The existential theory identifies anxiety as related to the overall fear of death. When one recognizes that they are going to die they experience high levels of anxiety and daily anxiety behaviour knowing that one day they will no longer be; thus, anxiety is the result of the internal "clash of being and the threat of nonbeing" (Yalom & Josselson, 2019, p. 282). Ultimately, existential theory suggests that in order to reduce the levels of daily anxiety one must accept the fact they will no longer be alive one day as a purpose to live the best they can today (Yalom & Josselson, 2019).

Freedom results in anxiety once the individual becomes aware of their overall responsibility for their life. In other words, once an individual recognizes they are one day going to die they may experience greater feelings of anxiety due to the concept of being free; thus, their one chance at life is unstructured and solely depended on their personal choices and self-guidance (Yalom & Josselson, 2019).

Have you felt a sense of fear of dying and felt anxious to live? If so, what have you done to try to eliminate this sense of anxiety?

Please use these sources to support your answer with in-text citations

Yalom, I. D., & Josselson, R. (2019)Existential psychotherapy.In D. Wedding & R. J. Corsini (Eds.), Current psychotherapies (11th ed.) pp. 273-308. Boston, MA: Cengage.

Garrow, S., Walker, J. (2001)Existential Group Therapy and Anxiety. Adultspan Journal. Fall, Vol. 3 Issue 2, p77. 11p. DOI: 10.1002/j.2161-0029. 2001.tb00109. x. https://discovery.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=d080a694-c528-3cd6-8f6e-eaa58ace5563

Golan, Shahar. (2022)Yalom, Strenger, and the Psychodynamics of Inner Freedom: A Contribution to Existential Psychoanalysis. Psychoanalytic Psychology,American Psychological Association 2022, Vol. 39, No. 1, 5-11 https://doi.org/10.1037/pap000039https://discovery.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=e08be2c2-c85d-3121-8876-710dd22ad8e4