Just as there is a personal will . . . so there is a Transpersonal Will. . . . It is its action which is felt by the personal self, or “I,” as a “pull” or “call.”
—Roberto Assagioli
The fundamental importance of “I” and Self has been a major theme throughout this book. It is the I-Self relationship which, facilitated by empathic unifying centers, forms the axis of optimum human development. When this relationship is intact, there is a burgeoning of “I” and an unfolding of authentic personality throughout the life span, a following of one’s unique path in life.
Conversely, when this relationship is disturbed by nonempathic response from the environment, primal wounding occurs. This wounding in turn leads to the splitting of the higher and lower unconscious, polarization and conflict within the natural multiplicity of the personality, a lack of meaning in life, and various other types of psychological disturbances.
In this chapter we will more closely examine the nature of “I” and Self, with a particular focus on the dynamic relationship between them, or what is called Self-realization. We will see that Self-realization does not denote a state of consciousness, a stage of development, a transformational moment, or any other particular mode of experiencing but rather an ongoing relationship with Self though all experiencing. In order to discern this relationship more clearly, we will later describe the two dimensions of Self-realization, personal psychosynthesis and transpersonal psychosynthesis.
As we have seen, human spirit, or “I,” is able to engage a breathtaking range of different experiences: moving through inner chaos and psychological crises, disidentifying from subpersonalities and other personality structures, engaging the ongoing events of psyche and soma, embracing the heights of unitive experience, experiencing no-self and emptiness, and walking through the valleys of primal wounding.
Throughout, “I” remains distinct-but-not-separate of—transcendent-immanent within—all energies, patterns, contents, processes, images, feelings, thoughts, drives, heights and depths. “I” is ever the experiencer transcendent-immanent within the experience. The essence of who we are should not be confused with our bodies, our feelings, our minds, our roles, or any state of human being.
Given this nature of “I,” what might we say then about the source of “I”? Clearly, “I” cannot derive from instinctual drives, physical sensations, dynamics of emotion, patterns of thought, or social conditioning, because “I” is ultimately distinct from all of these. What then might be the source of such a mysterious spirit? It would make sense to posit that the source of this remarkable transcendent-immanent I-amness is an even more remarkable, deeper, transcendent-immanent I-amness. It is this deeper source of “I” that we call Self.
The reflection [“I”] appears to be self-existent but has, in reality, no autonomous substantiality. It is, in other words, not a new and different light but a projection of its luminous source [Self]. (Assagioli 1965a, 20)
Transcendent-immanent personal self, human spirit, or “I,” is the direct projection or reflection of transcendent-immanent Self, Spirit, or “Divine I am.” Unique human selfhood is not a cosmic mistake, not an isolated ego lost in illusion, but something far more essential that is chosen and sustained by Self.1
Further, just as “I” can be transcendent-immanent within many sensations, feelings, thoughts, subpersonalities, and so on, we can posit that Self is transcendent-immanent within all of the contents and processes of the entire personality and perhaps beyond (see discussion that follows). Self would then be present and active at all of the levels of the unconscious—lower, middle, higher—and thus could be met at any level and invite us to any level.
This transcendent-immanent omnipresence of Self makes sense of the fact that many, in following their path of Self-realization, find themselves traversing all levels of experience and not simply ascending into the higher unconscious. Self can meet us anywhere, invite us anywhere. This is an important reason to not picture Self at the apex of the oval diagram and instead assume that Self is transcendent-immanent within the entire diagram (see “Self and the Oval Diagram” in Chapter 2).
SELF AS SOURCE
Note that since Self is transcendent-immanent within all levels, it is not a mere totality, a summation of these levels. Self is not a collectivity, a totality, or an undifferentiated unity from which we must separate in order to attain a sense of individuality. Quite the contrary, Self gives us our individuality, is choosing our I-amness. To lose the connection to Self would be to lose individuality, not to gain it. Think of the analogy we used in Chapter 2, of Self as a candle flame whose image—“I”—is being reflected in a mirror: we might say that losing the connection to Self amounts to interposing an obstacle between the candle (Self) and the mirror reflection of the candle (“I”), thus causing the absolute disappearance of the image (i.e., nonbeing, primal wounding).
Conversely, the more we are in alignment or communion with Self, the brighter and clearer the reflected image will be—“I” will blossom. This is quite apparent in the phenomenon of empathic mirroring: the more we are seen by authentic unifying centers, which are conduits for Self, the more “I” is in evidence.
This view of the genesis of personal individuality differs from a common view found in psychoanalysis, Jungian psychology, and even transpersonal psychology. Some proponents of these approaches posit that our individuality separates from a primordial unity of some sort, whether this is called id (Freud), self (Jung), Spiritual Ground (Nelson 1994), or Dynamic Ground (Washburn 1988)—although much current infant research has strongly called into question the existence of a primary unity from which the infant must differentiate (see Stern 1985).
In any case, Self here is not considered an undifferentiated unity from which we must separate to gain individuality. Self is in no way and at no time inimical to individuality but the direct and immediate source of this at every moment. A disconnection from Self undercuts our being; a connection with Self gives us our being. Psychological disturbances are not caused by an inability to differentiate from Self but from an experienced disconnection from Self caused by primal wounding. (Of course, a relationship to Self potentiates “I” and therefore can put survival personality into crisis, so yes, that type of identity can be threatened—remember Ellen in Chapter 3.)
THE I-SELF UNION
In Assagioli’s conception of “I” as a projection of Self, we also can see that “I” and Self exist in a profound, unbreakable union. Think again of an image reflected in a mirror—the image is in complete union with the object imaged, the “projection” in union with its “luminous source.” Furthermore, since both “I” and Self are transcendent-immanent, it seems clear that their union too is transcendent-immanent. The I-Self union exists at a depth beyond all things. In fact, from this point of view primal wounding—the apparent breaking of the I-Self connection—is an illusion.
That is, the I-Self union cannot in actuality be broken—or improved—because this is transcendent-immanent of anything that might conceivably disrupt or improve it. In the words of the great mystic, Meister Eckhart, “there is something in the soul so closely akin to God that it is already one with him and need never be united to him” (Blakney 1941, 205). What does occur, of course, is that we experience a disruption through empathic failures in our lives, and as we have seen, we undergo many tremendous changes in order to manage this perceived threat to our spirit.
This transcendence-immanence of the I-Self connection helps explain how primal wounding is finally healed. Such healing of course involves reestablishing an empathic connection with the wounded layers in ourselves as they emerge during Self-realization, our empathy dispelling the night of nonbeing. But those who feel deeply the hurt, fear, and loneliness of these younger parts often discover a surprising thing: their essential nature was never in fact hurt, they were never truly alone, and they were never in danger of annihilation:
I was angry that God had deserted me in this abusive family. It wasn’t fair. I shouted at God a lot, raging at the betrayal. But gradually I began to see something amazing. If God had deserted me, how is it I could now live to tell the tale? I am here, undamaged at some level, at some deep level from which I can see what happened to me and have compassion for myself. God got me through. So God did not actually desert me, though it felt that way at the time.
In remaining empathic with such traumatized layers of ourselves, there often is the realization that Self was in fact ever-present, holding us in being, saving our soul. It is simply that the abuse or neglect cut us off from conscious contact with Self at the time. Healing often is a matter of returning to these moments, to those parts of us, and seeing through the illusory absence of Self to the unbroken connection to Self.
SELF AS EMPATHIC
This transcendent-immanent union of “I” and Self also illuminates why this relationship is quintessentially empathic. As direct reflections of Self, continuously in union with Self, we are known by Self in the most intimate way possible. In fact, although we ourselves may be unclear about who we are, as we are caught up in various roles and identifications or immersed in the details of our daily lives, Self continuously knows us at the level of spirit, of “I.” The following statements show this spiritual empathy operating through authentic unifying centers:
My grandmother really knew me. She always seemed to know what I really needed before I did.
My high school coach accepted my doubt and fear, but saw through this to the athlete in me. I blossomed.
She’s awesome. I can’t put one over on her; she knows me too well. She sees through my dramas and gets me to laugh at myself.
There was this tree I used to sit in for hours when I was ten years old. No one seemed to know my loneliness but the spirit of that tree.
And even more clearly:
I feel like God has always known me, from the womb and before, and through all the moments of my life, even when it seemed God wasn’t there.
These statements show the operation of a transcendent-immanent empathy that can reach our essential nature. While we may not be seen and understood in much of our lives, even by ourselves, empathic Self remains clear about who we truly are. To paraphrase St. Augustine, “God is more intimate to us than we are to ourselves.”
Transcendent-immanent empathy is a fundamental aspect of the I-Self relationship. As we have seen, to the extent that this empathy is manifested by unifying centers throughout our development, we are able to experience whatever arises in our lives and to hold these experiences meaning-fully—we gain self-empathy. Within the radiance of this empathy our sense of transcendent-immanent I-amness blossoms, and we show up for our lives in an expression of authentic personality.
. . . his spiritual Self who already knows his problem, his crisis, his perplexity.
—Roberto Assagioli
SELF AS UNIVERSAL
From the deepest point of view, Self can be conceptualized as universal much along the lines of Jung’s statement that “self is not only in me but in all beings, like the Atman, like Tao” (Jung 1964, 463), or as in Wilber’s description of what he calls Spirit:
Spirit transcends all, so it includes all. It is utterly beyond this world, but utterly embraces every single holon in this world. It permeates all of manifestation but is not merely manifestation. It is ever-present at every level or dimension, but is not merely a particular level of dimension. Transcends all, includes all, as the groundless Ground or Emptiness of all manifestation. (1996, 38)
Wilber’s “transcends and includes” is what we are calling transcendence-immanence, and in the universality of Self, this transcendence-immanence would embrace “all of manifestation.” This universality would be one possible explanation for the fact that Self can be present to us through such a staggering variety of unifying centers: oceans and mountains, animals and plants, blankets and teddy bears, people, real and fictional, symbols and beliefs, and so on.
Of course, as Assagioli (1973a, 125–26) points out, such a profound omnipresence of Self would be beyond the human mind’s power of comprehension, so the universality of Self cannot finally be proven or denied intellectually. However, he would point to the fact that one can have an “intuitive, direct experience of communion with the ultimate Reality” (125), and that this type of experience constitutes an observable fact (see Bucke 1967; Laski 1968; Maslow 1971). This is akin to Jung’s statement that, “God is an obvious psychic and non-physical fact, i.e., a fact that can be established psychically but not physically” (Jung 1969b, 464).
Whether Self is understood as pervading all levels of the personality, the collective unconscious, and/or the entire cosmos, here we can see that Self-realization does not entail “identifying with Self” or “becoming Self,” as it is sometimes held. If this were in fact possible, it would mean becoming directly aware of all contents and processes existing at all of the levels of the unconscious—and perhaps beyond—simultaneously, presumably an overwhelming experience inconsistent with healthy human functioning. Rather, Self-realization can be seen as involving the development of an increasingly conscious communion with Self in our daily living, in other words, the development of authentic personality.
The Supreme Value, Cosmic Mind, Supreme Reality, both transcendent and immanent.
—Roberto Assagioli
HOW TO DESCRIBE SELF-REALIZATION?
This I-Self connection or axis is then transcendent-immanent within the entire range of human experience, including the depths of our pain in the lower unconscious, the more accessible structures of the middle unconscious, the higher unconscious heights of unitive and peak experiences, and beyond. But if Self-realization is not to be confused with any particular point along this tremendously broad spectrum of human experience, then how are we to describe it?
In our discussion of the stages of psychosynthesis (Chapter 2), we outlined the process in which Self-realization can be supported by exploration and work with the middle unconscious, the higher unconscious, and the lower unconscious. Although Self-realization cannot be reduced to engagement with these levels of ourselves, it seems apparent that these levels form the psychospiritual terrain through which our unique journey of Self-realization will pass. To put it another way, since Self is transcendent of, yet immanent within, these sectors of the unconscious, Self-realization may entail engaging material from any and all sectors at different times.
In order to bring Self-realization into sharper focus, then, let us now examine working with these various levels of the unconscious, understanding this work as occurring along two developmental lines—personal psychosynthesis and transpersonal psychosynthesis.
Human healing and growth that involves work with either the middle unconscious or the lower unconscious is known as personal psychosynthesis. In Assagioli’s words:
This [personal psychosynthesis] includes the development and harmonizing of all human functions and potentialities at all levels of the lower and middle area in the diagram of the constitution of man [and woman]. (1973a, 121)
In this quotation, Assagioli is referring to the oval diagram, and he is indicating the middle and the lower unconscious as the areas involved in personal psychosynthesis. Of course, there is seldom an aspect of the human journey that does not include material from all of the levels of the unconscious. Personal psychosynthesis, while more obviously engaging the lower and middle unconscious contents, will involve higher unconscious material as well—for example, one quite often encounters higher unconscious content when working through early trauma. Indeed, we can think of personal psychosynthesis as simply referring to where one is currently focused in the overall healing of the split between the lower and higher unconscious.
Personal psychosynthesis does not necessarily involve the application of formal methods of education, counseling, or therapy—surely it most often occurs simply in the living of our lives. In the process of rising to meet the challenges of our personal and professional lives, we overcome feelings of unhealthy guilt and shame, transform fears and anxieties, and develop more harmony within our personalities. In an effort to live authentically, we often will find old wounds healing and personal wholeness blossoming. But in many cases, too, much time and struggle can be saved by consciously working at personal psychosynthesis with a trained professional.
THE PROCESS
In Mark’s initial work with his Lover and Worker subpersonalities (Chapter 4), we saw an example of personal psychosynthesis occurring at the level of the middle unconscious. In his case, more or less conscious aspects of his personality—the Worker and Lover—were recognized and brought more sharply into consciousness. This type of work can of course involve a variety of different techniques and methods from the entire range of therapeutic and growth modalities available today.
The deeper aspect of personal psychosynthesis can be seen as Mark uncovered the early abuse, shame, and grief underlying these two subpersonalities—a healing and an integration of material from the lower unconscious into the conscious personality. Here we are not dealing only with subpersonalities but also with deeper structures comprising experiences, attitudes, motivations, and life scripts conditioning the personality as a whole.
The manifestations of this deeper level may include phenomena such as self-destructive patterns; compulsions, addictions, and dysfunctional attachments; depression, anxiety, and rage; and disturbing experiences of early abuse and neglect. Personal psychosynthesis at these more primary levels is a long-term process, and it may involve the following:
Such growth often will mean incremental change in habitual ways of relating to ourselves and others, and in the very way of living itself. Personal psychosynthesis that involves much lower unconscious work therefore is best done within the context of stable, secure life structures—authentic unifying centers—such as counseling and psychotherapy, psychosynthesis therapy, ongoing support groups, and an empathic circle of family and friends.
THE HIGHER UNCONSCIOUS
Whether addressing the middle or lower unconscious, personal psychosynthesis tends to lead toward, among other things: less debilitating conflict within the personality; a growing awareness of the physical, emotional, and mental aspects of experience; a sense of freedom and spontaneity; less toxic self-criticism; increasingly realistic self-acceptance; and a sense of personal choice and responsibility.
Note that personal psychosynthesis includes the integration of higher unconscious content as well. Higher unconscious qualities such as creativity, freedom, self-confidence, and spontaneity are included in conscious functioning. We might, for example, be working with an anxious, closed-off subpersonality who, after some amount of empathic connection, begins to manifest playfulness and creativity. Here we initially have moved into the lower unconscious, then into the higher unconscious, and finally we begin to form a healthy new structure in the middle unconscious. So we need not think of personal and transpersonal psychosynthesis as being completely separate; each ultimately implies the other, because each addresses complementary dimensions of our growth.
Furthermore, as many have discovered, personal growth moves quite naturally into a more overt intensification of transpersonal growth. People working on their psychological healing may encounter unexpected moments of profound serenity, ecstatic joy, and spiritual insight; or, plumbing the depths of psychological trauma, they may find a deeper presence that has been holding them always, even at tremendous depths of isolation and pain.
On the other hand, as we proceed further along the personal dimension, we may find a growing emptiness and boredom gnawing at our lives—a crisis of transformation, called the existential crisis (see Firman and Vargiu 1977; Firman and Gila 1997; Firman and Vargiu 1980). Such a crisis triggers a search for something more, something that has meaning beyond our individual lives and will lead us eventually into the transpersonal dimension of growth. Thus whether surprised by joy or surprised by lack of joy, we often find that the path of personal psychosynthesis intersects the path of transpersonal psychosynthesis.
Whereas personal psychosynthesis involves the integration of material from the middle and lower unconscious, transpersonal psychosynthesis (or spiritual psychosynthesis) is aimed at integrating material from the higher unconscious. In Assagioli’s words:
The specific therapeutic task . . . is that of arriving at a harmonious adjustment by means of the proper assimilation of the inflowing superconscious energies and of their integration with the pre-existing aspects of the personality; that is, of accomplishing not only a personal but also a spiritual psychosynthesis. (1965a, 53)
As with personal psychosynthesis, transpersonal psychosynthesis often may occur gracefully, with no need for any conscious attention or work on our part at all. Whether in striking peak experiences or in a gradual shift in consciousness, the higher unconscious reveals itself, and we begin an active engagement with this realm. Through meditation, prayer, ritual, music, art, service, and community, we seek to contact and express this dimension of existence.
And as we become more familiar with higher unconscious energies, we may automatically transform our attitudes and behaviors to express these energies in our daily living. We gradually become more compassionate, wise, and inclusive, and we are less controlled by separative attitudes such as greed, rage, and envy. Perhaps a new appreciation for the natural world, an experienced solidarity with other human beings, or a love of the Divine here infuses our lives with little or no disturbance of our personal equilibrium.
However, higher unconscious experiences can be difficult to integrate at times. For example, if we have an intense experience of solidarity and compassion for all humankind, this may lead afterward to a heightened awareness of our feelings of hatred or revenge—feelings that obstruct the expression of compassion. Or perhaps a strong experience of our unity with nature may reveal the personal attitudes and beliefs that caused us to violate this union in the past—attitudes and beliefs that are obstacles to a right relationship with nature. It is as if the older habits, attitudes, and feelings that would obstruct the concrete expression of the new experience are thrown into stark relief in light of the experience itself.
All the rocks and rubbish, which had been covered and concealed at high tide, emerge again.
—Roberto Assagioli
This dynamic in which obstacles to our growth are energized by a potential step in our growth is called induction (Firman 1991; Firman and Gila 1997). The notion of induction is meant to convey the idea that the energy of a forward step activates both the higher unconscious and lower unconscious material that will be needed to manifest the new potential. Induction is, in effect, a call to wholeness, and it often reveals that the higher and lower unconscious are two sides of one split, so that an engagement with one sector often will invite—or demand—engagement with the other. In all such cases, active and intentional psychological work on the problematic reactions often can help a great deal.
THE LOWER UNCONSCIOUS
When the higher unconscious energizes or inducts psychological patterns that have roots in the lower unconscious, transpersonal psychosynthesis will involve lower unconscious work. For example, the reactions mentioned above—the feelings of hatred and revenge, or the disrespectful attitude toward the natural world—may stem from an underlying rage that has childhood antecedents. Perhaps there is a history of sexual or emotional abuse that has left strong feelings of abandonment and shame in the lower unconscious, and a layer of rage has been used to protect the wounds from these early events.
Transpersonal psychosynthesis here will involve a psychological exploration of these childhood events in order to uncover and heal the earlier wounding. In this way, the attitudes of hatred and disrespect mentioned above may eventually be ameliorated, and the original experiences of compassion for humanity or closeness with nature gradually may begin to be expressed in our lives. Thus the modes of perception once glimpsed in peak moments do not remain simply ideal qualities of momentary experiences but become attitudes, values, and patterns of behavior by which we can live our entire lives.
INFATUATION WITH THE SUBLIME
While transpersonal growth may involve addressing patterns that appear as obstacles to integrating higher unconscious energies, it also may involve work with patterns of overvaluing these energies. Such overvaluing can occur as we engage the idealized nature of the higher unconscious and begin to feel that our more mundane daily lives are less important or indeed illusory in light of such experiences. In Assagioli’s (1973c) words, we may become caught in “the illusion that everything is an illusion!”
If we become caught up in an enthrallment with higher unconscious energies, an obsessive striving for higher experiences or “enlightenment” may commence, and we may attempt a flight from the problematic world of personal relationships, life responsibilities, and authentic human growth. This phenomenon has been recognized as polarizing mysticism by Maslow (1971), as infatuation with the sublime by Haronian (1983), as spiritual bypassing by Welwood (2000), and as dualistic denial by Firman (1991).
As such an infatuation organizes our lives, we begin to develop an identification based on this—what in Chapter 5 we called a transpersonal identification, where we, in effect, become addicted to the higher unconscious, and our expressions of transpersonal qualities become dissociated from other aspects of our personality. We may be feeling happy, joyous, and free, but others will be aware of the sadness, pain, and anger hidden beneath these emotions—lower unconscious material.2
We mentioned that in personal psychosynthesis we may encounter the existential crisis, a crisis of transformation that orients us toward the transpersonal dimension. Conversely, in transpersonal psychosynthesis, we may encounter a crisis of transformation inviting us to include the personal dimension, called the crisis of duality by Vargiu (see Firman and Vargiu 1977; Firman and Gila 1997; Firman and Vargiu 1980).
In this crisis we are faced with an inherent duality, an unbridgeable chasm, in our quest for enlightenment—we find that we “cannot get there from here.” That is, we find that our sublime sense of the beauty and joy of life cannot maintain itself in a pure, idealized state, that the pain and suffering of life must be accepted, and that an authentic life will mean actively engaging the brokenness in ourselves and in the world.
But when they have reached the depth of despondency or desperation there may come a sudden flow of inspiration inaugurating a period of renewed and intense productive activity.
—Roberto Assagioli
Of course, as we work through this crisis, we will find that the energies of the higher unconscious are free to find their natural way into expression. No longer idealized, the transpersonal qualities will become a part of the mysterious mix of light and dark that characterizes human existence. Again, these energies are not ultimately ideal forms separate from the world but normal, everyday modes of relationship to the world.
THE EXPANSION OF THE MIDDLE UNCONSCIOUS
Let us point out once more that personal psychosynthesis and transpersonal psychosynthesis refer simply to particular points of focus within the larger bridging of the higher and lower unconscious. Personal psychosynthesis begins at the “bottom,” so to speak, and tends toward the “top,” while transpersonal psychosynthesis implies beginning at the “top” and working toward the “bottom.”
So, for example, both personal and transpersonal psychosynthesis may involve working with subpersonalities in the middle unconscious, early trauma in the lower unconscious, and the heights of higher unconscious experience. Even the repression of the sublime is not simply a higher unconscious dynamic, because the resistance here is invariably the resistance to experiencing some early traumatic event—for example, loss of control, being overwhelmed, or loss of identity—that will come to light (i.e., be inducted) if the higher unconscious is contacted. Although each of us will have our own unique path, this path seems to tend toward a healed relationship between the heights and depths of human being.
Taken together, these two dimensions amount to an expansion of the middle unconscious. That is, as the experiential range represented by the higher and lower unconscious is freed up in us, we become more open to the heights and depths in ourselves and in the world. Our consciousness opens us up to a wider range of life experience and, thus, by definition, our middle unconscious—those experiences that can easily enter consciousness—can be said to have expanded. We are more apt to sense the beauty and pain around us, to rejoice in the good and grieve the losses, to feel inspired by the Divine and concerned about the suffering in the world. We become increasingly open to being touched by life in all of its diverse mystery.
Having said all of this, of course, it must be remembered that Self-realization should not ipso facto be equated to this deeper sense of personhood represented by an expanded middle unconscious. Since the I-Self relationship is transcendent-immanent, an ongoing relationship can occur with or without the expanded empathic range that we have been describing. Different paths of Self-realization will involve many different patterns of engagement and nonengagement with the higher and lower bandwidths of our experiential range. Again, even the extremes of psychological disturbances outlined in the previous chapter do not necessarily prevent a meaningful I-Self relationship. We may contact and respond to the invitations from Self, no matter what the state of our bodies and souls. It is this contact and response that we call Self-realization.
If both “I” and Self are distinct but not separate from all levels of experience, then the I-Self relationship cannot be equated to any specific type of experience. Thus an ongoing relationship between “I” and Self, or Self-realization, is independent of any particular level of experience and can occur whether the content is from the lower, middle, or higher unconscious. Self-realization is distinct from both personal psychosynthesis and transpersonal psychosynthesis and can occur in either. Thus if we were to chart someone’s path of Self-realization, with transpersonal psychosynthesis represented by a vertical axis and personal psychosynthesis represented by a horizontal one, it might look like Figure 8.1.3
In other words, Self-realization can take us anywhere on the chart. There is no yardstick, no map of Self-realization that can tell us whither we are called. We must simply listen to our own unique calling and be prepared to follow it, no matter where it leads. Self-realization is not a matter of the content or quality of experience, nor a structuralization of the personality, nor a particular stage of growth. Rather, Self-realization has to do with whether or not we are responding to the invitations of Self in our lives. Self-realization involves us relating to Self, responding to that fundamental union with Self, in whatever type of experience, state of consciousness, or stage of growth we find ourselves.
Seen in this way, Self-realization is a matter of the moment-to-moment, here-and-now relationship to our deepest sense of truth and meaning in life; in Jung’s (1954) words, it revolves around “fidelity to the law of one’s own being.” And we may betray that deeper truth in one moment and realign with it the next, in other words, we may be Self-realizing one moment and not Self-realizing the next. Self-realization is not the culmination of a journey but the journey itself.
FIGURE 8.1
It follows that we may, for example, not be Self-realizing when feeling an ineffable union with the cosmos and may actually be Self-realizing when feeling utter isolation and fragmentation. Or we may not be Self-realizing when involved in transpersonal psychosynthesis and may actually be Self-realizing when working at personal psychosynthesis. Virtually any and all experiences may or may not be Self-realization. The determining factor is not the quality or content of the experience but whether or not we are responding to the deeper source of our being.
CALLED BY SELF
So hearing and responding to the call of Self is a fundamental aspect of Self-realization, a twin phenomena that we have examined also as the contact and response stages of psychosynthesis (Chapter 3). Self is not simply a passive holding of us but acts in our lives as well. Self-realization is an ongoing relationship between “I” and Self, an interplay or a dialogue between personal will and transpersonal will.
Many stories could be told illustrating call and response. Perhaps immediately we think of famous people who throughout history responded to a powerful call and were led to great tasks. We think of Moses encountering God in the burning bush, called to lead the Israelites out of Egypt; Siddhartha Gautama, led from a sheltered life of wealth and privilege through an arduous journey culminating in his transformation into the Buddha; Jesus of Nazareth saying to God, “Not my will but yours be done,” and accepting death on the cross; and Allah speaking to Muhammad in the depths of the cave, sending him as a messenger to the world. Countless others also come to mind, such as Joan of Arc, Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa, and Martin Luther King Jr., who were led and sustained by the voice of a deeper center beyond their limited individuality.
. . . the establishing of a direct relation to the spiritual will, to the Self, is the goal of psychosynthesis.
—Roberto Assagioli
But many of us less famous can be seen following such a calling, leading us into a fuller sense of ourselves and the world, whether returning to school, discovering a new career, or developing latent artistic gifts. A popular book gives many examples of such calls (Levoy 1997), while the subjects of call, vocation, and dharma have appeared in the psychological literature as well (Bogart 1994, 1995; Bollas 1989; Fleischman 1990; Hillman 1996; Jung 1954; Levoy 1997).4
An example of hearing and responding to a transcendent-immanent call was given in Chapter 2 in the case of Ellen. Beginning with the destructuring of her survival personality, she moved through many experiences to discern a rightness in leaving her job for a new life. Along the way, she did much inner work, and she was open to Self through various authentic unifying centers: her prayer group, daily meditation practice, spiritual books, lectures, workshops, nocturnal dreams, and empathic friends. Here was an invitation from Self unfolding in her life.
The story of Jamie in Chapter 6 also illustrates Self-realization. Jamie began with what appeared to be a struggle to find her purpose, a struggle that turned out to be an obsession; here was a driven search for a “Supreme Life’s Purpose” that would compensate for her underlying feelings of waste and worthlessness. As she worked with this, it was revealed that her authentic calling was to a healing of her early wounding and thus freedom from her compulsive quest. This led in turn to a deeper, more realistic call to develop her art. Clearly, the path of Self-realization may involve many different types of experience.
Whether in the lives of the famous or the lesser known, it is easiest to see a response to call when it results in a major life change. However, there is a much more immediate dimension of call. Remember, the I-Self relationship is ever present, so hearing and responding to call can occur every moment of every day. This immediacy of Self can be experienced as an invitation to act from our highest values, our most cherished principles, and our deepest sense of truth. Such a call was heard by Sara.
SARA’S CALL TO TRUTH
Sara and Ed, out on a date, were having a wonderfully flowing conversation over a fine meal and a good wine. All was going well until Ed briefly made a comment that involved a racial stereotype. Sara was shocked by this for an instant, but the enjoyable flow of their conversation quickly reestablished itself, and the moment passed.
Inside, however, she was in turmoil. Should she say something about the racism embodied in the stereotype? Ed was a wonderful person in many ways and certainly not consciously racist, but she recently had attended several diversity trainings at school and felt it was right to confront racism and sexism in her personal life. But the comment was now in the distant past—how awkward and offensive it would be to return to it now. Why not just let it slide and mention it if it happened again? Why make a big deal about this right now when it might cause awkwardness or even a break in the relationship? Would it not be better to have a closer relationship with him before approaching such a potentially explosive subject?
Essentially, it means tuning in and willingly participating in the rhythms of Universal Life.
——Roberto Assagioli
Like Ellen discerning whether to leave her job or not (Chapter 3), Sara could find no ultimate authority in her rational mind. A rational case could be made on either side: say nothing, get closer, and then gently confront the racism if it emerges, following that political policy known as “constructive engagement”; or, mention it now, even if awkward, because that will show her values clearly and early and will allow the relationship to develop only with these included.
Furthermore, as she realized later, many different feelings were activated in her: a little girl not wanting to displease a father; a lover not wanting to break the romantic mood; a dreamy teenager wondering if Ed were “Mr. Right”; a judge saying that she was a coward if she did not express outrage to him; another feeling bad, small, and immobilized in the face of this judgment; a rebel, angrily refusing the judge’s guilt trip, saying that she does not have to do anything that she does not want to do; and, finally, a seemingly spiritual voice saying to let go, that in the larger scheme it does not matter what she does.
SARA’S RESPONSE TO TRUTH
The dinner and evening ended with Sara not voicing her concern after all, but she was left with her turmoil the next day. In a call to authenticity, she refused to ignore the truth of her discomfort and her perception of Ed’s behavior. With the knowledge gained from her diversity training and the values gathered over her life experience (unifying centers), her own sense of right and truth called to her—an invitation from Self.
Note that Sara moved through the stages of psychosynthesis in a brief time. She moved out of stage zero, the survival stage, by electing not to go with her old habit of ignoring uncomfortable situations, and then she engaged the remaining stages: (1) in exploration of the personality, she became conscious of the many feelings and thoughts within her by writing in her journal and talking to friends; (2) in the emergence of “I,” she became more clear that she was distinct from these many parts, that she was free from them, and that she could choose among them, or not at all; (3) in contact with Self, she began listening more acutely to her heart regarding the right thing to do; and finally, yes, (4) in response to Self, she called Ed on the telephone and discussed the incident, which happily led to a deeper intimacy and respect between them.
For the Stoics and Spinoza it has been the willing acceptance of one’s “destiny.”
—Roberto Assagioli
Later Sara reported a paradox that may occur in a close alignment of “I” and Self. She said that in the end it felt like she had no choice but to call Ed. This can appear to be an odd thought, given the painstaking, conscious journey to her final decision. But this speaks to the ultimate mysterious unity between ourselves and Self. “I had no choice” means here, “It was so right, so true, so obvious, that there was really nothing else I could do.” This experience is more in the nature of a discovery, a revelation, than what we usually take for an intentional act. It is a stumbling upon what Martin Buber (1958) called “the deed that intends me.” In psychosynthesis terms, this is an alignment of personal will with transpersonal will, so that the two are indistinguishable.
We have described calls that change the course of one’s life and a call involving a woman’s struggle over twenty-four hours, but calls also happen in the moment and can be responded to in the moment.
CALL IN THE MOMENT: DAVID
David, who received a call that invited an immediate response in the moment, said:
I am best man at a dear friend’s wedding. All afternoon I have been thinking of him, helping him with his nerves, his glee, his fear, his details. Then, it’s ten past seven and the cantor has not shown up. She’s ten minutes late. All the guests are seated outside by the hoopa waiting for the ceremony. We wait another ten but she still does not show up. I feel sad for my friend now, and for his fiance. We call the cantor and realize that she is ninety minutes away still waiting for the limo (she had no number or address . . . quite strange, but there it was). I am certain things are going to end sadly this day and I feel scared. My friend turns to his father, who says, “Let’s go ahead with the ceremony, you can get legally married on Monday.” His attitude is light and uncharacteristically supportive. My friend smiles, turns to me, and says, “Dave, marry me.” My belly drops and I am swallowed by insecurity and self-doubt—but then something surges through me, something like courage and excitement and a love for my friend all mixing it up together. I rise to the occasion, and I lead the ceremony. To my surprise, everyone is moved—the reception is magical, and my heart grows three times in size.
As in earlier cases, David’s path of Self-realization here obviously is not a blissful, unitive state of consciousness. He had to encounter insecurity, self-doubt, and anxiety, as well as courage, love, and excitement. He was held in being, and he thus was able to hold a full range of his experience in responding to call, from the depths to the heights. But the point was, he responded, stood up for his friend, and allowed himself to be in service of something greater than himself.
The Chinese call this attitude wu-wei, or identification with the tao.
—Roberto Assagioli
CALL IN THE MOMENT: ANNE
Yet another call in the moment, received by Anne through the comments from a friend and a cup of ginger tea, is described as thus:
I was at a loss to be in touch with my center, with God, with Self. The need was acute, but my usual paths (writing, meditation, breathing, walking at the water, etc.) weren’t working. I was sick at the time, and intensely nauseated. A friend whom I called in desperation told me to stop trying so hard to reach this Self, and rather to work to alleviate the nausea and fatigue. What could I think of? I focused some, and considered ginger tea. I prepared some, drank it slowly (because it was hot), and began to feel better. Suddenly, I was aware of feeling centered, in touch with Self, reconnected to God and the Universe. . . . It entered me when I was doing a purely mundane thing, and I felt as touched as I’ve ever been by satisfying prayer, etc. I had realigned, and it had something to do—for me—with Self.
We can see the thread of this call as it reached Anne through her felt disconnection, her willingness to reach out, her friend’s sage advice, her intuition about ginger tea, and the simple, pragmatic act of drinking tea. Like Jamie, she was called out of her desperate search for Self by the very Self she was seeking. And while this call did indeed culminate in a wonderful sense of being held, Self-realization was occurring the whole time—her relationship to Self was present and active through all of these different events and experiences.
Clearly, even when we feel disconnected from Self, we are still in a relationship. Whether we feel union or distance, open or closed, conscious or unconscious, our relationship exists and seems to operate at some level deeper than all of this—a level of transcendence-immanence.
It is as if we are married to Self. Whether we forget this marriage, feel its fullness, or feel estranged from it, this abiding communion remains. Indeed, marriage may be one of the most accurate metaphors for the I-Self relationship. As with any committed relationship, this relationship cannot be limited to any single moment or special event, however wondrous; rather, it is lived out in all life events, for better or worse, in sickness and in health.
CALL AND PSYCHOSYNTHESIS THERAPY
This spiritual marriage—or at least spiritual courtship—between “I” and Self is recognized and facilitated in psychosynthesis therapy as well. The individual client invariably, if implicitly, embodies some desired sense of direction; there is some sense that things can be better than they are now, that there is something more to be revealed. In psychosynthesis therapy, this “something more” or sense of direction will be taken operationally as an invitation from Self and will be recognized in many different guises as the therapist remains empathic.
For example, this direction may be sensed as a feeling that life need not be as painful as it has been; or as a need for better interpersonal relationships; or as a wish to integrate spirituality more fully into one’s life. The issue of call also appears clearly in statements such as: “I am afraid that at the end of my life I will discover I missed my true vocation,” or, “I feel I have something to accomplish in life, but I don’t know what it is.” Sometimes we need a guide to help us clarify what it is we are seeking:
Client: Work is a mess, I’m being run ragged by all the pressures. It’s just way too much
Therapist: How would you wish to be at work? [Asking for direction.]
C: I don’t know, just feeling more peace, more spaciousness.
T: Have you ever felt that type of peace and spaciousness before? [Clarifying direction.]
C: Not for a long time, but I used to feel that way when my wife and I would go camping down in Big Sur.
T: Would you like to explore this more?
C: Sure.
T: Okay, take a moment to imagine you are there now, in Big Sur. How does it feel? Let yourself experience it in your body. [Allowing the state the client is seeking to become energetically present.]
C: [Closing his eyes; long pause.] It feels wonderful. I wish I could feel this way at work.
T: Can you imagine feeling this way at work?
C: Not really. It seems impossible.
T: What happens when you try?
C: I get scared that I won’t get anything done, that I’ll be irresponsible. [The obstacle to the direction is being triggered or energized, i.e., induction.]
T: Can you get an image for that one who is scared?
C: Yeah, it’s a little kid. It’s me, at school, scared about the work, feeling overwhelmed and alone. Being scolded by Mr. Rich.
T: What does that little kid need from you?
C: He needs me to listen to him, to hear his story, not let so much work be dumped on him, and yeah, not let him be yelled at.
As we have seen in preceding chapters, this type of work can unfold in many different ways and will mean healing his connection with the wounded aspect of himself. But as this occurs, the client will become more free to feel and express the qualities of peace and spaciousness at work. And, yes, this may mean active engagement with the inner and outer figures who scold him at work (recall the kind of active engagement that we saw in Ellen’s case in Chapter 3).
This sense of peace and spaciousness operate here as what Assagioli (1965a, 1973a) called an ideal model, something which represents our next attainable step in growth. This burgeoning new way of being—here peace and spaciousness—can be explored by writing about it, visualizing ourselves manifesting it, “acting as if” we are manifesting it, rendering it in creative expressions such as art and music, and seeking unifying centers which represent and support it.
So here is an example of Self-realization in psychosynthesis therapy. The revealed intention to have more peace and spaciousness represents a response to call or vocation, the acceptance of an invitation to a more authentic life. And, quite frequently, the obstacle that is inducted by a contact with call embodies the very aspects of the personality that are needed to respond. For example, this client found that the little kid part of him, as this was included in his life, held much of his ability to feel peaceful and spacious.
Furthermore, helping a client get in touch with his or her deeper direction allows the therapeutic work to be held in a positive context. We are not in therapy simply “working on problems” but attempting to clarify and move toward things that we care most deeply about. Developing this sense of direction in therapy is tremendously motivating and empowering to the client—gone is any need for the therapist to push or pull the client toward some notion of normality or adjustment.
This sense of direction, however inchoate, buried, or even distorted at times, obviously can be present in anyone. It seems that most people have some sense of identity in the present that includes some notion of the past, and some sense of direction toward something new, however ill defined and even unconscious that new possibility may be. Even the most tentative “buds” of call can, held within the empathic concern of the therapist, flower into a more conscious, meaningful direction for the client.
CALL AND AUTHENTIC UNIFYING CENTERS
A more structured way to work with call or direction is to ask the client to imagine a wise, loving person or a symbol of wisdom and love with whom she or he can have a conversation; this can be facilitated much like the dialogue work with subpersonalities, described earlier. Developing a relationship with such an inner figure has long been a technique in psychosynthesis practice (Assagioli 1965a; Brown 1983, 1993; Ferrucci 1982; Miller 1975; Whitmore 1991).
However, remembering our discussion of the various types of possible authentic unifying centers that someone might have, it also can be quite effective to refer to these important figures. For example, knowing that a client had a good, empathic connection with her grandmother, a therapist might ask, “What would your grandmother say to you about that?” Any authentic unifying center can be worked with in this way, from a cherished childhood pet, to a beloved teacher, to a favorite natural setting.
One client received a tremendous amount of inner support and wisdom by renewing her relationship with the mountains and forests where she spent her summers as a child. Developing an ongoing relationship with such authentic unifying centers is a powerful way to facilitate a relationship with Self. This approach is empowering for clients, as they learn to develop and work with their own sense of inner wisdom and direction.
So in speaking of a sense of direction, call, or invitation from Self, we do not mean to imply some ideal vision of how things might be, nor a wish-fulfilling fantasy of the conscious personality. Neither do we mean necessarily to imply some larger perception of meaning in life or the opening to transpersonal qualities. Much more simply and immediately, this direction is the person’s best sense of what life might be for her or him, however modest this may seem. And this direction may of course change and clarify as Self-realization becomes more conscious—the I-Self relationship is always a dynamic, changing interplay.
To sum up this discussion of Self-realization, we can say that it is the ongoing dynamic relationship between “I” and Self throughout all life experiences. This relationship may indeed at times involve an experience of profound unity “in which the sense of individual identity is dimmed and may even seem temporarily lost” (Assagioli 1973a, 128), a unity that temporarily obscures any distinction between “I” and Self at all. But the path of Self-realization also may lead through the abyss, through periods of isolation, fragmentation, and pain. In whatever experience, Self is present and available to relationship; in whatever experience, Self-realization is distinct but not separate from the type or content of experience; in whatever experience, the intimate relationship of “I” and Self abides.
Thus the psychotherapist must have a sense of vocation as well as a technique.
—Roberto Assagioli
In this book we have attempted to explore the broad outlines of psychosyn-thesis. Psychosynthesis personality theory has been presented in our discussion of the oval-shaped diagram, subpersonalities, authentic personality, survival personality, psychological disturbances, and “I”; developmental theory has been represented in the stages of psychosynthesis, the phases of personality harmonization, the concentric ring model of the person, personal psychosynthesis, transpersonal psychosynthesis, and Self-realization; and clinical theory has been present throughout, including cases in which various types of work were illustrated.
Note, however, that throughout this discussion there has been little emphasis on specific techniques or methodologies. We have described the terrain of the human journey without exploring the many particular methods of travel, so to speak. One reason for this is that psychosynthesis is fundamentally an orientation, a general approach to the whole human being, and it exists apart from any particular concrete applications. According to Assagioli:
If we now consider psychosynthesis as a whole, with all its implications and developments, we see that it should not be looked upon as a particular psychological doctrine, nor as a single technical procedure.
It is first and foremost a dynamic, even a dramatic conception of our psychological life. (1965a, 30)
Psychosynthesis provides a broad perspective of the human drama, from personal to transpersonal dimensions, from the individual to the larger world, and it attempts to base this perspective on phenomenological observation. And, as an overall perspective, psychosynthesis may suggest particular techniques and methods, but it nevertheless remains distinct from these.
This fact allows a rich variety of approaches and settings to be informed by psychosynthesis, from guided imagery, dream work, and hypnosis, to art therapy, sand tray, or body work, to cognitive-behavioral techniques, object relations, or family systems, to individual and group psychotherapy, meditation practices, or spiritual direction, to pastoral counseling, teaching, parenting, medicine, or religion, and to ecopsychology, environmental education, and ecological activism. Indeed, it is hard to think of a sphere in which the perspective of psychosynthesis cannot be useful.5
But more importantly, the breadth of the psychosynthesis perspective allows us to recognize and validate an extensive range of human experience: the vicissitudes of developmental difficulties and early trauma; the confrontation with existential identity, choice, and responsibility; the heights of inspired creativity, peak performance, and spiritual experience; and the search for purpose and meaning in life. None of these important areas of experience need be reduced to the other, and each can find its right place in the whole. This means that no matter what type of experience is engaged, and no matter what phase of growth is negotiated, the complexity and uniqueness of the individual person may be respected.
. . . the central, decisive importance of the human factor, of the living interpersonal relation between the therapist and the patient.
—Roberto Assagioli
It means approaching him or her with sympathy, with respect, even with wonder, as a “thou” and thus establishing a deeper inner relationship.
—Roberto Assagioli