Alchemy of the Soul

Integral Healing: The Work of Psychology and Spirituality

Arya Maloney

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ISBN: 978-1-57733-172-8, 200 pp., 5.5 x 8.5, paperback, $17.95
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This book depicts the ever-widening circle of an evolutionary psychology which views the soul rather than the ego as the epi-center of human experience. The reader can observe this experience directly. Within the context of the author's therapeutic practice, trauma converges with the transpersonal.

The force that propels this work and redefines the boundaries of depth psychology is the Integral Psychology of the great mystic/philosopher, Sri Aurobindo. This ever-widening, yet clearly defined psycho-spiritual realm incorporates the fullness of the human psyche without ignoring the occult or cosmic. Beyond the theoretical, this book opens the office door as client and clinician experience the soul's alchemy.

Endorsements

"The body-mind-soul interface is the frontier of much significant exploration today. Its impact on psychology and spirituality is facilitating the discovery of our true Selves. While transpersonal psychologists delve ever deeper into the soul, Sri Aurobindo guides the soul on its return journey through manifestation. Influenced by the soul psychology of Sri Aurobindo and his consort, the Mother, Arya Maloney began his unique approach to transpersonal psychology. With guides like Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, the door to awakening opens. Bridging the juncture between spirituality and psychology, Arya reveals the alchemy of the soul." Lama Surya das

"Arya Maloney updates the basis and practice of transpersonal psychology by using the spiritual principles of India's masters and the transformational alchemy inherent in his clients' processes. His work is both enlightening and informative." Arnold Mindell

"Maloney has contributed significantly to the field of transpersonal psychology by updating and enlarging its scope for the twenty-first century. He has included both the concrete spiritual dimension beyond intellect and the physical body. He reports clear and real experiences of his transformative work through the body that goes beyond the confines of traditional psychology into the supernormal. He tells of past lives, the soul leaving the body and other awarenesses outside concensus reality. His references to the Integral Yoga of Aurobindo are expertly selected. They show an informed, and practiced, understanding of that great Indian saint's extensive exploration into the realm of the transpersonal. His work, says Maloney, in 'recognizing the impotence of ego, ... offers modern psychology the power of the soul, the subliminal and the superconscious.' I recommend Maloney's book to anyone seeking an understanding of the whole person, beyond the confines perscribed by traditional psychology." Aminah Raheem, author of Soul Lightning: Awakening Soul Consciousness

Table of Contents

Foreword
Introduction: The Encounter of Psychology and Spirituality

Part I: Integral Psychology
1. Spontaneity of Soul: An Autobiographical Glimpse
2. The Body and Psycho-Spiritual Process
3. A Soul-Centered Psychology
4. Bridging Spiritual Practice and Psychotherapy

Part II: The Process of Integral Psychology
5. The Suffocated Soul
6. Where Are My Children!
7. Transforming Torture
8. The Uninvited Guest

Epilogue
References
Index

Excerpt

A New Paradigm of the Human Psyche

The Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother is the ground on which I stand as a transpersonal therapist. While it is not within the scope of this book to fully investigate their vision, I will focus on their psycho-spiritual paradigm-a paradigm of evolutionary consciousness. This model of the human psyche can be more easily understood within the context of their personal history.

Sri Aurobindo was born on August 15, 1872, in Calcutta, India. His father, an anglicized Indian doctor prejudiced against Indian culture, sent his children to study in England. Hence, from the age of seven to twenty Sri Aurobindo studied at St. Paul's School and Cambridge University. During those thirteen years he received a thorough grounding in Western literature and civilization, receiving recognition as a brilliant scholar of Greek and Latin, as well as an accomplished poet. Returning to India in 1893, he taught at Baroda College, then became leader of an extremist political party striving to drive the British out of India. Through his revolutionary writing and oratory, he gained notoriety as "the most dangerous man in India." Arrested for conspiracy in May, 1908, he spent a year in prison. Though the British Government tried to convict him, he was acquitted and released in May 1909. His political activism continued, as did police harassment. His political career ended suddenly. Following what he called an inner command, he took refuge in the French Province of Pondicherry, arriving there on April 4, 1910. As his political life ended, his work of transformation of human nature began.

Sri Aurobindo achieved two major spiritual realizations during his public life-the experience of nirvana (the transcendent reality beyond name and form), and the experience of cosmic consciousness (the immanent Divine living in all forms). These experiences became the springboard for a new state of consciousness which, he claimed, sought liberation and unity not only in the hereafter, but on the earth-in the physical body. This state, which he called the supramental, was the next evolutionary stage-a stage in which all beings will possess a divine knowledge and power capable of transforming matter.

For the next forty years, Sri Aurobindo explored this work of transformation with his spiritual partner, the Mother.

Mother was born in Paris on February 21, 1878, and named Mirra Alfassa. She became aware of her deep and profound mission at the tender age of five. Later, between ages eleven and thirteen, psychic/spiritual experiences revealed her future: Many years before meeting Sri Aurobindo physically, she met him often in dreams, calling him "Krishna."

Gifted in mathematics, music and painting, Mirra befriended many of the great, contemporary Impressionist painters-Moreau, Rodin, Monet, before meeting Sri Aurobindo. She also studied the occult in Algeria with a Polish adept named Theon and his French wife, Alma. Study of supra-physical planes of consciousness led to her great spiritual ideal-the bringing of Divine Consciousness into matter. In 1914, Mirra visited Pondicherry with her husband, Paul Richard. Upon meeting Sri Aurobindo, she instantly recognized him as the "Krishna" of her dreams, and returned to Pondicherry on April 24, 1920 to begin their collaboration. After Sri Aurobindo's death in 1950, she continued their exploration of the "yoga of the cells"-a yoga leading to the total transformation of the body.

These spiritual explorers have given us a new paradigm for a greater psychology: This paradigm does not ignore the human physical or psychological nature, however, it goes beyond the egocentric focus of modern depth psychology as well as the etheric spiritualities which negate the possibility of transformation on earth. Even in the midst of his revolutionary thrust to free India from British rule, Sri Aurobindo turned to yoga for a greater knowledge and power, to transform this world.

Blue Dolphin Publishing, 2007


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