Daseinsanalysis, the German word for “Existential Analysis,” is based on the phenomenological anthropology of Martin Heidegger (1889–1976), and the subsequent development of his thought for clinical endeavors in the 1940s by two Swiss psychiatrists, first, Ludwig Binswanger (1881–1966) and then Medard Boss (1903–1990). Differentiating from both psychoanalysis and other styles of existential therapy, Daseinsanalysis is distinctive in its analysis of Dasein, or quality of “being there” in the world.

Martin Heidegger proposed that human existence has an ontological, or general and foundational, structure that is expressed in “ontic,” or concrete, ways of living out unique comportments in the world (Heidegger 1962). Yet, Heidegger argued that understanding these concrete and specific ways of living in the world requires a prior awareness of how these unique ways of being-in-the-world relate to the broader understanding of human existence as an ontological whole. Heidegger distinguished between an analysis of Dasein and Daseinsanalysis as a clinical practice, seeing the former as a philosophical anthropology on which the latter is based. Daseinsanalysis addresses particular ways each human being moves in the world in the light of the larger ontological structure of human existence.

Heidegger wanted to leave the word, “Dasein,” untranslated in order to avoid the inaccurate equation of “Dasein” with concepts such as “person,” “ego,” or “self.” Dasein is not a “thing” or a fixed and encapsulated entity, but a phenomenological process in which cleared space and the lightening of existential constriction and burden allow for the possibility of phenomena to “show themselves.” Dasein, both concealed and revealed, discloses itself through existential givens, which are inherent conditions all human beings live out in our everyday existence. They are, specifically, temporality, spatiality, coexistence, mood or attunement, historicity, bodyhood, and mortality. Moreover, Dasein discloses itself within the equiprimordiality of human existence. By saying that human existence is equiprimordial, we mean that we all simultaneously live our lives within three modes of being: the Umwelt, Mitwelt, and Eigenwelt (Boss 1979; Heidegger 1962; May et al. 1958).

The Umwelt is our biological and environmental existence. Our Mitwelt is our “with-world,” or relational world, which entails the quality of “being-with” in our relationships (i.e., close, distant, and conflictual). Our Eigenwelt is our lived experience, which is the unique ways we experience ourselves living through situations. No one mode of existence dominates and takes priority over any of the other two. No one mode of existence can be extracted from the other two. Pain, stress, and hypertension are examples of how the three modes of existence mutually shape and are shaped by the other two. Our integrated, equiprimordial comportment through our everydayness always and already finds itself within the integrated existential givens in the world. The world is not a place to locate persons and things, but a web of meaning and backdrop against which aspects of our lives come to make sense to us and come to disclose themselves to us.

Through embracing inherent limitations in each moment, that is, our finitude, facticity, and contingency in existence, which Heidegger called our “throwness,” we can more authentically live out our “ownmost” possibilities in the world. Relinquishing this call towards our ownmost possibilities, and instead, succumbing to being defined by culture, the status quo, or just allowing life to carry one along and define us without claiming one’s own life as one’s own is a life of inauthenticity. Existence, in its ontic sense, is a perpetual movement between authenticity and inauthenticity, as well as between freedom and finitude. Meaningful experiences in life are those that occur within the embrace of one’s limitations in the search for immanent possibilities.

Binswanger, Boss, and other Daseinsanalysts align with psychoanalysis around the value of a human existence coming to know itself through the movement from concealment to disclosure, but differ significantly from psychoanalysis regarding its more mechanistic understanding of mental processes (Binswanger 1967; Boss 1963, 1977, 1979). As such, key constructs of the psychoanalytic project, such as the psyche, unconscious, transference, and projection, are jettisoned outright, or, at least significantly, altered in their meaning. Furthermore, Boss believed the therapeutic question guiding clinicians should not be the psychoanalytic persistence on a determinative past as expressed in the word, “why?,” but, instead, should be the more hopeful, future oriented, and more inviting question, “why not?” Our future impacts us as much as our past, as Daseinsanalysts see it, and both our lived future and lived past disclose themselves in the present, or, here and now, comportment in the world. Boss and other commentators of Boss’ work have argued, then, that Daseinsanalysis is “purified” psychoanalysis, having rid itself of unnecessary metapsychology and engineering conceptualizations of mind that are not phenomenologically experienced anyway (Stadlen 2005, 2007).

In relation to other existentially oriented therapies, Daseinsanalysis also differentiates itself by insisting on the “thrown” nature of our world situations. We are never absolutely free, as some more humanistically bend existentialists may argue, but lean into our possibilities within situated freedom. Likewise, Daseinsanalysis does not see the person as an ego, psyche, or any kind of “thing-hood,” but sees the person as inextricably interwoven in the world. The person is how one moves in the world. What is seen in the world is not a static “it,” but a process of being, a comportment through situations. The relationship of Dasein and the world is co-constructive, as the world is disclosed as it is only in light of the presencing of Dasein being “all there.”

Commentary

Spirituality is an inherent aspect of Daseinsanalysis and is understood as transcendence within and through immanence (Driver 1985). One’s experience of transcendence, understood as the experience of unfolding and living through one’s ownmost possibilities, is enframed by embracing one’s being-unto-death or embracing one’s situational and ontological limitations, including, of course, but not exclusively, the end of our biological existence. One’s “throwness,” though, is an everyday and every moment phenomenon. Several theorists have tried to compare Heidegger’s work to other religious traditions, such as Taoism, Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Judaism, which is evidence to the universality Heidegger’s work could offer to such diverse life worlds, as the impulse to comparisons is predicated on qualities that may easily be deemed “spiritual,” in the existential way, that are embedded within both the ontological and ontic expressions of Dasein-in-the-world.

The very ontological structure of Dasein is what Heidegger called “solicitude,” or care. This is not primarily a feeling of empathy, but an inherent intending and enacting of significance. Each moment of experience intends and responds to his or her world’s call to significance. We are always and already attuned, intending, called by, and responding to meaningful encounters in the world. I call this approach “pastoral” in that its focus is on clearing space and lightening burdens such that disclosures of possibility can show themselves. It is “pastoral” in its alignment with one’s own most possibilities within the tragic dimension of life’s “thrones,” or finitude. This approach is very incarnate and finds transcendence by courageously enacting one’s own most possibilities while embracing one’s death amidst the tragic dimension of life.

Daseinsanalysis values meditative releasement, as Heidegger’s calls it, or letting go while exploring phenomena, rather than a habit of calculative manipulation and control of situations and persons. Letting go shows itself in uncovering, clearing, unburdening, disclosing, and releasing phenomena to show themselves as manifestations of Dasein’s being there, and never being-elsewhere-beyond existence. In other words, transcendence does not occur outside of existence, for the Daseinsanalyst, but within it. Transcendence, however, is the heart of Daseinsanalysis, where the therapeutic questions and goals are on freedom towards how one would like to be in the world and what seems to be constricting their freedom to be so. Hence, rather than fall short of a true integration of psychology and religion through incomplete comparisons and contrasts, or juxtapositioning of one against the other, Daseinsanalysis provides us with the possibility of a discourse and language that could provide a true integration of our present-day separatism, if one agrees that transcendence is found in and through immanence. In the clearing of space and the lightening of burdens, modes of being-in-the-world are uncovered and truths of existence show themselves in ontic particularities. What is also interesting to consider is how Daseinsanalysis can provide a foundation for multicultural considerations, given that we all live through equiprimordial and existential givens in the world simply by being human beings, but take up those experiences in very unique ways. We then could celebrate a true communion of diversity.

Daseinsanalysis is practiced around the world and is centralized in the International Federation of Daseinsanalysis, including countries such as Brazil, Greece, Belgium, France, Hungary, Austria, Canada, England, the Czech Republic, and, of course, Switzerland. Originally having its training headquarters in Zurich, which was originally limited to medically trained psychiatrists, the apparent exclusivism sparked points of contention among some Daseinsanalysts (Stadlen 2005, 2007). Today, though, Daseinsanalysis is growing in appreciation in the United States and is taught in the human science-oriented doctoral programs in psychology. As it continues to spread in awareness and appreciation, more and more clearings will provide space for freeing us all to live more into our ownmost possibilities.

See Also