Rogers felt that psychologists had the most important job in the world, because ultimately it was not the physical sciences that would save us, but better quality interactions between human beings. Hostile emotions are simply “the frustration of more basic impulses for love and security and belonging”.

The idea behind it is deeply rooted within the philosophy of existentialism (Kierkegaard, Buber, Sartre): namely, that we are free to choose to become whoever we want to, but are frustrated because we are trapped in an existence which doesn’t express us. The first is that I believe there is limited value to the notion of a “true self,” and also that freeing a client’s “true self” is perhaps not the right way to conceptualize the ultimate goal of therapy. According to Carl Rogers, a person attains the level of self-actualization when they accomplish their desires, wishes and goals, at each stage of their life.The mistake people made was to try to control all aspects of their experience, with the end result being a personality not grounded in reality. Rogers initially named his client-centred approach to therapy as non-directive therapy, because this therapeutic approach required the therapist to maintain a therapeutic relationship in which the therapist attends to the client’s lead rather than the direct discussion. Despite its challenges, unconditional positive regard remains a cornerstone of humanistic therapy and an important factor in promoting personal growth and positive change.

It is only lately that I have begun to lower my expectations and certain ideal notions of relationships in general. When I decided to pursue a career in counseling, a mentor recommended Carl Rogers as one of the key historical figures in the development of modern psychotherapy.Successful development makes us more flexible in relationships, more creative, and less open to suggestion and control. Also, if a counselor proves unable to adequately model a client’s internal perspective despite their best efforts, being forthright about that may compromise empathic understanding. We’ve already told you a thing or two about existentialism’s fundamental tenets while summarizing Being and Nothingness , the central work by, arguably, the greatest existentialist philosopher of the 20 th century, Jean-Paul Sartre. As a last word, I’d like to point out that Rogers’s work has a lot to offer, even for readers uninterested in therapy. If they can just fix their marital problems, so their reasoning goes, all will be well and they'll live happily ever after.