Potential-oriented Psychotherapy is a variant of Humanistic Psychotherapy for people who
- suffer from or even become ill from, the internal conflict between excessive adaptation to the standards of others, Normopathy, and the need for self-determination, autonomy,
- experience crisis, suffering and disease as a challenge, and to stop suppressing one's own possibilities and abilities because of outside influences and others ideas,
- evaluate symptoms as a guide toward an orientation, adequate to the essence of being human, according to the motto, "Fear is a form of lust, but which is lacking direction".
In Potential-oriented Psychotherapy, particular attention is devoted to Feeling. Feeling is, in contrast to the emotional responses that are triggered by nonspecific stimuli reflexively and inappropriate with regard to a situation, a conscious act in the present moment. To Feel means to perceive with our senses. They are what move us inside, and what provides for our ever-changing and evolving inner movements, and provide appropriate meaning and importance within an ever evolving situation.
Through feeling, the feeling person may:
- recognize the influence or imprints of the conditions of their socialization,
- detach from identification as a victim of their own history,
- act appropriately according to the situation,
- perceive what is true now,
- become witness of the present, absolute and unconditional being.