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Emmy van Deurzen is one of the foremost existential therapists in the United Kingdom. She initially came to the UK to work with the anti-psychiatrists, but soon created her own school. She founded the Society for Existential Analysis and the International Society for Existential Psychotherapists and Counsellors and created the two most important training institutes for the approach: the School of Psychotherapy and Counselling at Regent's College, London and the New School for Psychotherapy and Counselling at Schiller International University, London.

Emmy van Deurzen's work is based strongly in existential philosophy and her therapeutic methods enable people to reflect on their lives with equal attention to past, present and future. There are some similarities between this form of existential therapy and philosophical counselling. See also: Existential Psychotherapy.

Contents 1 Life 2 Major contributions 3 Principal Ideas 4 References

Emmy van Deurzen was born in The Hague, Netherlands, on 13 December 1951, the second daughter of Arie Marinus van Deurzen and Anna Lamina Hensel. Her elder sister, Ingrid was born in 1949. Emmy van Deurzen had a classical education at the Dalton Lyceum in the Hague, where she became interested in philosophy, mainly through Aristotle's and Plato's writings.

After finishing her Gymnasium she went to Montpellier, France, to study French. She transferred her studies to Philosophy a year later and specialized in Rousseau, Hegel, Marx, Spinoza, Husserl, Sartre, Merleau Ponty and Freud. Her master's degree was in moral and political philosophy and her thesis considered the relationship between loneliness, solipsism and schizophrenia. She began working in the revolutionary psychiatric hospital of Saint-Alban, Lozere, in 1973, under the name of Emmy Fabre, by now married to the psychiatrist Jean-Pierre Fabre. She became a group psychotherapist and learnt techniques like psychodrama and psychoanalytic psychotherapy, whilst also staging several plays with the patients in the hospital, including Brecht's The Good Man of Seh-Shuan.

She moved to work in the psychiatric community of La Candelie, in Agen in 1975, whilst taking a degree in psychology, then training as a clinical psychologist at the University of Bordeaux. It was here that she began to work with couples and individuals from an existential perspective, combining her philosophical training with psychotherapeutic principles. She met several of the anti-psychiatrists at a conference in Milan and was invited to come and work in London.

She moved to London to live and work in an anti-psychiatric community with the Arbours Association, in 1977, and also did some work in their crisis centre as well as teaching existential psychotherapy on their training programme for some years. In 1978, after a three months' study trip to California, she separated from her husband and started working for Antioch University in London on their Masters programme in Humanistic Psychology of which she soon became Associate Director. She became Director of the new MA in the Psychology of Therapy and Counselling, which she created for Antioch University in 1982.

She married David Livingstone Smith II in 1980 and had a son Benjamin Yuri Smith in 1981. A daughter, Sasha Daniella Smith, was born in 1985.

She transferred the Antioch programme to Regent's College, London, in 1985 and merged this with the College four years later. This grew into the School of Psychotherapy and Counselling, which she founded as a limited company, together with the then President of Regent's College, John Payne, in 1990. She became Director of the School as well as its Dean a few years later. She was given a personal chair at the College in 1993.

In 1984 she contributed a chapter to the first Dryden Handbook of Psychotherapy and delineated her existential approach in writing for the first time. In 1988 her landmark book was published by Sage Publications, Existential Counselling in Practice. This immediately became a bestseller and was reprinted each year and re-edited as Existential Counselling and Psychotherapy in Practice in 2002. It saw many foreign translations.

In 1993 van Deurzen became the first Chair of the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy, and gave a speech at the House of Lords at the launch of the first Register of psychotherapists. She also became active in European wide political work to establish psychotherapy as an independent profession and was external relations officer to the European Association for Psychotherapy and ambassador to the Council of Europe and the European Commission for many years.

In 1996 she was unfairly dismissed from Regent's College over political differences with the management of the College in relation to their financial practices. She separated from her husband David Smith in the same year. She created the New School of Psychotherapy and Counselling together with Prof. Digby Tantam, soon after her dismissal from Regent's College at the London base of Schiller International University, on the South Bank at Waterloo. NSPC was specifically conceived for the training of existential therapists. She was made a Professor by Schiller International University. In spite of a failed legal challenge to her new institute by Regent's College, the New School thrived and became a unique organization for existential therapy training, offering masters and doctoral degrees in existential psychotherapy and counselling, with validation from the University of Sheffield and Middlesex University.

In 1997 Emmy van Deurzen moved to Sheffield, with her daughter, to live with Digby Tantam, who she married in 1998. They created the Centre for the Study of Conflict and Reconciliation at the University of Sheffield, where Emmy became an Honorary Reader, then an Honorary Professor. Her books Everyday Mysteries and Paradox and Passion were published in these two years, showing a maturing of her thinking and practice.

Emmy van Deurzen and Digby Tantam created Dilemma Consultancy Ltd., in Sheffield, a private practice run entirely on existential principles. They also became co-chairs of the European Association of Psychotherapy Training Standards Committee and were largely responsible for the creation of the European Certificate of Psychotherapy in 1998. They married on 1 August 1998. They worked together with the European Commission and the Council of Europe to secure the status of psychotherapy in Europe. They set up an internet based training programme in psychotherapy SEPTIMUS, funded by the European commission. They founded the International Community for Existential Counsellors and Psychotherapists (ICECAP) in 2006 at the Tenth Anniversary Conference of NSPC.

Emmy completed a doctorate in philosophy with City University in London in 2003, on Heidegger's approach to Self-Deception and its relevance to Psychotherapy. This remains unpublished to this day. Emmy gave many international talks and key note addresses at conferences worldwide during this period, especially in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Lithuania, Russia, France, Holland, Ireland, Italy, Austria, Switserland, Argentina, Mexico and the USA. Many new national training associations in existential psychotherapy were created in this process. She published two further books with colleagues in 2005. She wrote two unpublished novels and became increasinlgy interested in the concept of 'living well'. Her book 'Psychotherapy and the Quest for Happiness' was published in 2007.

Emmy van Deurzen has been instrumental in establishing the existential approach in the United Kingdom in the nineteen eighties and nineties, through her publications, through the creation of the Society for Existential Analysis (SEA) in 1988 and the creation of the International Collaborative of Existential Counsellors and Psychotherapists (ICECAP) in 2006. She has also secured the training of hundreds of existential therapists in the UK by founding the School of Psychotherapy and Counselling at Regent’s College along existential principles and by setting up the New School of Psychotherapy and Counselling specifically for the purpose of existential training.

She also ensured the recognition of the approach in the UK when she was chair of the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy 1993-1995 and at a European level when she was co-Chair of the training standards committee of the European Association for Psychotherapy.

The translation of her books into numerous languages has also facilitated the spread of the approach across other continents. Her international lecturing has added further strength to the interest in the approach across the world and has led to the creation of a number of other national organizations for existential therapy. Her work in setting up an e-learning training course (SEPTIMUS) in existential psychotherapy with colleagues through European funding has given access to existential training to many people across the globe.

Van Deurzen’s work is based on Sartrian and Heideggerian ideas, but she has altered these philosophical concepts to fit the pragmatic framework of therapeutic intervention. She has contributed many original ideas to the existential literature, including that of the emotional cycle or the emotional compass. She has also introduced the idea of an onto-dynamic approach to psychotherapy as opposed to a psychodynamic one. She has coined various new terms, including the notion of virtue-ability or morability, emphasizing the person’s continuous search for a way of life that is not rigidly bound by values and rules, but rather based in freedom and a willingness to consider what the best and most principled way forward is at any one time in the specific situation. She is probably best known for her four worlds model which maps a person’s life experience and world orientation on four dimensions. She uses this in relation to dream analysis as well as in the diagnostic interview. She describes each dimension of existence as containing a paradox that the person has to come to terms with throughout life in different ways.

Physical dimension On the physical dimension (Umwelt) we relate to our environment and to the givens of the natural world around us. This includes our attitude to the body we have, to the concrete surroundings we find ourselves in, to the climate and the weather, to objects and material possessions, to the bodies of other people, our own bodily needs, to health and illness and to our own mortality. The struggle on this dimension is, in general terms, between the search for domination over the elements and natural law (as in technology, or in sports) and the need to accept the limitations of natural boundaries (as in ecology or old age). While people generally aim for security on this dimension (through health and wealth), much of life brings a gradual disillusionment and realization that such security can only be temporary. Recognizing limitations can bring great release of tension. Social dimension On the social dimension (Mitwelt) we relate to others as we interact with the public world around us. This dimension includes our response to the culture we live in, as well as to the class and race we belong to (and also those we do not belong to). Attitudes here range from love to hate and from co-operation to competition. The dynamic contradictions can be understood in terms of acceptance versus rejection or belonging versus isolation. Some people prefer to withdraw from the world of others as much as possible. Others blindly chase public acceptance by going along with the rules and fashions of the moment. Otherwise they try to rise above these by becoming trendsetters themselves. By acquiring fame or other forms of power, we can attain dominance over others temporarily. Sooner or later we are, however, all confronted with both failure and aloneness. Psychological dimension On the psychological dimension (Eigenwelt) we relate to ourselves and in this way create a personal world. This dimension includes views about our character, our past experience and our future possibilities. Contradictions here are often experienced in terms of personal strengths and weaknesses. People search for a sense of identity, a feeling of being substantial and having a self. But inevitably many events will confront us with evidence to the contrary and plunge us into a state of confusion or disintegration. Activity and passivity are an important polarity here. Self-affirmation and resolution go with the former and surrender and yielding with the latter. Facing the final dissolution of self that comes with personal loss and the facing of death might bring anxiety and confusion to many who have not yet given up their sense of self-importance. Spiritual dimension On the spiritual dimension (Überwelt) (van Deurzen, 1984) we relate to the unknown and thus create a sense of an ideal world, an ideology and a philosophical outlook. It is here that we find meaning by putting all the pieces of the puzzle together for ourselves. For some people this is done by adhering to the dogma of a religion or some other prescriptive world view, for others it is about discovering or attributing meaning in a more secular or personal way. The contradictions that have to be faced on this dimension are often related to the tension between purpose and absurdity, hope and despair. People create their values in search of something that matters enough to live or die for, something that may even have ultimate and universal validity. Usually the aim is the conquest of a soul, or something that will substantially surpass mortality (as for instance in having contributed something valuable to humankind). Facing the void and the possibility of nothingness are the indispensable counterparts of this quest for the eternal.

• Deurzen, E. van (2002) Existential Counselling and Psychotherapy in Practice, 2nd edition, London: Sage Publications.

• Deurzen, E. van (1997) Everyday Mysteries: Existential Dimensions of Psychotherapy, London: Routledge. (2nd edition 2006)

• Deurzen, E. van (1998) Paradox and Passion in Psychotherapy, Chichester: Wiley.

• Deurzen, E. van, and Kenward, R. (2005) Dictionary of Existential Psychotherapy and Counselling, London: Sage Publications.

• Deurzen, E. van and Arnold-Baker, C., eds. (2005) Existential Perspectives on Human Issues: a Handbook for Practice, London: Palgrave, Macmillan.

• Deurzen, E. van (2007) Psychotherapy and the Quest for Happiness, London:Sage Publications.