Exploring Psychosynthesis Therapy

Assagioli’s leading book on the subject explained that psychosynthesis therapy’s primary goal is “the conscious and intended reconstruction or re-creation of the client’s personality, through the interaction and collaboration of the client and therapist.” Later, he outlines the stages of an individual as a being’s harmonious development. This includes:

• Detailed knowledge of one’s personality
• Control of different elements
• Understanding one’s true self or creating or discovering a unifying centre.
• Psychosynthesis: the rebuilding or formation of the personality around a new centre.

The first stage is considered a tall order, and it impossible to achieve an absolute goal. This is considered unachievable and a sign of arrogance. The reasoning behind this process is that a client should be willing to enter a mindful reflection on what is present from the unconscious. This shouldn’t be rushed and requires patience and the courage to go back and look at difficult memories and reflections. For the entire exploration, the client must agree to stay with the process. Psychosynthesis may be used for short-term therapy, but it is essential to understand that it doesn’t offer any “quick fix.”

While the therapist and client continue exploring the personality, the client also identifies ways to control various elements. Assagioli considered this the second stage of development. However, the control isn’t about achieving a rigid mastery of the personality. Instead, it is about the power that results from letting go of the process and finding the most effective ways to make happen the choices that are certain to arise. Development is considered a fluid, non-linear process.

Piero Ferrucci states, “When human growth is balanced and healthy, it advances in every direction; it looks like an expanding ball rather than a horizontal line. This is precisely why psychosynthesis considers all the dimensions of a life which truly matter.”

Here’s a comparison that is often attributed to Assagioli. If the psyche is a house, we are worried about the underground basement, bottom floor, and top floors.

During therapy, Assagioli states, “‘the synchronization and assimilation into one functioning whole of all the qualities and functions of the individual must be aimed at and actively fostered.” Disidentification is a process frequently used to achieve this integration. Disidentification involves stepping away from what controls us with a heightened awareness of the deeper choice that results from self-identification or the alignment of the personality with the Self.

This requires that the client take on the role of the arbitrator and later director of the development of their psyche. In therapy, the therapist initially takes on a more active role. As time progresses, the therapist’s impact “becomes increasingly catalytic…in the final stage, the therapist withdraws slowly and is interchanged by the self, with whom the client has established a growing relationship.”

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