Paradoxical intention is a Logotherapeutic technique for phobias. Someone has a fear of public speaking, for example, and suffers from anticipatory anxiety meaning that the person anticipates, or expects something to go wrong, fearing what will happen as a result of his or her fear.
Someone in this situation might imagine he or she will faint of have a heart attack. So the person has a fear of the fear, and therefore avoids the situation he or she is afraid of.
A similar pattern occurs when people have an obsessive fear that they will do something they fear doing. A third parallel pattern occurs when people don’t fight against what they are afraid of but fight for it. Thus in the case of sexual neuroses the forced intention of the goal prevents attaining the goal.
Frankl notes the interesting fact that anticipatory anxiety brings about what the person was trying to avoid and “hyper-intention” prevents what the person wanted, and adds that paradoxical intention is based on these two phenomenon of trying to avoid something from happening and trying too hard to make something happen.
In the next post we will see the examples Frankl brings. (pp. 221-223)