He was influenced by many spiritual and philosophical traditions and people, such as the Russian esotericist Ouspensky, the Sufi mystic Inhayat Khan,  Jung, Buber, the founder of logotherapy Viktor Frankl and Alice Bailey, with whom he was a close friend.  His concerns were towards fragmentation and the possibility for synthesis at both an individual and collective level, including an interest in education and social issues.  These spiritual and mystical influences mean that within psychosynthesis lies a deeply optimistic and structured approach to not just personal development, but spiritual synthesis, personally and culturally, in which the individual finds a meaningful, purposeful and interconnected place within the whole.

This was therefore very much a Renaissance time and accordingly Assagioli drew from many fields and influences, though he tended to play down the more mystical aspects of his work, intending to gain scientific validity for his theories.  Inherent in the development of his ideas are both a scientific and a mystical approach.

This is not necessarily a big change from what I was doing previously, as I have had a solid grounding in use of transference and countertransference in which it is assumed that the therapist’s experience is good information about the client’s process (as well as indicators of where the therapist might be getting stimulated with their own material).  However, the subtle shift of attitude seems to have an effect both on me as a therapist and with the experience my clients are having.  A sense of emerging mystery, a feeling of creativity without having to ‘do anything’ creative, a feeling of greater democracy within the therapeutic relationship and a sense of connectedness.

I will be exploring this experience more fully:  focusing on concepts from physics that give us an alternative way of assessing ‘reality’;  looking at some ideas from ‘Universalist’ approaches that are emerging in spiritual and ecological forms in the West; and drawing on ways of working with the transferential phenomena that bring in interrelated approaches.  Throughout, I will be intending to draw conclusions or at least stay with the questions raised for psychosynthesis theory and practice.

The research methodology for this dissertation has been heuristic.  That is, it is self reflective research in which I am using source material and my clinical practice to reflect on the subject matter and make it my own.  I hope to bring both a rigorous academic, clinical and personal approach to the work.

In this chapter I will set the scene for the more focused analysis which follows.  I intend to do this by looking at the historical context in which Assagioli conducted his research and development of psychosynthesis theory and beginning to assess how the changing scientific and social climate today might impact our theories of the Self.

When reflecting on the purpose of this chapter, I asked myself what would be useful about examining the historical context of Assagioli’s work.  In answer to this I turn to Amy Mindell who writes eloquently in her book Metaskills about how our attitudes affect our clients more than our actual techniques, or even which school we have trained in. ‘By looking at these basic beliefs and feelings of the therapist we are confronting the very ground of psychotherapy – the mother, the earth, from which it springs; the container which holds and produces all other skills.’  (1995.P27).

In questioning myself on the relevance of an interrelated world view on the clinical relationship, I have found Amy’s ideas very helpful in addressing the subtlety of presence and the impact of our most fundamental world views and values on our presence with our clients.  If presence is one of the determining factors of the quality of our work, then I feel that it would be useful to address the world views that psychosynthesis might contain within its theories and which I might also have as a therapist within the current culture.

I wanted to search a little below the definitions of Self I have learned in my psychosynthesis training to explore what might be implicit in Assagioli’s approach.  He has published very little of his own writing and I feel, therefore, that I might benefit from assessing the influences around him to gain some suggestion of his beliefs and how they are passed on in the training of therapists within the psychosynthesis tradition.   I draw largely from Jean Hardy’s book A Psychology with a Soul for this background information.