Playing our roles

28 November 2021

Each one of us was ‘thrown into this world’. 

No one has had a say in the location and time of their birth, nor their parents’ ethnic and socio-cultural backgrounds. We have to live with it and make the best of it…

Nevertheless, we all can distance ourselves from ourselves to develop an awareness of our identities and the roles and (im)possibilities that go with them.

However, self-distancing is undoubtedly more difficult for some than others because of our individual starting points.

Kierkegaard says life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.

That is true, of course, but it does not mean that life is pure improvisation.

Setting goals is a well-known way of giving direction to life and the various roles we (want to) play in it. However, life experience teaches us that there comes a time when we have to take account of our role fulfilment, evaluate it and ask ourselves whether the sum of our goals has led to the role we wanted to play in life.

As parents, we ultimately see what has become of our children and what bonds they have with each other; as an immigrant, one considers his integration process; as adults, you look at what kind of student you have been; as retirees, we evaluate our role as a colleague or leader.

Based on the above, in Logotherapy & Existential Analysis by Viktor Frankl we focus on values rather than goals. This is based on the premise that essential goals find their origin in our (often unconscious) values.

The more we are aware of what is essential to us, our values, the better we can shape our life (forwards) and the roles we want to play in it to conclude (backwards) that we have at least played them consciously. 

In this way, as a Logotherapist, I hope to support a conscious and responsible way of life.Don’t hesitate to get in touch with me if you would like to discuss your way of fulfilling your roles.

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