The most exciting aspect of the Existential Phenomenological Approach is the emphasis on the authentic human experience being that of relationship. In the therapeutic relationship the two persons experience the possibilities in the world that are opened up by the existence of mutual love and respect. The events and perceptions within the client are made real and relevant to the present world as experienced by the client. Obviously in a neurotic situation the encounter may not reveal these possibilities. The person may be limited by his or her past experience of relationship, or conditioned by events in the past that limit the acceptance of possibility in the future.
Healing seems to be a necessary to authentic encounter.
Finally I arrive at the concept of risk that is implicit in the approach. In order for the therapist to be in authentic, sustaining and truth-revealing relationship with the client there has to be some openness to all possibility. What is more important is that any questions posed by the therapist should elicit meaning - a way in which the client can both understand and own his or her own intelligent subjective insight. The authentic individual is more than the sum of learned, cognitive experience. The experience for the client should be one that sets the individual free by examining the person as a subjective phenomenon.