precluded.
As a therapist, it became clear to be that the humanizing force of eros had been
overshadowed by the psychoanalytic myth of pansexuality. In the therapeutic setting, eros had
been regularly misconstrued as a manifestation of sexuality, which then had to be analyzed or in
some other way “dealt with” and expunged. Of course, as all psychotherapists know, in some
instances, sexuality does supervene in the therapeutic venture. This has led to a close
examination of the ethics of practice of psychotherapy. With nothing to contrast with the
sexual, however, there was no way of understanding the difference between it and the deep
longing that shows up all the time between human beings and can be turned to therapeutic
efficacy in existential analysis but which may be misidentified as a manifestation of sexuality.
I learned all this from working with Will and for this I am grateful to him. I learned that eros
is fundament to the unfolding of existence in existential analysis, much as it is formative in that
initial relationship that makes us human, the infant-mother bond which John Bowlby (1983)
described as being based on attachment. I saw that the work of existential analysis is freeing
up the play of eros to allow for the revelation of sheer possibility. To conclude, briefly and by way
of further illustration, let me tell you about a bit more about how things went on between Will
and me.
I merely had to wait, without offering explanations or introducing expectations—that is,
without intervening. A certain kind of solicitude or concern was offered—what Heidegger
termed vorausspringende Fürsorge—namely, concern for another’s existence that makes way
for its renewal. In this, my practice owes a lot to Boss’s Daseinsanalyse, but with this difference: I
see such concern as happening only in the context of eros. I should add that it is not enough to
substitute stepping aside for intervening—einspringende Fürsorge. In addition, I regularly
emphasized to Will the ambiguity of our relationship. With one exception, I offered Will only
questions. My conversations with Will always ended as they had begun, with a question mark.
Understanding that something had changed for Will and that this is what had brought him to see
me took a “back seat” to allowing the free play of eros. I learned from Will what I have since
brought into my practice with others, that what is essential is to allow myself and the other to
remain open to the ongoing play of eros. Waiting and genuine puzzlement—which play like light
on the surface of a body of water—are all one can do as an existential analyst. Eros does the
rest. Our work is to allow eros its time and space.
If I were asked to say in the simplest terms what I think is therapeutic in existential analysis
of the kind I have described, I would say it is the existential analyst’s ongoing authentic
puzzlement. For how else can one respond to sheer possibility in the other? I no longer first
concern myself with the question—What has changed? I no longer concern myself in the first
instance with illumination of the patient’s existence. The momentum of ambiguity must be
allowed to continue, since this is where eros plays. As for one’s existence, which unfolds within its
Spielraum, I am now more than ever convinced that it eludes the therapeutic grasp.
One day, Will asked me what I thought had changed for him. I have learned that the
question always eventually comes up in existential analysis. In this case, I did not “mirror” his
question with another question—“Well, what do you think changed?” Instead, I replied with my
only assertion during our many meetings: “Whatever I might tell you would be meaningless—
even if it happened to be correct. This is for you to say.” Will told me he sensed something had
changed—but he did not know what it was. We did not inquire further. In any case, I am not
sure that it is something important to know. It is now clear to me that changes of great moment
are often not registered as “something important.” Weeks later, however, we were talking about
being available and open to other people. Will paused and casually remarked that, at a certain
point a few months before he first came to see me, he had felt himself to be approachable for