The process of human growth and development occurs through a series of identity cycles. The transition from one identity level to the next is precipitated by extraordinary experiences, positive or negative in nature, that destabilize the ordinary state of consciousness. The result is a naturalistic trance or special learning state. If properly utilized, these trances lead to new, more evolved states of human being; but if not welcomed and received, violence and other forms of destructive pathology result. This address will examine this process in detail, and discuss implications for development at individual, group, and cultural levels.
Psyche has been located wholly intrapersonally (within the individual} or interpersonally (between persons, families, groups}, but never is it conceived also extra-personally as a component of the world, as a world soul or anima mundi in the classical sense.
Evidence that the hourly and daily variations in our consciousness are related to the wavelike flow of messenger molecules operating on all levels from mind to gene will be reviewed. Stress, psychosomatic problems, and their resolution are a function of how we manage this wave nature of our consciousness. How do we create a new psychotherapy for the future that utilizes these natural windows of the mindbody?