Philosophical Counselling in Solving Identity Crisis Among Youth

Abstract

Philosophical counselling is a relatively new field of study that has recently attracted the interest of academics as an interdisciplinary, interwoven practice synthesising philosophical argument and current models of human well-being. This research aims to address the identity crisis faced by the youth of the modern era by bringing to the fore the interaction between philosophical counselling and Indian philosophy with logic-based therapy (LBT).

Philosophical counselling, based on Socrates and renewed by Gerd Achenbach in the 1980s, is used to solve particularly identity confusion, role conflict, and value disorientation increasingly prevalent among the youth that often go unaddressed during the more usual clinical psychotherapy. While both the biomedical and psychotherapeutic methods concern themselves with the mitigation of symptoms and behavioural change, there is a tendency to ignore the problem of meaning, self-identity and moral disorientation in particular, which become even more salient in younger people who are facing psychological and social headwinds.

Suffering (duḥkha) is conceptualised in Indian philosophical schools, especially the Vedanta, Sāṅkhya, Yoga, and Bhakti schools, as being caused by ignorance (avidyā), false identification (ahaṅkāra), desire (kāma), and attachment (rāga). They put forward a psycho-ethical-spiritual model of self-understanding which is focused on self-knowledge (ātma-jñāna), dharmic life, and liberation (moksha). The Puruṣārtha paradigm (Dharma, Artha, Kāma, and Mokṣa) provides a comprehensive framework for balanced and integrated well-being. Elliot Cohen's Logic-Based Therapy is based on Aristotelian virtue, Stoic rationality, as well as the analytic philosophy, which serves as a systematic diagnostic tool to determine irrational beliefs and administer philosophical antidotes. LBT integrates the Indian philosophical tradition with this to enable the youth to have a culturally responsive counselling experience, improvement in practical wisdom (phronēsis), emotional clarity, ethical identity formation and freedom for well-being.