Teria Shantall - The Life-changing Impact of Viktor Frankl’s Logotherapy

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Despite the remarkable progress of Logotherapy in the past two decades in Russia, Kazakhstan, and elsewhere in the world, there is a recognized vacuum in the education of logo-therapists, namely, the neglect of their own spiritual dimension. Shantalls book fills this vacuum remarkably well. Her book deals with the fundamental principles of what it means to be a human being. And particularly with how a person looks upon the world, whether as a meaningless or as a meaningful place. For absence of meaning in life makes existence miserable.

This book reflects and enlivens the authors struggle to turn many meaningless lives into productive and meaningful ones. And her life serves as illustration to this struggle and to its positive outcome.

Shantalls book is based on her long, rich, and distinguished background in Logotherapy, and on her teaching Frankls theory and method of Logotherapy in different parts and cultures in the world. She is one of Professor Frankls students in the United States who were fortunate to study under the guidance of the founder of Logotherapy. And this explains her positive and lively approach to the spiritual, philosophical, and particularly to the applied aspects of Logotherapy.

As she so convincingly shows, a logo-therapist is a human being with strengths and weaknesses similar to his or her clients. This means that a logo-therapist is not above the characteristics common to all people. In her lengthy exposition of Logotherapy, she manages to show in great detail how to conduct ourselves so that we may be able to overcome pain, sorrow, frustration, sickness, and even death.

Shantall demonstrates that nobody is beyond hope, beyond redemption. The more one experiences lack of meaning in his or her life, the more he or she may benefit from using Logotherapy to combat feelings of distress and helplessness. As all therapists know, the caring and curing function of Logotherapy is vested in establishing a close emotional bond between therapist and client. This bond is called trust. Trust is a central condition of therapy, of all therapy. It plays a crucial role in individual and social well-being.

According to Shantall, trust in the hands of a logo-therapist means recognition and responsibility for the potential of changing a persons entire life for good or bad. There is an explicit agreement about the expectations of what each party has to do. And if this trust is damaged and lost, then the whole practice is gone. Therefore, both parties should be equally interested in the outcome of the therapeutic work.

The encounters in Shantalls book between client and therapist are based on the Socratic Dialogue. Socrates, the ancient Greek philosopher, is generally regarded as the father of ethics. His method of teaching is commonly known as midwifery. Similar to the midwife who helps the mother to give birth, Socrates helped his listeners and students to give birth to the truth that resided in their souls. Socrates used provocative questions to elicit answers from his opponents in order to awaken in their hearts a sense of personal responsibility for their attitudes to life and truth.

The Socratic Dialogue was developed by Frankl as a helping and teaching technique for the practice of Logotherapy. It teaches the seeker of help how to use his or her power, fantasy, dreams, and caring for another person to find meaning in life. This method is basic in the encounter with a client. When the encounter has a positive value for the client, it leads to trust.

In order to achieve trust, a logo-therapist needs to be a person of virtues. As Shantall notes, Logotherapy is based on moral requirements. First and foremost among them are integrity and decency of the practitioner. A logo-therapist must be an individual with honesty and authenticity. For intervening in another persons life needs courage, wisdom, life experience, and a great measure of responsibility. And above all, a logo-therapist must realize that he or she is a worker.

Shantalls book is a work of love. All works of love benefit the giver and the receiver. Viktor Frankl has said that life revolves around work. People fulfill a meaning when they create something, when through their work they improve the world. And Voltaire the French philosopher said that, rather than philosophizing about the purpose of life, one has to understand what life demands from all of us, namely work for the sake of other people not only for my own sake.

There are many books written on the various facets of Logotherapy by well-known logo-therapists. Yet, none gives such detailed account, nor goes to such lengths to demonstrate the actual work requested from the practitioner to advance the well-being of a client.

Shantall built her book mainly on the spiritual dimension of a human being. This dimension, as Frankl said, is the most important among the three dimensions, namely the biological and the psychological dimensions. The spiritual dimension includes wisdom, which in turn is based on freedom of choice thats unique to human beings. Wisdom is not open to scientific measurements or to analysis. Wisdom can be approached only by philosophy, which in turn deals with personal experience. As Shantall shows in the personal experiences of her own life and in the cases she presents in her book, these lives cant be repeated, but they can be changed for the better.