Transpersonal Psychology in Psychoanalytic Perspective

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SUNY Press, Jan 1, 1994 - Psychology - 367 pages
In this book, Michael Washburn provides a psychoanalytic foundation for transpersonal psychology. Using psychoanalytic theory, Washburn explains how ego development both prepares for and creates obstacles to ego transcendence. Spiritual development, he proposes, can be properly understood only in terms of the ego development that precedes it. For example, many difficulties encountered in spiritual development can be traced to repressive underpinnings of ego development, and significant gender differences in spiritual development can be traced to corresponding gender differences that emerge during ego development.

Washburn draws on a wide range of psychoanalytic perspectives in discussing ego development and uses both Eastern and Western sources in discussing spiritual development. In rethinking transpersonal psychology in psychoanalytic terms, he explains how essential elements of Jungian thought can be grounded in psychoanalytic theory.
 

Contents

Introduction
1
CHAPTER ONE THE SOURCES
19
CHAPTER TWO EGO FORMATION AND
44
Rapprochement Ambivalence and the Splitting
51
The Repressive Underpinnings of Object Constancy
54
The Oedipus Complex and the Consolidation
67
Conclusion
73
Gender Variations in the Oedipus Complex
81
Earning Being and ValueThe
174
Conclusion
181
AND PATHOLOGIES OF THE SELF
183
Pathologies of the Self
189
Conclusion
216
Aridity
223
Transition to the Dark Night of Spirit
230
CHAPTER NINE THE SPIRAL PATH
237

Gender Differences in the Context
92
Psychodynamics
98
Object Relations
105
Playful Exploration
119
Object Relations
130
Ego Development
142
Identity Testing
151
Psychodynamics
158
Ego Development
164
On Distinguishing
254
Conclusion
267
A Critique
276
CHAPTER ELEVEN THE GOAL
293
The Marriage of the Ego and the Dynamic Ground
311
References
335
Index
359
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About the author (1994)

Michael Washburn is Professor of Philosophy at Indiana University, South Bend.

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