THE PROCESSES ACCORDING TO ESALEN Using the World’s Greatest Growth Center To Build Your Own Integral Growth Program Hugh & Amalia Kaye Martin P.O. Box 1736 Sebastopol, CA 95473
[email protected] Copyright Hugh Martin & Co. January 2009 The Processes According to Esalen, Page 2 PROLOGUE A REPRIEVE FROM DEATH Hugh Martin remembers his early years at Esalen: “I first discovered Esalen in the Spring of 1965, just three years after its founding. I had been diagnosed with advanced-stage Hodgkin’s Disease lymphatic cancer, and given just two years to live. To make the best of my last days on earth, I had dropped the intensive stress of grad school, and traveled via Berkeley to California’s rugged Big Sur coast in search of a new life. With my young wife (a ‘Joan Baez with curves’) and baby daughter, I settled in a little cabin in the Redwoods, only accessible in mid-winter by an undulating suspension footbridge over a rag- ing stream. From there, my family and I commuted to Esalen Institute, for volunteer work de- veloping the grounds of the new Growth Center. While there, we meshed with the Esalen com- munity, and plunged into the Esalen experience – brutal hotseats with the the infamous Fritz Perls, soul-stripping encounter groups with the tough-but-caring Will Schutz, graceful Tai Chi ballets with Yoda-like Gia Fu Feng, exuberant dance, throbbing drums, soothing sensory aware- ness by the baths, searing acid mind-trips on windy ridge-tops, free sex, savage fist fights, and group hugs. Eventually, as my health and stability recovered, I was offered the position of Esa- len general manager (by Esalen co-founder Dick Price) -- and later, of Perls’ video cameraman – both of which I declined in favor of a life back in the ‘real world.’ Through the influence of Esa- len, of Gestalt Therapy (Gene Sagan), of Reichian Therapy (Gerald Frank), of my third wife Kaye, and of a generous and forgiving God, my cancer completely vanished, and I went on to lead a happy and successful life.