Transpersonal Development
Cultivating the Human Resources of Peace, Wisdom, Purpose and Oneness
All photos by B.G. Schaub
Human Resources of Peace, Wisdom, Purpose and Oneness
Written with a Federal grant from the Veterans Administration, Transpersonal Development served as the guide for fifteen clinical meditation and imagery training sessions with the mental health staff of a large VA hospital in suburban New York City.
Bonney and Richard have accomplished something rare. You will probably never encounter a treatise on transpersonal development with the depth, brevity and clarity of this book.
It is an honor to recommend it.
-Larry Dossey MD
The Three Features of Transpersonal Experience
There are three general features that characterize a transpersonal experience:
1. You experience an energetic/emotional shift that is new to you.
2. You simultaneously experience a knowing, a new understanding.
3. You feel you have just participated in something greater than yourself.
B.G. Schaub
The Varieties of Transpersonal Experience
These are some of the ways people have described their transpersonal experiences:
• a quiet joy pervading all things
• the delight of beauty
• feeling loving unity with all beings
• an instantly understood inner vision, an illumination
• feeling an extraordinary inner silence
• feeling contact with the soul
• inflows of inspi
Awareness Is The Source Of Inner Peace
"What you are looking for is what is looking." -St. Francis of Assisi
Awareness itself is naturally serene. This discovery is the reason that all of the meditative traditions, East and West, emphasize awareness practices and seek to enter a state of awareness itself. These practices are variously called contemplation, concentration, presence, mindfulness, silence, one-pointedness, liberation.
When you enter a state of awareness itself, all mind and body stimuli fall away. All you are aware of is being aware. You’re not asleep, you’re not in a trance, you are wide awake. You are aware of awareness.
Spontaneous Experiences
The spontaneous opening of the mind and heart
“As little flowers from the frosty night
are closed and limp,
and when the sun shines down on them,
they rise to open on their stem,
my wilted strength began to bloom within me,
and such warm courage
flowed into my heart
that I spoke like a man set free.”
- Dante
“Your real nature is that you are a created being who is part of creation. This is your true identity. You have been, are, and always will be part of creation. It is why, when you walk in the woods or float in the ocean, you feel more like your basic self, at home in the world and at home in your own skin. You come from creation, live in it, and return to it.”
Three Features of Inner Wisdom Experience
“My wilted strength began to bloom within me.”
When you enter unfocused into your imagination, a wide and wild range of images and thoughts can come to you. But when you enter the imagination focused and holding a question in mind, creative, intuitive answers emerge.
• Surprise. The information shows you a new way to grasp a situation or question. It opens and expands your thinking.
• Peace and relief. The information feels true, and the truth relaxes you.
• Gratitude. The information makes you feel grateful that this wise part of you actually exists.
