Why 'More Than' Therapy?

“Feel the pain of the earth piercing you. Understand that the earth is not an extension of our bodies, it’s the other way around” – Machado de Oliveira, 2021

Psychosynthesis teaches us to conceptualise people as not merely the ‘personal self’ – a centre of consciousness and will – but always more than that. That is, more than our bodies, feelings and thoughts, as well as, through the inclusion of the transpersonal, more than our individual experiences. I think this definition beautifully captures the human/everything interconnectedness: “Transpersonal’ multivalently acknowledges the sacred dimension of life dynamically moving beyond as well as within” (Richard Tarnas 2001)

I believe it is essential to include more than the individual and childhood wounding in the therapeutic process, such as external global, political, economic, and ecological issues. Psychosynthesis speaks of ‘more than’ the individual in its ‘disidentification’ exercise, which is a way of accessing consciousness through physical, emotional, and mental awareness. In meditation, we affirm: “I have my body. I have my feelings. I have my mind. And I am more than my body. I am more than my feelings. I am more thanthe mind.” The idea of this exercise is to practise fully identifying with each aspect of consciousness in turn – which is naturally not limited to the personal – and then choosing to let it go, to disidentify.

Roberto Assagioli, the founder of psychosynthesis, used the words “am not” for the disidentification meditation, but I think “more than” captures an expansive quality that I find particularly empowering. Assagioli described ‘disidentification’ as the ability “to dominate and control everything from which we disidentify ourselves.” However, I believe “a therapeutic goal of control and domination can easily lead to an exaggeration… of the habitual egoic self”. (Allan Frater, 2021) Frater reminds us to not fall into colonised mindsets: “assumptions of control run the danger of turning transpersonal psychotherapy into an egocentric colonisation project” (Frater, 2021). By conceptualising my clients as always more than, I am taking a deeply compassionate, relational, holistic, global view of their whole selves.

The ‘collective unconscious’ is a parallel idea in psychosynthesis that is depicted in the psychosynthesis egg diagram as a dotted line, suggesting that there is no solid, fixed distinction between the individual and the world. Molly Young Brown explains: “the collective unconscious lies outside the borders of the individual unconscious” and understands it as synonymous with “pain for the world, instinct, intuition.” (Young Brown, 1999) By bringing awareness to this unconscious, collective, global yet individualised pain, we can begin to relate to it.

This same expansive vision is captured in psychosynthesis’s ‘bifocal vision’ which means we see the client (and ourselves) as both wounded from the past, and as an authentic, emerging future-self. I add ‘present global wounding’ to the standard definition creating ‘trifocal vision’, so as to see my clients with a more respectful, present fullness. Diana Whitmore reminds us that “Without a ‘bifocal vision’ … and without a context which sees the client as more than her pathology, the therapist greatly reduces the effectiveness of the work.” (Whitmore, 2014) I understand Whitmore’s ‘more than’ as the collective unconscious. Without this holistic view, we limit potential emergence. Also see Angie Fee’s article, The Personal is Political.

Most psychotherapy focuses solely on the early woundings from caregivers, and excludes the ongoing wounding we experience in the here and now from global issues. However, Young Brown recognises that “psychotherapists are realising how their profession has blinded itself to the larger context of their clients’ lives, and pathologised their pain for the world” (Young Brown, 1999). Many psychologists ask what it means to be well in unwell times, believing in our intimate connectedness to the natural world and taking as obvious that global issues impact us. Bayo Akomolafe argues “We must do something more than just treat ourselves … we must think of ourselves as always entangled with the world at large.” (Akomolafe, 2023). I think this entanglement with global issues is essential to keep in mind with clients, otherwise we risk belittling the very real impact of the ugliness all around us, and tell the client – colluding with society, doctors and bad therapists – that anxiety is wholly internal. James Hillman believes we then understand the anxiety as “All mine and therefore all my fault.” (Hillman,1990) This causes shame which anaesthetises sensitive people to harmful global issues, reducing their participation and feeling of connectedness to the world around them, a connection I believe is essential to wellness.

I strive to always see my therapy clients as ‘more than’ their feelings, thoughts, body, behaviour, background, etc. so I can help them access their emerging authentic future self.

Reference list

• Akomolafe, Bayo. 2015, Decolonizing ourselves.
• Akomolafe, Bayo. 2021, What does it mean to be well in unwell times? P26 in Holding The Hope: Reviving Psychological And Spiritual Agency In The Face Of Climate Change
• Angie Fee, The Personal is Political – a bifocal vision
• Frater, Allan. 2021, Waking Dreams: Imagination in Psychotherapy and Everyday Life
• Hillman, James. 2019, What kind of society nurtures the soul? Digital audiobook
• Keen, Sam. 1974, The Golden Mean of Roberto Assagioli: An interview conducted with Dr. Assagioli by Sam Keen that was published in the December 1974 issue of Psychology Today.
• Machado de Oliveira, Vanessa. 2021, Hospicing Modernity: Parting with Harmful Ways of Living
• Tarnas, Richard. 2006, Cosmos and Psyche: Intimations of a New World View
• Whitmore, Diana. 2013, Psychosynthesis Counselling in Action (Counselling in Action series) Fourth Edition
• Whitmore, Diana. 2014, Psychosynthesis: Psychology with a Soul
• Yeomans, Thomas. 2021, Personal & Spiritual Growth: Psychosynthesis Exercises for Personal & Spiritual Growth
• Young Brown, Molly. 1999. Ecopsychosynthesis: Meeting the crises of our times.