Editing Logotherapy (section)

==Logotherapeutic views and treatment==

===Overcoming anxiety===
By recognizing the purpose of our circumstances, one can master [[anxiety]]. Anecdotes about this use of logotherapy are given by ''New York Times'' writer Tim Sanders, who explained how he uses its concept to relieve the stress of fellow airline travelers by asking them the purpose of their journey. When he does this, no matter how miserable they are, their whole demeanor changes, and they remain happy throughout the flight.<ref name="Sanders2008">{{Cite news |last=Sanders |first=Tim |date=27 October 2008 |title=A Chatterer's Guide to Easing Anxiety |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/27/travel/27iht-25flier.18204176.html}}</ref> Overall, Frankl believed that the anxious individual does not understand that their anxiety is the result of dealing with a sense of "unfulfilled responsibility" and ultimately a lack of meaning.<ref name="Boeree">{{Cite web |last=Boeree |first=C. George |year=2006 |title=Viktor Frankl |url=http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/frankl.html |publisher=Shippensburg University}}</ref>

===Treatment of neurosis===
Frankl cites two neurotic pathogens: hyper-intention, a forced intention toward some end which makes that end unattainable; and hyper-reflection, an excessive attention to oneself which stifles attempts to avoid the [[neurosis]] to which one thinks oneself predisposed. Frankl identified [[anticipatory anxiety]], a fear of a given outcome which makes that outcome more likely. To relieve the anticipatory anxiety and treat the resulting neuroses, logotherapy offers [[paradoxical intention]], wherein the patient intends to do the opposite of their hyper-intended goal.

A person, then, who fears (i.e. experiences anticipatory anxiety over) not getting a good night's sleep may try too hard (that is, hyper-intend) to fall asleep, and this would hinder their ability to do so. A logotherapist would recommend, then, that the person go to bed and intentionally try not to fall asleep. This would relieve the anticipatory anxiety which kept the person awake in the first place, thus allowing them to fall asleep in an acceptable amount of time.<ref name="Frankl2006" />

===Depression===
Viktor Frankl believed depression occurred at the psychological, physiological, and spiritual levels.<ref name="Boeree" /> At the psychological level, he believed that feelings of inadequacy stem from undertaking tasks beyond our abilities. At the physiological level, he recognized a "vital low", which he defined as a "diminishment of physical energy".<ref name="Boeree" /> Finally, Frankl believed that at the spiritual level, the depressed individual faces tension between who they actually are in relation to what they should be. Frankl refers to this as the gaping abyss.<ref name="Frankl1986" />{{rp|202}}<ref name="Boeree" /> Finally Frankl suggests that if goals seem unreachable, an individual loses a sense of future and thus meaning, resulting in depression.<ref name="Boeree" /> Thus logotherapy aims "to change the patient's attitude toward their disease as well as toward their life as a task".<ref name="Frankl1986" />{{rp|200}}

In order to overcome depressed feelings and thoughts, Frankl challenges individuals who suffer from depression to find meaning in their suffering.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Frankl |first1=Victor |title=Man's Search for Meaning |date=1959 |publisher=Beacon Press |isbn=080701429X}}</ref> Frankl frequently cites [[Nietzsche]]'s words, "If we have our own why in life, we shall get along with almost any how".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Nietzsche |first1=Friedrich |title=Twilight of the Idols, or, How to Philosophize with a Hammer |date=1889 |publisher=Penguin Publishing |isbn=978-0140445145}}</ref> Suffering and all the [[negative emotion]]s that come with it are a normal part of the human experience and should even be expected. Edith Weisskopf-Joelson, a psychologist and follower of logotherapy, argues that "our current mental-hygiene philosophy stresses the idea that people ought to be happy, that unhappiness is a symptom of maladjustment. Such a value system might be responsible for the fact that the burden of unavoidable unhappiness is increased by unhappiness about being unhappy".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Weisskopf-Joelson |first1=Edith |title=Some comments on a Viennese school of psychiatry. |journal=The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology |date=November 1955 |volume=51 |issue=3 |pages=701–703 |doi=10.1037/h0045771 |pmid=13286026 |url=https://doi.org/10.1037/h0045771|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

=== Obsessive–compulsive disorder ===
Frankl believed that those with obsessive–compulsive disorder lack the sense of completion that most other individuals possess.<ref name="Boeree" /> Instead of fighting the tendencies to repeat thoughts or actions, or focusing on changing the individual symptoms of the disease, the therapist should focus on "transform[ing] the neurotic's attitude toward their neurosis".<ref name="Frankl1986" />{{rp|185}} Therefore, it is important to recognize that the patient is "not responsible for his obsessional ideas", but that "he is certainly responsible for his attitude toward these ideas".<ref name="Frankl1986" />{{rp|188}} Frankl suggested that it is important for the patient to recognize their inclinations toward perfection as fate, and therefore, must learn to accept some degrees of uncertainty.<ref name="Boeree" /> Ultimately, following the premise of logotherapy, the patient must eventually ignore their obsessional thoughts and find meaning in their life despite such thoughts.<ref name="Frankl1986" />

===Schizophrenia===
Though logotherapy was not intended to deal with severe disorders, Frankl believed that logotherapy could benefit even those with [[schizophrenia]].<ref name="Boeree" /> He recognized the roots of schizophrenia in physiological dysfunction.<ref name="Boeree" /> In this dysfunction, the person with schizophrenia "experiences himself as an object" rather than as a subject.<ref name="Frankl1986" />{{rp|208}} Frankl suggested that a person with schizophrenia could be helped by logotherapy by first being taught to ignore voices and to end persistent self-observation.<ref name="Boeree" /> Then, during this same period, the person with schizophrenia must be led toward meaningful activity, as "even for the schizophrenic there remains that residue of freedom toward fate and toward the disease which man always possesses, no matter how ill he may be, in all situations and at every moment of life, to the very last".<ref name="Frankl1986" />{{rp|216}}

===Terminally ill patients===
In 1977, Terry Zuehlke and John Watkins conducted a study analyzing the effectiveness of logotherapy in treating terminally ill patients. The study's design used 20 male Veterans Administration volunteers who were randomly assigned to one of two possible treatments – (1) group that received eight 45-minute sessions over a 2-week period and (2) group used as control that received delayed treatment. Each group was tested on five scales – the [[Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory|MMPI K Scale]], MMPI L Scale, Death Anxiety Scale, Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale, and the Purpose of Life Test. The results showed an overall significant difference between the control and treatment groups. While the univariate analyses showed that there were significant group differences in 3/5 of the dependent measures. These results confirm the idea that terminally ill patients can benefit from logotherapy in coping with death.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Zuehlke |first1=T.E. |last2=Watkins, J.T. |year=1977 |title=Psychotherapy with Terminally Ill Patients |journal=Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice |volume=14 |issue=4 |pages=403–410 |doi=10.1037/h0087512}}</ref>

===Forms of treatment===
''Ecce Homo'' is a method used in logotherapy. It requires of the therapist to note the innate strengths that people have and how they have dealt with adversity and suffering in life; to ask the patient to consider how, despite everything a person may have gone through, they made the best of their suffering. The method is called "Ecce Homo", which is Latin for "Behold the Man", because the method involves beholding how other people have made the best of their adversity.<ref>Viktor Frankl, ''The Will to Meaning'', Penguin Publishing Group, Kindle edition, p. 94.</ref>