1. Rollo May. THE ORIGINS OF THE EXISTENTIAL ORIGIN IN PSYCHOLOGY AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE Recently, many psychiatrists and psychologists have become more and more aware that there are serious gaps in our understanding of man. For psychotherapists who face

2. Rollo May. THE CONTRIBUTION OF EXISTENTIAL PSYCHOTHERAPY The fundamental contribution of existential therapy is its understanding of man as being. She does not deny the value of dynamism and the study of specific behavioral patterns in appropriate places. But she claims

Chapter 29. Rollo May: Existential Psychology Rollo May, undoubtedly, can be called one of the key figures not only in American, but also in world psychology. Until his death in 1994, he was one of the leading existential psychologists in the United States. Over the past half century this

Rollo May. A disease that affirms a mission Fate cannot be ignored; we cannot simply erase it or replace it with something else. But we can choose how to meet our destiny using the abilities given to us. Rollo May Rollo May is rightfully considered one of the

Rollo May (May; b. 1909) is a famous American psychologist and psychotherapist, a reformer of psychoanalysis who introduced existential ideas into it, one of the most famous psychiatrists in the world. May's views were shaped by a range of intellectual traditions. May was educated in the 1930s in Europe, where he studied psychoanalysis and Adlerian individual psychology. Returning to her homeland, May graduates from the Faculty of Theology. At this time he met the Protestant theologian Paul, who emigrated from Germany. Tillich (Tillich; 1886 - 1965), with whom he establishes the most friendly relations and under whose influence he turns to the works of existentialist philosophers 223. To some extent, we can talk about the opposite influence, since Tillich has repeatedly stated that his work "Courage to Be" written as a response to May's The Meaning of Anxiety. Having received a theological education, May began to combine psychotherapeutic work with pastoral activities. He devoted his first book to exploring the therapeutic potential of Christianity. May's work "The Art of Psychological Counseling" was the first to be published on existential psychotherapy in the United States.

In the 40s, May, together with Fromm and Sullivan, worked at the New York Institute of Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis and Psychology, the main American center of neo-Freudianism. Therefore, although he subsequently brought an existential-phenomenological basis to his psychotherapeutic concept, many of the provisions of Sullivan and Fromm, in slightly modified formulations, were included in his existential psychology. May's teaching activities were associated with Harvard, Princeton and other leading American universities. May has been awarded the American Psychological Association's Gold Medal, recognizing the "grace, wit and style" of his books, which have repeatedly appeared on bestseller lists. He owns such works as “Love and Will”, “The Meaning of Anxiety”, "Man in search of himself""Courage to Create" "Freedom and justice" ba", "Opening life and I".

", May is the author of an interesting “personal portrait” of Tillich, containing information about Tillich’s life in the USA, the perception of his ideas by the American audience, etc. (May R. Paulus: Reminiscences of a Freindship - NY. - 1973).

Psychotheology - Rollo May

May is considered one of the most ardent proponents of existentialism in America. His introductory chapters to the book "Existence"(1958) 224, as well as his book "Existential Psychology" were the main source of information about existentialism for American psychologists. In American literature, there is often an opinion that it was after the publication of the book “Existence” - an anthology of works by European (mainly Swiss and German) representatives of phenomenological psychiatry and existential analysis, to which May wrote an extensive theoretical introduction, that the rapid spread of existential psychology and psychotherapy in the USA began . According to Spiegelberg, May is "the most influential American exponent of existential phenomenology, preparing the climate for a new approach to phenomenological psychology" 225 .

The most characteristic feature of May's teaching is the desire to combine Freud's reformed psychoanalysis with the ideas of Kierkegaard, read "ontologically", that is, through Heidegger's Being and Time, Binswanger's existential analysis, Tillich's theology. The publication of the anthology “Existenza” in 1958 marks the watershed of two stages of May’s work. At the first stage, his works were dominated by themes common to all neo-Freudians, although even then he relied heavily on the ideas of existentialist philosophers. At the second stage, he becomes the most prominent American proponent of reforming psychology and psychiatry based on existential phenomenology and Binswanger’s existential analysis. May, therefore, did not immediately come to existentialism, but already from his early works it is clear that his meeting with this philosophical movement was natural.

Throughout his entire work, May acts as an opponent of orthodox Freudianism and notes the inapplicability of its central concepts in psychotherapeutic practice, which was faced with a number of new phenomena in the middle of the century. Freud considered the cause of neuroses to be the suppression of instinctive drives that “work” according to the “principle of pleasure” and come into conflict with social norms, the representative of which in the individual’s psyche is the “Super-I”.

""" Existence: A New Dimension in Psychiatry and Psychology/ Ed. by R. May, E. Angel and

H. Ellenberger.-N.Y.: Basic books.- 1958.

225 Spiegelberg H. Phenomenology in Psychology and Psychiatry.- Evanston.- 1972- P. 158.

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Softening the harsh moral standards of the Victorian era, he believed, would rid people of neuroses.

But even before the “sexual revolution,” May drew attention to the fact that softening moral standards and lifting prohibitions did not lead to a decrease in the number of mental disorders. On the contrary, greater freedom of self-expression in the sphere of sexual relations, instead of the increase in vitality predicted by Freud, caused only quantities of these disorders. At the same time, May notes, patients turn to a psychoanalyst about difficulties that are of a completely different nature than those observed by Freud at the beginning of the century. Loneliness, boredom, dissatisfaction, loss of meaning of existence, spiritual atrophy - these are the characteristic symptoms of modern mental disorders. May came to the conclusion that the cause of neuroses is not poorly repressed childhood impressions, not fixations of libido, in a word, not the patient’s past, but those problems that he cannot solve at the present moment, which leads to the loss of spontaneity, focus on the future, creativity existence. A mentally normal person, according to May, is able to find constructive ways for self-expression. It is characterized by a gap between what it is and what it wants to be, a gap that creates theoretical tension. Formation, the free choice of personality, already in May’s first work are accepted as criteria for mental health.

May recognizes that freedom is not arbitrariness. Otherwise it would be difficult to talk about the “constructiveness” of the patient’s choice, which must correspond to what May calls the “necessary structure” that ensures the harmony of man and society, individual and universal. In his first book "The Art of Consulting" May, firstly, finds this necessary structure in Jung’s archetypes of the collective unconscious, and secondly, he considers the most universal principles to be the norms of individual behavior established by the Christian religion. He sees the reason for the egocentrism and selfishness of man in modern society in the fall and separation of man from God. May considers following the Christian faith an imperative for personal health. However, in this case, not only all atheists, but also the majority of people on Earth turn out to be not completely mentally healthy. True, May distinguishes “true religion”, which gives meaning to human existence (and accordingly

Psychotheology - Rollo May

responsibility and health), from “dogmatic religion”, which takes away from him freedom and responsibility for his own actions. But it is extremely difficult to understand what, according to May, this “true religion” is, as well as how it can sanctify the ideas expressed by him that human self-affirmation, various manifestations of spontaneous creativity should be considered as an expression of mental health. On the one hand, it affirms the eternal and absolute “divine principles”, and on the other, the complete freedom of the individual creating himself.

In 1940, May released work 226, in which religious motives are strengthened. Christ is interpreted as the “therapist of humanity.” However, in subsequent years, May moved away from such constructions; religious reflections themselves disappeared from his books and articles, and he forbade reprinting his early works. May comes to the idea of ​​an eternal conflict between ethics and religion as it exists historically and socially: “there is a brutal war between ethically sensitive people and religious institutions” 227. The heroic self-affirmation of man, the “Promethean” struggle against any forms of organization and institutions become for some time the main points of his works. The myth of Prometheus, according to May, expresses the eternal struggle of an independent and responsible individual with authorities and traditional norms. From childhood, a person’s life is described by him as a struggle for self-affirmation, as “a continuum of differentiation from the “mass” towards individual freedom” 228. May is ready to talk about the neuroticism of almost any form of power; he even sees parental authority as a threat to the child’s mental health.

It cannot be said that May completely ignores the social causes of neurotic disorders. His research "The Meaning of Anxiety" is of interest not only in the sense that it was the first to attempt to give a psychological interpretation of the existentialist doctrine of anxiety, but also because its author turns to criticism of modern society and comes to the conclusion about the need for social change. May tried in his work to show that neurotic fears are generated by a society of "struggle-

2 - to May R. The Springs of Creative Living: A Study on Human Nature and God.-N.Y.- 1940. 2:7 May R. Man's Search For Himself.- N.Y.-1953.- P. 164. ~* MayR. Man "s Search for Himself-P. 164.

Yu.V. Tizhonravov

"all against all", social inequality, the threat of unemployment and similar reasons. However, May subsequently omits consideration of issues of psychotherapy in a broad social context, discussions about "adequate forms of community", overcoming a "neurotic society" and individualism. His teaching on anxiety becomes a preparation transition to existential analysis and phenomenological psychology.

Anxiety was defined by May as the awareness of a threat to “any value that the individual considers essential to his existence as a person” 229. A person can be threatened by physical death or suffering, the loss of certain social benefits, values ​​or symbols. But May’s main attention is paid to the threat of losing the meaning of existence, since a person experiences fear, not anxiety, about the threat of losing any specific things, benefits, or circumstances. That is, he is able to clearly formulate a threat, fight it or run away from something terrible. The scary does not threaten the core of the personality, while anxiety strikes at the very foundation of its psychological structure, on which the understanding of oneself and the world is built. In anxiety, a person experiences fear about his own existence, fears “becoming nothing.”

Fear of death is a normal form of anxiety, but it is not, May believes, its source. It is caused by the fear of emptiness, meaninglessness, nothingness. This is anxiety, which is necessarily inherent in human existence; it is inseparable from the existence of the individual. Without anxiety, positive personality development is impossible; it is a necessary element in the structure of the human psyche. It is not the anxiety itself that is not neurotic, but the attempts to avoid it. The neurotic runs away from “basic anxiety,” but as a result begins to experience anxiety where a normal person (that is, aware of his finitude and the constant threat of nothing) experiences only fear, realizing the specific dangerous circumstances of his existence and finding the strength to resist them.

From here the basic principles of May's psychotherapy are derived: the individual is freed from neurotic fears through awareness of “basic anxiety,” since “there is an inverse relationship between awareness and

MayR. Meaning of Anxiety.- N.Y.- I977.-P.239.

Psychotheology - Rollo May

knowledge of anxiety and the presence of symptoms" 230. Anxiety, as fear for the very being of existence, should "dissolve" all neurotic phobias: "conscious anxiety may be more painful, but it can also be used for the integration of the "I" 231. Psychotherapy, therefore, is a kind of education of the patient in the spirit of existentialist philosophy: he must understand the inauthenticity of his own existence and his fears, realize his own finitude and choose himself in the face of nothingness. Many of the patients, as May himself noted, come to the analyst, from a medical point of view, completely healthy. They are worried about the emptiness, the meaninglessness of their own existence, and the psychotherapist points out to them the need to choose themselves, calls for “the courage to create” and not to be afraid of anything but death, realizing their own freedom.

Psychotherapeutic persuasion is, of course, an extremely important treatment tool. It affects not only ideas, but also the emotions, intellect, and personality of the patient as a whole. The doctor can point out the inadequacy of the patient’s assessment of his situation and the people around him, and can to some extent change the patient’s established attitudes and norms of behavior. In May, this moment of psychotherapy dominates: the psychotherapist convinces his patients that everything is in their hands, depends on their free choice. If we are talking about practically healthy people who are worried about the purposelessness of their own existence, this kind of belief is undoubtedly useful, but under certain conditions it can also cause harm to a truly sick person if he tries to overcome the disease with the sole effort of freed will. The failure of such attempts can lead to an increase in neurotic symptoms.

In order to help the patient find meaning in life, it is necessary to understand his inner world. In this case, May believes, it is necessary to start from the general foundation that makes both normal and mentally abnormal existence possible, that is, it is necessary to reveal its being-in-the-world, the structure of its meaningfulness.

1 "May R. Meaning of Anxiety.- P.371. May repeats here what Heidegger wrote about the relationship between fear and anxiety: “Fear is anxiety that has fallen into the “world,” inauthentic and hidden from itself” (Heidegger M.SeinundZeit. -S.I89.) 231 May R. Meaning of Anxiety.-P.371.

Yu.V. Tikhonravov

ny experiences, intentions. Concrete sciences give us, in his opinion, knowledge about certain mechanisms of thinking and behavior, but not about this basis. In order to be able to understand the existence of each individual person, an ontology is needed. “The distinctive feature of existential analysis is, therefore, that it deals with ontology, with the existence of this concrete being that is before the psychotherapist” 232. The structure of such existence, according to May, is called upon to be revealed by existential phenomenology. Only after comprehending this integral structure can the study of various mechanisms of the psyche be of any benefit: “Cure from symptoms, undoubtedly desirable ... is not the main goal of therapy. The most important thing is the discovery by the individual of his being, his Dasein” 233. The essence of the therapy process is to assist “the patient in realizing and experiencing his existence” 234.

May denies the possibility of rational and objective knowledge of human existence. Science, he repeats after other existentialists, speaks the language of Cartesian dualism, separates subject and object, and is an expression of modern civilization, in which mutual alienation and depersonalization reign. However, man and the world are inextricably linked with each other, these are two poles of a single structural whole, being-in-the-world. The world of personality cannot be understood through a description of all possible factors of the external environment, which is only one of the modes of this being-in-the-world. According to May, there are many surrounding worlds - as many as there are individuals. “The world is a structure of semantic relations in which a person exists and in the image of which he participates” 235. The world includes past events, but they exist for the individual not on their own, not “objectively”, but depending on his attitude towards them, on the meaning that they have for him. The world also includes the capabilities of the individual, including those given by society and culture. Man is constantly building up his world.

2J - Existence: A New Dimension in Psychiatry and Psychology.- P.37. -" Existence, -P.27.

114 Existence- P.77.

115 Existence.- P.59.

Psychotheology - Rollo May

Following Binswanger, May speaks of three main modes of the world. In the first of them - the surrounding world, the habitat - a person encounters all the diversity of natural forces and adapts to them. In the second world - the universe of "co-existence" - a person meets other people. Here we are no longer talking about adaptation, but about coexistence, which presupposes mutual recognition as individuals. The world around us is comprehended by modern biological and psychological theories; May considers Freudian teaching to be an important component of a correct description of this dimension of human existence. The world of “co-existence” is considered in various sociocultural theories, among which May singles out Sullivan’s neo-Freudian concept as the most correct.

However, May believes that a person’s own world cannot be reduced to these modes. This world, unique to everyone, presupposes self-awareness and should be the basis for seeing all human problems, since only here the world of inner meanings is revealed. Only by turning to this dimension can one understand what the objects around him mean for any individual, what meaning, say, a flower, an ocean, another person, etc. have for him.

Freud's teaching, according to May, correctly describes biopsychic determinants, the neo-Freudians supplemented it with social teaching, and May himself adds the top floor to this building - the doctrine of the inner world of each person. At the same time, he writes about the mutual penetration of all three modes, about the simultaneous existence of man in all three dimensions. In fact, the existence of nature and society is reduced by May to the existence of the individual. They are given only as elements of being-in-the-world; if the perceiving person disappears, the world disappears 236. In fact, if we are talking about my subjective picture of the world, then it is impossible without me and will disappear along with my disappearance. The meaning that I, unlike all other people, can give to a flower or another person is also my meaning. May goes further and adheres to the point of view that there are as many space-time continuums as there are individuals, and that it is impossible to talk about an objective existence independent of people’s consciousness. Being for May is being-in-the-world, then

sh See: Rutkevich A.M. From Freud to Heidegger: A Critical Essay on the Existential

psychoanalysis-M: Politizdat, I985.-C. 115.

Yu.V. Tikhonravov

is a set of semantic relations between two poles: a person and his world. In this case, it is impossible to talk about nature and society in themselves: this is nature and society as they are given to the subject. The only world we can talk about is our own world.

May devoted several works to discussing the question of the existential foundation of psychotherapy 237 . He considers the following structures of being-in-the-world as ontological conditions of human existence: centeredness, self-affirmation, participation, awareness, self-awareness, anxiety. Centeredness is the basis of a separate existence, different from others. It's about the uniqueness of each individual. Centeredness is not predetermined in a person. He must have the courage to see himself as a separate and independent center of everything around him, and to assert himself in this capacity. This is the meaning of existential "self-affirmation" a person must realize himself in his choice. If centrality indicates the uniqueness of each individual, then complicity reveals his necessary correlation with other people. Neurotic symptoms appear when either complicity or centrality is dominant. Isolation from everyone or complete absorption then takes the place of the interrelationship of autonomous existences. The subjective side of centrality is, according to May, awareness(or “awareness” -awareness). Every living being is endowed with the experience of itself, its desires, and needs. This experience exists even before clear consciousness and purposeful action. May considers self-awareness to be uniquely human. Finally, in the ontological sense anxiety the possibility of non-existence opens up to man.

May's system of existentials can be seen as an attempt to bring Heidegger's analytics closer to what is sometimes called "American common sense." May writes not about some kind of “being-with-in-the-world-existence,” but about self-affirmation, self-awareness, anxiety, which are to one degree or another familiar to every person. But as a result of such grounding of Heidegger’s ontology, a complete confusion of philosophical (ontological) and concrete scientific (ontic) categories occurs. When May was not yet a follower of Heidegger, he to some extent adhered to the socio-historical

Especially in detail in the book: Existential Psychology /Ed. R.May.-N.Y.- 1961

Psychotheology - Rollo May

approach and wrote in “The Meaning of Anxiety” that fear, anxiety, and guilt are experiences of people characteristic of certain socio-cultural entities at certain stages of their development. Having become an ontologist, he transferred into the realm of existentials those feelings experienced by his contemporaries, in particular his patients.

The concept outlined in May's most widely known book is of a similar nature. "Love and Will"(1969), which became a “national bestseller” in the United States. It contains an analysis of love and will as fundamental dimensions of human existence in their historical perspective and current phenomenology. The author demonstrates the position according to which expansion of the horizons of consciousness is achievable only on the path of reviving the unity of love and will, in which new sources of the meaning of existence in the schizoid world can be found. Love and will are recognized in this book as necessary conditions for human existence. May quotes Tillich: "Love is an ontological concept. Its emotional element is a consequence of its ontological nature." However, what kind of ontology are we talking about in this case? Modern psychology, on behalf of which May speaks, cannot, in the spirit of Empedocle, consider love and hate as forces governing the entire world. The Christian teaching about merciful love also cannot serve as a basis for the human sciences, since this would presuppose an uncritical acceptance of the dogmas of the Christian religion.

May's teaching on love is intended as a sublation of two concepts: Freud's theory of libido and Plato's doctrine of Eros. May wants to prove "that they are not only compatible, but also represent two halves, each of which is necessary for the psychological development of a person" 238. Freud paid special attention to the biological prerequisites of love and described the influence of the past on the emotions of the individual. But “regression” to the biological prehistory of love does not explain it itself. Plato's teaching, in contrast to Freud's, May believes, gives “progression”: Eros is directed towards the future. May would like to combine the physical (regressive) and spiritual (progressive)

MayR. Love and WilL-N.Y-l969.-P.88.

Yu.V. Tikhonravov

sive) beginnings of love, pointing out their common basis, which he considers the intentionality of human existence.

Eros, the “creative vitality,” according to May, is the deepest impulse of human existence. This “desire to establish unity, complete interrelationship” 239 is the center of human creative abilities, the “demonic feeling” that lies at the basis of existence. The concept of “demonic” is interpreted by May in the ancient sense: “the demonic can be both creative and destructive, being in the normal case both” 240. Demonic Eros turns out to be the unity of what May previously called self-affirmation and complicity. This is both the spontaneous vitality of an individual asserting himself and the basis of interpersonal relationships.

May names will as another fundamental property of human existence. It permeates all being-in-the-world, since a person becomes identical to himself only in the act of choice. The themes of possibility, freedom, determination, anxiety, guilt are now considered by May in connection with will as “the basic intentionality of existence.” His reflections bring to mind Nietzsche’s “will to power,” although May is far from thinking that power over others is a sign of authentic existence. But many themes of the “philosophy of life” come to the fore in this work of May, since both love and will become features of a certain primordial vitality that goes beyond its own limits. In the interaction of desire and will he sees the essence of human existence. Will is seen as an organizing principle that requires reflection, a conscious decision in the realization of desires. True, here May comes into conflict with his own idea about the identity of the will with the sphere of intentionality as a whole. Then any desire is already a manifestation of the will and there is no need for a special organizing principle of desire.

In intentionality, the direction of existence, its going beyond its own limits, May sees the foundation of human existence. Intentional acts form the semantic contents with which a person deals. This is “our way of understanding reality,” understanding the world and ourselves. The structure of intentional acts determines the mode of existence, being-in-the-world of each person.

Psychotheology - Rollo May

As for the goal of psychotherapy, May now sees it as identifying the patient’s basic intentional structure, which must be brought to his consciousness and helped to rebuild. The process of therapy consists, in his words, of “connecting three dimensions with each other - desire, will and decision” 241. The patient must first be taught to experience his own desires, then bring them to consciousness and accept himself as an autonomous person and, finally, make an appropriate decision, with full responsibility to assert himself in the world, thereby changing the structure of intentionality. Man is presented as a free existence that defines itself in the act of choice.

One of May's latest books was named "Courage to create" - to this he calls both his patients and all of humanity. Of course, creativity has been and remains the ideal of human activity. However, when May writes that each individual creates his own world, he does not only mean that human activity is capable of transforming the world in accordance with the needs of people. The world, according to May, changes with the transformation of the individual's own point of view.

This situation is also reflected in the understanding of psychotherapy: it should help the patient become able to recreate his goals, orientations, and attitudes. The model for May, as for Binswanger, is the life of the artist. To cure neurosis means to teach how to create, to make a person “an artist of his own life.” But, firstly, if mental health and artistic creativity are identical, then most people will have to be considered neurotic. Secondly, creativity can only rarely be a means of healing for those who are truly sick. Neither willpower nor creative impulses will help most neurotics. Finally, human creativity itself becomes for May some kind of demonic, magical force, capable, at the will of a person, of changing not only his goals and attitudes, but also the entire surrounding reality. If you accept May's prescriptions, you can become like Don Quixote and live in a fantasy world that may be beautiful, but does not correspond to reality at all.

Yu.V. Tikhonravov

It turns out that May's Patients can only in imagination freely and responsibly choose themselves as great artists 242.

May doesn't stop there. Like many other representatives of humanistic and existential psychology, he calls for a “transformation of consciousness.” The Courage to Create also became a bestseller, and for obvious reasons. The time of its release - the mid-70s - was a time of widespread counterculture, whose adherents paid great attention to Eastern religions, meditation, and psychedelic drugs such as LSD. Although May, unlike some other existential analysts, is quite cautious in assessing such means of transforming consciousness, he is talking about the same thing. For example, he writes: "Ecstasy is a well-deserved ancient method of transcending our ordinary consciousness, helping us to achieve insights otherwise inaccessible. The element of ecstasy... is part and premise of every true symbol and myth: for if we truly participate in the symbol or myth , we are temporarily “withdrawn” and are “outside” ourselves” 243. Such complicity becomes for May the main characteristic of the authenticity of human existence. The rejection of positivist psychology thus leads May to mysticism: hidden behind calls to “create courageously” is a technique of ecstasy, participation in myth and ritual.

May became one of the most consistent supporters of the rejection of positivist approaches in psychology. Without going beyond the humanistic movement as a whole, May dissociated himself from the eclecticism of his colleagues. He believed that positivist methods play a very insignificant role in understanding the ontological characteristics of human existence.

People turn to psychology, May wrote, in search of solutions to their most pressing problems: love, hope, despair and anxiety related to the meaning of their lives 244. Psychologists, however, avoid confronting these purely human dilemmas. They explain love as sexual attraction; turn the alarm into

42 See: Rutkevich A.M. From Freud to Heidegger: A Critical Essay on the Existential

psychoanalysis.- M.: Politizdat, 1985.-P. 120..

""May R. The Courage to Create- N.Y.- 1978- P. 130.

will- N. Y.: W. W. Norton, 1969.- P. 18.

Psychotheology - Rollo May

physical stress; claim that our hope is just an illusion; identify despair with depression; reduce passion to the satisfaction of biological needs and turn pleasant relaxation into a simple release of tension. When, finally, in utter desperation, people act boldly and passionately to influence their destiny, they call it nothing more than a reaction to a stimulus.

Modern psychology, May emphasized, not only silences, but also simplifies the essential aspects of human experience itself 245. Hiding behind the indisputability of one or another methodological procedure, it avoids meeting the essential aspects of human existence, which are somehow “cut off” by the reductionist tendencies of objective measurement. If psychology cannot deal with the full range of a person's immediate experience and dilemmas, May argued, then the idea of ​​it as a science is mistaken.

In his own program of humanistic psychology, May argues that psychologists should abandon all claims to control and predict behavior and stop ignoring human subjectivity simply because it has no analogues in the animal kingdom 246 . A science that avoids giving that does not correspond to its methods is a defensive science. Any psychological study involving humans must focus on the whole person with all his life problems, and not just on animals, machines, behavior or diagnostic categories. The science of human nature should follow the humanistic model and study the unique properties of people - what he called "ontological characteristics of human existence" 247. These characteristics might include the ability of people to treat themselves as both subjects and objects, to choose and perform ethical actions, to think, to create symbols, and to participate in the historical development of their society.

Psychology, according to May, should adopt a phenomenological approach and study people in the immediate reality, as they really are, and not as projections of the psyche.

A 100-percent American from the Midwest, May taught English in Greece after college while traveling through Europe, educating himself and pursuing a career in clinical psychology. Returning to the United States, he published the country's first (and still one of the best) manuals on psychological counseling. At the same time, he graduated from seminary and became a practicing clergyman.

He tried to “combine” these two sides of his personality in the 1940 book “The Origins of Creative Life,” dedicated to the relationship between psychotherapy and religion, with an epigraph from Berdyaev: “...To talk about a person means at the same time to talk about God...” The book was a success, but May soon bought up the remainder of the circulation and forbade mentioning or reprinting it. “I realized that I didn’t believe what I wrote.” The next turning point was tuberculosis, which was deadly in those years, and put him to bed for a year and a half. Recovery was facilitated by the realization that death threatens primarily those who are ready to give in to it in advance or who go enchanted towards it. “Looking death in the face was a valuable experience,” May said, “it taught me to look life in the face.” After recovering, May broke with religion, finding in psychology a more effective means of reducing suffering. However, the main thing for him was not consulting, but writing books. Almost all of his works are addressed to a wide audience; they brought him not only scientific but also literary prizes.

Rollo May became the main propagandist of the ideas of European existentialism in the USA, one of the founders and leaders of humanistic psychology. The existential view allowed him to see in a person not what is given by genes and environment, but, first of all, what he creates from himself, making certain choices.

• April 21, 1909: born in Ada (USA).
• 1930–1933: After graduating from college, he teaches in Thessaloniki (Greece), attends seminars with psychoanalyst Alfred Adler in Vienna.
• 1933–1938: studies at the Unionist Theological Seminary, graduating with honors. The beginning of a long-term friendship with Paul Tillich.
• 1939: "The Art of Psychological Counseling."
• 1942–1943: Treatment in a tuberculosis sanatorium: “The main reason why I contracted tuberculosis was despair and a sense of doom.”
• 1949: Defense of dissertation “The Meaning of Anxiety” at Columbia University.
• 1958: Elected president of the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis and Psychology in New York.
• 1971: Awarded the American Psychological Association Gold Medal for outstanding contributions to the science and practice of clinical psychology.
• October 29, 1994: died in Tiburon (USA).

Keys to Understanding

Choice of fate

Each of us is given the opportunity to manage our own development - this is our freedom. With freedom and self-awareness, we can break the chain of stimuli and reactions and act consciously, so freedom is associated with flexibility, openness, and readiness to change. At the same time, it correlates with the inevitable givens of our life - in other words, with fate. May distinguishes its levels: cosmic, genetic, cultural fate and specific circumstances. And although each of these levels predetermines a lot, we still have the freedom to cooperate with fate, accept it, challenge it. The price of freedom is the inevitability of evil. If I am free to choose, no one can guarantee that I will choose good. All great saints considered themselves great sinners, being extremely sensitive to both good and evil and thereby to the consequences of their actions. Freedom, while expanding potential opportunities for good, simultaneously expands opportunities for evil. And only the person himself is responsible for what he chooses.

The Becoming of Man

“SO MANY PEOPLE WANT TO BE TOLD THAT FREEDOM IS AN ILLUSION AND THAT THERE IS NO NEED TO WORRY ABOUT IT.”

The main dilemma of our life is the fundamental ability inherent only in man to perceive himself both as an active subject and as a passive object. In the space between these two poles, our consciousness fluctuates, choosing the way of our existence. Identity, the sense of “I”, is the starting point of our life. Everything we do is aimed at preserving this inner center, even our neuroses serve this purpose. The formation of personality is the development of the sense of “I”, the feeling of being an active subject influencing events. This process is associated with liberation from various kinds of unconscious dependencies and the transition to freely chosen actions and relationships.

The value of anxiety

Anxiety is a natural and constructive feeling. It is caused by the unpredictability of the future and is associated with a feeling of threat to something significant: personal values ​​or life itself. May translated the philosophical ideas of Kierkegaard, Heidegger and Tillich about existential anxiety as an irreducible condition of our existence into the language of psychological concepts. Only anxiety that is disproportionate to the cause is painful. It arises when we, not wanting to put up with our experiences, try to completely banish anxiety from life, which, on the contrary, leads to its intensification. The task of a psychotherapist is not to eliminate anxiety altogether, but to help accept it, preventing its pathological growth.

About it

Books by Rollo May

• “The Art of Psychological Consulting”, Institute of General Humanitarian Research, Astrel Press, 2008.
• “The Discovery of Being”, Institute of General Humanitarian Studies, 2004.
• “The Meaning of Anxiety”, Klass, 2001.

Rollo Reese May was born on April 21, 1909. His parents, Earl Title May and Mathie Boughton May, lived in Ada, USA. The father traveled a lot, and the mother cared little about the children. They did not consider the education of their children compulsory, and even discouraged what they considered to be excessive intellectual pursuits. When their eldest daughter was diagnosed with psychosis, they attributed it to excessive mental work. Rollo May himself was fond of art and literature, and his relationship with his parents did not work out, so the future scientist spent a lot of time alone. He studied reluctantly at school, was a hooligan and a lazy person. He said that schoolwork gave him much less than reading books on the river bank. Subsequently, already being a famous psychotherapist, he found the reasons for his unsuccessful personal life in the problems that accompanied his relationship with his mother and unbalanced sister. Soon the family broke up, and R. May was glad to leave home to study. In 1926 he entered the University of Michigan. There he participated in the creation of a radical student magazine, and then headed it. The result of this was his expulsion. R. May went to study at Oberlin College in Ohio and, graduating in 1930, received a bachelor's degree. Having received his education, May found a job in the Greek city of Thessaloniki and soon went to Greece to teach English at college. The specifics of his work left him with a lot of free time, which he used wisely, studied ancient history, the works of Greek masters, and tried to draw himself. On weekends and holidays he traveled and visited Turkey, Austria, and Poland. Such an active life was not in vain: after a year, May felt completely tired and empty, and a feeling of loneliness began to overcome him. The basic psychological knowledge he acquired in college led him to think about the cause of this malaise. May decided that its source was the wrong way of life, the wrong principles and goals of existence. In 1932, while traveling in Austria, May participated in Alfred Adler's summer seminar and became very interested in his ideas. In search of new principles of life, he turned to religion, believing that the centuries-old tradition accumulated by it would help him in his life’s quest. In 1933, returning to the United States, he entered the seminary of the Theological Society. There he met the famous theologian and philosopher Paul Tillich, who fled to America from Nazi Germany. They began a friendship that had a great influence on R. May. In 1938, he graduated from the seminary and received a master's degree in theology, then was ordained to the priesthood. After two years of serving the church, May became disillusioned with his chosen path and left religion. A further choice was made under the influence of a long-standing meeting with A. Adler: May decided to study psychoanalysis at the Alanson White Institute of Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis and Psychology. In parallel with his studies, he worked as a consulting psychologist at City College in New York. At that time, he met such famous scientists as G. Sullivan and E. Fromm. These people greatly influenced the formation of R. May's views. May took especially close to the peculiarity of Sullivan's views on the psychotherapeutic process as an adventure that benefits both the patient and the doctor. After graduation, R. May began to engage in private practice, and in 1948 he began working as a teacher at the White Institute. In 1949, the board of Columbia University awarded him a doctorate. He believed that the main task of psychotherapy is to gain the patient the freedom necessary to understand his capabilities and use them. It is impossible to study and treat only the symptoms of the patient's illness. In fact, according to May, these symptoms are essentially attempts to escape from freedom due to the lack (or perceived lack) of options for using one's own capabilities. The doctor, helping the patient to find inner freedom, thereby relieves him of neurotic manifestations. R. May emphasized that getting rid of the symptoms of the disease is not the main goal. The scientist did not give specific solutions on how to achieve this, believing that it was necessary to take into account the personal characteristics of each person. It is possible to achieve a better understanding of oneself by the patient through the establishment of a trusting personal relationship. In such conditions, a person will be able to better understand himself, realize his own world and his values. R. May imagined this as a kind of “duel with one’s own destiny, with despair, with a sense of guilt.” Both participants in the therapeutic process are active individuals who participate equally in the treatment. Possessing a rich imagination, May imagined the treatment process as a journey through hell and then purgatory. The therapist is a guide who explains to the person where he is and shows the person the path to recovery. At this time, R. May was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and he had to go for treatment to a sanatorium in upstate New York. At that time, tuberculosis was still difficult to cure, and the two years that the scientist spent in the sanatorium were filled with constant anticipation of death. sentence and its constant deferment Being a talented psychologist, May realized that moral experiences were harmful to him and could cause the progression of the disease. He tried to change his attitude towards the disease, change his passive position to a more active one. The disease influenced not only R. May's worldview, but also his theories. He pondered the problems of fear and anxiety and studied the works of Freud and Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher and theologian. The latter viewed anxiety as a struggle against non-existence hidden from consciousness. Against the backdrop of the problems he was experiencing, this concept seemed to him the most correct. R. May published the results of his own reflections on this topic in the work “The Meaning of Anxiety,” which became his doctoral dissertation. At the end of his life, R. May turned to global reflections about human fate and the choices that a person constantly makes in life. In his opinion, fate a person’s life cannot be radically changed by him or replaced with another, but the scientist did not believe that a person should unconditionally obey the dictates of fate. Everyone can choose how to react to events that happen in their life. R. May, having studied the works of many psychologists, denied both the possibility of reducing human nature to his instincts and the perception of his behavior solely as a reaction to external stimuli. Thanks to his abilities, a person can actively influence the world around him, therefore, he is responsible for who he is and for his life path. Rollo May died on October 22, 1994 after a long illness. During his life, he communicated with many famous psychologists and thinkers, succumbed to their influence and absorbed many of their ideas. Creating his own theories, he generalized the experience of many scientists, taking into account the shortcomings and advantages of their theories. The scientist’s whole life consisted of a long search for his “I”; he conducted similar searches with his patients, trying to help them regain their lost sense of freedom. May did not come to psychology right away, but already as an adult with well-established personal characteristics. At the same time, psychology became for him an opportunity to find his ideals in life. Rollo May was distinguished by his high ability to work and excellent literary style. He wrote many articles and books that contain both theoretical theories and methods of clinical therapy.

MAY Rollo

(1909 -1994) - American psychologist and psychotherapist, one of the founders of humanistic psychology, theoretical and ideological leader of its existentialist branch. He initially received a philological and theological education. M.'s interest in psychology was influenced by communication with Alfred Adler during trips to Europe, and his spiritual mentor was the Protestant theologian and philosopher Paul Tillich. Starting in the late 1930s. career as a priest, M. is simultaneously studying at Columbia University, majoring in clinical psychology. During this period, he published his first book, The Art of Psychological Counseling (in Russian translation, published in 1995; 1999). The normal course of life, however, was interrupted by severe tuberculosis, which brought him face to face with death. Having recovered, M. changes his worldview and refuses to serve God, seeing in psychology a more powerful means of alleviating human suffering than religion. In 1949 he received a doctorate. degree in clinical psychology and in the early 1950s. finally confirmed in his existentialist views. Remaining a practicing psychotherapist, M. becomes the main propagandist of the ideas of European existentialism in the United States, creatively developing them in the context of problems of personality psychology and psychotherapy. In the 1950s-80s. publishes many books that have made his name known far beyond the psychological community. The main ones are the meaning of anxiety, love and will, freedom and fate. In the late 1950s and early 60s. he, along with A. Maslow and K. Rogers, became one of the organizational and ideological leaders of humanistic psychology and until his death remained associated with this movement, although he subsequently expressed disappointment with the movement’s departure from its existential-phenomenological roots. In his books, M. examines the key problems of human life. Many of them stem, according to M., from the fundamental ability, inherent only in man, to perceive oneself as a subject and as an object. These two poles define the continuum in which human consciousness moves. Analyzing the problems of modern man, M. brings to the fore the problem of anxiety. Anxiety itself is a normal, even constructive feeling associated with a sense of threat to something significant: physical life, psychological life, or personal values. Only anxiety that is disproportionate to the cause is pathological, and the psychotherapist’s task is not to eliminate anxiety altogether, but to help accept it and prevent normal anxiety from developing into pathological. The flexibility of personal values ​​is a factor that facilitates coping with normal anxiety. Likewise, normal guilt, appropriate to the situation, is an aspect of relationships with people. It is constructive, in contrast to pathological guilt, which develops from normal. The source of higher specifically human properties, such as the ability to distinguish one’s self from the surrounding world, navigate in time, going beyond the present, etc., is self-awareness. Unlike simple awareness-wakefulness, which is also inherent in animals, self-awareness is inherent only in humans. It is characterized by intentionality and awareness of one’s identity, one’s self. Unconscious M. is identified with the unidentified and unrealized potentials of a person. Identity, the sense of Self, is the starting point of a person’s psychological life. M. defines the self as a function of an individual’s organization of himself, an internal center from which a person is aware of both the environment and various aspects of himself. Any human action, including any neurosis, is aimed at preserving one’s inner center. The formation of personality, according to M., is the development of the sense of Self, the feeling of being a subject. This process involves liberation from various kinds of unconscious dependencies that determine the course of life, and the transition to chosen actions and relationships. Freedom is a person's ability to control his own development, closely related to self-awareness. Freedom is associated with flexibility, openness, and readiness to change. Thanks to self-awareness, we can interrupt the chain of stimuli and reactions, create a pause in it, in which we can make a conscious choice of our reaction. Freedom is cumulative: each freely made choice increases the freedom of subsequent choices. Freedom is not the opposite of determinism, but correlates with specific givens and inevitabilities that must be consciously accepted, and only in relation to which it is determined. M. calls these givens, inevitabilities and limitations that form the space of determinism in human life fate. M. distinguishes a number of levels of such givens: cosmic fate, genetic fate, cultural fate and specific circumstances. There are different ways of interacting with fate: cooperation, conscious acceptance, challenge or rebellion. The paradox of freedom is that it owes its significance to fate and vice versa; freedom and fate are unthinkable without each other. The opposite of freedom is automatic conformity. Freedom from addiction creates anxiety, which courage allows you to resist. The price of freedom is the inevitability of evil. If a person is free to choose, no one can guarantee that his choice will be one way and not another. All great saints considered themselves great sinners, for they were extremely sensitive to good and evil. Sensitivity to goodness means sensitivity to the consequences of one's actions; By expanding the potential for good, it simultaneously expands the potential for evil. Liberation is the goal of psychotherapy - liberation from symptoms, from compulsions, from unconstructive skills, etc. At the same time, psychotherapy strives for the patient to understand his capabilities, his freedom to choose his own lifestyle, accepting the inevitable. Existential psychotherapy, according to M., is not a school opposed to other psychotherapeutic schools; on the contrary, it allows one to expand and deepen the context of any psychotherapy. M.'s merits received worthy recognition. In 1970 he received the R.W. Emerson, and in 1971 - a gold medal and an APA Award for outstanding contributions to the science and practice of clinical psychology. In 1989, a research center at the Saybrook Institute in San Francisco, a leading educational and research institute specializing in humanistic psychology, was named after him. M. author of works: Mantis search for himself, N.Y., 1953; Psychology and the human dilemma, Princeton, 1967; Love and Will, N.Y., 1969; Power and innocence, N.Y., 1972; The courage to create, Toronto, 1975; The meaning of anxiety, N.Y., 1977; Freedom and destiny, N.Y., 1981; The discovery of being, N.Y., 1983; My quest for beauty, Dallas, 1985; The cry for myth, N.Y., 1991. D.L. Leontiev