{"title":"The Self and the Structure of the Personality: An Overview of Sri Aurobindo’s Topography of Consciousness","authors":"M. Cornelissen","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.63","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.63","url":null,"abstract":"Sri Aurobindo’s Integral Yoga aimed not only at what he called the realization of the Divine, but also at an integral transformation of human nature under Divine influence. For this exceptionally wide aim, he developed an exceptionally deep and comprehensive frame for understanding human nature. His concepts, as discussed in this paper, must be understood on their own terms, which are often different from meanings attributed in the conventional language of Western psychology. This paper provides a detailed account of Sri Aurobindo’s conceptualization of the various centers of identity and of the vertical and concentric dimensions he used to describe the structure of the personality. It explains the importance Sri Aurobindo gave to the location where one places one’s consciousness, and indicates why he argued that consciousness is not only awareness, but also force. Finally, this paper describes how Sri Aurobindo visualized the still ongoing evolution of consciousness and humanity’s role in it.","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":"43956463","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":"Does Spiritual Awakening Exist? Critical Considerations in the Study of Transformative Postconventional Development","authors":"G. Hartelius","doi":"10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.2.III","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.2.III","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":"44763604","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 Unconscious in Sri Aurobindo: A Study in Integral Psychology","authors":"I. Sen","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.120","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.120","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":"46332289","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":"A Matter of Heart and Soul: The Value of Positing a Personal Ontological Center for Developmental Psychology","authors":"Elizabeth M. Teklinski","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.90","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.90","url":null,"abstract":"A whole person understanding of postconventional development needs to offer a facilitative agent, what is here called a psychocentric dimension, with a unique and necessary role in the transformation of individual consciousness, that complements and completes the egocentric and cosmocentric domains. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother’s writings and praxis concerning what they called the psychic being may elucidate an alternative frame to current theoretical speculations, in a way that may offer a new synthesis and a more theoretically satisfying interpretation. More specifically, it is hoped that an integral yoga psychology framework for postconventional development can meaningfully account for the transformation of individual consciousness by rendering the psychic being as the definitive reference point, facilitative agent, basis, source, originating point of the self and-or cause for the process of self-individuation of postconventional consciousness.","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":"44769935","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":"Haridas Chaudhuri's Contributions to Integral Psychology","authors":"Bahman A. K. Shirazi","doi":"10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.1.55","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.1.55","url":null,"abstract":"This article provides a summary of Haridas Chaudhuri’s contributions to the field of integral psychology. First an outline and a brief discussion of his principal tenets and triadic principle of integral psychology are presented, followed by a review of Chaudhuri’s critical reflections on some aspects of early transpersonal psychology. The article concludes with a reflection on recent trends in the field of transpersonal psychology and its evolution toward a whole person orientation compatible with integral psychology.","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":"46234456","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":"Well-being and Self-transformation in Indian Psychology","authors":"Sangeetha Menon, Shankar Rajaraman, Lakshmi Kuchibotla","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.13","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2018.37.1.13","url":null,"abstract":"This paper uses instances from literature covering a broad spectrum of Indian philosophies, art, medicine and practices—attempts to offer the components of a psychology that is rooted in transformative and transpersonal consciousness. Psychology, in this instance, refers to a systematic study of mind, behavior, and relationship, rather than the formal Western discipline as such. In the Indian approach to understanding consciousness, primary importance is given to the possibility of well-being. Such an approach facilitates an immediate comprehension of the unity of metaphysical opposites, such as matter and consciousness, and its experience as empathy, love and intuition. It involves a thinking that connects the gross and the subtle, the particular and the universal, the outer and the inner, the objective and the subjective, through a discipline of transcendence. This paper argues, based on carefully selected narratives from the Indian philosophical discourse, that the theories of the transpersonal developed in Indian wisdom traditions are founded on a practical body-mind discipline designed to lead to well-being and self-transformation.","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":"46167586","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}
B. Robbins, H. Friedman, Chad V. Johnson, Zeno Franco
{"title":"Subjectivity Is No Object: Can Subject-Object Dualism Be Reconciled Through Phenomenology?","authors":"B. Robbins, H. Friedman, Chad V. Johnson, Zeno Franco","doi":"10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.2.144","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.2.144","url":null,"abstract":"Transpersonal psychology has at times critiqued the broader psychology field for perpetrating a somewhat arbitrary Cartesian subject-object divide. Some phenomenologists claim that reframing this purported divide as an experienced phenomenon can defuse its philosophical impact. If subjective experiences are viewed as continuous with the lifeworld out of which objective phenomena are abstracted, the divide between these is revealed as a somewhat arbitrary, if useful, construction. This, in turn, challenges psychology to engage with subjective phenomena in a more substantive way. In this paper based on excerpts from a protracted email conversation held on the American Psychological Association’s Humanistic Psychology (Division 32) listserv, two academic psychologists with transpersonal interests explore this extraordinary claim of phenomenology, one being a proponent and the other being a skeptic of the claim. Two other academic psychologists with transpersonal interests who participated in this dialogue comment on its relevance for transpersonal psychology. The conversation focuses on the ideas of Husserl and Heidegger, and emphasizes how phenomenology might reconcile the subject-object divide through exploring intentionality, the meaning of noetic/noema, and thinking itself, while the discussion serves as an example of an adversarial collaboration in which disagreeing parties seek deeper understanding through dialogue.","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":"42326414","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}
Srikanth N. Jois, S. Nagaraj, K. Prasad, L. D'souza
{"title":"Training in Aura Reading: Results from a Small Quasi-Experimental Study in India (Research Note)","authors":"Srikanth N. Jois, S. Nagaraj, K. Prasad, L. D'souza","doi":"10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.2.171","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/IJTS.2018.37.2.171","url":null,"abstract":"The aura is believed to be an invisible field surrounding the physical body, interpenetrating and extending beyond it. The present study examines whether appearance of an aura-like phenomenon around the hand can be perceived visually after a short training session. A quasi-experimental research design was employed with 47 participants with a mean age of 19 years. Results from before and after attempting to view an aura-like phenomenon around the hand were analyzed using Contingency Coefficient analysis. The results suggest that an aura-like phenomenon can be detected around the hand since the participants narrated several experiences that were novel (p < .001). We found a significant increase (p = .009) in the number of reports of positive thoughts among the respondents during the session in which an aura-like phenomenon was experienced.","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":"49007760","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":"Re-veiling the Revealed: Insights into the Psychology of “Enlightenment” from the Kabbalah","authors":"B. Lancaster","doi":"10.24972/ijts.2018.37.2.73","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.24972/ijts.2018.37.2.73","url":null,"abstract":"I explore psychological aspects of a mystically-awakened state as depicted in the Kabbalah. This awakened state is portrayed using imagery of light and is associated with wisdom. The path towards the state entails intense hermeneutic work, and the core characteristic of the awakened person is the ability to see into that which is concealed—be it in scriptural texts, fellow humans, or the outer world. The primary distinction between this kabbalistic state and awakened states as portrayed in recent psychological and perennialist conceptions is the importance of cognitive and intellectual components in the former. I argue that cultural constructions of spiritual goals are impoverished when such intellectual aspects are omitted, and that these aspects can be viewed in meaningful psychological terms.","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":"45487834","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}