PSYCHOSYNTHESIS: A PSYCHOLOGY WITH A SOUL by Diana Whitmore Published in Counselling: The BACP Counselling Reader Volume Two: August 2001 PSYCHOSYNTHESIS : A PSYCHOLOGY WITH A SOUL Diana Whitmore Initial motivation : freedom from pain progressive context within which the “It hurts” “ I want to feel better” “ I want client can experience herself and make to know what is happening to me”. “I choices rather than merely mend want to be free.” Every good therapist brokenness. A client will report many will want to respond sensitively to what experiences which will prompt the is motivating a client in the moment. Psychosynthesis therapist to speculate as Nearly always our initial motivation follows : What is trying to emerge involves a deep pain we are experiencing through these difficulties and what which usually reflects a much deeper potential growth is contained within need contained within the pain and the them ? If the client was unconsciously problem. People seek therapy because seeking a step forward, what might it be they are in pain. Pain in this context is ? What old behaviour pattern is dying in one of the most powerful motivating order for something new to be born ? forces for change. The good news is that, This attitude provides a way of although seemingly negative, this step “reframing” experience, enabling the provides a healthy, energizing and life- creative potential within a problem to be affirming force for the beginning of the actualized. therapeutic work. Psychosynthesis maintains that when an The existential crisis individual seeks to enter therapy, there is Also among those who seek therapy are invariably more lying beneath the many who are basically healthy and able immediately obvious. We could question to function well but who experience a whether our problems in life are sense of dissatisfaction with the quality “distractions to be got rid of” – the result of life and long for greater fulfillment. of inadequacy – or psychological There may be a need conscious or wounding from childhood experiences. unconscious to expand individual Alternatively, we could entertain the identity beyond personal existence. The hypothesis that problems and obstacles choice to enter counselling can reflect a at their deepest level are inherently life-affirming impulse which transcends meaningful, evolutionary, coherent and the confines of conventional life – a potentially transformative. Perhaps it is search for meaning, for purpose and a no accident that various conflicts deeper identity leads to this choice. become foreground issues at particular Although a person may appear to be times in our lives. Old psychological integrated and to live a more or less forms die in order for new ones to be successful life with many goals born. The energy of conflict is the achieved, her life can lose its lustre and energy of transformation. become somewhat grey and meaningless. The things in life that were Reframing pathology : the creative once rewarding may become no longer use of pain and crisis so. This is not neurosis, for often the Psychosynthesis hypothesizes a model of individual can stand on her own two “emerging purpose” which provides a feet. What does she do then ? just stand there ? She may ask herself questions neurotic elements must be brought into like : “What am I here for ? What is the consciousness and transformed. meaning of my life ? What is my place Psychosynthesis counselling begins by in the world ? There must be more to life assessing the client’s blocks and than this !” These pertinent questions potentials to allow for a purposeful may drive a person to seek therapy. exploration of the unconscious. In order to reach the roots of psychological The process of therapy complexes, childhood experiences are un Assagioli likens the three principal covered with particular regard to the stages of Psychosynthesis therapy to impact they currently have on the Dante’s Divine Comedy : first there is client’s life. Our past, our history, our the descent into the Inferno which childhood experiences do not sit quietly represents the psychodynamic phase of in the basement of our psyche. descent into the lower unconscious : then Repression, suppression or denial of the journey through Purgatory which feelings creates emotional stress. resembles working with the client’s Psychosynthesis works extensively to existential reality : and finally the ascent release the grip of the past and to learn to paradise which symbolise exploring to express real but buried feelings in the the transpersonal dimension of the present. When a natural capacity for psyche. expression of feelings is redeemed, emotional health can be re-established. Our perception is also conditioned and The past : assessment of the coloured by our history. From past unconscious experiences, defense mechanisms are Psychosynthesis has its roots in formed which preserve the stability of psychoanalysis. Before founding the personality but do so at the expense Psychosynthesis, Dr Roberto of distorting reality. They lower anxiety Assagioli(1888-1974) was a member of in order to maintain a stable level of the Freud Society in Zurich in 1910 and functioning. Initially these defenses together with various other pioneers of serve us well but later they may restrict the psychoanalytic movement was our quality of life. These “loyal soldiers” among the first to bring psychoanalysis must be acknowledged for how they to Italy. have served us in the past but then The first step in Psychosynthesis is the released as obsolete. attainment of a certain level of self- Psychosynthesis contends that the past knowledge, the ability to move within may have an even deeper function in one’s inner world with some degree of determining the quality of our life as awareness. The influence of our adults. Our inner life and world may be childhood is multi-dimensional, often incongruent with our outer life which indirect and pervasive. It profoundly contributes to a sense of inauthenticity. affects our capacity for love and As a result, the integrity of feeling at intimacy, for assertion and self- home in the world may be lacking. affirmation : it determines our Mentally too, our history influences our perception of life and colours our attitudes, beliefs and philosophies about deepest attitudes and values. Unless we life. We may, for example, are to remain puppets to the past, our unconsciously believe that people cannot be trusted or that we will never get our psychological system and it will colour needs met. These basic attitudes will in vividly her attitudes and expectations. turn condition our image of reality. The memories belonging to such a life The main difference between pattern will have a similar basic theme psychodynamic work with the and carry a strong emotional charge of unconscious and psychosynthetic work the same quality. For example a pattern is that Psychosynthesis delves into the of low self-esteem will contain the past in a focused way on particular life client’s memories of past experiences of issues. Indiscriminate delving into the the humiliating and degrading situations unconscious is not encouraged. The that damaged it. These life experiences client’s presenting problem will evoke a will form identities which form further exploration into the roots and autonomous configurations within the historical background. The principle in personality. They are discrete Psychosynthesis is for awareness to be psychological identities, co-existing as a expanded into the unconscious regarding multitude of lives within one person : an issue in the client’s life and then for each with its own specific behaviour that awareness to be integrated in a pattern and corresponding self-image, controlled manner. This work with the feelings and beliefs. Their unique unconscious will include attention to characteristics form a relatively unified dynamics of transference and counter- whole. transference. The transferred childhood Each of our identities has an exclusive pattern which clients unconsciously “live way of experiencing and responding to again” in their relationship with the life. We are often different when we are therapist, needs also to be addressed. with our children compared to when we are in our workplace or in certain The present : exploration of challenging situations we quickly lose subpersonalities and identity the calm, self-assured demeanour that Experiences which are familiar and we display most of the time. When we repetitious are often to be found in the shift our identifications in this way it is client’s presenting problems. It is as if often in reaction to the demands of the some uncontrollable force is situation and in response to the conditioning both inner and outer unconscious feelings evoked. We are experience. Recurring situations, unaware of the expectations from the seemingly out of the client’s control, environment and the demands of our result in predictable and limited inner world that control us. We are behavioural responses. Every chronic caught in ambivalence, confusion or life pattern has its historical base, its conflict. biography, often traumatic around which These identifications are usually many other painful experiences unconscious and largely beyond our accumulate. Whether positive or control. Our identifications will change negative, the core experience tends to in response to the demands of both inner repeat itself again and again, forming a and outer conditions much more than our generalized behaviour pattern which in desire and will. If we identify too closely similar situations evokes similar with one aspect of our personality, we responses. Eventually the client will lose accessibility to the rest of our perceive her whole world through this personality. We need to free ourselves from the limited and dominating increasing dissatisfaction with behaviour of any one particular identity. competitive materialism, the pursuit of immediate gratification, as well as by a Self-identification and psychological conscious or unconscious search for freedom different and higher values an activities, A longer-term goal of Psychosynthesis a longing for what is sometimes termed therapy is the fostering of a stable sense “spiritual”.