A New Psychology
Psychology continues to push the boundaries of knowledge in the quest to
understand the working of the human psyche. It is surely one of the major
sciences of our age, reaching into all areas of human life: society, education,
criminology, ecology, feminism, the list is endless. Yet much psychological
thinking has been established through research into the problems of the mind
and emotions. Any new psychology must surely develop as well as models and
frameworks for understanding the positive and constructive potential of the
human psyche.
The last century saw many great thinkers working within this field of service
resulting in diverse thinking and theorising on the subject. Different schools
of thought laid particular emphasis on certain aspects of the human mind and emotions.
For some, the human psyche remains a brain-bound function of the human being. For
others, the idea that the mind and emotions may exist in different dimensions from
the body has wide appeal. Still others look beyond body, mind and emotion to the
notion that the human psyche extends into subtler levels still, the realm of the
transpersonal, the worlds of soul and spirit.
It was Carl Rogers, a psychologist of the last century and a major influence on the
development of client-centred therapy, who suggested that when he was closest to his
“inner, intuitive self” whatever he did was “full of healing.”
That there were times in therapy when his “inner spirit reached out and touched the
inner spirit of the other.”1 Such moments he described in terms of the
therapeutic relationship transcending itself and becoming a part of something larger.
Jean Hardy, writing of psychosynthesis, suggests that “the more the person becomes
what he or she could be, the more the unique individual becomes part of the
whole”2. Psychology, if it is to continue to develop for a new era in
which humanity strives to achieve global community, must integrate the spiritual within
its framework for explaining human behaviour and relationships. A psychology of right
relationship might then be developed that is truly inclusive of the human psyche.
Many of the pioneers in psychology today are the individuals seeking to know themselves
more fully, who are undergoing their own process of self-development. This may take
many forms—meditation, therapy, adventure, spiritual study—but the end
result is the same: greater self-awareness and self-knowledge. Yet with all the
knowledge that psychology brings us, what is of greatest importance is its application.
It must surely bring us freedom to become increasingly sensitive and responsive to
the soul or spirit aspect of the human psyche.
The work of Triangles contributes to this process of freeing humanity to express
its spiritual essence. Daily we energise the network of light and goodwill through
which these deeper levels of the human psyche can impress themselves on human hearts
and minds, affecting the relationships that we create within ourselves, with each
other, with the world around us, and with the Divine.
1 Rogers, C R. (1983) A Way of Being. Houghton Mifflin, Boston
2 Hardy, J. (1987) A Psychology with a Soul. Arkana, London
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