Spotlight on Transpersonal Psychology
As the only accredited institution in North America devoted to the study of Transpersonal Psychology, the curriculum in each program at the school consistently contains cutting-edge courses on this topic. The following is a list of courses that have been offered in the past at ITP. Courses are offered based upon the interests of the current student body and faculty availability. Please consult the academic course schedule for each program of interest for classes offered at this time.
The Fourth Force: Proseminar in Transpersonal and Spiritual Psychology
Transpersonal psychology holds an expanded view of human nature, which includes areas such as spiritual growth, peak experiences, higher values, human development, and a holistic mind-body-spirit integration of the self. The objectives of this course are for students to become familiar with the body of knowledge about transpersonal development, to learn how it can be studied with research and critical thinking, and the applications for human well being.
Philosophical Issues of Transpersonal Psychology: Concepts of Self
This course introduces students to five authors who are “creative iconoclasts.” To the extent that those in the field of psychology hold concepts of self that go unquestioned, these authors highlight such concepts, examine them with fresh eyes, and offer alternative ways of viewing both Self and the context of Self— in love relationships, in family, society, nature, and the cosmos.
It is the aim of the course to help students develop an eye for the unexamined premise and the skills for examining it; fresher, deeper and wider ways to view the Self—approaching it with fresh faculties (e.g. the intuitive in addition to the rational) and approaching it in fresh contexts (erotic, cross-cultural, scientific, dialectical, etc.); an appreciation for what it means to practice “philosophy,” or, to be true to the Greek, the “love of wisdom,” in an embodied fashion; an ability to articulate and express one’s own views clearly and vividly.
Philosophical Issues of Transpersonal Psychology: The Self and the Collective
In this course students will address philosophical underpinnings of the self as well as underpinnings provided by religion. Students will review major religions, including Goddess religion, using disciplines such as theology and the history-of-an-idea (A History of God). In addition, students will use hermeneutical methodology (cf. Feminism and World Religions) and cross-cultural perspective (Tibetan Book of Living and Dying) to flush out “dominant culture” premises that might otherwise slip below the radar –premises that might privilege male over female or West over East. The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying challenges the Western neglect of, if not hostility toward, death and dying. The Divine Feminine and Coming Home challenge failing attitudes toward the ecosphere and ethnosphere and delineate instead a new awareness and a new cherishing.
The course will communicate skills for careful and thoughtful research, whether one approaches the Bible (A History of God), poems and myths (Divine Feminine), visual presentations (Coming Home) or politics and metaphysics (The Republic and A Brief History of Everything). In that sense, students learn to apply a filter of transpersonal psychology to a wide variety of disciplines and modes, in keeping with ITP’s interdisciplinary and multimedia education.
Philosophical Issues of Transpersonal Psychology: Cognition and Behavior; Contemporary and Wisdom Psychologies
The purpose of this course is to encourage students to learn how to narrow focus. Once one masters the ability to use philosophical and socio-cultural lenses to examine premises, one then should be able to bring such sophisticated analysis to specifically investigate the field of transpersonal psychology. Over and above an exploration of classical theories of psychology, including behavioral, psychoanalytic and cognitive theories this course will also focus on psychology of religion and in this manner continue to deepen your knowledge of psychology beyond ego.
Material will be utilized from wisdom psychologies around the world, including the work of Chodron and Vaughan. Both of these authors also introduce pragmatic viewpoints on how to bring theory to bear on spiritual practice and in psychotherapy. An author who emphasizes the physiological/biological substratum, along with and interacting with the transpersonal, is the psychiatrist Stan Grof. Like Vaughan he thinks both deep and wide. They are longtime innovators in and custodians of the transpersonal discipline.
The course is designed to help students develop interdisciplinary, multicultural, multimodal and political capacities to bring to the study of transpersonal psychological issues; thoughtful and informed views on translating transpersonal psychology into practice; and increasing clarity on where one stands on transpersonal psychological questions.
Social Applications of Transpersonal Psychology
This course surveys global issues and available resources, after which the student selects an issue on which to do further research, or an issue to develop and implement a plan of action which contributes to the transformation of the world community using personal interests, values, and assets. The culmination of the course is the Social Applications Project where students will carry out their chosen project or plan of action. By studying Social Applications of Transpersonal Psychology students will have an opportunity to explore and reflect upon the world in which one lives. Students will also be encouraged to explore an integral, holistic model for thinking about and acting as an effective social change agent in a world culture influenced by rapid change.
A Transpersonal Approach to Family Systems
This course is an exploration and application of a family systems theory, providing students with an opportunity to search for patterns in their own family history through the generations. Students will be introduced to techniques of family chronology including the genogram, as well as a clinical approach to Bowen family systems. The transpersonal tools of dreamwork and journaling will further the exploration. Feminist revisions of family systems theory are presented as well.
Students are expected to keep a journal throughout the course to capture insights into one’s own family story. The course includes an assignment to read about and ponder a feminist critique of Bowen’s theory. Students will then have the opportunity to consider their own attitudes about gender, class, race and culture, and those in one’s family. As an added element to the class, students may elect to explore Pennebakers’ technique for letting go of trauma though writing.
Transpersonal Psychology: Theory, Research, and Integration
This course explores the interface of psychology and spiritual disciplines in transpersonal psychology. This course defines the field; looks at the history of transpersonal psychology; explores the scope of transpersonal psychology; and delves into some specific fields of integration or application. We will introduce principle concepts, assumptions, and practices. There will be space given for direct exploration and experience of the subject matter in an integrated manner.
Transpersonal Psychotherapy
What makes transpersonal psychotherapy different from the more traditional talk psychotherapies? The answer is connection to the Divine, Spirit, and the All, connection to the stories/myths of our ancestors, ritual, prayer, and meditation. Yet how does one invite the Divine into the therapeutic container? This course will attempt to answer this question via research, group discussion, and dyad role-playing.
The course is structured through the exploration of nine common existential issues/archetypes from a variety of religious, spiritual, philosophical, and mythic lenses Students will have hands-on experience of when and how to bring the transpersonal into the psychotherapeutic setting. In addition, students will learn how to blend symptom relief along with a deeper transpersonal meaning and wisdom and improve pragmatic psychotherapeutic skills.
Approaches to Transpersonal Psychotherapy
This course examines the current and potential interchange between Eastern and Western psychotherapeutic methods and belief systems. It integrates transpersonal theory into psychotherapy and offers a variety of ways of working with clients including dreamwork, meditation, altered states of consciousness, somatic approaches to therapy, and psychosynthesis. Also examined is the interface between transpersonal and more traditional/established forms of psychotherapy. Several segments of the course will introduce students to different ways to integrate principles and practices of Eastern psychologies and spiritual disciplines. Particular attention is given to the use of meditation. At the conclusion of the course, students should have a working knowledge and appreciation of a variety of different transpersonal approaches in psychotherapy as they are applied by a broad range of transpersonal practitioners.
Psychospiritual Integration and Transformation
The goal of this class is to develop personal and professional skills and methods to integrate psychological and spiritual issues and to transform ourselves to live the integral consciousness and to help clients in their transformation. The class will be based mainly on the tenets of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother (Mira Alfassa), their lived experience and teachings of psychospiritual integration and transformation. The instructors have been using this method in the practice of psychospiritual integration with clients and in a group for integral consciousness for more than eighteen years. We will share our experiences and method of developing this integral consciousness, psychospiritual integration and transformation in this learning community. The class will consist of experiences, exercises and readings, case presentations, writing and creative projects. The class will require students to engage in personal exploration alone and in the class.
Transpersonal Listening Skills
This course is a hands-on class in the transpersonal nature of listening as an active, participatory event. Students are expected to “try-on” skills and practice them mindfully to broaden their interpersonal awareness and skills. The goals of the course are to enable students to increase awareness and understanding of the nature of communication and it’s impact upon other beings and larger systems; to begin to look at patterns or cycles as a way to predict and enrich communication; an to further the student’s integration of theory and practice.
Forgive for Good: The Art and Science of Forgiveness
The primary focus of this class is to learn and practice a research proven method of training forgiveness. In this class forgiveness will be explored first for forgiving others and secondarily for forgiving oneself. The forgiveness method taught is based from behavioral medicine practices that include journaling, breath meditation, heart centered meditation, changing narratives, and using cognitive disputation. In addition, forgiveness as it relates to both clinical practice and political violence will be explored. The course includes readings, lecture, discussion, and in depth personal practice of the “Forgive for Good” methodology.
Group Process with a Transpersonal Psychology Perspective: The Tao of Leadership
This course offers us opportunities to learn about Group Process from a Transpersonal Psychology perspective, more specifically from an alternative Eastern transpersonal view of Self-leadership and Group-leadership. Emphasis will be on an integrative life approach to the study of leadership development. We will study how we can develop transpersonal leadership within one’s true Self and within a group process. We will attempt to discover guiding principles and methods throughout our study, so that we can begin to integrate them into a new Transpersonal Psychology of Self-cultivation, leadership, and transformation. Most importantly, the principles and methods that serve Self-development and Self-leadership are the very same ones that serve Social-development, leadership, and transformation.
We will approach our study by examining the world spiritual tradition of Taoism as an alternative way for humanity to develop Self-leadership as well as Group-leadership. We will follow the sacred text of the Tao Te Ching and its teachings as our guide. Through this study, we will search for a higher transpersonal life purpose, practice of freedom, and transformation through the Tao of leadership. We will discover significant psycho-spiritual guiding principles and methods in realizing our transpersonal nature. We will apply these lessons from our discourse to our ordinary everyday life, to rediscover a truly integrative way of living and practice.
Research on Exceptional Human Experiences
This three-part Research Group will involve faculty and student explorations of various aspects of exceptional human experiences (mystical/unitive, psychic, transpersonal, and transformative experiences). We will emphasize the rich description, life impacts, meanings, interpretations, implications, and possible practical applications of such experiences. In the Research Group projects we will pay particular attention to (a) the role and power of intention in these experiences; (b) time-related aspects of these experiences; and (c) the relevance of such experiences to typically unquestioned premises and assumptions of science, psychology, and various spiritual and wisdom traditions.
The Research Group will begin with students assisting in the development, conduct, and extension of present faculty research projects. Specifically, students will contribute to, and support in some way, William Braud’s research and thinking regarding exceptional human experiences, the power of intention, time-related “anomalies,” and questioning premises and assumptions. Thereafter, students will be encouraged to design and conduct projects that are variants of the initial projects. The three-part course will involve combinations of collaborative and individual projects of research and scholarship.
Research Group: Peace Psychology
The field of psychology has a long history of contributing to the development, implementation, advocacy, and evaluation of public policies, but not always in the interest of peace and social justice. This research group has been exploring the various dimensions of peace psychology, and the contributions psychology can make to the process of conflict resolution and the elimination of violence in the 21st Century. As we continue to review the most current research, we will also continue the work we have done in the past on a project that will further the research effort.
Taoism and Existential Psychology
This course explores the Taoist and existentialist perspectives on the human predicament and the means to its resolution, particularly in terms of theory and practice in psychotherapy. We will examine the historical origins, cultural context, major tenets, and practices of each enterprise. Clinical relevance of views of the self (assuming there is one), interpersonal life, health, illness, freedom, meaning, alienation, and death. Emphasis will be placed on the on encounter and dialogue between these two traditions, rather than synthesis or integration.
