Rembering Dr. Aaron T. Beck and Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in moving forward in counselling and psychotherapy in Asia

Abstract

As a global community, we are tested by various large-scale challenges – epidemiological, cultural, sociopolitical, and etc. These continually call upon our individual and collective capacities to strengthen our resilience, meaning, empathy and mutual support. As we remember those among us who have passed on, our fear, grief, and loss in the face of the spectres of illness and mortality are ever counter-balanced by our existential commitment: to recognize and embody the gifts, the legacies, and the enduring, living contributions of our honoured deceased. In the fall of 2021, the field of psychology felt the departure of two luminaries and historical giants of the profession, Dr. Aaron T. Beck and Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. The beauty, relevance, and utter timeliness of their contributions and of each of their life’s works adds poignancy to this loss. Both of these men contributed strongly to the precise tools and frameworks so crucial to human sustenance and to thriving-through difficult and uncertain times. Dr. Beck is widely acknowledged as the father of cognitive therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy, arguably the definitive approach to modern helping profession. His direct and indirect beneficial impacts on the lived experiences of countless human beings are prodigious: research, theoretical formulation, countless clinical hours, and most notably the shaping and training of future generations of subsequent scientists, doctors, researchers, and helping professionals up to and including the present-day (Beck, 1967, 1972, 1975, 1989, 1999; Beck & Alford, 2009; Beck et al., 2005, 2003) Dr. Csikszentmihalyi is recognized as one of the great contributors of Positive Psychology. He drew on his ongoing research and keen observations to develop the innovative and influential concept of ‘Flow’ – a vital human capacity of systemic engagement, long since integrated into the professional and popular lexicon. His works (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975, 1978, 1990, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2003, 2014)investigated, celebrated, and mapped out the human family’s diverse pathways to happiness, motivation, and creativity. In times of loss and instability, we seek out and engage inner and interpersonal resources to face pain; we gather courage and compassion; we creatively generate strategies of living and structures of meaning. Aiding, clarifying, and facilitating these worthy efforts is the essence of the counselling and therapeutic enterprise. The contributions of Aaron T. Beck and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi to this field were tremendous and the shadows of their influence stretch long. They live on through the many colleagues continuing to advance their work and in the countless people continuing to heal, to benefit, and to thrive by means of that work. ASIA PACIFIC JOURNAL OF COUNSELLING AND PSYCHOTHERAPY 2022, VOL. 13, NO. 1, 1–4 https://doi.org/10.1080/21507686.2022.2040125