Meaningful Coincidences (mock study) - Psychology of Exceptional Experiences

*Note:  The following is a research proposal that was submitted as a course assignment.  As of this day, there are no plans to actually conduct the experiment detailed below.

Astrology Horoscopes and Meaningful Coincidences

Austin P. Haedicke

Psychology of Exceptional Experiences

Dr. Simmonds-Moore

University of West Georgia - Fall 2012

Abstract:  

This study examines the emotional, cognitive, and mental responses people have towards coincidental events.  The participants will take a brief initial survey documenting demographic information.  All participants will be divided into three groups.  Each participant will submit documentation of their emotional, cognitive, and mental states prior to and after the experiment is conducted.  The experiments will vary between groups, but are designed to promote a prediction of the future events of the participants’ lives.  A follow up survey is to be sent after one week has passed since the initial experiment.  This allows time for “coincidental” events to occur.  The nature of the second survey is a monitoring of the participants’ response to, attributed motivations for, and attributed meaning to potentially coincidental events which have occurred in the given time frame.


Purpose of Study:

The purpose of this study is to research the participants’ hermeneutical and existential responses to events which may possibly be interpreted as having been coincidental.  The study structures around three primary points of concern.  Firstly, do people associate emotional, spiritual, or cognitive (or any combination thereof) motivations with seemingly coincidental events?  Secondly, is there any attributed meaning associated with these motivations and experiences?  Lastly, are certain demographic groups more prone to attribute emotional, spiritual, or cognitive meaning to coincidental events and / or extrasensory and other anomalous experiences?  The study study results will also be analyzed in regards to observer effects.

The rationale for this study is based on the premiss that human beings do not seek simply to gain knowledge of the world, their world, and themselves; rather, they seek to understand and make use of the knowledge they have already obtained.  The rationale of this study hinges on the fact that people attribute meaning to the events that occur throughout their lifetime.  The point of inquiry in this fact is; what is motivating people towards these attributions?  In psychology’s quest to answer why we (humans) do the things we do, there is a vicious interplay between cognitive, spiritual, and emotional reasoning that is then interpreted and used to make future decision based on previous experiences.  The phenomenology of our lives forces us to towards a hermeneutical reaction that then attempts to remedy residual and inevitable existential concern.

Literature Review:

Belief Systems

A person’s reaction to and interpretation of events (coincidental and other) is highly subject to the belief system to which the person adheres to.  In general, there is a great deal of research that has been on in accordance to how people’s belief structures affect their interpretation of events and way of life.

Alcock (1995) states, in an article for The Skeptical Inquirer, that “Our brains and nervous systems constitute a belief-generating machine, a system that evolved to assure not truth, logic, and reason, but survival.”  Part of this survival based belief generation is in relevance to one’s psychological survival and existential satisfaction.  It is also important to note that essentially every aspect of a person’s life influences the ways in which they will perceive future events and coincidental occurrences.  “Learning does not occur in a vacuum.  We are not passive receivers of information.  We actively seek out information to satisfy our many needs.  We may yearn to find meaning in life.  We may yearn for a sense of identity.  We may yearn for recovery from disease.  We may yearn to be in touch with deceased loved ones” (Alcock, 1995).  The idea that learning does not occur in an objective vacuum is crucial in understanding how one identifies with the events of their life.
Alcock (1995) also states that “beliefs help us to function.  They guide our actions and increase or reduce our anxieties.  If we operate on the basis of belief, and if it ‘works’ for us, even though faulty, why would we be inclined to change?”  This is an important aspect of the function of belief systems.  Regardless of the validity of an event’s occurrence, the fact of the matter is that the interpretation of these occurrences produces a phenomenological response.

On the topic of paranormal beliefs, of which meaningful coincidences could be included, Jerome Tobacyk (1985) states that “One function of paranormal belief systems is to solve existential problems such as the meaning of life and the meaning of one’s personal death... However, different paranormal beliefs differ in their effectiveness in solving existential problems.”  Meaningful coincidences are one such para-normal belief that significantly impacts the manner in which one approaches and reacts to existential concerns of meaning.  To specifically address this point it is important to recognize that “in the beginning of the 20th century... magical thinking was seen as a response to uncertainty and ritual was seen as a means of dealing with anxiety” (Holt, 2012, p. 22).

Coincidences

There has also been a fair amount of research specifically pertaining to coincidences and their interpretation and definition.  S.L. Coleman (2009) defines a coincidence as “the co-occurrence of an integral thought or state and an external event within a short period of time (p. 273).  Alcock explains that “A strong coincidence may produce an emotional ‘zing’ that points us toward a paranormal explanation, because normal events would not be expected to produce such emotion (1995).  
Coleman’s study states that 300 million people in the United States would experience 300 incredible coincidences per day or 109,500 incredible coincidences per year” (2009, p. 272).  This statistic is important in understanding the frequency of coincidental events in which the experiencer finds them to be meaningful.  Holt writes, in Anomalistic Psychology, that “significant correlations have been found between sensation seeking and anomaly-proneness” (2012, p. 35).  

Holt also explains that “Social psychologists have considered superstitious beliefs to be the misapplication of a skill orientation to tasks determined by chance, thereby giving rise to superstitious stemming from an illusion of control” (2012, p. 55).  Paul Rogers conducted a study in 2009 in which he concluded that “Current trends suggest that individuals who reported a greater number of paranormal experiences also made more conjunction errors... Such biases are likely to have a major impact on subjective perceptions of chance and randomness, and thus on people (p. 537).  Coleman’s 2009 study also relates as he writes that “Our results indicate some relationship between both cognitive and affective individual difference variables and the reporting of coincidences (p. 279).

However, Coleman (2009) also presents an important mitigating statement that “Whether or not a coincidence will be considered ‘meaningful’ is strongly influenced by an individual's specific circumstance (eg: history, cognitive style, emotional state)” (p. 273).  This point leads back to the importance of understanding the belief systems of individuals prior to investigating their interpretation of coincidental events.

Memory

A person’s ability to remember a coincidental event is also an important variable to consider.  Alcock (1995) states that “It is very difficult for an individual to reject the products of his or her own memory process, for memory can seem so real.”  It is also important to consider the analytic tendencies (or lack thereof) of paranormal believing and meaning attributing individuals.  Rogers (2009) makes two crucial observations on the topic:  “Paranormal believers generally require less objective evidence of causal relatedness before they perceive a cause-and-effect relationship between events” (p. 526) and “Participants (in this study) generally made fewer conjunction errors for paranormal than for non-paranormal events” (p. 536).

Astrology

“Astrology is not a system of physical influences but of synchronicities relating the meaningful coincidence of planetary configurations with the underlying archetypal themes of human experiences” (Diaz, 2010, p. 31).  Diaz explains that the coincidental events of planetary alignment are attributed meaning by people and correlated towards respective events in their lives.  Diaz also states that “If we take a strictly archetypal view of astrology, we can predict the general flavor or thematic quality of the transit (eg: changes in relationship) but we cannot say much about how the transit will actually manifest” (2010, p. 33).  Rather, Diaz (2010) argues that “If a developmental approach were taken, it might be used to refine astrological prediction and to guide and inform the therapeutic process” (p. 33).


Methodology:

Materials and Equipment

The method of analyzation for this research will primarily lie in the form of surveys.  There will be two surveys as part of the study.  Each is described below.  The study will also require two professional volunteers or paid persons.  These persons are allowed full knowledge of the study, its purpose of inquiry, and methodology.  Release of the study results to these persons is at the discretion of the lead examiner. The first person is a professional psychic who specializes in extrasensory readings.  This person will be requested to make future predictions and insightful suggestions towards future events of the participants’ lives.  The second person is one who has formal training in a therapeutic setting as a life coach, psychologist, psychotherapist, or social worker.  This person will administer test to a one group of participants (processes detailed below).  

The administrators of the study will need a valid email address to send a follow-up survey to the participants.  Postage and mailing materials may be required to send the follow-up survey to the participants if a valid email address cannot be provided.  The administers will also need to collect a sampling of astrology horoscopes from either online or newspaper sources.  The samplings do not need to be specific to astrological sign, publisher of the newspaper / website, publisher of the article in which the sampling was found, or date of publication.  The samplings should however, be drawn from a variety of sources including varying dates of publication, sources of publication, and astrological sign affiliation.  The samplings should also have the date of publication and specific astrological sign removed prior to their presentation to the participants.

Participants

A collection of randomly selected participants will be required for this study.  Selection of participants may be restricted to the United States of America, or a specific geographical location within the United States.  A larger number of persons would be more preferred.  The selected participants may be of any age, race, gender, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, or ethnicity.  Diversity is paramount among the participants.  Participants do not need to have specific beliefs in regards to meaningful coincidences, spirituality, skepticism, paranormal events, or extrasensory protection.  The number of participants should, however, be evenly divisible by three (3).  The total number of participants will be randomly divided into three groups.  The participants should not be given prior knowledge as to the specific purpose of the study, however, they are permitted to know the general orientation of the experiment(s).  Participants are required to have either a valid mailing address or email address for the purposes of the follow up second survey.

Procedure

Prior to being divided into the three groups, all participants should be given Survey One as a precursor to their participation in the experiments at hand.  A sample Survey One can be found in Appendix One of this writing.  The first survey is designed to address any ethical concerns regarding the study as well as document confidentiality agreement and the participants’ age, gender, ethnicity, country of origin, country of citizenship, education level, religious affiliation, and sexual orientation.
The participants will then be divided into three equal (in number or participants) groups for the experiment portion of this study.  Group One will be asked to write a short statement detailing their emotional, cognitive, and mental states at the present moment and submit the statement to the experiment administrators.  The members of the group will then be asked to independently (and in a private location) read the horoscope samplings gathered by the experiment administers.  The members of the group again be asked to document their emotional, cognitive, and mental states after having read the horoscope selections.  The selected horoscope readings provided to each member of this group should be identical.
Group Two will also be asked to write and submit an initial analysis of their emotional, mental, and cognitive states.  The members of this group will be asked to attend a private psychic reading and request a fortune telling procedure of the professional psychic. After the reading has been completed the participants will again be asked to submit a statement of their emotional, cognitive, and mental states after the reading has been completed.
Group Three will also provide the same preemptive statement as the other groups.  The participants in this group will be taken to a private counseling session with the professional chosen by the experiment administrators.  The counselor will be instructed to guide the participant based on the horoscope samplings collected by the experiment administrators (the same selection as those read independently by the members of Group One).  The duration of the counseling session should be relatively close to that of the duration of the psychic readings partaken in by the participants in Group Two.  The participants of Group Three will also be asked to document and submit a statement of their emotional, cognitive, and mental states after the counseling session has ended.
One week after the initial experiment takes place each participant will be mailed a follow-up survey either via postal mail or email.  A sample of this survey can be found in Appendix Two of this writing.  The survey will document participants’ beliefs towards coincidental events.  The survey consists of thirty (30) questions that are to be ranked on a like-it scale ranging from “1” to “7” with listings including “Strongly Disagree (1), Somewhat Disagree (2), Slightly Disagree (3), Uncertain / Neutral (4), Slightly Agree (5), Somewhat Agree (6), Strongly Agree (7).  A return envelope with paid postage should be supplied with the survey if it is sent through postal mail.

Analysis of Results

The results of Survey Two are analyzed into 6 different categories.  Question 1 - 7 describe a change in direction, questions 8 - 11 describe a love connection, question 12 - 15 relate to thoughts and emotions, questions 16 - 19 relate to dreams, questions 20 - 25 relate to thoughts and ideas, and questions 26 - 30 specifically relate to coincidental events.
There are three primary points of correlative analysis for this study.  Firstly, data should be compiled to check the relationship and statistical correlations between Survey One and Survey Two for each participant.  Secondly, observer effects should be checked for via the group results of Group One compared with those of Groups Two and Three.  Next, there should be an analysis of all participants’ “before” and “after” statements of emotional, mental, and cognitive states that were submitted prior to and after the experiment was conducted.  Lastly, documentation should be made of the type of experience (per group) and the individual participant results of of Survey Two.


Appendix 1 - Sample Pre-Experiment Survey (Confidentiality and Demographics):
_____ Check this space if you consent to accurately and honestly complete the surveys and procedural requests assigned to you by the administers of this study.
_____ Check this space if you understand that at any time during the study you feel a moral or ethical objection to its procedure that you have the right to withdraw from the study for these reasons or if you feel that you can no longer fulfill your obligation to participate.
_____ Check this space if you understand that the information provided below will be held in complete confidentiality to the examiners of this research study and will not be released to any parties other than as a statistical meta-analysis documenting the results of this study.  By checking this space you also understand that your name and personal identification are used only to compare the various segments of the study you participate in.
Age in years:  __________
Gender: _____
A) Male
B) Female
C) Transgendered
Ethnicity: _____
A) White / Caucasian
B) African American
C) Hispanic
D) Asian
E) Other:  __________
Country of Origin: _____________________
Country of Citizenship: ___________________
Completed Level of Education: _____
A) No High School
B) Some, but did not complete, High School
C) High School Diploma / GED
D) Some College
E) Two-Year College Degree
F) Four-Year College Degree
G) Graduate / Professional College Degree
Religious Affiliation: _____
A) Christian (non-denominational)
B) Christian - Denomination: __________
C) Islamic
D) Eastern Religion (Buddhist, Hindu, Dao, Shinto, etc..)
E) Agnostic
F) Atheist
G) Non-religious
H) Other: __________
Sexual Orientation: _____
A) Straight (heterosexual)
B) Gay (homosexual)
C) Bisexual
D) Asexual
_____ Check this space if you agree to the confidentiality of your participation in this experiment and the content of its procedures and administers.
Email or Mailing Address (for follow-up surveys):
Email Address: __________________________
Mailing Address
____________________
____________________
____________________

Printed Name (for correspondence with following surveys): ___________________

Written Signature: _____________________________


Appendix 2 - Sample Post-Experiment (Meaningful Coincidences):
Instructions:  Please rank the following statements on a scale of 1 to 7.  1 = Strongly Disagree, 2 = Somewhat Disagree, 3 = Slightly Disagree, 4 = Neutral / Uncertain, 5 = Slightly Agree, 6 = Somewhat Agree, 7 = Strongly Agree.

1)  I am introduced to people who unexpectedly further my work/career/education. _____
2)  In attempting to reach a goal, obstacle after obstacle prevented me from continuing on a path, I later discovered that the alternative path was better for me. _____
3) I advance in my work/career/education through being at “the right place at the right time.” _____
4) Meaningful coincidences change my life. _____
5) A series of coincidences point me toward taking a particular action in my personal life, career, or education. _____
6) Meaningful coincidence helps me determine my educational path. _____
7) Meaningful coincidence validates my course of action. _____
8) I experience strong emotions or physical sensations that were simultaneously experienced at a distance by someone I love. _____
9) After a loved one died, I have received some indication that this person was communicating with me. _____
10) I am in the right place at the right time to rescue somebody. _____
11) I discover that I felt pains and / or anguish as someone I loved was dying in another place. _____
12) I think of calling someone, only to have that person unexpectedly call me. _____
13) When my phone rings, I know who is calling (without checking the cell phone screen or using personalized ring tones). _____
14) I run into a friend in an out-of-the-way place. _____
15) I think about someone and then that person unexpectedly drops by my house or office or passes me in the hall or street. _____
16) I have dreams that predict future events. _____
17) I have dreams that supply me with specific information about my personal life, career, or education. _____
18) I have dreams and later find out that events in my dreams actually happened around the same time that I had dreamt them. _____
19) I have dreams about unknown persons whom I then subsequently meet. _____
20) I think about a song and then hear it on the radio. _____
21) The same name or word has appeared several times in close proximity in different contexts. _____
22) I think of an idea and hear or see it on radio, TV, or internet. _____
23) I think of a question only to have it answered by external media (ie: TV, radio, people) before I can ask it. _____
24) A certain number regularly appears in my life.  And that number is __________ ?
25) I experience a series of numerically-related coincidences (for example: Buying something for $1.44 before taking flight #144 at 1:44 P.M.) _____
26) I feel that meaningful coincidences point to a connection between my internal and external worlds. _____
27) I believe that human minds are interconnected. _____
28) I believe that God speaks to us through meaningful coincidences. _____
29) Meaningful coincidences help me grow spiritually. _____
30) I believe coincidences can be explained by the laws of probability. _____

Printed Name: ___________________






Appendix Three - Works Cited:

Alcock, J. (1995, May). The Belief Engine. In The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. Retrieved September 19, 2012, from http://www.csicop.org/si/show/belief_engine/

Coleman, S. L., & Beitman, B. D. (2009). Characterizing High-frequency Coincidence Detectors. Psychiatric Annals, 39(5), 271.

Diaz, A. M. (2010). The Role of the Astrological Symbol System in Understanding the Process of Evolutionary Growth. Revision, 32(1), 29-34.

Holt, N. J., Simmonds-Moore, C., Luke, D., & French, C. C. (2012). Anomalistic Psychology (pp. 35-55). New York, NY: Palgrave-Macmillan.

Rogers,, P. (2009). Paranormal belief and susceptibility to the conjunction fallacy. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 23(4), 524. doi:10.1002/acp.1472

Tobacyk, J. (1985, December). Paranormal Beliefs, Alienation and Anomie in College Students. Psychological Reports, 57(3), 844-846. Retrieved September 19, 2012, from http://www.amsciepub.com/doi/abs/10.2466/pr0.1985.57.3.844



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Foundation of Humanistic Psychology - Ken Wilber

*This was a journal response entry handed in for my "Foundations of Humanistic Psychology" course.

Ken Wilber

No Boundary:  Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth

I had some very mixed feelings about Ken Wilber’s “No Boundary.”  In a sense, I feel like it was kind of a philosophical roller coaster for me.  I would find segments in the book where I thought Wilber was spot on with my own opinions and beliefs.  However, I would turn a few pages and be very disappointed by his seemingly overzealous and exuberant joy in his transluminal approach.
I was not instantly set-off by Wilber.  I finished the book with a rather neutral feeling.  However, upon reviewing my notes I found that most of them reflected the book in a negative light.  This was interesting because I was not preemptively trying to make a case against Wilber.  However, it seemed that in the end I had many more concerns than compliments for him.
I certainly like the idea of pushing boundaries for the purposes of extending them.  However, I disagree with Wilber that all boundaries are also connections.  I would agree that many things are connected in “our world.”  This helps resolve some of the other issues I have had with Maslow, Rogers, and Van Den Berg (for example) not paying enough credence to the physical realm of our experiences.  However, I would say that I am certainly more inclined to take a Heidegerrian rather than Wilberian approach to pan- and panen- experiential issues.  This brings me to my first major stumbling block with Wilber.  He asserts oneness, gestalt-type ideas, and duality to the point of wholism.  I very much agree that there are certainly tensions in our lives that create a fertile proving ground for our being, and yes, they are all connected.  However, my concern is that wholism, by its definition, denies individuality.  This is a major “sin” from my existential-phenomenological-hermeneutic viewpoint.  I am aware that some Eastern traditions see wholism as an opportunity to express individualism by taking part in the whole.  Nevertheless, I feel that something very significant to ourselves and our being is lost when it is absorbed to the being of the whole (ala Heidegger’s “das man”).  When our being assimilates to the being of the whole, do our individual characteristics lose their stature and significance as we are no longer ourselves, but “the” self?
This brings me to my next question for Wilber.  Theoretically speaking, what if I do not want to take part in the whole?  What if I do not care about the transpersonal world?  Perhaps my decision or concern are uneffective in rebelling against our “oneness” as it is inevitable and a constant connection whether recognized, acknowledge, accepted, or actively participated in.  If this were the case the I reiterate my disdain for the idea of oneness for its lack of individual authenticity and culpable conviction.
Wilber speaks of transpersonality and transliminality as ways to happiness and to remove individual constraints of suffering by way of universal sharing of all burdens.  However, the question, then, that begs to be asked is; “What if I am content with my suffering, satisfied with my misery?  What if I prefer to bear my burdens alone as they contribute to my-self and I do not want to lose that part of my-being to the-being of us all?”
Furthermore, Wilber speaks of living “beyond” our suffering.  Still, I hold to the concerns expressed above.  I do not want to live “beyond” anything associated with my becoming or being.  To move beyond is an implicit and concise detriment to the very notion of “being” as a present state of motion, of living, of expressing and experiencing.  Being is not a state of reciprocity to the future or the past or even to any other being.  I have connections, projections, and inspirations.  I am not those things.  In other words, I do not want to “live beyond” my sufferings (to do so also implies a move beyond my joys) because my being is defined by how I live in and live with them in this moment, by my own oneness, by being “one” with myself.

Thanks for Reading!

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Sanity and Morality - 3/5/11 republication

       
           I recently ready "Heart of Scars" by Brian P. Easton.  I highly recommend both of the books in the series; When the Autumn Moon is Bright (An Autobiography of a Werewolf Hunter) and Heart of Scars.  The books themselves are not relevant to this post, but what the main character, Sylvester, says in one part of "Heart of Scars" is.  At one point, Sylvester muses over his sanity and consequently his morality.  He concludes that if you have the mental capacity to question your sanity, then you are (for all intensive purposes) sane.  He then wonders whether or not the same is true of morality.  This  is a very minor part of the plot, but I found it very thought provoking.  So the question is:  "If questioning your sanity declares you sane, does questioning your morality declare you moral?"
          There are a few thing we need to consider first.  Is the first statement true?  Does questioning your sanity declare you sane?   In a very specific sense it could be argued that it does not, as there is a fine line between genius and insanity as they say.  However, in a general sense, and for the purpose of this discussion, I think it does hold true.  If you are mentally and cognitively capable of arranging a logical argument in your head whether you are mentally sound (sane) or not, then decisively it is more likely that you are indeed sane than it is that you are insane.  I am aware that there may be many people suffering from mental illnesses who can arrange arguments for their sanity when clearly (to outsiders) they are not.  I think it could be argued that though their arguments may be flawed, in accordance to what their brain declares to be rational, their argument is flawless.  My greatest sympathy goes out to these people who can function on their own but by the bounds of the law are condemned to forever rely on the assistance of others.  However, excuse me for getting a bit off topic.  In the Aristotelian sense of the question, yes, the ability to argue over whether you are sane or insane does vindicate your sanity.  In a more platonic and universal sense the answer may be "no" but for the vast majority of situations to be considered, the answer is "yes."
          Now on to the real question.  The first thing that must be noticed is that in the question of sanity, there were only two possible answers.  Either you were sane or insane, there was no "half-sane" option.  While this may lead to some ambiguity in the above paragraph, it becomes a matter of the glass being half empty or half full.  Sanity is partially defined by the ability to logically reason and insane is to be of a not sound mind.  This means that even if we are as insane as we are sane, the tie goes to the side of sanity.  When arguing over the same question only with  morality instead of sanity, there are three options involved.  They are; moral, immoral, and amoral.  While I am skeptical of anyone who claims to be 100% amoral ( much like true stoics or nihilists)  the side is at least possible in theory if not in practicality.
          Kant said that we do as we are, in a much different light Nietzsche said that we are as we do.  These two philosophical greats of course lead us to very different directions when discerning what is moral or not, what is good and what is evil.  However, this is not a blog on the thought of Nietzsche or Kant, but a blog on my thoughts.  So, if you were to ask me the question; "Does questioning your morality declare you moral?", my answer would be "yes."
          I would answer the question yes, for the following reasons.  Doubt or questioning itself is not directly indicative of morality.  Questioning morality is, however, a byproduct of guilt.  This immediately eliminates the possibility of questioning your morality declaring that you are amoral.  If you are amoral and feeling guilt, then you were not truly amoral in the first place.  The remaining choices are immoral and moral.  In order for our questioning to declare us immoral, it would have to be proven that there is an ethical violation in asking questions.  Certainly, not asking any questions (due to the vast potential for abuse and malicious intent) would be unethical.  Therefore, by default, asking questions is not immoral.  This leads to my next point.  Being moral does not always indicate doing the "right thing."  The "right thing" can mean very different things depending on the slightest religious, cultural, environmental, essential, or educational context that place specific conditions on such an argument.  It is simple enough and accurate enough to establish that to be moral is to question whether something is right or not much more than it is to say that to be moral is to do the right thing.
          In the conclusion of my reasoning listed above:  "if questioning your sanity declares you sane, then questioning your morality does declare you moral."  Consequently if you were to ask Kant this question, I believe he would have come to the same answer.  If we are as we do, what we are doing is questioning right and wrong, questioning right and wrong is moral, thus we are moral.  For Nietzsche, if we do as we are, then we are uncertain if we are moral, uncertainty does not equal immorality, uncertainty may mean amorality, questioning is indicative of concern, concern over morality cannot lead to amorality, therefore we are uncertain of right and wrong thus we question right and wrong and may be categorized as moral.  What a strange irony that Kant and Nietzsche would actually come to the same answer (though through different means) on something as controversial as moral behavior.



*Originally published in "Lies of Lions" on 3/5/11.  This is a republication in its original, unedited state.  The contents of this post may not reflect my current philosophical and personal interests and viewpoints.  Nevertheless, it should prove to be quite intellectually inquisitive.




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Foundations of Humanistic Psychology - R.D. Laing

*The following is a brief response paper that I wrote for an assignment in my "Foundations of Humanistic Psychology" course.

R.D. Laing

"The Divided Self"

I did enjoy reading R.D Laing’s “The Divided Self.”  I did not find it as inspirational to me personally as other works, such as those by Rollo May, however, Laing’s piece did provide some very intriguing insight.  While it was not one of those “aha!” books for me, it certainly did provide a lot of fodder and fuel to write about in terms of a phenomenological approach to psychology.

There are some key definitions provided by Laing which I think are very pertinent to the context of the book in its entirety.  Firstly, “The term schizoid refers to an individual the totality of whose experience is split in two main ways... there is a rent in his relation with his world and... there is a disruption of his relation with himself” (Laing, 17).  Secondly, “Existential phenomenology becomes the attempt to reconstruct the patient’s way of being himself in his world, although, in the therapeutic relationship, the focus may be on the patient’s way of being-with-me” (Laing, 25).  Next, “The self, therefore, is precluded from having a direct relationship with real things and real people” (Laing, 82).  Then, “The false self arises in compliance with the intentions or expectations of the other...” (Laing, 98).  Laing also writes that “... psychosis is sometimes simply the sudden removal of the veil of the false self, which had been serving to maintain an outer behavioural normality that may, long ago, have failed to be any reflection of the state of affairs in the secret self” (99-100).  Laing also cites Tillich and Heidegger for two important references.  Tillich - “Neurosis is the way of avoiding non-being by avoiding being” (Laing, 111).  Heidegger - “Guilt is the call of Being for itself in silence” (Laing, 132).  Lastly, the real “meat-and-potatoes” of the work is “the schizoid individual is frequently tormented by the compulsive nature of his awareness of his own process” (Laing, 106).

I did take fondly to Laing’s phenomenological approach to schizoid, schizophrenia, and dissociative disorders.  Right away, on page 23, Laing writes, “People who experience themselves as automata, as robots, as bits of machinery, or even as animals.. such persons are rightly regarded as crazy.”  The experiential aspect of these issues comes into play shortly after as Laing asserts that “No one has schizophrenia, like having a cold.  The patient has not “got” schizophrenia.  He is schizophrenic” (Laing, 34).  Thus we have a experiential-phenomenological basis for the issue at hand.  “We can say that in the individual whose own being is secure in his primary experiential sense, relatedness with others is potentially gratifying; whereas the ontologically insecure person is preoccupied with preserving rather than gratifying himself” (Laing, 42).

Something that Laing hit on that I feel is very near to my own work is on page 65 where he writes that “In the absence of such basic security, life must, nevertheless, go on.”  In a sense we are all dying, if not already dead.  However, the very fact that you are presently conscious or at least in some state of presence (being or non-being) illuminates the will to continue onward in spite of one’s agonies.  Laing also helped me better express my issue with Maslow’s self-actualization by stating that “The self can relate itself with immediacy to an object which is an object of its own imagination or memory but not to a real person” (Laing, 86).  Laing then goes on to illustrate a point which I would tend to agree with; “If he does not exist objectively as well as subjectively, but has only a subjective identity, an identity-for-himself, he cannot be real” (Laing, 95).

I also liked Laing’s sentiments of other people leaving fragments of themselves embeded within our own being and how we may not like these parts of ourselves.  “Such little fragments of others seem to get embedded in the individual’s behaviour as pieces of shrapnel in the body” (Laing, 105).  “... he had not dared to admit this possibility to himself because it would have precipitated him into a violent conflict with all the values that had been inculcated into him and entirely disrupted his own idea of who he was” (Laing, 97).

The part of the book that I found most thought provoking was in the early-middle third of the book where Laing discusses a young man who has disassociated from his “true-self” in the sense that he goes about life constantly role playing different characters and speaking “largely in quotes.”  I found this to be very intriguing because from my observation many great writers exude vicariouslives of fragments of themselves in the characters depicted in their writing.
There is a nice conclusion towards the end of the book which, nevertheless, leaves the reader (as only great works can do) with more questions than answers.  “This provides striking confirmation of Jung’s statement that the schizophrenic ceases to be schizophrenic when he meets someone by whom he feels understood” (Laing, 165).  Lastly, Laing hints that there is a sort of depth-charging strategy to life in order to conquer non-being and fulfill our being.  “If one could go deep into the depth of the dark earth one would discover ‘the bright gold’, or if one could get fathoms down one would discover ‘the pearl at the bottom of the sea’” (Laing, 205).  However, this begs the question then, Mr. Laing, what measures do we take to begin this process of depth-charging our being?  Furthermore, how are we to survive ourselves long enough that we can sustain and complete this journey?

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A Shot of Bourbon

          The following is a poem that I wrote in 2010 and was published in my (no archived) blog "Lies of Lions" on September 2, 2010.  I'm in the process of moving those archived posts, those which I feel are still relevant to this blog and its content, to a republished state in a blog that is still active.  This one. This poem was the first post in that blog.  Honestly, I had not read it since posting it and did not even remember writing such a poem.  However, I thoroughly enjoyed re-reading it and I hope you get the sense of what I was trying to say then and am still saying now.

A Shot of Bourbon

Life's like a shot of bourbon.

It's short and sour

And after long enough

It's sure to kick your ass,

But somehow we find a way to enjoy it.

It burns all the way to the end,

Leaves you with a bitter grimace,

But there's a moment to be held,

To be cherished,

Just before the sigh of relief

When you finish.

Knock back a few too man,

And get knocked down a few too many times.

Just when you're flying high

You feel the gravel in your guts

Because you're empty, like that bottle, inside.

Your head hangs heavy

Atop smoke filled lungs.

Wait for the sun to rise before you hang it up.

Chased below the label,

You'd undo it all if you were able.

Turned upside down to pull the last drop,

Drink it up and dedicate the good stuff.

Like a hollow play, puppets play and glasses clang.

It won't last too long,

It's bittersweet and cumbersome.

However burned and gray, broken and beaten up

We'll still pour another one.

A slow burn and subtle hurt;

For better or worse, we've enjoyed it.

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