{"title":"From romantic jealousy to sympathetic joy: Monogamy, polyamory, and beyond","authors":"Jorge N. Ferrer","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.185","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.185","url":null,"abstract":"This paper explores how the extension of contemplative qualities to intimate relationships can transform human sexual/emotional responses and relationship choices. The paper reviews contemporary findings from the field of evolutionary psychology on the twin origins of jealousy and monogamy, argues for the possibility to transform jealousy into sympathetic joy (or compersion), addresses the common objections against polyamory (or nonmonogamy), and challenges the culturally prevalent belief that the only spiritually correct sexual options are either celibacy or (lifelong or serial) monogamy. To conclude, it is suggested that the cultivation of sympathetic joy in intimate bonds can pave the way to overcome the problematic dichotomy between monogamy and polyamory, grounding individuals in a radical openness to the dynamic unfolding of life that eludes any fixed relational identity or structure.","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42387544","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sexuality, esoteric energies, and the subtleties of transmutation versus transformation","authors":"B. Barratt","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.166","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.166","url":null,"abstract":"Transpersonal perspectives on the meaningfulness of being human, and especially the significance of subtle energy teachings, necessitate a rethinking of the notion of sexuality, beyond definitions in terms of sex acts, biological endowments, or perhaps even the complex fantasia of desire. This redefining of the erotic dimension of human life leads both to appreciation of healing as inherently sexual and to understanding how the processes of transmutation by the forces of subtle energies profoundly differ from the transformations that representation of thoughts, feelings, and wishes may undergo. Cognitive access (including that of reflective self-consciousness) to these forces is inevitably limited and necessarily distorted. In this context, it is suggested that the esoteric traditions of mystical sexuality, including the teachings of authentic tantric practice, be reconsidered and appreciated for their transpersonal dimension.","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41582002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The religious and philosophical characteristics in a consensually nonmonogamous sample","authors":"A. Kolesar, Seth T. Pardo","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.99","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.99","url":null,"abstract":"Consensual nonmonogamy refers to the variety of ways people partner romantically and/or sexually with multiple others. This study examined the spiritual identities of people who self-identify as consensually and openly partnered with more than one person, as well as if and how these identities changed since childhood. Moreover, to deepen previous transpersonal research that investigated how nonmonogamous paradigms of loving contribute to spiritual development, the study also examined between group differences of whether nonmonogamous sexual behavior and spirituality are emotionally linked. Data were gathered from 484 participants; they were mostly college-educated, Caucasian, bisexual women in their 30s, who were raised in moderately conservative, Judeo-Christian households. The majority self-identified as polyamorous. Between-group differences tests revealed that participants reported lower degrees of religiosity and greater degrees of liberalism since childhood, and a change from more traditional to nonreligious but spiritual values in adulthood. Data also suggested that pagan spiritualities may provide more supportive philosophical and spiritual frameworks that normalize and validate nonmonogamous behavior, nonheterosexual interests, sexual desire, and the sacredness of sexuality. Clinical implications of these findings are discussed.","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42725229","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sexual Ecstasy Scale: Conceptualizations and measurement","authors":"John Elfers, Reid Offringa","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.66","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.66","url":null,"abstract":"This article describes the development of the Sexual Ecstasy Scale, an instrument designed to measure the specific features that emerge when sexual arousal is the trigger for an ecstatic experience. Drawing from descriptions of features of sexual ecstasy in the phenomenological literature, the authors generated an initial survey of 31 items. In Study 1, the survey was completed by a wide demographic sample (N = 331). Exploratory factor analysis revealed a 4-factor solution that was replicated in Study 2 using confirmatory factor analysis with an independent sample (N = 331) that showed strong fit indices. Internal consistency for the overall scale and subscales was high with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.873. Positive correlations with measures of emotional, sexual, and spiritual intimacy, and a measure of self-transcendence were used to establish convergent validity. The absence of correlations with measures of personal esteem and life satisfaction was used to distinguish the continuum of sexual ecstasy from other personality factors. The results show that ecstatic sexual experience is consistent with other measures of peak experience and heightened emotion while demonstrating the ability to measure the specific features of the construct. Conclusions are drawn regarding the importance of the ecstatic features of sexuality to transpersonal psychology.","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42658366","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sexual consent as transcendence: A phenomenological understanding","authors":"Mark A. Levand, Nicolle Zapien","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.154","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.154","url":null,"abstract":"Consent to sex is a topic of much research, particularly with the goal of optimizing sex education for youth, college students, and military service personnel. Sex educators have tended to err on the side of clear and concise definitions of consent for ease of instruction. However, the sexual science literature has steadily shown that the navigation of consent to sexuality activity is much more nuanced, situated and contextual. When consent is conceptualized as a yes or no answer to particular sexual acts or sexual activity altogether, it overlooks the dynamic nature of how people experience consenting. This article examines consent in the sexual science research literature and then considers these findings through the lens of some of the contributions of phenomenological philosophy. We then discuss the experience of consent as a dialogic process that can lead to moments of transcendence of the self and deep reverence for the other, despite some moments of lack of clarity or ambiguity within the same sexual act.","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49508211","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Science and a whole person psychology: Can participatory empiricism ease the way forward?","authors":"Jack, Schwarz","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.iii","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.iii","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43122048","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Intimations of a spiritual New Age: III. Martin Heidegger's phenomenology of numinous/Being experience and the \"Other Beginning\" of a futural planetary spirituality","authors":"H. Hunt","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.1","url":null,"abstract":"The phenomenology of numinous or Being-experience in the later Heidegger is the focus in this third in a series of papers on a group of independent figures— also including Jung, Reich, Toynbee, Teilhard de Chardin, and Simone Weil—who beginning in the crisis years of the 1930s envisioned versions of a futural “New Age” spirituality to address a globalizing materialism and its disenchantments—and so also creating a context for much of contemporary transpersonal and consciousness studies. A preliminary consideration of Heidegger in the contexts of transpersonal psychology, religious studies, the macro-histories of Toynbee and Sorokin, James on “pure experience,” and spirituality as intelligence must also lead to some reckoning with Heidegger’s disastrous initial involvement with National Socialism. Considered here in terms of a spiritual metapathology of narcissistic inflation/grandiosity, it was his way past this episode that led from the mid 1930s on into his radical critique of a globalizing technology of universal commodification and to an answering futural potential for a spiritual “Other Beginning” and “last god”—re-sacralizing humanity for the “guardianship” and “sheltering” of planet and life.","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42033867","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Science and a Whole Person Psychology: Can Participatory Empiricism Ease the Way Forward?","authors":"G. Hartelius","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2018.38.1.iii","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2018.38.1.iii","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":"38 1","pages":"2"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"69306283","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Introduction to the special topic on transpersonal sexuality: Bringing sexy back to transpersonal studies","authors":"S. A. Malkemus, Marie I. Thouin-Savard","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.59","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2019.38.1.59","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"69306289","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Introduction to the Special Topic Section on Integral Yoga Psychology: The Challenge of Multiple Integrities","authors":"D. Banerji","doi":"10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.1.27","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.1.27","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":38668,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Transpersonal Studies","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43255207","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}