Psychology Commons^™

Transformative, Noetic, And Transpersonal Experiences During Personal Development Workshops, Helané Wahbeh, Cassandra Vieten, Garrett Yount, Agnes Cartry-Jacobsen, Dean Radin, Arnaud Delorme

International Journal of Transpersonal Studies

The global personal development market was valued at $38.28 billion in 2019 and is expected to grow an additional 5% from 2020 to 2027. Many of these workshops promise to be transformational. This secondary analysis study examined transformative, transpersonal, and noetic aspects of personal development workshops. We found that 74% of post-survey records endorsed that participants experienced a moment of clarity or profound insight during their workshop. In addition, 66% endorsed that participants had experienced at least one noetic experience, and 84% endorsed at least one transpersonal experience. These analyses provide preliminary evidence for the transformational potential of personal development …

Locating The Embodied Sense Of Self And Examining Its Relationship With Psychological Well-Being, Adam Wesley Hanley, Natalie Lecy, Robert Hanley

International Journal of Transpersonal Studies

Westerners tend to localize their sense of self in the head, and, to a lesser degree, in the chest. However, single-point, localization studies of the self omit direct exploration of the size and shape of the embodied self. This study explored a) beliefs about the location and spatial distribution of the embodied sense of self, and b) whether individual differences in how the embodied self was represented were associated with psychological and subjective well-being. Results from a sample of 206 American adults confirm extant reports, indicating that the embodied sense of self is most often located in the head and …

Well-Being And Self-Transformation In Indian Psychology, Sangeetha Menon, Shankar Rajaraman, Lakshmi Kuchibotla

International Journal of Transpersonal Studies

This paper uses instances from literature covering a broad spectrum of Indian philosophies, art, medicine and practices—attempts to offer the components of a psychology that is rooted in transformative and transpersonal consciousness. Psychology, in this instance, refers to a systematic study of mind, behavior, and relationship, rather than the formal Western discipline as such. In the Indian approach to understanding consciousness, primary importance is given to the possibility of well-being. Such an approach facilitates an immediate comprehension of the unity of metaphysical opposites, such as matter and consciousness, and its experience as empathy, love and intuition. It involves a thinking …

The Scale For Existential Thinking, Blake A. Allan, Branton Shearer

International Journal of Transpersonal Studies

This study introduced the construct of existential thinking, which we defined as the tendency

to explore the fundamental concerns of human existence and the capacity to engage in a

meaning-making process that locates oneself in respect to these issues. We also assessed

the psychometric properties of the 11-item “Scale for Existential Thinking” (SET). In two

studies, we found the SET to have unidimensional factor structure and good reliability

diagnostics in both student and adult samples. Moreover, the SET showed construct validity

by correlating with meaning in life, curiosity, and other existential variables. Furthermore,

we found meaning in life to mediate …