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SYNOPSIS OF EACH CHAPTER:
Introduction:
Transcending Our Existential Predicament
Our inner states-of-being are disclosed to us at special moments of vision in which we see deeply into ourselves. Some of the obstacles that prevent us from noticing how we are in our deepest beings are lack of sensitivity, lack of subjectivity, and being in bad faith. These moments of vision may be triggered by deep encounters with nature, striking events in our lives, by artistic creation and appreciation, and by simply looking inward.
Each chapter of this book deals with a different inner state-of being: existential loneliness, depression, absurdity, meaninglessness, etc. But it is possible to live beyond our Existential Malaise. We prepare ourselves for this new condition by (1) uncovering and accepting our Existential Predicament, (2) giving up the psychological methods that do work for coping with the psychological twin of our Existential Malaise, and (3) a profound re-orientation of being.
Chapter 1
Existential Loneliness:
Deeper than the Reach of Love.
Our sense of incompleteness is deeper than love can reach. It is more propound than all forms of interpersonal loneliness. Our existential loneliness is really an incompleteness of being.
Chapter 2
Existential Depression:
Deeper than Psychological Depression
We feel 'down' without any objective cause. And all our psychological methods of cure do not work.
Chapter 3
Existential Absurdity:
Is Life Worth Living?
Our existential absurdity may be discovered deep within ourselves when the metaphysical systems that attempt to explain everything collapse.
Chapter 4
Existential Meaninglessness:
The Collapse of 'Meanings' and Illusions
For people who are asking for the ultimate purpose of their lives. We may notice the existential meaninglessness peeking out from behind the ordinary disappoints and discrepancies of life.
Chapter 5
The Existential Void:
Discovering Our Bottomless Emptiness
Another way to feel our Existential Malaise is The Void, a dark hole in the middle of our beings, which threatens to engulf us entirely. Could this be what sensitive artists and thinkers have tried to articulate?
An emptiness within, even in the midst of external achievement and happiness.
Chapter 6
Existential Anxiety:
Angst
Simple fears and worries are distinguished from the free-floating terror that has no cause. Here our Existential Malaise may be discovered in the ways it distorts and exaggerates our ordinary fears. In some ways angst may be the paradigm of our Existential Predicament.
Chapter 7
Existential Splitting:
Soren Kierkegaard's Sickness unto Death
For a change of pace, this chapter is based on a famous book. Kierkegaard describes the many ways in which we may be split against ourselves. And he shines a light in the direction of wholeness.
Chapter 8
Existential Guilt:
Deeper than Moral Conscience
People from moralistic backgrounds are likely to feel their Predicament as an intractable guilt. This deeper guilt is carefully distinguished from simple moral conscience.
Chapter 9
An Existential Understanding of Death:
A Phenomenology of Ontological Anxiety
Can we make sense of a terror deeper than death itself? Kierkegaard and Heidegger figure strongly in this longest chapter. Readers may find this the most difficult chapter, but it is also the most original and profound.
Chapter 10
Existential Despair:
Floating Down the River of Despair
Another philosophical way of discovering our Existential Predicament. We see thru the cardboard scenery to the bleak truth beyond. But even below the deepest despair, there is hope.
Chapter 11
Existential Insecurity:
When all Security-Operations Fail
For readers whose Malaise makes them feel insecure about everything. When ordinary security-operations do not being security, perhaps the problem is existential.
Afterword:
Obstacles to Existential Freedom
This conclusion to the book explores the many inward problems that prevent us from opening ourselves to Existential Freedom. And it makes more clear than ever how this new inner state-of-being differs from a wide variety of psychological means of coping.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
From the Publisher:
Our Existential Predicament is the product of more than 30 years of writing. Most of the current chapters first appeared in a series of small books called The Existential Freedom Series. They were used over a period of several years as texts for discussions, thereby encouraging several revisions.
About the Author:
The concept "our Existential Malaise or Predicament" is a reformulation of a phenomenon (or perhaps several related phenomena) known to human beings since the dawn of consciousness. In the earliest phases of human thinking, this Malaise or Dilemma was usually expressed in mythological form. But later philosophy and psychology attempted to explain our Malaise using various philosophical and psychological models.
James Park is an independent existential philosopher, with special interests love, death, and our Existential Predicament. Our Existential Predicament is his major work. He has about a dozen other books in print. Much more information will be found on the author's home page, which will be found by searching the Internet for "James Leonard Park".
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherExistential Books
- Publication date2001
- ISBN 10 0892319402
- ISBN 13 9780892319404
- BindingPaperback
- Edition number4
- Number of pages312
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