ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on leaving the active human subject out of the picture is a significant mistake, as mental health challenges can be understood as being, in large part, reflections of existential challenges that individuals face. It describes a deterministic model that denies human agency will be counterproductive – that is, will contribute to mental health problems, rather than to mental well-being. The traditional approach to selfhood is to think of the individual as having a relatively fixed personality on a journey through life. The idea that our personality is relatively fixed is known as “essentialism,” based on the notion that we each have a basic “essence,” an underlying reality that defines who we are. Social problems are generally understood to be problems that affect society itself and not just a certain number of people within it.
