Existential Clinical Psychology—Subjectivity, Meaning, and Action

This preprint presents a theoretical framework for existential clinical psychology organized around subjectivity, meaning, and action. It distinguishes symptom control from the restoration of existential agency and proposes the concept of adaptive finite freedom: freedom belongs to the subject, while its effective exercise is shaped by current psychological condition, practical capacity, and the subject’s willingness to accept meaning, responsibility, and growth. The framework integrates psychodynamic explanation, environmental and relational analysis, symptom stabilization, and existential empowerment. It argues that clinicians may identify pathological conditions that obscure or restrict effective freedom, but cannot determine the client’s final meaning, goals, or life direction. The manuscript also discusses the false self as a historically formed adaptation that may be brought under the authority of subjectivity rather than treated solely as an object of dismantling. This work is a theoretical proposal and preprint. It is not a clinically validated treatment protocol. The manuscript is made available for scholarly discussion and critical peer feedback.