18 Oct Humanistic and Transpersonal Psychology
Since their inceptions, both humanistic and transpersonal psychologies have stood outside the mainstream of scientific, reductionist psychology. Both disciplines have remained outsiders, even though many of the concepts, techniques, and worldviews of humanistic and transpersonal have permeated mainstream psychological thought, appearing especially in the psychotherapy office as the techniques of mindfulness and meditation. The two disciplines as a whole have experienced declining respect. Humanistic psychology, in the view of Elkins (2008), has suffered not only from an internal lack of scientific research, but also from outright hostility from the conventional world.
Transpersonal psychology has been weakened from internal bickering about what it even defines itself as. Although transpersonal psychology has always been concerned with the spiritual dimension, the word “spiritual” was in disrepute in its early days, although it now is popular in the mainstream. Hartelius et al. (2015) wonder if we could improve our “brand” by calling ourselves “spiritual psychology,” a term that has in the meantime been coopted by religious institutions. The authors decide that no, the transpersonal is about much more than the spiritual. MacDonald quoted in Hartelius et al. (2015) has suggested that we study the “expressions” of spirituality, not spirituality itself.
Two other disciplines under consideration this week are Integral Yoga and Psychosynthesis, which are similar in that both offer a system of development that anyone may follow. Sri Aurobindo who developed Integral Yoga, was a genius intellect who was a major influence on Ken Wilbur. He taught that the real story of evolution is the evolution of consciousness, and he taught a slow, graded, orderly path development (Cortright, 2015). Sri Aurobindo viewed his personal yoga practice as one of continuous and unending evolution, and by example demonstrated for others how they could do the same (Banerji, 2018). A side note, but particularly human, is that Aurobindo and The Mother believed that they were physically immortal, but they died just like everyone else.
We could conclude by saying that Western psychology is fixated on the surface manifestations of consciousness (Hartelius et al., 2015), and that transpersonal psychology offers a vision of higher functioning on every level.
References
Assagioli, R. (1974). Jung and psychosynthesis. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 14(1), 35-55.
Banerji, D. (2018). Sri Aurobindo’s formulations of the integral yoga. International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 37(1), 38–54.
Cortright, B. (2015). Integral psychology. In H. L. Friedman & G. Hartelius (Eds.),The Wiley-Blackwell handbook of transpersonal psychology (pp. 155-165). Wiley & Sons.
Elkins, D. N. (2008). Why humanistic psychology lost its power and influence in American psychology: Implications for advancing humanistic psychology. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 49(3), 267-291.
Hartelius, G., Friedman, H. L., & Pappas, J. D. (2015). The calling to a spiritual psychology: Should transpersonal psychology convert? In H. L. Friedman & G. Hartelius (Eds.), The Wiley-Blackwell handbook of transpersonal psychology (pp. 44-61). Wiley & Sons.
Hartelius, G., Rothe, G., & Roy, P. (2015). A brand from the burning: Defining transpersonal psychology. In H. L. Friedman & G. Hartelius (Eds.), The Wiley Blackwell handbook of transpersonal psychology (pp. 3-22). Wiley & Sons.
© 2022 Catherine Auman
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