The Digital Magazine of the Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis

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1 ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF PSYCHOSYNTHESIS PSYCHOSYNTHESIS QUARTERLY The Digital Magazine of the Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis Volume 6 Number 3 September 2017 Psychosynthesis and Jung in a Nutshell - Catherine Ann Lombard Have To? Should? Could? Will? - Dorothy Firman EFT and Emotional Cycle Work: Psychosynthesis and Energy Psychology - Jan Kuniholm Transpersonal Practice in Painful Times - Richard Schaub The Higher Dimension of Life - Daryl Paulson Tune in, Step Out - Dorothy Firman Your Own Star: An Interactive Map of the Psychological Functions New Books: Behaviorism: The Quandary of a Psychology Without a Soul by Samuel Bendeck Sotillos Integral Meditation by Kenneth Sørensen Programs: Clinical Meditation and Imagery Transpersonal Nurse Coaching Synthesis Coaching Retreat: Praising Our World in Hard Times Poems - Stephanie Sorrell A She-Soul Story - Margret Rueffler My Social Psychosynthesis - Julie Rivers And MORE... 1

2 Psychosynthesis Quarterly Editor: Jan Kuniholm Assistant Editors: Audrey McMorrow, Walter Polt and Douglas Russell Design and Production: Jan Kuniholm, Walter Polt Psychosynthesis Quarterly is published by AAP four times a year in March, June, September and December. Submission deadlines are February 7, May 7, August 7, and November 7. Send Announcements, Ideas, Reviews of Books and Events, Articles, Poetry, Art, Exercises, Photos, and Letters: Tell us what has helped your life and work, what can help others, and examples of psychosynthesis theory in action. Notice of Events should be 1500 words or less, and articles should usually be 4500 words or less. We accept psychosynthesis-related advertising from members. Non-members who wish to run psychosynthesis-related advertising are requested to make a donation to AAP. Send submittals to: newsletter@aap-psychosynthesis.org The Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis: Founded in 1995, AAP is a Massachusetts nonprofit corporation with tax exemption in the United States. It is dedicated to advocating on behalf of psychosynthesis and conducting psychosynthesis educational programs. Membership and donations are tax deductible in the United States. AAP membership supports this publication and the other educational activities of AAP. Membership can be obtained on a sliding scale. Click Here. or contact us at (413) or info@aap-psychosynthesis.org If you are NOT a member we invite you to join AAP and support psychosynthesis in North America and the world. Views expressed in Psychosynthesis Quarterly are not necessarily those of the editors or of AAP. AAP makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of what appears in the Quarterly but accepts no liability for errors or omissions. We may edit submissions for grammar, syntax, and length. Psychosynthesis Quarterly is sent to all current AAP members and to others who are interested in our work. Our membership list is never sold. Copyright 2017 by AAP 61 East Main Street Cheshire, MA All Rights Reserved contents Psychosynthesis and Jung in a Nutshell - Catherine Ann Lombard 3 Letters and An Invitation 14 Clinical Meditation and Imagery Program 15 Bike Trail - Jan Kuniholm 16 Sir John Whitmore - An Additional Obituary - Will Parfitt 18 Have to? Should? Could? Will? - Dorothy Firman 19 Retreat in Vermont: Praising Our World in Hard Times 20 Synthesis Coaching - Jon Schottland 21 Transpersonal Practice in Painful Times - Richard Schaub 22 A She-Soul Story - Margret Rueffler 24 Two Poems - Stephanie Sorrell 26 The Higher Dimension of Life - Daryl Paulson 27 Book Announcement: Behaviorism - The Quandary of A Psychology Without A Soul by S. B. Sotillos 29 EFT and Emotional Cycle Work - Psychosynthesis And Energy Psychology - Jan Kuniholm 30 Book Announcement: Integral Meditation by Kenneth Sørensen 35 My Social Psychosynthesis - Julie Rivers 36 Transpersonal Nurse Coaching Program 37 Your Own Star - An Interactive Map of the Psychological Functions - Pelizzatti and Burr 38 Tune In, Step Out - Dorothy Firman 43 Poem - Stephanie Sorrell 45 Notes from the Editor This issue explores connection between psychosynthesis and other approaches to psychology, namely Jungian psychology and energy psychology, in major articles by Catherine Ann Lombard and yours truly. Our responses to hard times are addressed in an article by Richard Schaub and in a retreat to be held this fall in Vermont. Two short blogs by Dorothy Firman challenge us to engage, and Julie Rivers reflects on how stepping back enabled connection. New contributor Daryl Paulson shares how reaching into a higher dimension of life helped him recover from war and reach for a more fulfilled life. New poems by Stephanie Sorrel and an imaginative story by Margret Rueffler offer us portals to deeper feeling. Jon Schottland explores the nature of Synthesis Coaching, and Cristina Pelizzatti and Bill Burr provide a new tool for putting it into action. And a lot more... Enjoy! Jan Kuniholm 2

3 Psychosynthesis and Jung in a Nutshell Catherine Ann Lombard Carl Gustav Jung, Sigmund Freud, Roberto Assagioli The birds of passage are returning Among them is a very pleasant and perhaps valuable acquaintance, our first Italian, a Dr. Assagioli from the psychiatric clinic in Florence. Prof. Tanzi 1 assigned him our work for a dissertation. The young man is very intelligent, seems to be extremely knowledgeable and is an enthusiastic follower, who is entering the new territory with the proper brio. He wants to visit you next spring. C.G. Jung, letter to Freud dated 13 July 1909 (McGuire, 1974, p. 241). While most people are at least familiar with the term Jungian psychology, few have ever heard of psychosynthesis. As a psychosynthesis practitioner, you might have felt slightly tongue-tied when asked, What s the difference between Jung and psychosynthesis? As you try to answer, your listener s eyes become glazed over, and even you feel lost in your own explanation. Without a doubt, the differences are not easily condensed into a snappy sound bite. This difficulty might be partly due to the fact that the two men Roberto Assagioli ( ), the founder of psychosynthesis, and Carl Gustav Jung ( ), the founder of analytical psychology (also referred to as Jungian psychology) knew each other early in their careers. McGuire (1974) states that Jung was actually the first to propose the term psychosynthesis in 1909, a term which he later abandoned. In contrast, Lachman (2010) writes that: Jung got the term psychosynthesis from Roberto Assagioli, whose work he admired and who took the spiritual dimension of human nature seriously (p. 236). The two young men (Assagioli was Jung s junior by 13 years) probably first met in 1907, when Assagioli was spending time at the Psychiatric Clinic at Burghölzi, University of Zürich. While studying in Zürich, Assagioli came into contact with psychoanalytic theory and worked directly with Jung and Eugen Bleuler, famous for his discovery and work on schizophrenia (Giovetti, 1995). Along with 20 other doctors, Assagioli participated (as an outside guest) in the Freud Society, newly founded in 1907 by Jung, who at the time was an assistant physician under Eugen Bleuler (Rosselli & Vanni, 2014). Sometime around 1910, Bleuler began holding meetings of what was loosely called the study group for doctors interested in Freudian ideas (Bair, 2003, p. 252), and we can (Continued on page 4) 3

4 (Continued from page 3) assume Assagioli attended these meetings. Assagioli (n.d., ) later wrote about meeting with Jung at his villa in Küssnacht, during which they had animated conversations in Jung s study, which Assagioli noted was full of books and curious exotic objects. They would meet several times over the years and exchanged correspondence, in which Assagioli addressed Jung as Trѐs honoré et cher Confrѐre (Very honored and dear colleague; Assagioli, 1948) and Illustre e caro collega (Illustrious and dear colleague; Assagioli, 1946). Among psychotherapists, Assagioli (1974) wrote: Jung is one of the closest to the conceptions and practice of psychosynthesis (p. 35). Carl Gustav Jung standing in front of Bughölzli Clinic, Zurich, in 1910, around the same time he met Assagioli, who was a medical student at Bughölzli. To fully explore the similarities and differences between psychosynthesis and Jung, you would need to devote many hours researching the two psychologies and then writing a book. Nevertheless, I have (boldly!) compiled this overview to help compare and contrast these two great visionaries understanding of the human psyche. The following compilation is derived from two articles: (1) Assagioli s (1974) comparative survey of Jung and psychosynthesis and (2) Rosselli & Vanni s (2014) overview of Assagioli and Jung s personal relationship. In addition, I have reviewed Assagioli s personal notes that are available through his online archives (archivioassagioli.org). Unfortunately, the contents of Box 73, which contains Assagioli s notes on Jung, have not yet been scanned and, therefore, are unavailable online. However, when conducting a search on Jung, the archive search engine retrieves a total of 368 entries. These documents are mostly Assagioli referencing and/or citing Jung s work; however, a number of interesting reflections can be found among them. To conclude, I will offer my own thoughts on psychosynthesis and Jung, and finally end with Assagioli s personal reflections on his illustrious and dear colleague. Similarities between Psychosynthesis and Jungian Psychology They are transpersonal psychologies. Psychosynthesis and Jungian psychology integrate the spiritual and transcendent aspects of the human experience within their frameworks. Historically, Assagioli and Jung, along with William James and Abraham Maslow, helped to develop and influence the field of transpersonal psychology. Both psychological approaches recognize and proclaim the reality and importance of spiritual needs and a spiritual dimension of the human psyche. This spiritual dimension includes the need to reach an understanding of the meaning of life and to believe that it has a purpose of a spiritual nature. Assagioli s handwritten note from his archives (Assagioli, n.d., 14888). They include the concept of a collective unconscious. In his 1916 essay, The Structure of the Unconscious, Jung was the first to describe the collective unconscious as the soul of humanity at large (Young-Eisendrath & Dawson, 2008, pp. xxiii xxxvii). According to Jung, the human collective unconscious contains shared structures of the unconscious mind such as universal symbols, instincts and archetypes. Assagioli included the collective unconscious in his (Continued on page 5) 4

5 (Continued from page 4) diagram of the human psyche, also referred to as the egg-diagram. However, according to Assagioli, Jung does not clearly define the collective unconscious, especially its different elements and levels, and at times opposite manifestations. For example, Jung places primordial levels of the psychic alongside archetypes of a spiritual nature, which Assagioli says lumps everything together into a great mishmash (Assagioli, n.d., 1901). To more clearly distinguish the material deriving from the collective unconscious, Assagioli includes a transpersonal unconsciousness as a dimension from which the collective unconscious material of a higher nature can emerge and be experienced by the individual. The process of psychosynthesis is very similar to the process of individuation. Psychosynthesis and Jungian psychology prefer to understand human beings from the perspective of their health as opposed to their pathologies. Jung aimed to produce for each client a profound transformation of the personality and its integration by means of what he called the process of individuation. The phases of this process are: 1. Clarification of the nature and causes of the disturbance. 2. Conscious assimilation of the content of the unconscious. 3. The discovery of the will. 4. The transformation of the personality. 5. Personality integration and synthesis. Assagioli (1974) stated that this process and its phases are akin to psychosynthetic therapy (p. 44). Many of the methods for reaching synthesis and individuation are the same. Psychosynthesis and Jungian psychology acknowledge the infinite variety of human beings and conditions, and therefore the necessity of using different psychotherapeutic methods adapted to the constitution and specific situation of each client (Assagioli, 1974, p. 42). Methods shared by both approaches include the analysis of dreams and free drawing. Psychosynthesis, however, also includes a wide variety of active techniques to promote therapeutic integration of the personality. Such techniques include, for example, activities in which the will plays a central role, mental imagery techniques, and initiated symbol projection. Both men emphasize the importance of the psychotherapeutic relationship as a vehicle for healing, in particular through transference-countertransference dynamics and through the living experience of the transpersonal dimension in human relationships. Assagioli and Jung shared similar views on education, especially for gifted children. Psychosynthesis and Jungian psychology attach great importance to the psychological rapport between parents and children and between teachers and students. Both men wrote about the difficulty in recognizing a gifted child, viewed the suppression of natural gifts in talented children as infallibly leading to social catastrophe, and acknowledged that gifts are not limited to scholarly aptitude, but also include gifts of the heart (Assagioli, 1974, p. 52). Both Assagioli and Jung drew on Western and Eastern philosophy and spirituality. Like Jung, Assagioli was a scientist and, at the same time, an esotericist. Both had interests in Eastern philosophy and religions, astrology, alchemy, telepathy, other paranormal activities, and symbolism. All such explorations were viable approaches to understanding the structure, dynamics and contents of the unconscious psyche, and hence, all pertinent to their professional work as psychologists and scientists. Differences between Psychosynthesis and Jungian Psychology The differences between psychosynthesis and Jungian psychology are briefly compiled in the table on pages 6-9. (Continued on page 6) 5

6 (Continued from page 5) Conceptual differences Archetypes The Self I Psychosynthesis (Assagioli, 1978, 1993, 2000, 2002) Archetypes are spiritual energies of higher ideas emerging from a transpersonal unconsciousness or transpersonal collective unconsciousness. One psychosynthesis method is to study the higher, purer, fuller aspects, qualities, and functions of an archetype and then examine and trace its successive reflections, expressions and degradations at various levels. The functions of the Self are pure consciousness and will. The Self is not an archetype, but an inclusive reality and part of the human psyche. Therefore, an individual can have a direct and certain knowledge or awareness of it. We co-exist and participate with the Self. The Self is both individual and universal in nature. The center of pure consciousness and will. The I is an emanation from or projection of the Self. The aim is to bring the I -Self into relationship and a deeper connection. Jungian psychology (Jung, 1966, 1969, 1989) Images emerging from the collective unconscious. These images have transpersonal and personal expressions. They cannot be experienced directly, but can have important effects on the human psyche. Sometimes described as archaic images charged with a strong emotion. Other times, archetypes are treated as principles or ideas. The Self focuses on the unconscious. The Self is the archetype of archetypes and expresses totality, the union of opposites (i.e., synthesis), most generally the union of consciousness with unconsciousness. It also includes the dark (lower) side of man. The Self, like all archetypes, cannot be directly experienced, but it can guide the individuation process. Center of the field of consciousness. Subordinate to the Self. The Unconscious The personal unconsciousness is subdivided into lower, middle, and higher unconsciousness. In addition, all unconscious material is The unconscious contains: Everything that we do not know; Everything that we know, but are not at the moment thinking; (Continued on page 7) 6

7 (Continued from page 6) interfacing with the collective unconscious. The lower unconscious contains: The elementary psychological activities which direct the life of the body; the intelligent co-ordination of bodily functions. The fundamental drives and primitive urges. Many complexes, charged with intense emotion. Dreams and imaginations of an inferior kind. Lower, uncontrolled parapsychological processes. Various pathological manifestations such as phobia, obsessions, compulsive urges, and paranoid delusions. The middle unconscious contains our awareness that lies within the periphery of our consciousness. This is where memories are held that are easily retrievable and where imaginative activities are elaborated and developed in a sort of psychological gestation before their birth into the light of consciousness (Assagioli, 2000, p. 15). The higher unconscious or superconscious holds our greater human potential and is the region from which we receive our higher intuitions and inspirations artistic, philosophical or scientific, ethical imperatives and urges to humanitarian and heroic action. In this realm are latent the higher psychic functions and spiritual energies (Assagioli 2000, p. 15). Everything of which we were once conscious of, but have forgotten; Everything perceived by the senses, but not noted by the conscious mind; Everything which, involuntarily and without paying attention to, we feel, think, remember, want, and do; All the future things taking shape inside that will sometime come to consciousness; All more or less intentional repressions of painful thoughts and feelings (see also The Shadow); Instincts and impulses to carry out actions from necessity, without conscious motivation (see also Archetypes). (Continued on page 8) 7

8 (Continued from page 7) The Shadow The Will Disidentification Subpersonalities vs. persona (Latin for mask ) There are dangers in acknowledging one s shadow. Anyone able to give conscious recognition to the Shadow without being overwhelmed is achieving a true spiritual conquest. The Shadow does not always or chiefly have a compensatory relation to consciousness. Psychosynthesis emphasizes that the subject seeks to experience higher realities and to work slowly and wisely with the Shadow with the goal of redeeming one s lower unconscious. Emphasized through the whole psychosynthesis process. Especially employed to reinforce consciousness of the I and to dominate elements already present and active in the conscious personality. Essential to being able to distance oneself from one s own personal identity and for building a stronger I -Self connection. The individual has many subpersonalities. Subpersonalities are the different selves or roles we play according to the different relationships we have with other people, groups, and our surroundings. The goal of psychosynthesis is for the individual to disidentify from a particular role in order to better play it. This allows the I to The sum of all unconscious personal and collective psychic elements. The inferior part of the personality. The shadow is the hidden, repressed, and for the most part, inferior and guilt-laden personality. The shadow behaves compensatorily to consciousness; hence its effects can be positive as well as negative. During individuation, the subject must have the courage to face his or her shadow so as to include it [or its elements] in his or her conscious personality. Valued for the process of individuation, but given less overall attention. Recognized but not utilized. Given little attention. The individual has one persona, usually associated with their calling or profession. a The persona is the social face the individual presents to the world. It is an external functional identity derived from an archetypal image. It appears as a consciously created personality fashioned out of part of the collective psyche through socialization, acculturation and experience. The individuation process is achieved by liberating the self both from the one s (Continued on page 9) 8

9 (Continued from page 8) consciously direct and play the various roles. The psychosynthesis process involves synthesizing one s subpersonalities into a larger organic whole without repressing any of their useful traits. persona and from the power of unconscious impulses. Anima/Animus (Latin for soul ) Psychological functions Psychological types Social and interpersonal relationships Subpersonalities include components of the inner authentic personality or anima/animus. Seven: sensation, emotionfeeling, impulse-desire, thought, intuition, imagination, will. b Seven, each based on a tendency and main quality. The seven types are: Love, Will, Devotional-Idealistic, Active-Practical, Creative- Artistic, Scientific, Organizational Encouraged and actively pursued through practical techniques and methods to help the client initiate and live in relationship with others. Viewed as an indispensable part of psychosynthetic therapy and education. Personification of the feminine nature of a man s unconscious and the masculine nature of a woman s unconscious. The anima/animus is primarily in contrast to the persona. Four: sensation, feeling, thought, and intuition Eight. The four human functions are linked to Jung s two fundamental types: introverted and extraverted. The eight are: the extraverted sensory, extraverted emotional, extraverted mental, extraverted intuitive and the four corresponding introverted types. More of an aspiration than a directed choice. The emphasis is on individuation. Once united with oneself, it is supposed that the individual will be (automatically) unified with humanity. Table 1. Differences between Psychosynthesis and Jungian Psychology. Notes: (a) While Jung believed that the individual has one persona, post-jungians talk about individuals having more than one persona. (b) They are illustrated in Assagioli s star diagram. (Continued on page 10) 9

10 (Continued from page 9) Unconscious / According to Jung it has a "compensatory" relation to consciousness. / [Not always and not chiefly] (Assagioli, n.d., 1922). Reflections and Conclusion While conducting research for this article, my own experience of reading Jung s works along with my thoughts regarding some of his concepts were often confirmed by Assagioli s personal observations, which are examined below. Jung s writings lack clarity Firstly and perhaps most importantly, one statement that seemed to be consistent throughout Assagioli s notes, which resonates with my own opinion, was Jung s general lack of clarity. I have often felt that Jung s language was muddled and his writing verbose and meandering as opposed to Assagioli s carefully crafted and meticulously worded books. Perhaps this is exemplified by the number of books attributed to both men. While Assagioli published five books (two posthumously), The Collected Works of C. G. Jung is a book series containing 20 volumes! Edward C. Whitmont ( ), a Jungian psychoanalyst who introduced many Americans to the fundamentals of Jungian psychology, once said: I must warn you that insight into or comprehension of what Jung really stands for can not be gained from his published writings. Quite frequently they hide more than they express, unless, of course, you can read between the lines I want to emphasize that you cannot judge what Jung said from his writings; you can judge [analytical psychology] only from the way it is being practiced. (Whitmont, 1968, p. 1, 13, emphasis in original). Explaining that the only way to really understand Jung is through personal experience, Whitmont (1968, p. 2) then relates an example from when he was Jung s student. Perplexed by a concept that Jung had written about, he asked Jung to further explain it. Where the hell did you read this nonsense? Jung asked him. In your book! Whitmont responded along with the page number and paragraph. Oh forget it! said Jung. If Jung tells his own students to forget about his writings because they contradict what he wants to express, and his own student warns us to not expect to understand Jung from his writings, then what are we supposed to understand from his publications? In fact, Assagioli (n.d., 11357) wrote that Jung did not seem to be conscious of semantics and often used words in a very loose way. In addition to asserting that Jung s ideas on the various aspects and levels of the unconscious are uncertain, confused and lack clarity, notes appear in Assagioli s archives that repeat this same criticism for Jung s concepts of spirit, inner voice, and the term depth (n.d., 11240, 11472, 10490, respectively). Without mincing his words, Assagioli wrote the following with regard to Jung s understanding of the Self: He made quite a mess of it (n.d., 10310). The animus does not correspond to the female reality Secondly, I have never been comfortable with Jung s concept of the animus for women as a counterpart to the male principal of the anima. Jung used these terms to define: the inner figure of a women held by a man and (Continued on page 11) 10

11 (Continued from page 10) the figure of a man at work in a woman s psyche (Bair, 2003, p. 745, n. 6). The anima is a personification of all the feminine psychological tendencies in the male psyche. As a rule, the anima is shaped by the man s mother and can manifest as and/or be projected upon both negative and positive symbolic figures. The anima also personifies man s relation to his unconscious. Negative figures include the femme fatale, the Greek Sirens, witches, and women who appear in erotic fantasy. Positive figures include romantic, idealized beauty, like Helen of Troy. Higher positive images include spiritual wisdom like the Chinese goddess Kwan-Yin who can bestow the gift of poetry or music and even immortality on her favorites, Sappho or the Virgin Mary. Most importantly, however, according to von Franz (1964), the anima has the essential role of conveying the vital messages of the Self and putting a man s mind in tune with the right inner values and thereby opening the way into more profound inner depths (pp. 188, 180). Examples of this anima role appear in literary works such as Dante s Divine Comedy in the form of Beatrice and as the eternal feminine in Goethe s Faust. In contrast, the male personification of the unconscious in women the animus does not play such a vital role for the female psyche. For example, while Dante s spiritual journey may be the complete poetic form of psychosynthesis (Lombard & den Biesen, 2014), his search for Beatrice is, nevertheless, quintessentially male. Sayers argues that while Dante s journey to Beatrice could symbolize man s search for his anima, for the female from time immemorial there is no corresponding Enigma of Man (1955, p. 33). She continues by pointing out that, in fact, Jung s corresponding animus in the female [when compared to] the rich, poetic, and magical content of the anima in the male [is] so desiccated, impoverished, and lacking in any touch of the numinous that it might appear to have been artificially patched together for the sole purpose of completing the symmetrical pattern (ibid., p. 34, note 1). I am in total agreement with Sayers. I have always viewed and experienced the animus as the part of a woman s inner psyche that seems to know how best to manage the patriarchal world in which she must cope and survive while being judged and treated (for the most part) as an inferior being. In a world that has been dominated by men for thousands of years, if anything, the animus is usually over-emphasized in a Western woman s conscious life, especially when she is pursuing a successful career. Similar to the anima, the animus can also manifest as, and/or be projected upon, both negative and positive symbolic figures. However, I do not believe that the animus personifies a woman s relation to her unconscious nor is it the animus that can open the way to her inner depths or values. This door is unlocked instead by the triple power of the inner Divine Mother, the Dark Sister, and the Crone. Before grounding myself as a woman in order to coagulate [my] feminine potency to confront the patriarchy and the masculine as an equal (Perera., p. 29), I must first come into relation not with my male psyche tendencies but rather with the ancient parts of my repressed feminine self. These parts of me are too awesome to behold, the Great Round of nature, connected to active destruction but also to transformation (Perera, pp ). I was elated to have my intuition and feelings confirmed by this note by Assagioli (n.d., 2355): Polarity and struggle between the artificial personality constructed for society and the unconscious repressed elements, regrouped by Jung under the designation of anima (questionable as a name and questionable as a unified grouping in reality these elements remain multiple and often contrasting. Also this conception would only apply to men, not for women.) Once again Assagioli first questions Jung s choice of the term anima (which is Latin for soul ). He then continues by refuting Jung s definition of the term by the fact that it does not actually match the living reality. 11 (Continued on page 12)

12 (Continued from page 11) Finally, Assagioli confirms my belief that the animus, according to Jung s definition, does not actually apply to women. Jung undervalued the Will In his own life, Jung used his anima to avoid taking responsibility for his adulterous behavior with former client Toni Wolff (Bair, 2003). Years later, he is quoted as saying: Back then I was in the midst of the anima problem. Often he felt caught in an affair that was outside of his control, saying: What could you expect from me? the Anima bit me on the forehead and would not let go (Bair, 2003, p. 248.) This brings us to my final point regarding Jung, which Assagioli corroborates the absence of the will from Jung s approach (not to mention from his numerous extramarital affairs!). As demonstrated with his own confession of being dominated by his anima, Jung did not fully believe in free will. He also did not believe in determinism, but rather something in between the two. From Jung's perspective, we are all capable of making conscious decisions, but we are not capable of making any decision without some influence from both the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious (Meachem, 2016). Despite his vast number of publications, Jung wrote very little about the will. In Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, he (1969) actually warns against training one s will, saying that the more an individual trains his will, the more danger he has of getting lost and deviating further and further from the laws and roots of his being (p. 163). He wrote that the use of the personal will is only suited for young, unadjusted, unsuccessful people (!) and that a person in the second half of life no longer needs to educate his conscious will, but instead needs to understand the meaning of his individual life, needs to experience his own inner being (Jung, 1966, p. 50). Will / Jung speaks of will and its education, but he considers only the personal will and considers its use suited only for young, unadjusted, unsuccessful people! Moreover he does not give directions on how to educate. / (See Seelenprobl, v. Gegenwart, p. 110) (Assagioli, n.d., 2335). All this is, of course, in sharp contrast to psychosynthesis, in which the will is given a pre-eminent position. Assagioli (2002) states that The will has a directive and regulatory function, one that balances and constructively utilizes all the other activities and energies of the human being without repressing any of them (p. 10, emphasis in original). Not only does psychosynthesis recognize that the will exists and that we have a will but it extends even further to the fact that we are will. In his book The Act of Will, Assagioli analyses willing action in its various stages, describes the specific aspects and qualities of the will, and offers practical techniques for its development and optimum use (which he does not say to stop upon reaching middle age!). He regards the will as a direct expression of the I, the individual s authentic being, and states: The discovery of the will in oneself, and even more the realization that the self and the will are intimately connected, may come as a real revelation which can change, often radically, a man s self-awareness and his whole attitude toward himself, other people, and the world (Assagioli,p. 9). 12 (Continued on page 13)

13 (Continued from page 12) In his historical survey of the will, Assagioli (2002) criticizes Jung s omission: While he recognized and even emphasized the reality and the dynamic function of goals, aims, and purposes, he did not make an investigation of the various aspects and stages of the will, nor did he include the use of the will in his therapeutic procedures (pp ). Final Words from Assagioli Most biographies that include an exploration of Assagioli s relationship with Jung (e.g., Berti, 1988, Giovetti, 1995; Rosselli, 2012; Rosselli & Vanni, 2014) paint a positive, friendly, and long-term relationship between them. However, Jung apparently had a history of not having long-lasting male friendships and is noted as saying on numerous occasions that men in psychology always need to best other men (Bair, 2003, p. 366). Such competition might have also existed between the two men. There is evidence of this in Hahl s (2013) historical account of Eranos, the center in Ascona, Switzerland, sponsored by Olga Fröbe-Kapteyn ( ) as meeting place between East and West. According to Hahl, Fröbe sent a letter of invitation to Jung but he initially declined because of her close connection to the Theosophical Movement and to Assagioli who was associated with Alice Bailey. Jung only came to Eranos to lecture in 1933 once Bailey and Assagioli were no longer attending the Eranos Tagung (Hahl, 2013, p. 45). We can also see Assagioli s unmitigated opinion of Jung s work from the following notes: Lack of clarity, uncertainty, confusion between the various aspects and levels of the unconscious; lack of a real spiritual experience and therefore a nebulous and defective conception of spirit; lack of any social aspect or inter-individual psychosynthesis; lack of any understanding of the role of action in psychosynthesis and lack of appreciation and utilization of the will and therefore of discipline, form and self-restraint (Assagioli as cited by Rosselli & Vanni, 2014, p. 26) But it remains difficult to imagine Assagioli, as a man in psychology always needing to best other men. For example, Sergio Bartoli recalls being with Assagioli along with other psychiatrists and psychologists who had received Assagioli s book a bit sharply. They were criticizing Assagioli for wanting to reintroduce the concept of the soul through the window when it had already been placed outside the front door (Giovetti, 1995, p. 78). Sergio adamantly defended Assagioli s ideas before their colleagues. The next day, Assagioli, who had refrained from entering into the heated discussion, slipped one of his famous notes into Bartoli s pocket that said, Correct your impulsiveness! (ibid.). Therefore, I will end with Assagioli s thoughts about Jung that are not only generous in spirit but also full of admiration and gratitude: Jung never claimed to give a complete system or definitive conceptions. He has always asserted that psychoanalysis is a new science and still at an infantile stage, or at most adolescent Jung has been a courageous and genius pioneer, who has opened new ways and dimensions to the human mind. His contributions have been of great value, he has most of all liberated us from the narrow limits of objectivism, of purely descriptive study. He has immensely expanded the field of psychoanalysis, demonstrating as well the propensity and need for spirituality Thus he successfully invites one to pursue the course of individuation, that is, to discover and develop one s own true being, one s own Self. There he indeed deserves our great appreciation and our deep gratitude (Assagioli as cited by Rosselli & Vanni, 2014, p. 26). 13 (Continued on page 14)

14 (Continued from page 13) References Assagioli, R. (n.d.) Archivio Assagioli Firenze, ID Doc: 1738, 1901, 1922, 2335, 10490, 11240, 11357, 11472, 13010, 13546, Downloaded from archivioassagioli.org. Assagioli, R. (1946). Letter to C. Jung dated 18 January Zürich ETH-Bibliothek, Wissenschaftliche Sam mlungen [The Zurich ETH Library, Scientific Collection]. Assagioli, R. (1948). Letter to C. Jung dated 21 November Zürich ETH-Bibliothek, Wissenschaftliche Sammlungen [The Zurich ETH Library, Scientific Collection]. Assagioli, R. (1974). Jung and Psychosynthesis. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 14: 1, pp Assagioli R. (1978). I tipi humani [The Human Types]. Florence, Italy: Istituto di Psicosintesi. Assagioli, R. (1993). Transpersonal Development: The Dimension Beyond Psychosynthesis. London, UK: The Aquarian Press. Assagioli, R. (2000). Psychosynthesis: A Collection of Basic Writings. Amherst, MA: The Synthesis Center. Assagioli, R. (2002). The Act of Will. London, UK: The Psychosynthesis & Education Trust. Bair, D. (2003). Jung: A Biography. New York: Little, Brown, and Company. Berti, A. (1988). Roberto Assagioli, Profilo Biografico degli Anni di Formazione [Roberto Assagioli, A Bio graphical Profile of his Educational Years]. Florence, Italy: Istituto di Psicosintesi. Giovetti, P. (1995). Roberto Assagioli: La vita e l opera del fondatore della Psicosintesi [Roberto Assagioli: The life and work of the founder of Psychosynthesis]. Edizione Mediterranee, Roma. Hahl, H. T. (2013). Eranos: An Alternative Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century. New York: Routledge. Jung, C. G. (1966). The Practice of Psychotherapy (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.), Bollingen Series XX. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Jung, C. G. (1969). The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious (R. F. C. Hull, Trans.), Bollingen Series XX. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Lachman, G., (2010). Jung the mystic. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penquin. Lombard, C. A. & den Biesen, K. (2014). Reading the Divine Comedy from a psychosynthesis perspective, Psychosynthesis Quarterly, September, 2014, pp McGuire, W. (ed.), The Freud/Jung letters: The correspondence between Sigmund Freud and C.G. Jung. London, UK: The Hogarth Press and Routledge & Kegan Paul. Meachem, W. (2016). Carl Jung's Concept of Humanity and Theory of Personality, Owlcation, October 15, 2016, Carl-Jung. Perera, S. B. (1981), Descent to the Goddess, Toronto, Canada: Inner City Books. Rosselli, M. (2012). Roberto Assagioli: A bright star. International Journal of Psychotherapy, 16(2), Rosselli, M. & Vanni, D. (2014). Roberto Assagioli and Carl Gustav Jung, The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 46:1, pp Sayers, D. L. (1955). Introduction. In Alighieri, Dante, The Divine Comedy 2: Purgatory, (translated by D.L. Sayers). London, UK: Penguin Books. von Franz, M.-L. (1964). The Process of Individuation, in Jung, C.G (ed), Man and his Symbols. London, UK: Aldus Books Limited. Young-Eisendrath, P. & Dawson, T. (2008). The Cambridge Companion to Jung. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Whitmont, E.D. (1968). A Jungian s View of Psychosynthesis, Psychosynthesis Seminar 1967/8 Series. New York: Psychosynthesis Research Foundation. (Continued on page 15) 14

15 (Continued from page 14) Catherine Ann Lombard, MA, is a psychosynthesis psychologist, practitioner and researcher. She has had numerous articles published on psychosynthesis. Most recently, she edited Roberto Assagioli s Freedom in Jail, published by the Istituto di Psicosintesi, Florence. She and her husband Dr. Kees den Biesen, philosopher and theologian, lead inspirational journeys through Umbria, Tuscany, and Lazio (see poeticplaces.org). You can follow Catherine s bi-monthly blog at LoveAndWill.com. NOTES: 1 Eugenio Tanzi ( ) was a psychiatrist in Reggio Emilia and Florence. Along with Ernesto Lugaro ( ), he cowrote Trattato delle malattie mentali [A Treatise on Mental Illnesses]. (Please note that all translations into English are mine.) 2 I have indicated Assagioli s notes from his online archives in this way. The abbreviation n.d. refers to the note not having any date and the number refers to the ID Doc., which you can easily search for in the online archives. 3 While Jung believed that the individual has one persona, post-jungians talk about individuals having more than one persona. Hej from Sweden, I have just completed the second year of a program for personal development at the Psychosynthesis Institute in Gothenburg. It has been powerful and beautiful to see the other group members developing from their inner core as much as was possible. This part is over and some will continue to go through a therapist program. Now I have seen the power of psychosynthesis as psychotherapy in a structured and at times quite demanding setting with group and individual sessions. There are many books aimed at self-help, and psychosynthesis has a side which is not intended to be psychotherapy, but a way of relating to life and being, but I think nobody can answer as to how powerful those books are. Many of the books include descriptions of clients, so there might have been a relational component to the impact of the exercise. I wonder about psychosynthesis as a way of relating to life and how and to what extent all the readers of the Quarterly are using psychosynthesis practice in their daily life and which ones. With best regards Ulf Solterbeck (Karlstad, SE) a letter... and an invitation Psychosynthesis Quarterly invites readers to respond to Ulf Solterbeck by sending us your experiences with psychosynthesis in your daily life. Contributions can be anywhere from 100 to 1000 words. Please share your life in psychosynthesis with others! Send your writing to newsletter@aap-psychosynthesis.org Editor 15

16 CLINICAL MEDITATION AND IMAGERY Certificate Program Oct and Nov Dec. 1, 2017 in New York City. Onsite housing available. 50 Continuing Education Credits American Holistic Nurses Association National Board of Certified Counselors Learn the many forms of meditation, imagery and energy practices to help with issues such as young adult anxiety, cancer care, addictions recovery, chronic illness, stress-based disorders. And learn how to integrate the insights of The Vulnerability Model and Transpersonal Training developed by Bonney and Richard Schaub in the 1980s based on their studies in psychosynthesis and taught at clinics in the United States, Canada and Europe. "I learned new ways to practice that had deep meaning and profound effects for me personally and professionally." Registering Now And if you are interested in nurse coaching: Contact us for a free article: Attending to the Patient's Deeper Anxiety: Transpersonal Practices in Healthcare drrichardschaub@gmail.com Huntington Meditation and Imagery Center faculty: Bonney Gulino Schaub, RN, MS, PMHCNS-BC, NC-BC Mary Beth White, RN, MS, WHCNP, APHN-BC, NC-BC Heidi Taylor, PhD, RN, NC-BC Lisa Davis, PhD, RN, NC-BC Richard Schaub, PhD Ching-Tse Lee, PhD 16

17 BIKE TRAIL Jan Kuniholm A paved ribbon almost straight from south to north where once the iron horse brought food and freight now left for weekend cyclists and skateboarders and retired people, like me, walking to breathe in the sweet smell of rotting trees and fresh blooming flowers. A happy anonymous artist has left some painted rocks along the trail s edge to amuse, provoke, evoke. A snapping turtle chose to lay her eggs in the rocky bank along the river, an invitation to breakfast for some fox, raccoon or skunk, who accepted the gift. But my unknown artist left a word of encouragement for the turtle, should she return to try again. Persevere! I see a blackbird sitting at the top of a dead tree, and ask if he would wait there for a second for a portrait, but he does not want my eyes on him for long, for long stares in the woods do not come from friends, so he flies off in search of better privacy, or what is better, the company of his own kind. (Continued on page 18) 17

18 (Continued from page 17) As I walk back toward home the catbirds sing in every conceivable way, mimicking their neighbors or inventing fresh songs, chirps, chits I am every bird! they sing, so happily. I smile and think of nothing, just yes. A single morning glory has stayed for the afternoon sun along the riverbank. I wonder about just being here, still, and come across my unknown artist s second offering, asking what I want: Wisdom? 18

19 Sir John Whitmore An Additional Obituary Will Parfitt Whilst I appreciated the warmth of Richard Schaub s obituary of John Whitmore (Psychosynthesis Quarterly, June 2017) I felt I could add some interesting and relevant information. John was from an aristocratic family in England. He went to Eton and Sandhurst and could have had a conventional life for someone from that strand of society; but that wasn t for him, initially because he caught the racing bug. He was called the Racing Baronet, won some important motor races and befriended the other racing champs of the day such as Jackie Stewart, and various celebrities, most notably Steve McQueen, who used one of John s cars in The Great Escape movie. In 1968, he sold his family seat, other properties in London, the Bahamas and elsewhere, and embarked on a new path of inner discovery, moving to California and studying at Esalen. He became a very keen explorer of alternative lifestyles and in this period met and married Diana Bechetti. It was through her that he met Assagioli who was visiting California and being feted at Esalen. Diana became, of course, Lady Diana Whitmore, and it was she who brought them back to England and renewed The Psychosynthesis and Education Trust in London. It had existed for years, at least in concept, but she updated it and started what became the best (and soon largest) training in Psychosynthesis. That s another story, but John was very involved and supportive of Diana. It was what he learned and experienced from Diana about Psychosynthesis and confluent education that led to him incorporating transpersonal methods in his coaching work, especially The Inner Game developed for tennis coaching initially, then into world-class business coaching for which John is rightly considered a pioneer. Throughout this time, John was also involved in some rather unusual activities involving Andrija Puharich (a medical inventor and parapsychological researcher famous for bringing Uri Geller to the world s attention), and Phyllis Schlemmer, a psychic channel. They claimed to be receiving messages from non-material extraterrestrial beings ( the Nine ) who were intent on intervening to save the planet earth from our destructive human ways. I got to know John pretty well during a period when I was transcribing for him around 200 tapes of apparent conversations, through the channel Phyllis, with the extraterrestrials! I remember my early London contact with John very warmly. Diana was away in the US for a period. I was her apprentice and looking after the administration of the training on her behalf, and John and I did quite a lot of stuff together. My most fun memory is going with him to a big London department store to buy some furniture he needed. The assistant was very standoffish and took a very offhand attitude to these scruffy customers. Then John took out his cheque book and showed it to the assistant (with Sir and Bart short for Baronet - after his name) which caused a complete change in attitude: now with forelock touching obsequience he handed us over to the store manager and it became all yes Sir, no Sir, three bags of anything you want for nothing, Sir. What a gas! John told me lots of the aristos he knew lived their life like this, on credit, never paying for anything much at all. John did pay though; he paid for everything with his positive attitude and heart-full approach to life. I didn t see him in later years but I remember him with great warmth and as an outstanding presence. Will Parfitt is the author of Psychosynthesis: The Elements and Beyond, lives in Glastonbury England. His latest book is Meetings With Amazing People. 19

20 Have to? Should? Could? Will? Dorothy Firman Not many of us, in this fast-paced world, have long stretches of time to experience not knowing what to do next. In fact, it is usually the opposite. There is never a moment that is not booked, in the calendar, on the clock, in our inner worlds... and often double booked, overbooked, booked beyond capacity. Let s see: I ll make dinner, while calling my sister, making the kids do their homework... And, oh yes, having a glass of wine! Check four things off the list. Well, that s a bit of reality for many of us and it often leads to a sense of being dragged around by our to-do list, the should s of our lives, and the many external demands. And these are real. Most of us aren t making up a whole bunch of have to s. We really have to... do so many things. But by the time we feel like a victim of our circumstances, a slave to our shoulds, or a boat without anchor, tossed by every wave, then it is time to regain our Selves. The day may stay as busy, the list may stay as long, but instead of being possessed by the list and owned by the have to s, we can become the one who chooses. Do you get up in the morning and choose to go to work? Well, yes, but often without awareness... Gotta go, late for work. Nope, you don t have to go. Yep, you probably should. But, just to feel the moment of freedom, realize that you COULD take the day off, call in sick, quit the job, hitchhike across the country, paint a picture, take a nap. There would be consequences, but you could. So imagine standing at the threshold of your door, noting all the many coulds and then choosing. I choose to go to work today (or maybe you won t!). When we choose, of our free will, we are our own authors, directors and bosses. And we might just stay more deeply connected to WHY we are choosing this thing. I m going to work by choice and I am doing so because I value... (the work, the paycheck, the commitment). This experience of choice is liberating. It allows the influx of new energies, ways of being, qualities of our very Selves that show up when we act in service of our values, even when the tasks we are doing might be difficult, unpleasant or downright yucky! Who goes to the dentist for the fun of it? Or the bank? Who deals with taxes? Or pays a parking ticket? We don t look forward to these things, we wish we didn t have to... and oh, wait, we don t have to. But we do so many things, nonetheless, because we value something; our health or our safety or our obligations. So many things that we value! What s your value list? What has meaning to you? And can you hold these values and this sense of meaning in life and still take the time to choose? This is a life practice. It will serve us well. Whether we are choosing the thing that will keep a roof over or heads or taking the time to choose a moment of pleasure, intimacy, generosity, quiet or peace, when we breathe into our awareness of the many possibilities, and we breathe out into our choice, we will be the Captain of our ship. So here s a psychosynthesis practice in a nutshell. It takes between ten seconds and two minutes. It can become an ongoing ally. Right now, I could. Fill in the blank and color outside the box! And knowing how many things I could do, right now I choose and I choose this because it has value. This is the value that I am choosing (and name the value). To choose based on value, inner resonance, the very Call of our Self, rather than on limiting messages, loss of awareness, have to s and should s, is to live in freedom. And in that freedom we will still go to work, visit the dentist, and pay our taxes. And sometimes, hopefully more rather than less, we will also choose towards selfcare, play, creativity and enlivening activity. (Previously published, in slightly different form, online as a blog November 2015) Didi Firman is long-time principal trainer at The Synthesis Center, author of several books, and co-founder and first Cochair of the Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis. A friend of Didi s showed up in her back yard: Should have? Could have? 20

21 Praising Our World in Hard Times A Clay Sculpture and Writing Retreat in the forests of VT. led by Psychosynthesis guide/artist Alan Steinberg & writer/teacher Fred Taylor Fri. eve. Sept 22-4 p.m. Sun. Sept 24, The Empty Center, Townshend, VT Cost: $275, includes room, vegetarian meals, materials "This earth that we come from, this mother, needs to feel our appreciation. It nourishes her. The purpose of art is to praise, thank and express our gratitude and wonder. We make art to sing up the earth." Paddy Roe, Australian Aboriginal elder Nourish your creative vision Encounter the life & landscape of the forests and hills of Vermont Immerse yourself in the tactile, intuitive earthiness of clay. Discover the power of your own words to forge a bond with the archetypal soul of nature. Find sources for hope and ground your sense of purpose in a world grown mad. Alan & Fred s popular creativity workshops incorporate many sources, including Mindfulness & Psychosynthesis exercises, as well as Joanna Macy s Work that Reconnects a process that: enables us to transcend helplessness & hopelessness. grounds our sense of interconnectedness in the web of life, and empowers us to take part in the healing of the world Contact: Alan at Alans@sover.net, ; Fred at rtaylor@antioch.edu,

22 Synthesis Coaching: Discovering Self, Finding Purpose, and Connecting with What Really Matters Jon Schottland Coaching has always been about helping individuals and teams to achieve a higher level of performance, reach their desired goals, and fulfill more of their potential. Whether that client is a young gymnast, a corporate executive, a team of education professionals, or a couple looking to raise their child, coaching has provided a focused framework in which people realistically assess their situation then move systematically in the direction of improving their game, whatever that may be. It seems only fitting that psychosynthesis would eventually make an important contribution to the field of professional coaching, or to go one step further, to make a new home there as a next evolutionary step in its long and distinguished history. Psychosynthesis lends itself naturally to coaching with its emphasis on the will, ideal models, and the full blossoming of the self. As Martha Crampton noted (May, 2000): The emerging profession of life coaching seems destined to play a significant role in the future, providing support for relatively healthy people to realize their full potentials. It is a discipline which assigns a central role to the will, drawing on both personal and spiritual levels of this core psychological function. For its part, coaching has evolved over time to reflect many of the themes that are so central to psychosynthesis. With its emphasis on self-determination and personal agency, coaching recognizes that people are essentially creative, resourceful and whole (Whitworth, Kinsey-House, and Sandahl, 1998). They don t need to be given advice or told what to do but rather can be entrusted with their own process of self-discovery, finding the answers within themselves through a guided conversation not dissimilar from the psychosynthesis approach. The natural confluence of psychosynthesis and life coaching, bringing these two distinct but related fields together, having them mutually inform and act upon each other, has in recent years given rise to a new frontier: the field of Synthesis Coaching. This work holds great promise and is actively being developed through a collaboration between the Synthesis Center in Brattleboro, VT, and one of its spinoffs on the west coast, Synthesis San Francisco, producing a new generation of coaches who will further define and refine how this work unfolds in practice. The ideal model in this endeavor is for Synthesis Coaching to exemplify the best of what coaching brings to the table when it is further enlivened by the holistic, spiritually oriented depth psychology that is psychosynthesis. Coaching, for example, can be a highly supportive process in helping people identify goals and the action steps required to achieve those goals. But without establishing the deeper context, importance and significance of those goals, the process might not gain enough traction or, worse, end up as a meaningless exercise in making to do lists that never lead to any sense of personal satisfaction or an improved quality of life. Psychosynthesis, with its emphasis on self-discovery and a sense of purpose, helps connect those goals to deeper channels and inner longings that reflect an authentic self, the person one most deeply wishes to be. As professional coaches know quite well through experience, when goals are grounded in the fertile soil of conscious intention and a meaningful purpose, then motivation increases exponentially. Furthermore, resilience and perseverance in achieving those goals, in the face of inevitable challenges and setbacks, are significantly magnified. (Continued on page 23) 22

23 (Continued from page 22) Psychosynthesis also brings a whole new dimension to the field of coaching with its technology of the will, along with Assagioli s template for the stages of the Act of Will. Based on the seven core concepts identified by Assagioli, and elaborated by other practitioners, Synthesis Coaching represents an exciting development both in the field of professional coaching and in terms of finding a wider, receptive audience for the important and transformational work of psychosynthesis! More information on Synthesis Coaching, including the next training program starting October 2017, is available through Synthesis Northeast at For more details on west coast programs, contact Synthesis San Francisco at Jon Schottland, M.A., BCC, is President of The Synthesis Center and Regional Director of Synthesis Northeast. Transpersonal Practice in Painful Times Richard Schaub, PhD Aclient of mine died a week ago. We had worked together off and on for seventeen years beginning with her bouts of anxiety after the 9/11 bombing of the World Trade Center. Our only relationship was professional and limited to an hour a week, but we developed great affection for each other. I wake up missing her. Six years ago, she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, Stage Four. She hated the term battled with cancer, but that is what she did, fighting through continual chemotherapy and its side effects, blood tests, scans, consultations with alternative physicians, and a lot of time spent in the hospital infusion center for her treatments. She would often wonder if she was in denial because she was going through this battle with composure, dignity and humor. While she had a self-image as an anxious person lacking in confidence attributed by her to a domineering mother, she clearly had a reservoir of courage and grit. The courage-and-grit self was the one helping her through the battle with cancer. In all of those six years of treatment, she never once was considered free of the illness. She lived with it, and she lived despite it. She traveled with her husband, visited with her adult sons and grandchildren, took up studies in a foreign language, and considered new careers after her illness forced her retirement from working in the publishing business. At one point, she thought of becoming an executive coach because of all of her work experience dealing with the stresses of a big Manhattan company. Having trained in the therapeutic uses of meditation and imagery through psychosynthesis, the transpersonal psychology of Dr. Roberto Assagioli, I introduced these methods early on to this client. In the language of imagery researchers (my doctoral research was on imagery), she turned out to be a vivid visual imager. In other words, when she imagined something, she experienced it vividly and visually in her mind, which in turn would cause immediate emotional and physical changes. Her favorite psychosynthesis technique was the meeting with a wise being (see, for example, Schaub & Schaub, 2013, pp ), but this essay is about the single most profound experience she had which ultimately helped her to let go in her time of dying. (Continued on page 24) 23

24 (Continued from page 23) The technique itself has various names, but I had adapted it from the work on death imagery by Dr. Anees Sheikh, a leading imagery researcher and professor of psychology at Marquette University. The technique guides clients to pay attention to each part of their body and then suggests that the part can let go because its work is done. There is no mention of death. With such techniques, the therapist can never know in advance what will happen. For some clients, letting go like this can turn out to be scary and negative. Using it with my client a few months before her cancer diagnosis to explore a release from anxiety, she had an epiphany. What happened? She was lying on the office couch with the noise from Manhattan traffic serenading us even though we were on the twelfth floor. She was guided through the technique starting with her feet, then her legs, her hips and genitals, her stomach, her chest and arms, her face, eventually getting to her mind, telling it that it too can let go, that its work is done. The technique then guides the client to bring consciousness to the tip of her nostrils, noticing the breath go in and out, and then finally allowing consciousness to go free of the breath. I then waited while my client exhibited very slow breathing and rapid eye movement, a sign that she was experiencing vivid visual imagery. Despite the city noise below, the office now seemed very still, very peaceful. About ten minutes later, my client stirred on the couch and simply said, Wow. What was Wow? She had gone beyond all mental and physical content. In Dr. Assagioli s words, she had experienced an extensive period of consciousness without content. Consciousness without content is an energy state characterized by quietly pervading joy. In Taoist QiGong, which has many overlaps with Assagioli s work, it is referred to as the void (Lee, 2017), a highly positive discovery beyond the bodymind. By whatever name, my client had discovered this state and merged into it. Personal identity was gone. Fear was gone. There was only quietly pervading joy. I was impressed. Some months later, she was medically evaluated for stomach pressure, and her ovarian cancer was discovered. The Psychosynthesis Institute closed its office in the city and moved out to Huntington, Long Island; and so she and I had to continue our work on Skype and phone. By now we had known each other for eleven years, and so the distance work, though not ideal, was possible. As she was going through treatment, she would often remind me of the Wow experience, and I would guide her through variations of it. She told me that other than my children and my husband, that experience was the most important thing that has ever happened to me. Two weeks before her death, in a very weakened state, she directed me on the phone to guide her into that let go experience. During it, a spiritual figure in white robes appeared in her imagination, and they coasted over the ocean together. That was really really good, she said. This is what I need. References Lee, C-T. (2017). Personal communication. Schaub, R. & Schaub, B. (2013). Transpersonal development. Cultivating the human resources of peace, wisdom, purpose and oneness. Huntington NY: Florence Press. Sheikh, A., Ramaswami, S. & Sheikh, K. (2007). Near-death experiences: Heading toward omega? In Healing with Death Imagery (eds. Sheikh A. & Sheikh, K.), Amityville NY: Baywood Publishing. Richard Schaub, PhD, has been a mental health professional for 35 years, applying psychosynthesis in hospitals, clinics, drug rehab, adolescent day hospital, private practice and international training of health professionals. He is co-founder of the New York Psychosynthesis Institute. 24

25 A She-Soul Story Margret Rueffler It was in those olden first days of earth, when dragon-beings were real and had not yet turned into faint memories stored in the deep recesses of people s hearts. Today they come alive only as paper dragons, depicted on drawings and patterns of silk fabrics. Ohhhh such an incredible beautiful being the dragon. It could sleep floating in the skies, carried by the love of earth and its beings. The open loving hearts of the planet s inhabitants created a gentle crystal clear sound field that the dragon could ride on. In order to ride a dragon, one needed a wide open heart and to be able to emanate the love sound frequency on which the dragon was carried and could fly. It then could choose an earth-being to be its companion. In those days, there was love in abundance. The earth planet s body, its surface, and core were soft and malleable. It was not yet contracted and encrusted. This allowed the rich love potential to be present everywhere. Plants, animals, planet beings and dragons came into their existence being love-willed into form by the planet itself. She-Soul deeply loved the dragon with which she had bonded since its birth. When she rode its back and flew through the skies, the fluid mane of the dragon lit up in radiant gold. It takes very special skills to ride and care for a dragon. As mentioned before, one had to have a huge, deep and never-ending reservoir of overflowing heart-love for all beings in order to birth such a sky being into existence. Dragons are androgynous and can be love-willed into their dragon form through the immense love of another being for them. When a dragon approached through the air, you could perceive the most delicate fragrance preceding it, reminding one of wild bush roses. She-Soul was joined with this dragon being for eons. It was her heart mate. She enjoyed lounging and resting on its back, the mane providing a soft cushion, while floating on the love fields in the sky with the earth spirit smiling from above and below upon both her and the dragon. They could glide through the air with wings spread wide and stop in midair, could speed up suddenly and make reverse turns. The dragon loved to be carried by the high atmospheric wind streams, becoming one with their flow. It loved speed flying, passing the clouds and the winds. Its agility in the air and on the surface was unsurpassed. This dragon had warm luminous eyes, framed by long lashes under high brows. Its body was soft and yet had a solid form of golden light clothed in a fluid skin. 25 (Continued on page 26)

26 (Continued from page 25) Oh no, the dragon being was not one of those which kill people and kidnap young girls. This dragon being embraced the skies, it flew high and low, its spreading wings creating beautiful sounds and harmonies affecting all creation. Dragon Being and She-Soul communicated without words. Yes, it was a very special dragon being, the soul- and playmate of She-Soul. Their relationship was one of sheer joy and playfulness. At night when they rode together, the dragon s skin reflected and amplified the sparkling of the stars. The moon in those long-forgotten times was held in deep embrace with the earth planet. Their interwoven love fields were holding each other steady during their journey and long voyage from their birth place in the central sun of the Milky Way star system. Both were one heart and soul, so to speak. And as such, She-Soul and dragon being could slide and glide on these interactive loving magnetic fields to the moon. They did so quite often. In those olden days, the moon was like a small shining sun without heat. Its light radiated blessings onto the earth planet. It was lush with vegetation and alive and populated with moon beings. She-Soul, being an earth-angel, met with the moon beings. Angel-beings were different in kind from earth and moon beings. They were androgynous. Their greatest gift was the power of being able to love-will other beings into existence, into this reality. They were able to connect so deeply to their inner source and infinite love, which birthed new beings into existence. Oh no, they did not give birth in the painful way we know today. Their hearts opened wide and the new being was directly received from the heart into this reality and into an embrace which held it lovingly. Its nurture was the love it received from its creator. The bodies of these angel beings were not solid, more like liquid light, yet they had a defined outline and form. Their mind and their hearts were one, and they followed the path of the heart in joyful creation of beings. The dragon being, very intelligent and wise, was inseparable from She-Soul. It circled high into the skies sometimes up to the outer boundaries of the love-will field in which the planet was embedded. Eons later... She-Soul was riding a tiger. That was the name of this metallic beast, a red motorbike, and she could feel the dragon looking over her shoulder sitting on the back seat. How it loved the speed and the open air and wind flowing around it. She-Soul knew in order to tame this metallic machine, she had to align with it and not try to force it to do what she wanted but to become one with the machine. Not too long ago she had returned to this island in the tropical belt of the earth, following the voice of her heart which led her here, from the colder northern regions, once more into green abundance and lushness. She was aware of her deep connection with this place. Her heart knew of it and led her here again to re-connect and 26 (Continued on page 27)

27 (Continued from page 26) re-member. Even though she could not consciously remember how it was long, long ago, she intuitively knew it was very different. Yet when she first laid eyes on the place, she felt the strong reaction of the opening and expansion of her heart and knew she needed to stay here to explore. She had traveled many continents and crossed many deep waters flying in the belly of the metal bird why did her heart lead her here? She only knew that her heart connected deeply to the earth at this place on this island. Margret Rueffler, PhD, is a transpersonal psychologist, psychotherapist, acupuncturist and permaculture teacher. She is also the founder of Jiwa Damai permaculture gardens and Lagu Damai Foundation in Bali as well as the PPPI institute in New York. Two Poems by Stephanie Sorrell Here I walk Here I walk My retinas ablaze with the sun s shimmering. Sand dunes spill and reform at the wind s edge. Time has been released from the fretting hands of the clock-maker, the minutes escaped from their moorings. Stop... Become porous so that something outside the known trajectory enters you. I feel it in the bright tube of the sun, In the white shining around which this planet rotates This is time; raw and unkempt like some down-andout The stars have ladders The stars have ladders In the darkness they let them fall soundlessly as butterfly wings. And the light years melt away at their invitation. If you watch carefully you will see the young children scrambling up those shining rungs silvery laughter becoming the Milk Way and the elderly becoming youthful again as they climb. Even when the stars are veiled If you listen to the surrendering of the night You will hear the voices of the old and dying, the young and exuberant moving up and down those shining ladders. stepping off the City subway forever returning to their birthright of the stars... 27

28 The Higher Dimension of Life Daryl S. Paulson, PhD Roberto Assagioli was very passionate concerning the existence of a divine plan for our lives. But in his first two books (Assagioli, 1965, 1973), he was fearful of discussing this, since he wanted psychosynthesis to be grounded in science. In Psychosynthesis (1965), he wrote: that psychosynthesis does not attempt in any way to appropriate to itself the fields of religion and of philosophy. It is a scientific conception, and as such, it is neutral towards various religious forms and the various philosophical doctrines, excepting only those which are materialistic and therefore deny the existence of spiritual realities. Psychosynthesis does not aim nor attempt to give a metaphysical nor a theological explanation for the great Mystery, it leads to the door, but stops there. (pp. 6 7) However, he alluded to the spiritual in the same book: We seem to sense that whether we conceive it as a divine Being or as cosmic energy the Spirit working upon and within all creation is shaping it into order, harmony, and beauty, uniting all beings (some willing but the majority as yet blind and rebellious) with each other through links of love, achieving slowly and silently, but powerfully and irresistibly the Supreme Synthesis. (p. 31) He provided snippets of the mystery, but he did not elaborate on it. About 40 years ago, I first discovered psychosynthesis. Later, I discovered my higher Self during a visualization exercise (Ferrucci, 1982). In this exercise, I imagined myself walking up the side of a high mountain. As I ascended, the air temperature dropped, and soon I came to a cloud bank. I walked on and, suddenly, the clouds were below me. I saw a little cabin with smoke coming from its chimney. I knocked on the door and the person who answered was my higher self. Often, in periods of uncertainty or stress, it gives me advice that has been extremely valuable. I even began my company, BioScience Laboratories, with its guidance. Yet, my life was not always so positive. Having served in the U. S. Marine Corps with the First Marine Division, 5 th Marine Regiment, at An Hoa Combat Base in South Vietnam in 1968 and 1969, I returned home alive, but I soon developed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It became increasingly disabling, as I recalled more terrifying situations I had encountered during the war. I would shift into such a highly anxious state that drinking was the only way to keep my memories at bay. Soon, I could only suffer and drink and suffer and drink. I also felt a huge void inside me. I had lost my connection to God, to others, and to myself. I was lost. I returned to my church, but it did not fill this void. I tried several other Christian churches, but they did not fill it either. I discovered Haridas Chaudhuri (1965), a follower of Sri Aurobindo, whose works were very concise and resonated with my soul. Then I switched to Sri Aurobindo s (2012) works directly. In his early life, Sri Aurobindo was sent to England by his father to attend school for a proper education. But after his education, he returned to India to fulfil his inner purpose, combining both western and eastern perspectives into his writings. These, as well as psychosynthesis, were complementary and touched me deeply. They presented something in which I could believe. (Continued on page 29) 28

29 (Continued from page 28) Ten years ago, my outlook deepened through meditation. I had meditated for years, but I did not know why. What was supposed to happen, other than something? Yet, one day, I found my innermost being, or higher Self, directly, instead of having to perform a dialogue with it. I started to meditate three or four times a day. I had always heard of the word bliss but I had no idea what it was. Now I was filled with bliss. I felt I had purpose in my life. I could feel it now. At first, I wanted only to live in this blissful state, but I remembered what Assagioli (1973) said about my present state of being: I want to highlight that psychosynthesis is not necessarily about having mystical experiences. Its aim is not to draw away from the world, to transcend it and reach some other divine world (p. 207). I interpreted Assagioli s broader concept as that we are to be centered in the higher Self and use its guidance in this world. But life is also living in this world fully and making use of all the talents we have to help evolve it. Assagioli stated that there were three perspectives from which we live our lives: the spiritual, the practical, or an integration, using both of these attributes. If we live only in the spiritual world, we find bliss and contentment, but we do not contribute anything to the betterment of this life. On the contrary, if we live only in the practical side of life, we feel cut off from our soul, wondering why we were born, what our purpose is, and what the meaning of life is. The third way is to integrate the spiritual and the practical. He did not give a step-by-step procedure, detailing how to integrate them, probably because he realized that one method would not do for every person. By the way, it does not require experiencing a war to feel alienated in our lives. Growing up, many of us were not treated kindly. We may not have been loved adequately, some of us were ignored, others were told contradictions on how to live, and even some of us were abused. Our self-constructed subpersonalities protect us from getting squashed by other people, including our parents, siblings, boy/girlfriends, teachers, and the popular cliques in our school systems. Most of us live in this self-constructed region for our entire lives. Yet, our subpersonalities fight with each other, at times, causing us much pain and grief, because they are not integrated. If we are lucky, we grow up with a strong self-sense that can control them, or we begin psychotherapy to integrate our self with our various subpersonalities. For those who choose to grow and develop beyond, this is where they meet their higher Selves. Our consciousness of the higher Self, Assagioli stated (1965), is due to the existence of a permanent center, of a true Self situated beyond or above [ego] (p. 18). Assagioli (1965) went on to state: This Self is above, and unaffected by the flow of the mind-stream or by bodily conditions; and the personal conscious self should be considered merely as its reflection, it s protection in the field of personality (p. 19). The higher Self distinguishes psychosynthesis from many other methods of therapeutic growth. Assagioli briefly discussed this in Psychosynthesis (1965) and The Act of Will (1973) but elaborated on it in Transpersonal Development (2007), a collection of his unpublished articles. That book has much valuable information on this subject and others. In his spiritual work with Alice Bailey and with the School of Esoteric Studies, he was very open to discussing these spiritual areas beyond psychosynthesis. On our path to greater self-realization, we need to develop our complete Selves. We cannot just read about it or have someone do it for us. We need to find our own unique way. Sometimes it is very difficult and at other times, it is very easy. We need to keep walking our path, ultimately finding our place within the divine plan. (Continued on page 30) 29

30 (Continued from page 29) References Assagioli, R. (1965). Psychosynthesis. Hobbs, Dorman and Company, NY. Assagioli, R. (1973). The Act of Will. Viking Press, NY. Assagioli, R. (2007). Transpersonal Development: A Dimension beyond Psychosynthesis. Smiling Wisdom, Scotland. Bailey, A. A. (1944). Discipleship in the New Age Vol I. Orange Press, Albany, NY. These were written when Assagioli was a disciple, and he is presented in the book. She has written many volumes. Ferrucci, P. (1982). What We May be. JP Tarcher, Boston, MA. Chaudhuri, H. (1965). Integral Yoga. George Allen and Unwin LTD, San Francisco, CA. Sri Aurobindo (2012). The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo, Vols. 1-37, Sri Aurobindo Ashram Press, Pondicherry, India. Daryl S. Paulson, PhD, MBA, is President and CEO of BioScience Laboratories, Inc. in Bozeman, MT. He is the author of the standard texts of antimicrobial and disinfectant product testing. In addition to authoring texts Dr. Paulson has published over 30 articles in several industry journals. book announcement Behaviorism: The Quandary of a Psychology Without a Soul By Samuel Bendeck Sotillos Over a hundred years have passed since the birth of behaviorism, or behavioristic psychology, often regarded as the first force in contemporary psychology. Many might assume that the dark night of behaviorism has subsided once and for all, especially since the behavioristic paradigm has been superseded by the cognitive revolution and other developments, such as psychoanalysis ( second force ), humanistic psychology ( third force ) and transpersonal psychology ( fourth force ). However, this assumption would be incorrect. It initiated one of the most powerful currents of modern psychology in the twentieth century and launched an assault on the human microcosm by decisively abolishing, if not radically trivializing, the role of the psyche or soul and the spiritual dimension of the human being in an unparalleled fashion. Although less known, this destructive paradigm was perhaps even more influential than psychoanalysis, which paradoxically predated its existence but did not emerge into a movement in America until later on. Nonetheless, behaviorism has had an irrevocable impact on the way that the human psyche was universally understood across the diverse cultures prior to the advent of modernism and the development of modern psychology. The book is available on Amazon, which you can access by clicking here.. 30

31 EFT and Emotional Cycle Work: Psychosynthesis and Energy Psychology Jan Kuniholm I believe that energy work deserves a place in the psychosynthesis practitioner s toolbox, where it can be used to complement the other techniques we use as well as deepen and quicken the healing work that can be done. Various people in North America and Europe have been developing the western models of energy medicine and energy psychology for the past thirty years or so, as they have begun to build upon some of the experience that Asian practitioners have been using for centuries. An energy-cycle shift I am studying could help make energy psychology practices among the standard techniques used in psychosynthesis. Martha Crampton, one of the most significant teachers of psychosynthesis in North America, was an early pioneer in the use of energy psychology in a psychosynthesis context. In her 2006 article, Psychoenergetics: Toward an Integration of Subtle Energy Work with the Psychosynthesis Perspective, 1 she contemplated whether her move into energy psychology would brand her as a heretic in the psychosynthesis community. But then she recalled that Roberto Assagioli was unattached to specific techniques and felt reassured. Crampton reviewed the proliferation of authors and therapists who had already made forays into the use of subtle energies within their therapeutic work. She did not explore in any detail the wealth of information that is potentially available from eastern sources such as the ancient and also current modalities of acupuncture and acupressure, qi gong, shiatsu and other disciplines. She also shared case studies of some of her own work with clients, using a variety of energy techniques, and provided an invitation to the psychosynthesis community to contribute to and learn from the field of energy psychology. Another therapist who has written about the use of energy psychology in a western context is Wendy Webber, whose article Coming Home Reweaving the Web of Life 2 arose out of a case in which I was a coworker for six years. Webber, who is not a psychosynthesis practitioner, brought her multifaceted approach to healing trauma in this case, while I provided a variety of psychosynthesis techniques. This extended case was, in fact, partly an experiment in the integration of psychosynthesis with energy techniques, and the combination proved to be remarkably effective. In her article Webber discusses meridian tapping, or Emotional Freedom Techniques, (EFT) which are various forms of tapping on specific points on acupuncture meridians, while mentally and emotionally focusing on the issue at hand, combined with an affirmation of self-love and acceptance. The technique, as Webber points out, was evolved by Gary Craig out of discoveries made by Dr. Roger Callahan. I was so impressed by the effectiveness of EFT in this context (panic attacks, long-term complex PTSD) where psychosynthesis, medications, and a variety of therapeutic techniques alone or in combination had previously proven ineffective or downright counterproductive, that I have continued to investigate and use EFT and some of its therapeutic cousins for the past several years. EFT has, by now, been successfully used and studied by so many practitioners that it may be considered a successful evidence-based therapy, according to psychosynthesis therapist Janet Messer, PhD, of Phoenix, AZ. 3 But so far as I know, not a lot of psychosynthesis practitioners have yet studied it or incorporated it into their therapeutic tool box. I want to suggest that this is an extremely powerful yet very simple technique that deserves to be used and further studied in a psychosynthesis context. One aspect of EFT which makes it a natural candidate for becoming a tool for psychosynthesis therapy is that it can be used as a form of mind-body disidentification that can be taught to a client in minutes. EFT can be a means for empowering a client to immediately disidentify from even the most extreme emotions as well as bodily processes and thoughts; it is so simple that anyone (even young children) can learn it without prior knowledge or protocols. 4 (Continued on page 32) 31

32 (Continued from page 31) Furthermore, it can produce results in the therapeutic process in a shorter time span than many traditional talk-therapy modes, and it fits into the theory of psychosynthesis as if it were made for it. In particular, meridian tapping puts some of the initiative in the therapeutic process into the hands of the client, and this can be done very early in the process. In some cases of trauma, for example, when a personal history from the client could be retraumatizing, a therapist can teach the client the basic recipe of EFT in fifteen minutes without asking for any history or needing to satisfy any protocol. This enables the client to immediately begin self-help without recounting any details of the trauma, and gives the client a tool with which to address the energy of the trauma which often can block all other work if unaddressed. The resulting level of stability which may be achieved to some degree in one session, or may require more time will then enable the therapist, at the appropriate time, to begin to approach the nature of the trauma and to begin to help the client to face issues emotionally and cognitively, and in behavioral and historic contexts. But I have found that EFT can also be beneficial in more ordinary situations in both therapeutic and coaching contexts, and also be an important tool to facilitate drug withdrawal. Because we approach a client holistically in psychosynthesis, we can assume that in every facet of personal growth or healing there are aspects to be dealt with at different levels energetic and physical, emotional, cognitive and mental, spiritual and transpersonal. However, one common element in each level is energy. Energy techniques such as EFT may be successfully employed not only as adjunct therapies as suggested in the phrase psychosynthesis and the body, reflected in the title of AAP s 2006 booklet, but as full partner therapeutic techniques, along with subpersonality work, guided imagery, and the host of other techniques in the psychosynthesis tool box. The energy of a subpersonality can be observed, for example, as clearly distinct from that of another subpersonality or from self or Higher Self, and can be addressed with energy work in conjunction with these other options. A counselor may often ask, after a client has expressed an emotion, where do you feel this in your body? But what is the follow-through beyond an increased mind-emotion-body awareness? Practitioners of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and many of its western derivatives such as Integrative Acupressure know that emotional stress can be located in the body and related to one or more energy meridians. The study and mapping of the meridians over millennia have shown that there is often a direct correlation between certain emotions and the energy in meridians that are related to a variety of health issues. For example, anger may be connected to an imbalance of energy in the liver or gallbladder meridians, 5 and addressing the anger on a psychological level while simultaneously addressing the energy imbalance in meridians can be a more powerful means of addressing the issues and the personal situation than either alone. If the emotion that is felt by self is one arising out of an identified subpersonality, an EFT session can be employed at the outset to allow a physical or energetic disidentification prior to (and also after) cognitive or imagery work centered around that subpersonality. I have found that the energy work not only facilitates the other work, it often results in unique insights that do not always arise in the talk therapy. I call the EFT work physical disidentification because the EFT process takes the client to a direct recognition and acknowledgement conscious awareness of the feeling or other phenomenon being experienced. It does this with or without attention to details of the feeling or phenomenon s content or sources. The process includes a disidentification phrase such as I deeply and completely love and accept myself, or alternatively may include affirmations that energetically reinforce a chosen ideal model. The classic disidentification exercise originally presented by Roberto Assagioli seems often to require some explanation of terms and the understanding of phrases such as I have this feeling but I am more than this feeling; whereas the EFT phrases used need no introduction: Even though I have this feeling of, I deeply and completely love and accept myself. This simplicity is not only a great advantage in getting the process going quickly, it also actively involves the bodily energies in the process without mediation by explanations, reflection, understanding, or protocol. (Continued on page 33) 32

33 (Continued from page 32) I have found also that acupressure work can have a direct positive effect in personal growth and healing, but acupressure must be applied by a practitioner to a client, which in most cases requires that the practitioner be licensed. Many psychosynthesis practitioners do not have a license to touch. The beauty of EFT is that it is self-administered, and its employment by the client makes the client a partner in the therapeutic process from the outset, and this empowerment in itself is a powerful tool tending toward positive outcomes. The tapping motions are a way for a client to open inner lines of communication, as the combination of verbal acknowledgement and physical tapping on meridian points mobilizes the kind of holistic action that cannot be achieved through talk or physical manipulation alone. The effects can be remarkable. An area where energy techniques, specifically EFT, can be effective is in a method that I have begun to employ that I call emotional cycle work. Richard and Bonney Schaub, in their book Healing Addictions: The Vulnerability Model of Recovery, 6 provide a description of what they refer to as the cycle of addiction that demonstrates how addictive behavior runs in repeating cycles that iterate into self-perpetuating patterns. Because so much of human behavior depends on non-conscious, automatic cyclic behaviors, I believe that the cyclic model is a description of a large swath of human behavior that goes well beyond addictions. Cycles are ever-present in every level of human behavior, both conscious and non-conscious, from the circadian rhythms of biology to the habits and cycles of behavior that are evident in both normal life and the psychology of the disturbed. The Schaubs have admirably shown that there is cyclic activity in recovery as well as addiction. So far as I know, there has hitherto been no practical way to approach cycles of behavior, whether addictive, traumatic, or normal, as a whole, single process, except possibly in the behaviorist model but that model leaves consciousness out of the process and so is not effective by itself as a holistic approach. Most therapists need to address the way stations in the cycle: initial events, needs and their fulfillment or frustration, adaptations and limitations, cognitive elements, emotional elements, physical elements, all in turn. Emotional Cycle Work using energy techniques is a way to approach the complete cycle as a whole. For example, suppose a person has a behavioral pattern that runs as follows: vulnerability and feeling unsafe fear responses to fear, such as fight/flight/freeze/fawn, or adaptations such as mental figuring out the problem frustration anger violence of some kind, physical, emotional, verbal retaliation and finally, the cycle returns to vulnerability and feeling unsafe, and starts over again. This is an example of a repetitive pattern or cycle it begins and ends at the same point, such that the end point of one cycle is the beginning of the next, and the end point has a charge or creates a need that provokes a repetition. Such cycles are often self-perpetuating and may be marked by various kinds of addictions and compulsions, blindnesses, substance abuse, or abuse of self or other people. Other cycles may seem relatively harmless and be thought of simply as habits. The therapist may see the entirety of the cycle, and may even be able to explain this to the client at some point in the process of initiating therapeutic attention to the cycle; but the actual work will normally focus on specific stages in the cycle. Energy work can be used early in the process to assist in the work, as soon as the client is made aware of the nature of the cycle in general terms. But rather than focusing only on a specific emotion, a specific trigger, a specific 33 (Continued on page 34)

34 (Continued from page 33) thought or behavior, the energetic work may also be addressed to the entire cycle. Rather than focusing on each behavior, each emotion, each thought, and disidentifying from each, EFT may be used to disidentify from the entire cycle and thereby empower the client immediately, rather than at a later stage. A classic stage in the cycle of addictive behavior is when the client hits bottom and it is proverbial that many addicted clients will not even consider therapy or help until this devastating experience convinces them that there is no alternative: only then will a client begin to consider that work is needed. Before that point, self-loathing is often masked (if only temporarily) by the addiction, which is fueled by the need to keep the addictive defenses in place. The entire cycle can be approached, of course, only when a client has some degree of willingness to become aware. EFT can be used to help establish this initial willingness with tapping phrases such as Even though I sense there is some problem here, I am willing for there to be positive change. Once a minimal willingness to become aware is achieved, EFT of the whole cycle can provide a point of stability from which the awareness can be increased and work may be initiated in each area of concern. The work proceeds along the format of even though I have the cycle of and and, I deeply and completely love and accept myself. The disidentification that is initiated with the EFT process can then be a foundation for a psychosynthesis of the entire process, as EFT provides an energetic security from which a client may be better able to examine each stage of the cycle along with its sources and triggers. Of course, it may be found that a specific energy cycle is the driving or central characteristic of a subpersonality. I have seen that a cycle that triggers through a range of emotions, such as a cycle of loneliness feeling unsafe fear adaptations and responses such as fight, flight, freeze, figuring out a strategy, may have one overarching emotional attitude that is projected in some way throughout the entire cycle; in this example, the projected attitude may be Leave me alone! And the cycle is always jump-started into repetition by this attitude, which kicks the process back to the original loneliness at every stage. This attitude may be apparent, or it may be something that the energy work may help bring to the fore, but in any case it can be approached by a combination of energy work and psychosynthesis for a maximum benefit. Cycle work is not a substitute for more detailed therapeutic experience, but it can provide a framework that is at once cognitive, emotional, and physical-energetic that can anchor the more detailed work and provide the place of grounding at each stage. Just as the therapeutic ideal is psycho-synthesis, we can use cycle work to provide a first step toward that ideal by consciously approaching an entire suite of thoughts, emotions, and behaviors as a whole that awaits transformation from dysfunction to wholeness. The EFT tapping of the cycle shifts the client s relationship to the entire cycle as a single attitude that opens up the whole process. The transformation may well see the client jettisoning aspects of the cycle as he or she synthesizes it and the subpersonality that the cycle drives into the healthy personality. I find that the energy work with an entire cycle particularly encourages this holistic approach to healing, because the energy work EFT in this case incorporates many levels as part of its procedure. We ask a client to identify the emotions of the cycle, and the meridian tapping in a standard recipe of EFT stimulates important points on the bladder, gall bladder, stomach, large and small intestine, kidney and spleen meridians as well as the crown chakra or governing meridian. This activity actively engages a huge portion of a person s energy flow in the disidentification process, and the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) mappings have shown that at least one of these meridians is engaged when there is any significant emotional imbalance in a person. I have also observed that energy work on a cycle may evoke new and unpleasant physical or emotional symptoms and also evoke new insights. Body workers have long known that physical-contact body work on a client may produce sometimes unpleasant or explosive emotional responses, and Peter Levine has been among those who have shown that the energy of emotional trauma can be unlocked by work on the body. 7 I have seen the combination of psychosynthesis and EFT produce new and disturbing symptoms such as pains, muscle pulls, tension, and a wide variety of other possible physical ills that often may or may not be helped medically. The malady that was finally labeled fibromyalgia meets this description in many ways, and my observation has been that this syndrome may in some cases be a result of therapeutic interventions that disrupt a client s energy 34 (Continued on page 35)

35 (Continued from page 34) equilibrium. As is well known, a human system will try to adapt to interferences to its normal functioning, such as disturbances or trauma, by adapting its practices and its energies to meet the interference. If the adaptation is a cycle of thoughts-emotions-behaviors that become established over time, then the body s energies adapt to fit the cycle and become regular habits, attitudes, and outlooks, as well as physical pattern-behaviors they become the foundation of a subpersonality. A healing intervention will disrupt the cycle 8 and its energies, which will then look for somewhere to go to adapt to this new interference. Sometimes they can be released completely, as in some form of catharsis, or partially, as in hot flashes or intense physical exercise; but more often they travel through the human system, producing seemingly uncaused and often unrelated symptoms that may remain static over time or may travel across the consciousness and the body. For example, one response to such cycle disruption may begin with dizziness, go to impaired vision, then on to pains in legs or other limbs, to stomach or intestinal disorders, and include emotional irritability and negative thinking. Using EFT on this set of imbalances can be uniquely effective, because EFT does not require a knowledge of causes, sources, or reasons. This is critical, because the symptoms that are evoked by a healing intervention often baffle analysis or understanding and may show little or nothing on medical tests. Even if the symptoms were provoked by talk therapy, there may be no way to trace the connections or to address them cognitively. With energy work, the client addresses his or her experience 9 of the difficulty, and uses EFT phrases to acknowledge the situation, recognize the responses to it, and, especially with the love and acceptance phrases, disidentify from it. EFT has been used to completely eliminate such symptom outbreaks, which enables the client to return focus to the original cycle, and to facilitate energy work and such psychosynthesis techniques as visualizations and the development of ideal models to transform the cycle into healthy behavior. As EFT trainers have emphasized, many people who are introduced to EFT balk at the phrase I deeply and completely love and accept myself. I discovered something like this early in my psychosynthesis training when I found that positive affirmations often provoked antagonism from subpersonalities whose cycles had no place for such idealism. But in EFT, clients are assured that they don t have to believe the statement; they are just urged to use it. The use alone begins to increase both the awareness and acceptance of one s experience, which over time become deeper and more genuine. Of course, it turns out that acceptance of one s experience is a vital step towards acceptance of one s self. The repeated use of such phrases amounts to a practice which is an essential component in healing or integration on any level. A fact that is not explored in the majority of energy practices is that the phrase I deeply and completely love and accept myself used in EFT is in fact a shift into the transpersonal. This phrase is seldom initially accepted by people who need help, and this affirmation is a hallmark of the end state that the therapeutic process aims toward in other words, it is a practical evocation of an ideal model. The repeated evocation of the ideal, following Assagioli s Seventh Psychological Law, tends to make the ideal a reality that becomes habitual. 10 This by itself makes EFT a potent psychosynthesis tool even in the hands of practitioners who have never heard of Assagioli. The shift into the transpersonal that is eventually more completely accomplished is not necessarily achieved only by EFT, but the use of such a tool at the outset of coaching or therapy or personal growth work serves as a kind of accelerator that can be used to accompany every stage of personal work. EFT may not be the only energy technique that can accomplish this, but it is the one I am familiar with and have used to good effect. These are a few of the considerations that I would like to offer readers, who are encouraged to refer to the articles by Martha Crampton; to books such as The Promise of Energy Psychology by David Feinstein, Donna Eden, and Gary Craig; to online articles and websites by Gary Craig and others that can be searched under the title emotional freedom techniques. 35 (Continued on page 36)

36 (Continued from page 35) Of particular interest is an article titled Clinical EFT as an Evidence-Based Practice for the Treatment of Psychological and Physiological Conditions by Dawson Church, PhD, published in SciRes.1 Psychology Vol.4, No. 8, and Published Online August 2013 in SciRes (type in the title of the article above in the search window at ). Another resource is the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology at I am convinced that energy psychology techniques such as EFT can provide an essential element to the holistic practice that is aimed at in psychosynthesis, and that the psychosynthesis framework can enhance the use of these techniques. I am also convinced that approaching recurrent life patterns as energy cycles that can be addressed holistically can be a promising technique in a variety of settings. 1 In Psychosynthesis and the Body: Volume 6 of Conversations in Psychosynthesis; edited by Brad Roth; Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis, In Trauma and Recovery: Volume 9 of Conversations in Psychosynthesis; edited by Judith Broadus and Gwin Stewart, Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis, Personal communication 4 For an extended discussion of the use of EFT in psychological counseling, see The Promise of Energy Psychology by Feinstein, Eden and Craig; Jeremy Tarcher/Penguin, New York, See Sam McClellan s Integrative Acupressure; The Berkeley Publishing Group, New York, Delmar Publishers, For example, see his book In An Unspoken Voice, North Atlantic Books, Berkeley, CA, It is probably that the intervention also disrupts established neural pathways, which is why the resulting symptoms can be so incredibly varied. 9 Yet it may be important for the client not to include an interpretation at this stage, which could energetically lock in a negative approach to the situation. The EFT process works best if at this stage the client identifies the emotion, the thought, the experience, as an objective phenomenon that is simply experienced. Jan Kuniholm is editor of Psychosynthesis Quarterly. book announcement This new book will be available On Amazon Sept. 11,

37 My Social Psychosynthesis Julie Rivers I d like to share a recent memorable experience which was an opening for me into Social Psychosynthesis. It was 20 minutes spent with my fiancée, Mark. 20 timeless minutes a cosmic curiosity that many of us are likely to have experienced. Sunday morning started late for Mark after sleeping in and coming to wakefulness with the residue of tormenting dreams. He was feeling burdened by his own stories of under-achievement, a sense of inadequacy, and a compulsion to drive himself harder to assuage his internalized self-rejection, the residue of being a slow learner at school and being mercilessly bullied by his older brother as a child. We spoke of his plans for the day, which involved no time for him but rather a back-breaking line-up of chores for others. I mentioned that it was Sunday, and he could take some time for himself. With some hesitation, consideration, and a modicum of release, Mark changed his plans. We sat with that. We sat some more. And truth continued to speak: the removal of an unrelenting schedule wasn t the salve needed, or maybe better said, it wasn t enough. He continued to feel dis-connected from himself (his words). We talked about things that have helped him feel re-connected in the past: a nap, time outdoors, fishing, and, of course, the ever enticing call to numbness. Yet none of these felt right. He didn t know what he wanted and sat in front of me the visage of despair. Where is hope? I wondered. I was feeling my own stuff through this time and pondered how to manage my alternate desires to tell him what to do, close the topic in some well-justified way that took him away from my attention, or just flat out escape. And yet, what I really wanted to create was a space for all that was present. I suggested that we meditate together. He declined, saying something innocuously banal. We spoke some more. I leaned in again with courage, Let s meditate for 15 minutes together I ll set the timer. Mark let me lead. He trusted me. We sat down facing each other, closed our eyes, and looked inward and outward while listening, releasing, opening, sighing, and holding space without answers. We each had our own experiences during this time, as one would expect, and after 15 minutes had passed, we both returned to our living room renewed. In pace with the stillness in the room, I stood up, took his hand, and asked him if he would dance with me. Now it was time to connect with each other. With Ave Verum Corpus anointing us, we bathed in Mozart s succulent sounds of consecration for four and a half breathless minutes. He had reconnected. We had re-connected. We were present. We were open, and the day became easy and fluid. Was this Social Psychosynthesis? It felt like it was. For me, it was a new beginning of holding someone else s truth in equal love with mine and still leading and leaning-in. This is harder than doing the same for two other people! In societal circles of any level family, community, national, or international the holding of more than one position with equal tenacity and tenderness to one s own is necessary for transformation. This holding and trust needed to enter this space feels like cornerstones of Social Psychosynthesis. Social Psychosynthesis now feels real to me. And, the world just got bigger and smaller for me, all at the same time. All in the same cosmically curious moments. Julie Rivers is a corporate coach integrating psychosynthesis into her work in the corporate environment. She is also a learning professional, a lover of nature, a maker of music, an exerciser, and a mother of two amazing adult children. She spends her time tending her various gardens: some of them in her backyard and neighborhood community garden and some strewn across the planet earth. She is currently Cochair of the AAP Steering Committee. 37

38 Transpersonal Nurse Coaching (TNC) is a Program Endorsed by the American Holistic Nurses Association Join us on Monday September 25, 2017 in New York City 9 am 4:30 pm Earn 5 Contact Hours Tuition $99 INTRODUCTION TO NURSE COACHING Learn how coaching can provide new opportunities in healthcare organizations, agencies and private practice settings. Our Transpersonal Nurse Coaching (TNC) program includes clinical meditation, imagery, awareness and energy practices as part of nurse self-care and helping others. Nurse coaches partner with patients/clients to reduce their stress and anxiety, improve overall well-being, and help them to make healthy choices that support body, mind and spirit. Join us to learn about Nurse Coaching. Practice some of the skills and learn about Nurse Coach Board Certification. Faculty: Bonney Gulino Schaub RN, MS, PMHCNS-BC, NC-BC Mary Beth White RN, WHCNP, MS, APHN-BC, HWNC-BC To register and for additional information go to This program has been peer-reviewed and is endorsed by AHNA. This continuing nursing education activity was approved by the AAOHN, an accredited approver by the American Nurses Credentialing Center s Commission on Accreditation. TNC is a program of the 38

39 Your Own Star An Interactive Map of the Psychological Functions Cristina Pelizzatti and Bill Burr The primary driving force of life is that of growth, evolving through forms of ever higher consciousness the Self-Actualizing process in which the I, a reflection of the Higher Self into the personal realm, becomes aware of its source, the Self, leading towards synthesis. Remaining aware, through presence, that the Self calls inevitably and irreversibly towards the manifestation of its purpose, means choosing to become a protagonist in the process of synthesis: evolving through knowing - possessing - transforming (personal psychosynthesis) to integration-synthesis (transpersonal psychosynthesis), thereby becoming a Self in expression through the personality, as Assagioli taught. Notwithstanding the existence of this evolutionary pathway, we fight against ourselves and against the self-actualization process in an attempt to preserve intact our sense of self, even though this is in fact limited by identifications associated with our subpersonalities, stories, and scripts. Roberto Assagioli s Unpublished notes on the psychological functions The psychological functions as presented by Maestro Assagioli characterize the interfaces with which the I moves in the world, expressing not only qualities, talents, and potentials, but also limitations and distortions. Understanding the relativity and interplay of the psychological functions posited by psychosynthesis represents a fundamental tool for understanding who we are and our unique expression in the world. A regulated use of the psychological functions is possible at the moment we are free of limiting identifications and conditioning; that is when we are present with awareness and will in the content-less space of the I. The star diagram of the psychological functions used in psychosynthesis takes into account the multiplicity, plasticity and dynamism of the human psyche, mapping these functions in a coherent manner and enabling an intuitive, graphic vision of their existence and interplay. For example, in the center of the mandala of the psychological functions used by The Synthesis Center, designed by Clare Goodwin, (at left) we find the I, immersed in the intrinsic functions of the I itself: the will, inherent faculty of the I/Self, surrounded by transpersonal qualities; and awareness, another inherent faculty of the I/Self. (Continued on page 40) 39

40 (Continued from page 39) For those in the process of psychological growth, awareness of prevalent or non-dominant psychological functions is indispensable: the continuous work of harmonization of the functions contributes to a growing awareness of the Self and the capability to access the transpersonal energies and qualities in an ecological context from ego to eco (for oneself and others). Becoming conscious through disidentification and impartial observation of processes that we are often unaware of enables us to direct them in a responsible manner through love and will, empowering the I, promoting and regulating the psychological functions under the guidance of the Self. Through awareness the I can utilize the will to direct the various psychological functions at every moment of life in this process of harmonization. As a consequence, the will serves as coordinator of the psychological functions, without impacting directly on reality. Here at the TransAlpine Center in Italy, we've been working with a diagram that facilitates an understanding of how the psychological functions inter-relate with the fields of consciousness mapped in the Egg Diagram, effectively blending the functions into the fields illustrated in the egg. The reasoning behind this centers on the I, and the presence of consciousness at the center of both the egg and the star as a center of pure awareness and will. The upper rays of the star represent functions typically associated with content of the higher unconscious: imagination, intuition, thought; while the emotive/sensory/impulse functions are more closely aligned with the reactive content of the lower unconscious. The idea is to gain additional perspective on how the psychological processes of a particular function influence the others and the psyche in general. The continuing harmonization of one s own star facilitates the use of the psychological functions towards a given objective, and, more generally, the participation in a responsible manner in the process of Self-actualization or synthesis. In this context the ten Psychodynamic Laws (Assagioli, The Act of Will, Chapter 5) clarify in detail how the psychological functions are intimately interconnected. The understanding and conscious use of these laws is fundamental to the comprehension of psychic processes. Having a clear sense of one who wants, who moves toward their destination through realization of a series of goals and continued change, means to be aware that the will is always active and will accompany us in the manifestation of that which we truly and profoundly desire. This desire of the Self to manifest its unique purpose, meaning, and value is the seed of the intention (The Call of the Self) which leads, through the impulse inherent in life itself, to the realization of our Life Project: the unmanifest Unity which calls for manifestation. The larger goal is to experiment with life itself and through the experience, evolve. To realize oneself through a harmonious personality, i.e., one who uses the psychological functions in a conscious and proactive manner, the I has to be director and observer of the game of life or Lila as described in the ancient sacred texts of the Vedic tradition: You are what is your most profound desire. As is your desire, so is your intention. As is your intention, so is your will. As is your will, so is your action. As is your action, so is your destiny. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV. 4.5 To act in this context (from presence) means to manifest the project of the Self in a manner which is both aware and chosen. The understanding of who uses the psychological functions is therefore a first, fundamental step. (Continued on page 41) 40

41 (Continued from page 40) The psychological functions are the tools with which the personal self interacts with the manifest world. They serve the role of intermediary between our inner world and the outside. As Psychosynthesis Life Coaches, we want to be truly capable of using all the functions to the best of our ability and work in such a way that the client may do so as well. To do that, we need to understand: Which subpersonalities use the psychological functions, and to what extent do they use them? How can we prepare and train ourselves to the point where we can operate through a conscious and desired use of our psychological functions, in a sequence of our own choosing? Or, through a subpersonality of our own choosing? To further this process, the Psychosynthesis Life Coach, presenting oneself as an external unifying center, or guide, presents the traveler (client/coachee) with questions such as: Which psychological function is our ally? Which is the carrier of a profound wounding? Which one limits us? Which function is the strongest? Which is the weakest? With which one(s) are you in confidence, comfortable with? Which one(s) do you trust? Which do you listen to? Which don t you listen to? Which do you underestimate? Which is overvalued? On which function will my Call of Self land? To respond in detail to these questions and enable a comparative, graphical analysis of the situation here and now which might be useful in mapping the psychological functions, we've created a model ( Your Own Star or YOS ) bringing together the above concepts in an interactive format, answering the wish and the call of Maestro Assagioli that psychosynthesis belongs to everyone and must be continually developed. 41 (Continued on page 42)

42 (Continued from page 41) Through reflection, introspection, and a sincere and objective reply giving a weighting from 1 to 10 ( 1 - not at all, 10 - maximum) to powerful questions typical of psychosynthesis life coaching ( how much do you... how much have you... ) like those suggested above, a detailed and updated picture of the relative status of our psychological functions emerges. The first page ( Input tab) of YOS presents the opportunity to enter these values relative to the various functions and the degree of comfort we feel, and how much they re used, trusted, and listened to in various contexts: personal, relational, professional, spiritual, and one which is totally up to the user (define it in the Your Own Star field down at the header of the bottom entry matrix). Using the selector buttons on the second page ( Plot tab), the values are plotted on the classic psychosynthesis Star Diagram background, enabling an immediate visual grasp of the relative functions for the selected profile. In this way the various figures can be compared, clearly highlighting areas for work/improvement in the quest of a harmonious balance of functions at the service of the I/Self. We can see the parts without losing sight of the cohesive whole, the Self in expression through the I, in turn immersed in the personality and using the psychological functions as tools for action. YOS enables the psychosynthesis life coach to do an initial evaluation first on him/herself and to update it periodically as their own personal journey unfolds. Updates can be saved as duplicates of the original file, or printed to hardcopy/pdf. Once the guide is comfortable with the process, YOS can be applied in coaching situations. The Synthesis Center recommends the same discretion as is applied to all our coaching tools, and suggests that, in the case of a homework assignment for the traveler, guides provide a hardcopy only of the entry matrix (a standalone worksheet is available for those who prefer to stay paperless). Once a profile is created in YOS, there is a lot of work ahead. We can find wounded functions defending themselves, but we can also find precious gifts within them, wherein the vulnerability in a function can become a doorway to the Self, the place where the innocence and simplicity of the Self still reigns, protected by a dominant psychological function which now represents a comfort zone within which it is imprisoned, blocking the transpersonal energies of the Self. 42 (Continued on page 43)

43 (Continued from page 42) As psychosynthesis life coaches we will train our clients to respond to their Call of Self, strengthening the less-used psychological functions to the point where they become tools at the service of evolution. As Maestro Assagioli wrote: Research is to say that psychosynthesis is neither yet complete nor perfect: it is at its beginnings: there is much to experiment, improve, refine, develop, discover, extend to other fields. There is therefore room for young spirits and minds. Psychosynthesis is a process which doesn t finish with the end of the day or with the end of manifest life. Synthesis is progressive and continual, and being able to participate actively in this process produces great joy and a sense of satisfaction, of well-being: being well with one s own Self, by choosing to respond to Its call as an active willer. Your Own Star was created in Excel (part of the Microsoft Office suite) and includes functionality only available in Excel (Office 2011 or higher). It is available for download here ( ) Cristina Pelizzatti, PLC, is a Certified Psychosynthesis Life Coach with The Synthesis Center (TSC), and staff member of TSC. Cris is co-founder and lead instructor of The Synthesis Center s TransAlpine program. Holding a Masters in Indovedic Psychology as a foundation for subsequent Masters level studies in Psychosynthesis Counseling, Transpersonal Counseling, EcoCounseling (Ecopsychology applied in Counseling) and Psychoenergetics in Counseling, she has recently completed a further specialization as a certified Resilience Practitioner. Trainer, practitioner, and researcher, she brings into synthesis the reconnection with our Self, through nature, working in person, with groups, in educational and vocational settings, and on-line. Cristina Pelizzatti, The Synthesis Center Staff, PLC cris@criscoaching.com Following a series of assignments in Japan, South Africa, Europe, and the USA, William (Bill) Burr built the team which powered a struggling Italian family business to success, pioneering technologies which enabled the cellular/mobile computing revolution. His executive experience has subsequently been applied in coaching and mentoring startups in fields as diverse as digital creative and More than Moore technologies. Currently a Fellow of the Institute of Circuit Technology (UK), COO and Co-Founder of TransSiP Inc. (Irvine, CA), Chairman and Consigliere with YMEE Inc. (NYC), Administrator of the Synthesis Center s TransAlpine program, proprietor of Synthesis Insights (online publishing) and an active investor, Bill continues to follow the leading edge of emerging technologies when not studying his Synthesis Center assignments as a Psychosynthesis Life Coach. Bill Burr, Administrator, PLC-Italia, PLC-F wwb@psychosynthesislifecoach.com CONTRIBUTE TO PSYCHOSYNTHESIS QUARTERLY: WE INVITE YOUR ARTICLES, POEMS, NEWS, ANNOUNCEMENTS to newsletter@aap-psychosynthesis.org 43

44 Tune in, Step Out Inner Being and Outer Action Create a Balanced Life Dorothy Firman, EdD Every day we experience the balance of inner and outer in the simple act of breathing. Too much exhale and we start to fade. Too much inhale and we can t hold it. And we quickly know when our breath is out of balance. Hyperventilating. Holding our breath. Shallow breathing. Exasperated exhales. Sudden frightened inhales. The breath gives away a lot about what s going on in us at any given moment. And notice that every meditative tradition and every body-based practice from yoga to martial arts invites us to be aware of our breath and allow it to serve us well. Belly breathing helps reduce anxiety. Panting is a classic childbirth strategy. Deep breathing slows us down. Conscious breathing quiets the mind. Our life is just like that: doing and being; tuning in and stepping out; in-breath and out-breath. This is not the introvert/extrovert question. Both those with an internal orientation and those with an external orientation need balance. And balance will look different for each person, but nonetheless, balance is needed. So how s your balance? Take a quick glance at the last week. Many of us (most?) will be unbalanced towards the doing side of the equation. Some will be unbalanced on the other side. How does you balance feel? Check into your body, feelings and mind for clues to the balance (or lack of balance) in your life. Balance is not, in this more holistic sense, equal weight on each side. It is not equal amounts of time spent in the inner world and the outer world. It is the unique balance that keeps you finely tuned and in relationship to your deepest Self. A dancer spends lots of time moving, an acrobat flying through the air, a boxer crouched down low, a meditator, sitting. Each may be living a balanced life. or not. Balance is something you will know from the inside out. It is something you must create, for it doesn t happen easily. Boxer or meditator, each comes from within and steps out. Each tunes in to what is important, what has meaning, who they are and what they intend to create and then they step out: one into the ring, one onto the cushion. But if the boxer can t sleep at night or the meditator doesn t know how to relate to other people, then balance is lost. Out of balance? How do you know when that s true for you? disconnected restless agitated tired angry sad purposeless disinterested Just a few of the ways we might know. What are the signs for you, that you are out of balance? In balance? How do you know when it s true for you? aligned energized purposeful Engaged 44 (Continued on page 45)

45 (Continued from page 44) content rested peaceful What do you know about your unique experience of being in balance? Only you will know and only you can correct towards balance. Life is often hard and stressful and balance may seem impossible. Some of us get caught in the stepping out, with little time for tuning in. The big moves that might create balance may well be out of reach. We can t just quit our day job to find more peace. We can t stop reality from unfolding and often it unfolds with pain and suffering. So a good strategy is to take moments to find balance. Sometimes even stealing those moments from one place or another. We might like an hour to meditate or a day to lie in the hammock and read a novel. But we may not get those. Still we can tune in in brief moments throughout the day and week and month. 3 in-breaths before you start to work; driving a little more slowly, stretching for a few minutes when you wake up instead of leaping into action. The inner world is always available to us and we can choose to access it and deepen our in-breath towards more balance. The same is true for the folks who may be unbalanced on the inner side of the equation: people with a shy nature or limited by circumstances of health or access, or inwardly oriented by choice. We may find safety in tuning in and find stepping out to be more difficult. We have to find balance as well. And we, too, may need to step out slowly, one moment at a time. A hello to someone passing, a call to a friend, a letter to the editor, a walk in the park: finding balance in a moment by stepping out. Each step into an action brings us closer to our own right balance. We get the best of who we are when we tune in and step out. We claim the rich gifts of our inner world. We have access to feelings, imagination, thinking and intuition. We can hear the call of Self. We are conscious. We claim different gifts when we step out, equally rich. We create, change, manifest our inner visions, impact our world, take action that matters. We respond to the call of Self. We are willers. Who am I? I am a center of consciousness and will. I am the in-breath and the out-breath. I am all that I hold inside and all that I express in the world. I tune in. I step out. [This article originally appeared as a blogpost at psychologytoday.com] See biography of Didi Firman on page

46 The River Does Not Have to Make Itself Stephanie Sorrell (flying over the Mississippi) The river does not have to make itself Or adhere to the controlled straight lines of matter. It follows the curved breasts Of the land And shapes itself around The hard matter of rock and stone. It does not need to hurry to reach some destination. It just calls in the dancing, shimmering tributaries to itself, Receives the excited impulsive raindrops of the clouds Which tumble and dance Losing their separation as they go. The river does not have to make itself As it flows Through sun, stars, wind and snow. It just becomes itself And so it is with you also. 46