52 Spirituality Studies 10-1 Spring 2024 discipline has renounced any connection to higher orders of reality. 7 The Transpersonal Dimension of Healing Traditional cultures recognize the human body’s innate wisdom and capacity to heal, along with the spiritual dimension that supports this transformation. If psychology does not return to its sacred roots, it will fail to see the tripartite division of human beings into Spirit, soul, and body—this is critical to appreciating each person’s innate healing modalities (Bendeck Sotillos 2023b, 9–26). As traditional healers affirm, “[t]here is no sickness without a cause” (Calvo 1995, 139), yet it is incumbent on therapists to discern the interplay of these dimensions of a person, and to work with them in a wise and skillful manner. True wholeness flows from the transpersonal order, yet only the outer self requires therapy, as the inner Self always remains intrinsically whole. The “science of the soul,” as informed by the world’s spiritual traditions, is able to support the human psyche in becoming fully integrated into all its modes of knowing and corresponding ways of healing: “The soul’s apprehension of the nature of things changes in accordance with its own inner state” (Stithatos 1998, 92). In the same way that sages have taught the existence of an inner teacher – “the Guru is always within you” (Ramana Maharshi 1996, 370) – there is also an inner therapist, along with the required remedy to heal us from within. But this first requires the spiritual guidance of a valid tradition to help prevent us from going astray and becoming lost in our turbid subjectivity. A true sacred psychology ensures that the assessment, treatment, and healing of a person is informed by a transpersonal dimension – this is confirmed when we discern the intrinsic wisdom reflected in the human body (Nasr 1996, 235–269). Therefore, becoming a wayfarer on a spiritual path is indispensable. Paracelsus speaks of the “inner physician” hidden within each person and says that “[e]ach… disease bears its own remedy within itself” (1988, 76). Rūm (1207–1273) states something similar: “The physician comes to the sick man and questions the inward physician; for within you there is a physician” (2004, 61). St. John Cassian (c. 360– c. 435) writes: “The Doctor of our souls has also placed the remedy in the hidden regions of the soul” (1983, 76). According to ‘Al ibn Ab Ṭ lib (d. 661): “Your cure is within you, but you do not know” (‘Al ibn Ab Ṭ lib quoted in Chittick 2008, 104). Traditional healers and shamans allow the immanent “doctor within” (Dobkin de Rios 1992, 53) each person to support their healing process. Similarly, psychedelic researchers and practitioners have suggested the concept of an “inner healer” or “inner healing intelligence” (Grof 2000, 182). This certainly makes sense in a sacred context, whereas secular psychotherapy struggles with such notions, given it lacks a framework informed by divine transcendence and immanence. This confusion partly stems from erroneously assuming that “[t]he psyche is a self-regulating system” (Jung 1933, 17). This misconception captures the very predicament that afflicts modern psychology: namely, seeing the human psyche on a purely profane level, cut off from its “vertical” dimension – which alone can resolve the debilitating impasse that this discipline has brought on itself. 8 Set and Setting The “set” (the mindset or expectation that one brings) and “setting” (the environment in which it takes place) of the entheogenic experience are crucial – something that traditional healers always understood. Researchers and mental health professionals are trying to no longer utilize spaces that look like generic hospital rooms for the administration of these compounds, which is a step in the right direction towards ideal forms of treatment, but traditional approaches offer much more than just atmosphere. Sacred uses of this medicine presupposed a profound ecological knowledge rooted in metaphysics and spiritual principles that supported a person’s connection to all sentient beings in the web of life. No hospital or outpatient clinic can deliver this, even if the treatment were to be offered in a natural ambiance. A pioneering effort to account for “set” and “setting” within psychedelic research is as follows: “Of course, the drug dose does not produce the transcendent experience. It merely acts as a chemical key – it opens the mind, frees the nervous system of its ordinary patterns and structures. The nature of the experience depends almost entirely on set and setting” (Leary et al. 1990, 11). Elsewhere, this has been described in the following way: “Some of the more important variables are the personality of the individual, his current life situation, the attitude of those in contact with him during the experience, the setting and the reasons why the drug was taken and given” (Cohen 1972, 104–105). Other “extrapharmacological factors” (Grof 1980, 47) – such as non-drug variables – include inadequate preparation, negative expectations, poorly facilitated sessions, personalities of both the subject and therapist
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