<p> Travelers throughout time have attested to the profoundly moving and psychologically meaningful impact of their journeys, disclosing travel&rsquo;s potential as a soulful experience. Yet many travel experiences are better defined as &ldquo;ego-trips,&rdquo; with harmful consequences to host regions, individuals, and even the travelers themselves. Dedicated towards the notion of &ldquo;re-souling&rdquo; travel, this dissertation ventures into the typically unconscious aspects of Western travel. </p><p> Depth psychological in approach, this study employs hermeneutics and the symbolic perspective towards an interpretation of a few of the travel experiences recorded by two luminary psychological theorists: C. G. Jung and James Hillman. By exploring these guiding examples of soulful travel, this dissertation unearths key facets of meaning behind the impulse to travel, identifies certain ancestral and archetypal travel experiences, recognizes the role of ritual in the engagement between traveler and place, and regards the import of the traveler&rsquo;s relationship with Other. </p><p> Archetypal alienated seeking, influenced by a mythos of one&rsquo;s &ldquo;parturition&rdquo; from the natural world and spiritual belief systems, is an unconscious factor driving much of Western travel. Utilizing the symbolic approach can aid travelers in becoming aware of their consumptive and/or imperialistic behaviors, lack of meaning, the relativization of the ego, and the accompanying labor pains that are embedded in the collective history of travel as travail. Recognizing the archetypal nature of the journey can assist in uncovering the longing behind the call to explore. To that end, this study identifies archetypal experiences tied to Western travel&rsquo;s ancestry: the road trip, going south, aesthetic travel, therapeutic travel and poetic travel. Ritual can cultivate the Western traveler&rsquo;s receptivity to the psychological potency of place. Authentic engagement with other people and places can also be fostered through a reverent acceptance of liminality, reclaiming psychological projections, and courageous attendance to that which emerges in dialogue. </p><p> This dissertation concludes by positing that the impulse to travel is related to psyche&rsquo;s desire to be mapped as the Western culture moves away from the parturition myth and towards a new mythos of an interconnected world soul. </p>

<p> This theoretical study addresses the question of how spirituality affects a child's development of a sense of self and considers the role of the natural world in this process. The author uses a traditional hermeneutic method in combination with alchemical hermeneutics (Romanyshyn, 2007) in order to make room for the unconscious during the research process. The study is therefore both an examination of the interrelationships between self, spirituality, and the natural world, as well as a depiction of the author's use of self and the unconscious to penetrate the deeper dimensions of these interrelationships. Three main bodies of literature were reviewed for the study: children's spirituality, sense of self development, and the human-nature connection. In addition, the author made use of a logbook for the duration of the study to record dreams, symptoms, reveries, synchronicities, and the transference dialogues. These contributions from the unconscious were integrated with findings from the literature to articulate a new theoretical perspective on the child's development of a sense of self. The author finds that the spiritual life of the child is nurtured in communion with the natural world and that the child's sense of self is directly impacted by both the relationship with the natural world and her spiritual nature. Further, the author finds that the child's development of a spiritual sense of self in relationship with the natural world contributes to the reparation of the dissociation between human beings and the earth. The implications of this study for depth psychotherapy suggest that it is in our utmost interest to allow children opportunity to develop a sense of spiritual self in relationship with the earth. Both children and adults need opportunities to connect with the natural world in order for the spiritual self to emerge in the direction of human-earth unity. This study further implies that, in alchemical hermeneutics, depth psychology has an effective and reliable method of conducting research with the explicit participation of the unconscious in the research process.</p>

<p> This study of children's dreams used a mixed method to examine the dreams of 32 English-speaking children, ages 6-12 from the San Francisco Bay Area. The primary purpose of this research was to investigate dreams identified by the children as significant or meaningful, explore children's interpretations and meaning making, and to find if there was support for the hypothesis that some dreams might be connected to children's spiritual awareness, or influenced by their spirituality, beliefs, and practices, areas that have had little attention in previous dream research. Using a semi-structured interview protocol, participants were asked to tell the dream while drawing a picture of the dream. Major dream themes were identified, and the resulting dream data were correlated to participants' spiritual awareness, as measured by the Feeling Good, Living Life instrument (FGLL), specifically designed to measure spiritual health in children, and the Practice and Beliefs Scale for Children (PBSC) a 10-item instrument designed to assess connections between spirituality and religiosity. The FGLL was developed to measure four domains of spiritual well-being: Personal, Communal, Environmental, and Transcendental. The PBSC used a sentence-completion format to reflect the individual's language and assessed children's belief in the God of their definition as well as the importance and the role of the child's spiritual beliefs in coping in everyday life. Findings from the qualitative and quantitative results showed evidence of children's spiritual awareness in all domains, reflected their spirituality in the areas of awareness-sensing, value-sensing, and mystery-sensing, and found correlations between some of the dreams, meaning making, and their spiritual understanding. Implications are noted for therapists, spiritual directors, researchers, parents, and other adults who work with children regarding the benefits and challenges of dream work with children in this age group as a way of recognizing and nurturing their spirituality.</p>

<p> This study presents an existential-hermeneutic analysis of nine women's first-person accounts of extended periods of solitude. The accounts were analyzed along the five existential dimensions of spatiality, temporality, embodiment, language, and co-existentiality, producing a rich portrait of the women's lived experience of solitude. One of the first-person accounts was provided by the author of the study, who underwent three solitary retreats in the interest of this project, adding an autoethnographic component to the work. Theory from the existential-phenomenological, monastic, ecopsychological, and feminist literatures was applied to the data, enabling us to interpret the significance of the shifts the women experienced through an interdisciplinary set of lenses. The women experienced both subtle and profound shifts in their senses of self and modes of being in the world over the course of their retreats. In the absence of direct human relations, the women developed greater intimacy with things, non-human beings, and the Divine. Through the practice of simplicity, the women cultivated humility and more contemplative modes of seeing, revealing previously hidden contours of the material world and fostering a child-like sense of wonder. By leaving clock time and slowing down, the women became increasingly oriented toward the present moment, entrained to the rhythms of the natural world, and attuned to their desire. By retreating from the gaze of the (human) other, the women worked to heal a sense of alienation from their own bodies, experienced a respite from feminine performativity, and came to move through the world more seamlessly and comfortably. And by observing silence, the women cultivated the ability to listen beyond the human conversation and the chattering of their own minds, developed a more sacred relationship to language, confronted their emotional "demons," and found themselves increasingly drawn toward the poetic. Overall, through their solitudes, the women developed a greater stance of receptivity toward the more-than-human world, deconstructed elements of identity and modes of being aligned with the "false self," and recovered aspects of their lived experience which had been neglected or suppressed over the course of becoming an adult, and especially a woman, in the context of contemporary American culture.</p>

<p> Exploring a "call" to a place, this work uses the Alchemical Hermeneutic method developed by Robert Romanyshyn, along with elements of Rosemary Anderson's Intuitive Inquiry and Craig Chalquist's Terrapsychology to reflect on the "soul" of a part of Monterey, California, on a hill known to the Rumsen Ohlone people as "Hunukul." With a view of the Monterey Bay, which conceals a mile-deep canyon and provides the environment for the upwelling of a teeming marine life, a portal is found through which to enter the depths of Psyche, both historically and existentially. </p><p> Many groups have met in this place, from the time that the first buildings were erected by a group of Theosophists from Pasadena in 1918 to the current occupation by Saint James Episcopal Church. Young people with disabilities, addicts and alcoholics, people with psychiatric diagnoses seeking expression through art, Zen meditators, Korean evangelicals, and the Monterey Bay Friends of C. G. Jung have all found refuge in the place, and a way to dwell together. </p><p> Archetypal commonalities among these groups are herein explored, including the wounded image of <i>Christos Dionysos</i> (contrasted with the heroic image of <i>Christos Mithras</i>), strong manifestations of women's leadership and power, and an ongoing presence of the shadow of war. </p><p> Rather than postulate a quasi-material soul of this place, the relationship of human psyche and the psychic dimensions of place are seen as part of an ongoing process, the boundaries of which pulse in space and time through the life expressed in this place. Place may not "have" a soul. From one perspective, place may "be" soul.</p>

<p> This dissertation used the exploratory single-case study method to address the research question of: How and to what extent has Uta Hoehne, a licensed psychologist, applied Alice Bailey's principles of esoteric psychology in a humanistic/transpersonalbased clinical practice? </p><p> Alice Bailey was an esotericist in the first half of the 20th century whose principles of esoteric thought resonate with many of the founding principles of humanistic/transpersonal psychology. Bailey wrote extensively about a type of psychology she called esoteric psychology (EP), which uses principles potentially applicable to clinical psychology. Uta Hoehne is a present-day licensed psychologist and skilled esotericist whose clinical practice has humanistic/transpersonal psychology roots. </p><p> She has applied EP techniques successfully in her clinical practice, originally as a supplement to conventional therapeutic techniques. </p><p> The research question was investigated using three data sources: 10 structured interviews with Hoehne; other Hoehne source data including published articles on her nonprofit Web site, approximately 200 unpublished documents, 60 hours of lecture recordings; and interviews with two of her senior students, also licensed psychologists. </p><p> The data involved general background information, the clinical use of esoteric psychology principles including what she called "higher psychic powers and energy," the esoteric perspective and protocol for multiple categories of DSM-IV-TR psychological disorders, and specific clinical tools with potential general application in humanistic/transpersonal psychology clinical practices. Also, the effectiveness of esoteric psychology techniques in others' clinical practices was addressed with two of Hoehne's students. </p><p> Content analysis yielded five principal categories that encompass esoteric psychology in general and Hoehne's specific clinical practices in particular. These categories concern esoteric psychology's perspective, orientation, understanding of disease, practices, and interface with humanistic/transpersonal psychology, and each contains further subthemes. </p><p> Hoehne's apparent success in therapeutic outcomes with application of Bailey's esoteric principles in a clinical practice with humanistic/transpersonal psychology roots demonstrates the appropriateness of further research into both the theory and practice of esoteric psychology and of consideration of a more general application in other humanistic/transpersonal psychology clinical practices. A clear resonance is revealed between these two approaches to psychology, and their areas of confluence and difference may work together to address the greater unfolding of human potential.</p>

<p> The following study sought to explore transformative changes in self-esteem, self-perception of dance ability, and expressions of spirituality that may occur when adolescent girls not only participate in classical ballet classes, but also learn in a teaching model emphasizing compassion encouragement discipline technique. This study performed a pre and posttest using the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES), the dance subscale of Vispoel's Arts Self-Perception Inventory (ASPI), and MacDonald's short version of the Expressions of Spirituality Inventory (ESI) on 27 adolescent girls ages 14 through 19 randomly divided into 2 even groups, comparison and experimental, who participated in a 5-week classical ballet course. Both groups were taught by the researcher. The comparison group was taught in a traditional dance instructor style paying most attention to the execution of the participants' steps and dance combination performance rather than any internal changes. The experimental group received the researcher-developed Compassion Encouragement Discipline Technique. Results of the pre and posttests of each of the inventories were compared and analyzed via an analysis of variance and discussed to explore the efficacy of this pedagogical style. Quantitative results indicated no statistical significance on standardized assessments measuring their self-esteem, arts (dance) self-perception, or expressions of spirituality. However, researcher observed differences in the comparison and experimental group were noted and discussed. Because transpersonal psychology allows for emotional transformation, this study contributes to furthering transpersonal literature by acknowledging the potential impact of student/teacher rapport in the compassion and empowerment-based teaching of classical ballet to adolescent girls.</p>

<p> This dissertation compares the integrated vipassana movement of North America and the school of psychology. The comparison examines both healing practices and ontological paradigms. The integrated vipassan&amacr; movement in the United States is defined by that element of vipassan&amacr; teachings that blends Therav&amacr;da Buddhist practices with American cultural mores as promoted and disseminated by Insight Meditation Society and Spirit Rock Meditation Center. Existential-humanistic psychology is here represented by the teachings of Rollo May, James Bugental, and Irvin Yalom. This inquiry seeks to apprehend the nature and efficacy of compassionate and caring present-moment attention in the context of two distinct ontological orientations. The analysis begins with each tradition's description of humanity's most fundamental flaw: dukkha and angst. The examination of these maladies of life is followed by a comparison of these traditions' respective portrayals of health and harmony: Buddhist liberation as compared with existential freedom. This study then examines and compares the way in which these traditions employ the blended healing practices of compassion and present-moment awareness. The findings include the observation that the Therav&amacr;da concept of no-self and the existential notion of the groundlessness of being provide for two distinct kinds of healing: one promotes a grace born of skillfully encouraging a depth of surrender of self, and the other speaks to creating an authentic world for oneself. This dissertation finds that the two traditions offer practices and orientations that may be used complementarily.</p>

<p>This study researches the journey of transformative learning experiences of adult men and women who have adopted a positive attitude in dealing with challenging and life-threatening issues. By applying a Western grief model and the principles of &ldquo;living the present moment&rdquo; and &ldquo;letting go&rdquo; derived from Buddhist psychology, this study aims to identify ways to transform mental suffering and grieving into positive energy that may help to provide comfort to individuals in despair. </p><p> The research paradigm is transpersonal and the method of this study is narrative analysis. A combination of face-to-face and telephone interviews as well as email exchanges with eight individuals who shared their personal experiences in adopting a positive attitude in overcoming difficult situations were employed. These participants have battled and conquered their unique life-challenging situations. </p><p> The stories of these individuals document their challenges with grief and include insights learned from these experiences and the ways in which they transformed these experiences into catalysts for positive energy. Seven themes became evident and significant in their journey in coping with suffering, and paved the way for their transformational learning experiences. They are: a) Reaching acceptance, b) the importance of a support network, c) making meanings of suffering, d) impermanence, e) letting go of the past, f) living in the present moment, and g) spirituality. It is hoped that this transformational learning experience will enable other people from diverse demographic, professional, and cultural backgrounds to embrace a Western grief model in combination with Buddhist psychology to better cope with their loss or grieving, and help them to understand the opportunity for growth these life challenges can present. </p><p> Everyone experiences loss and difficult challenges in the course of a lifetime. How we view and react to them determines the effect they have on the rest of our lives. This study will contribute to the need for more research in this area by asking the following question: &ldquo;How do actions derived from Buddhist principles help to alleviate suffering among people facing challenges of change?&rdquo; </p>

<p> Religion and spirituality has become a widely researched topic within the field of psychology, however most research studies focus on the quantitative measures of religion used as a coping mechanism for individuals undergoing difficulties and struggles. The terms religion and spirituality are often misunderstood in the field of psychology and used interchangeably. Individuals who share their religious/spiritual experiences are often dismissed and not taken seriously therefore exacerbating the stigma and creating even more distance between the field of science and religion. The goal of this research is to capture the lived experience of prayer for individuals moving through psychosis without enframing the experience in a negative way by placing labels or categories on them or their experiences, but rather by letting the experience show itself in its own unique way. Thus 3 participants who have experienced psychosis were asked about their experience of praying during a time that is typically understood as a psychotic experience. The purpose of this approach is to better understand how the practice of prayer in religion/spirituality is more than just an instrumental coping mechanism, and is, rather, lived out as a way of being in the world. This study uses an existential-phenomenological method to understand participants' experiences of this phenomenon in light of common, existential givens shared by the participants. This study will close with implications for further research and clinical care.</p>