What is Psychosynthesis?

The name "Psychosynthesis" was coined in 1910 with the early work of Italian psychiatrist, Roberto Assagioli. Dr. Assagioli was a colleague of Sigmund Freud, C. G. Jung, and Abraham Maslow. From the beginning, Assagioli recognized the need for a broad conception of human nature, for a cultivation of humanity's natural tendency toward harmony within himself and the world. Within his work, he combined methods and ideas of Western psychology with spiritually oriented Eastern traditions. This evolving approach provides a framework to facilitate self-development and personal growth, as well as a means to release the more sublime and spiritual aspects of human nature.

Working with Psychosynthesis one learns to recognize and experience the self as an active, or directing agent, with the will harmonizing the various psychological elements composing the personality. One learns to move one's center of awareness to deeper levels which include the Transpersonal or the Higher Self. It is at this level that our journey toward experiencing and living with unconditional love, joy, beauty, wisdom, compassion, creativity, and universal consciousness begins.

So we can think of this as a comprehensive approach to self-realization and the development of human potential. The essential aim of Psychosynthesis is to help people discover their true spiritual nature, then to effectively utilize this discovery in everyday life. Psychosynthesis helps us to realize our creative potential, increase our ability to function harmoniously in the modern world, and improve the quality of all our relationships, and to do what we want to do when we tune into our innermost sense of self and purpose. So Psychosynthesis is a kind of therapy, and it is a method of self improvement, but more than this, it is also a process that co-operates with the unfolding evolution of all nature. It aims to bring awareness, wholeness and connection to the process of evolution as it happens in each of us.

The practice of Psychosynthesis honors both the individual and the groups of which the individual is a part. Partly because of this inclusive attitude, and partly by the nature of its transpersonal connection, Psychosynthesis is not a way of putting ourselves above or over anyone else. We can honor and utilize our own wishes and power but not at the expense of other people. Psychosynthesis does not rigidly analyze or label people and it is expected that we will not do this either.

Many people in our modern world suffer from either one or both of two main crises. Firstly, there is the 'crisis of meaning'. Particularly in the western world but increasingly over the whole planet, many people live in an existential vacuum, where life has lost its meaning (beyond, at the best, the purely material). Psychosynthesis helps with the healing of this 'illness'. The second crisis is that of 'duality' - we do not know ourselves as whole, single entities, but are constantly torn between different desires and wishes. Psychosynthesis also works on the healing of this crisis through moving all the parts that make us up towards a clearer harmony - synthesis in fact.

Holistic Psychotherapy recognizes that each of us is constantly growing. This viewpoint helps to put meaning and value back into life, and helps us make decisions about who we are and what we want. It can also help us realize our responsibility both to ourselves and the world as a whole. It can add a dynamic sense of self to the present moment, and a sense of meaning to ourselves and to our future.

This approach can help you to 'know yourself' in the fullest sense of these words. In our modern world situation there is much strife between people on an individual and collective level. The state of our world on an ecological level is so poor due to the greed of some people and the mindlessness of others. There often seems to be such an appalling lack of care and understanding and so much unbalance, particularly in the interaction between people. Anything which helps people know themselves better, both as individuals and in the context of living a life in accord with others, has to be useful.

Psychosynthesis is an approach to self development that includes our spiritual as well as our physical, emotional and mental needs. Psychosynthesis aims to move us away from fragmentation and pain and towards integration and joy through including both the lighter and the darker sides of life.

Taking a "holistic" approach includes cutting edge practices for personal and spiritual development while closely following the original intention of Roberto Assagioli, the founder of Psychosynthesis, to include both psychological theory and the best from both Western and Eastern Mystery traditions. He said, in Psychosynthesis,  we shall discover in ourselves hitherto unknown abilities, our true vocations, our higher potentialities which seek to express themselves, but which we often repel and repress through lack of understanding, through prejudice or fear.'

So we can say that Holistic Psychotherapy helps restore "soul" as the central focus of our work, and honors the dark side of our nature as equally part of the soul's journey as is the light. A deeper sense of meaning and value is revealed, which creates a psychic environment (or 'field') in which both individuals and groups of people are enabled to make decisions about who they are and what they want.

I have found in my work that Psychosynthesis is both a theory and practice where the focus is to achieve synthesis and harmony within and around ourselves. Its hallmarks are a remarkable model of consciousness, concrete tools for developing and expanding awareness, tangible ways of working with the personality and a life long model for spiritual development.