accessible to experience and study under ordinary circumstances
are of direct relevance for the understanding of unusual states of
consciousness. Individuals who have experienced various nonordinary states of
consciousness, including well-educated and sophisticated scientists from
various disciplines, frequently report that they entered hidden domains of
reality that seemed to be authentic and in some sense implicit in, and
supraordinated to, everyday reality.
Holotropic
Therapy
Perhaps Grof s most
remarkable discovery is that the same phenomena reported by individuals who
have taken LSD can also be experienced without resorting to drugs of any kind.
To this end, Grof and his wife, Christina, have developed a simple, nondrug
technique for inducing these holotropic , or nonordinary, states of
consciousness. They define a holotropic state of consciousness as one in which
it is possible to access the holographic labyrinth that connects all aspects of
existence. These include one's biological, psychological, racial, and spiritual
history, the past, present, and future of the world, other levels of reality,
and all the other experiences already discussed in the context of the LSD
experience.
The Grof's call their
technique holotropic therapy and use only rapid and controlled
breathing, evocative music, and massage and body work, to induce altered states
of consciousness. To date, thousands of individuals have attended their
workshops and report experiences that are every bit as spectacular and
emotionally profound as those described by subjects of Grof's previous work on
LSD. Grof describes his current work and gives a detailed account of his
methods in his book The Adventure of Self-Discovery.
Vortices of
Thought and Multiple Personalities
A number of researchers
have used the holographic model to explain various aspects of the thinking
process itself. For example, New York psychiatrist Edgar A. Levenson believes
the hologram provides a valuable mode] for understanding the sudden and
transformative changes individuals often experience during psychotherapy. He
bases his conclusion on the fact that such changes take place no matter what
technique or psychoanalytic approach the therapist uses. Hence, he feels all
psychoanalytic approaches are purely ceremonial, and change is due to something
else entirely.
Levenson believes that
something is resonance. A therapist always knows when therapy is going well, he
observes. There is a strong feeling that the pieces of an elusive pattern are
all about to come together. The therapist is not saying anything new to the
patient, but instead seems to be resonating with something the patient already
unconsciously knows: “It is as though a huge, three-dimensional, spatially
coded representation of the patient's experience develops in the therapy,
running through every aspect of his life, his history and his participation
with the therapist. At some point there is a kind of ‘overload’ and everything
falls into place.”
Levenson believes these
three-dimensional representations of experience are holograms buried deep in
the patient's psyche, and a resonance of feeling between the therapist and
patient causes them to emerge in a process similar to the way a laser of a
certain frequency causes an image made with a laser of the same frequency to
emerge from a multiple image hologram. “The holographic model suggests a
radically new paradigm which might give us a fresh way of perceiving and
connecting clinical phenomena which have always been known to be important, but
were relegated to the ‘art’ of psychotherapy,” says Levenson. “It offers a
possible theoretical template for change and a practical hope of clarifying
psychotherapeutic technique.”
Psychiatrist David
Shainberg, associate dean of the Postgraduate Psychoanalytic Program at the
William Alanson White Institute of Psychiatry in New York, feels Bohm's
assertion that thoughts are like vortices in a river should be taken
are of direct relevance for the understanding of unusual states of
consciousness. Individuals who have experienced various nonordinary states of
consciousness, including well-educated and sophisticated scientists from
various disciplines, frequently report that they entered hidden domains of
reality that seemed to be authentic and in some sense implicit in, and
supraordinated to, everyday reality.
Holotropic
Therapy
Perhaps Grof s most
remarkable discovery is that the same phenomena reported by individuals who
have taken LSD can also be experienced without resorting to drugs of any kind.
To this end, Grof and his wife, Christina, have developed a simple, nondrug
technique for inducing these holotropic , or nonordinary, states of
consciousness. They define a holotropic state of consciousness as one in which
it is possible to access the holographic labyrinth that connects all aspects of
existence. These include one's biological, psychological, racial, and spiritual
history, the past, present, and future of the world, other levels of reality,
and all the other experiences already discussed in the context of the LSD
experience.
The Grof's call their
technique holotropic therapy and use only rapid and controlled
breathing, evocative music, and massage and body work, to induce altered states
of consciousness. To date, thousands of individuals have attended their
workshops and report experiences that are every bit as spectacular and
emotionally profound as those described by subjects of Grof's previous work on
LSD. Grof describes his current work and gives a detailed account of his
methods in his book The Adventure of Self-Discovery.
Vortices of
Thought and Multiple Personalities
A number of researchers
have used the holographic model to explain various aspects of the thinking
process itself. For example, New York psychiatrist Edgar A. Levenson believes
the hologram provides a valuable mode] for understanding the sudden and
transformative changes individuals often experience during psychotherapy. He
bases his conclusion on the fact that such changes take place no matter what
technique or psychoanalytic approach the therapist uses. Hence, he feels all
psychoanalytic approaches are purely ceremonial, and change is due to something
else entirely.
Levenson believes that
something is resonance. A therapist always knows when therapy is going well, he
observes. There is a strong feeling that the pieces of an elusive pattern are
all about to come together. The therapist is not saying anything new to the
patient, but instead seems to be resonating with something the patient already
unconsciously knows: “It is as though a huge, three-dimensional, spatially
coded representation of the patient's experience develops in the therapy,
running through every aspect of his life, his history and his participation
with the therapist. At some point there is a kind of ‘overload’ and everything
falls into place.”
Levenson believes these
three-dimensional representations of experience are holograms buried deep in
the patient's psyche, and a resonance of feeling between the therapist and
patient causes them to emerge in a process similar to the way a laser of a
certain frequency causes an image made with a laser of the same frequency to
emerge from a multiple image hologram. “The holographic model suggests a
radically new paradigm which might give us a fresh way of perceiving and
connecting clinical phenomena which have always been known to be important, but
were relegated to the ‘art’ of psychotherapy,” says Levenson. “It offers a
possible theoretical template for change and a practical hope of clarifying
psychotherapeutic technique.”
Psychiatrist David
Shainberg, associate dean of the Postgraduate Psychoanalytic Program at the
William Alanson White Institute of Psychiatry in New York, feels Bohm's
assertion that thoughts are like vortices in a river should be taken
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