Existential & Meaning-Center Therapies Workshop
Clinical Tools for Clients Questioning Identity, Meaning, Purpose & Navigating Life Transitions
- Speaker:
- Pavel Somov, PhD
- Duration:
- Approx 12 hrs
- Copyright:
-
Oct 22, 2026
- Product Code:
- POS150707
- Media Type:
- Digital Seminar - Also available: Live Webinar
Description
Learn a non-pathologizing, integrative model for transforming life crises and struggles into turning points for growth and purpose.
Quarter-life, mid-life, and later-life crises aren’t signs of failure – they’re wake-up calls for meaning.
When your clients confront turning points – the 25-year-old anxious about direction, the 50-year-old facing divorce or burnout, the retiree negotiating time’s finitude – they’re not symptomatic …
They’re coming to you wrestling with the fundamental questions of existence. Who am I? What matters? What now?
Your crucial role as a therapist is to help these clients find their path.
In this workshop, Dr. Pavel Somov, licensed psychologist, author and existential therapist, presents his Existential-Developmental approach – a non-pathologizing, clinically integrative model for transforming life crises into opportunities for growth, authenticity, and purpose.
Through clinical vignettes, guided reflection, and experiential practice, you’ll learn how to:
- Reframe life crises as developmental and existential opportunities - not disorders
- Distinguish existential distress from DSM™-defined anxiety and depression
- Apply meaning-centered and mindfulness-based interventions to restore purpose
- Help clients articulate personal philosophies of self, life, love, and death
- Foster resilience and agency through value-driven action
… and so much more. Walk away from this training with a new framework for how you support your clients through life’s transitions and biggest struggles.
Purchase now!
Credit
Speaker
Pavel Somov, PhD Related seminars and products
Existential-Dynamic Associates, LLC
Pavel Somov, PhD, co-owner of Existential-Dynamic Associates, is a licensed psychologist in private practice with over 25 years of clinical experience working with self-criticism, crises of meaning, shame, guilt, perfectionism, affair recovery, eating disorders and anger management. Dr. Somov is on the advisory board for The Mindfulness Project (London, UK) and has conducted a variety of trainings for mental health professionals both domestically and internationally on applying mindfulness-based interventions to a variety of psychological issues. His work has been discussed in a number of radio interviews and in print publications including Martha Stewart’s Body + Soul Magazine and Oprah Winfrey’s O Magazine. Dr. Somov is the author of Anger Management Jumpstart: A Mindfulness Path Away from Anger to Equanimity (I-Catching Books, 2024) as well as a number of self-help books on perfectionism, overeating, and addiction. His books have been translated into Dutch, Vietnamese, Estonian, Portuguese, and Russian.
Dr. Somov has also published in peer-reviewed journals on the topics of group-based logotherapy, hospice research, group-based psychodrama, and on the interplay of time perception and pain intensity. Dr. Somov grew up in Moscow, Russia and after the service in the Soviet military immigrated to the US in the early 1990s. He lives with his wife and his daughter in Pittsburgh, PA and is passionate about downhill skiing, chess, water polo, CrossFit and cold exposure.
Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Pavel Somov maintains a private practice and has an employment relationship with Vista Behavioral Health Associates. He receives royalties as a published author. Pavel Somov receives a speaking honorarium, recording, and book royalties from PESI, Inc. He has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.
Non-financial: Pavel Somov is a member of the Pennsylvania Psychological Association and the Greater Pittsburgh Psychological Association. He serves on the advisory board for the Mindfulness Project.
Additional Info
Access for Self-Study (Non-Interactive)Access never expires for this product.
For a more detailed outline that includes times or durations of time, if needed, please contact cepesi@pesi.com.
Questions?
Visit our FAQ page at www.pesi.com/faq or contact us at www.pesi.com/info
Objectives
- Distinguish between existential therapy as a theoretical orientation and the existential stance as a clinical attitude.
- Identify the unique existential predicaments characteristic of quarter-life, mid-life, and late-life developmental stages.
- Evaluate existential distress using lifespan-developmental and phenomenological models.
- Utilize meaning-centered interventions to promote identity consolidation and resilience.
- Apply cross-cultural and Eastern philosophical perspectives to end-of-life and acceptance work.
- Integrate existential-developmental principles into individual, group, and “solitude” work modalities.
- Differentiate existential crises from DSM-defined psychopathology to prevent over-pathologizing normal developmental anxiety.
- Utilize reflective and narrative practices to facilitate clients’ construction of personal philosophies of self, life, love, and death.
- Utilize mindfulness-based and non-dual awareness practices to cultivate existential acceptance and reduce meaning anxiety.
- Choose stage-appropriate interventions for clients navigating identity diffusion, meaning fatigue, or legacy concerns.
- Evaluate the ethical and clinical boundaries of existential self-disclosure, authenticity, and therapist transparency in practice.
- Integrate existential-developmental formulations into supervision, consultation, and treatment planning across diverse clinical settings.
Outline
Foundations: Orienting to the Existential-Clinical Stance
- Existential Therapy vs. Existential Therapeutic Attitude
- The Integrative Landscape: Compatibility Across Humanistic and Meaning-Centered Models
- When to Intervene Existentially: Recognizing “Problems” vs. “More”
- Case Discussion: Reframing Crisis as Opportunity
- Clinical Literacy: Angst, Melancholy, and Adjustment Disorder, NOS
- The Manualization Debate: Structure vs. Spontaneity in Existential Work
The Four Awakenings: Mapping Existential Crises Across the Lifespan
- What Constitutes an Existential Crisis?
- The Four Awakenings: Early Life, Quarter Life, Mid-Life, Late-Life
- The 3 Most Common Existential Diagnoses
- Mapping Existential Predicaments Across Developmental Stages
- Temporal Awareness: “The Existential Clock” and Mortality as Motivator
- From Psychosocial to Existential Identity Formation
Foundations of Theory and Model Integration
- From Boethius to Yalom: A Brief History of Existential Thought
- Key Lineages:
- Logotherapy (Frankl)
- Existential-Humanistic & Integrative Therapy (Yalom)
- Person-Centered Therapy (Rogers)
- Phenomenological Therapy (Merleau-Ponty)
- Narrative & Meaning-Centered Therapies (White, Dezelic)
- Psychosynthesis (Assagioli)
- Mindfulness-Based Approaches as Existential Anchoring
- Existential-Developmental Therapy (Somov)
- Erickson Revisited: Psychosocial vs. Existential Identity
- Living in Fugure Shock: Revisiting Toffler in the Therapy Room
- Priorities vs. Values; Choices vs. Dilemmas
- Meaning-Making: The Story We Tell and The Way We Live It
Transforming Crises Through Existential and Meaning-Centered Therapies
- Clinical Decision Tree: Which Modality When?
- Individual, Group, and Solitude Work
- Upstream vs. Downstream Existential Work: Preventive and Reparative Models
- Neuroplasticity and Existential Change: Re-Wiring Through Reflection
- Facilitating Clients’ Personal Philosophies of Self, Life, and Death
- “Existential Rehab”: Helping Clients Detox from Inessentials
Early Life Crisis: The Birth of the “I” (Ages 0-10)
- The Process of Coming Into Oneself (Jungian Lens)
- First Flashes of Self-Awareness (Kohnstamm)
- “I-am-I”: Subject-as-Object and the Emergence of Self-Consciousness
- Tantrums as Proto-Existential Assertion
- Understanding others: Theory of Mind and the Early Philosophy of Otherness
- Clinical Applications: Supporting Early Identity and Empathy Formation
Quarter-Life Crisis: Emerging Adulthood (20s-30s)
- Three Core Markers: Disorientation, Ambivalence, Over-Identification with Potential
- Key Clinical Issues:
- Freedom and the Fear of Freedom
- Personhood vs. Performance
- Cultural Programing vs. Self-Authorship
- Existential Decision-Making at Relational and Professional Crossroads
- Inerventions:
- Choice Awareness and Uncertainty Tolerance Training
- Authenticity vs. Conformity: “Keeping Up with the Jones”
- Work Disapproval Inoculation and Resilience-Building
- Self-Esteem, Self-Compassion, and Self-Acceptance Compared
- Leveraging Self-Acceptance for Behavioral Change
Mid-Life Crisis: Consciousness as Turning Point (40s-50s)
- Three Core Markers: Restlessness, Mortality Awareness, Meaning Fatigue
- Clinical Themes:
- Existential Insomnia and Death Anxiety
- Parening Amid Crisis: The “To Love or To Teach” Dilemma
- Metacognition and Existential Identity: “The Riverbank” Approach
- Enoughness as a Therapeutic Intervention
- Existential Decluttering and the Art of Letting Go
- From Doing to Being: Rediscovering Contentment
- Tools and Techniques:
- Mindfulness for Existential Anxiety
- Narrative Re-authoring for Mid-Career Realignment
- Acceptance-Based “Existential Rehab” for Reality as It Is
Late-Life Crisis: Aging, Legacy, and Gerotranscendence (60s and Beyond)
- Three Core Markers: Loss, Reflection, and Transcendence
- Clinical Focus Areas:
- Denial of Death, Death Anxiety, and Personal Philosophy of Mortality
- Erik & Joan Erickson’s 8th and 9th Stages: Integrity, Despair, Transcendence
- Empty-Nest, Retirement, and End-of-Life Transitions
- Cynicism vs. Existential Openness: Working with the Disenchanted
- Loneliness – Solitude – Meaning Hermitage
- Life Review and Reminiscence as Intervention
- Supporting Gerotranscendence: Identify Beyond the Self
- Suicidality vs. Self-Determination and “The Art of Dying”
- Post-Morten Dilemmas: Legacy, Ritual, and Meaning Continuation
Eastern Winds: Existential Insights from Buddhist Psychology and Non-Dual Traditions
- The Sacred Mirror: Integrating Non-Dual Philosophy into Psychotherapy
- Working with the Inevitability of Suffering (Buddhist Psychology)
- Impermanence as Therapeutic Reality Testing
- “The Cup Is Already Broken”: Acceptance Practices for Clients Facing Loss
- Graceful Exits: End-of-Life Acceptance and Conscious Dying
- The Sannyasi Stage: Renunciation, Simplicity, and Existential Resolution
Ethics, Research & Limitations
- Ethical Considerations in Meaning-Centered Work
- Research, Limitations, and Future Directions
- Q&A
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychotherapists
- Therapists
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Case Managers
- Physicians
- Nurses
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Reviews
Satisfaction Guarantee
Your satisfaction is our goal and our guarantee. Concerns should be addressed to: PO Box 1000, Eau Claire, WI 54702-1000 or call 1-800-844-8260.
ADA Needs
We would be happy to accommodate your ADA needs; please call our Customer Service Department for more information at 1-800-844-8260.
PESI Mobile App
Access CE trainings on your phone or tablet through our free mobile app. Choose video or audio-only versions of online courses from the world’s best instructors, and complete your CE requirements anywhere, anytime, at your own pace.
Please wait ...