TRANSPERSONAL COACHING PSYCHOLOGY

This course explores the basis and value of a transpersonal approach to coaching: Students will investigate what criteria promote transformation in coaching, with a focus on what transpersonal perspectives may contribute. This will include identifying transpersonal states that may be leveraged for positive change, as well as detecting and dealing with psychospiritual crises in the context of coaching. The course places a particular emphasis on stress and ‘burnout’ – a form of deep human suffering affecting us on every level, physical, mental, emotional, spiritual. Stanislav Grof (2000) work and writings on spiritual emergency come to mind: “a crisis, but at the same time an opportunity to ‘emerge’, to rise to a higher level of psychological functioning and spiritual awareness” (p.137). Students of this course have the opportunity to explore how Transpersonal Coaching Psychology can be of value in the context of crisis and emergence.

Whilst there may be a variety of ways in which transpersonal psychology can be incorporated into the praxis of coaching, a transpersonal coaching methodology might be especially useful when it comes to transcending consciousness, moving from ego-based problems to spiritual solutions. This begs the question: Can spiritual solutions be useful to people with ‘real life’ problems? In other words, can transpersonal insights be helpful to clients when they come to coaching in order to resolve issues on the personal or interpersonal level? Students on this course will explore such questions and also examine the various approaches available to transpersonal coaches that enable them to help their clients generate peak experiences. Each student will select one or two of such approaches and investigate how peak experiences can be utilised in order for those ‘higher’ states to become meaningful and practical in the context of daily life.