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Spiritual Counseling
©2014 by Rev. Anthony S. Wright, Ph.D., CCHT The spiritual counselor meets you exactly where you are in the unfolding experience of life with Spirituality- with compassion, interest, and patience, to facilitate your developing discernment and awareness of a context within which to place your experience. Only when we develop the capability for discernment within a context, can spiritual development occur. Together, we embrace and explore elements regarding the situation that are less in harmony than we would like. In cases of crisis, this disharmony can be significant. Though the spiritual counselor may have less of an opportunity initially to assess the breadth and depth of the context within which one finds oneself, the presenting problem will offer of itself a modality by which to proceed. Please click Here to schedule a spiritual counseling session. --------------------------------------------------------- There is an enfolded presupposition for self-generativity for us within spiritual counseling. We can learn discernment for our own ongoing process, and action we can take to facilitate deepening harmony. But techniques are not the whole story. "…There are moments of the secret ground in which the world order is beheld as present. Then the tone is heard all of a sudden whose uninterpretable score the ordered world is. These moments are immortal; none are more evanescent. They leave no content that could be preserved, but their force enters into the creation and into man's knowledge, and the radiation of its force penetrates the ordered world and thaws it again and again…" Martin Buber, in I and Thou (Buber, 1970, p.82) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alan Watts (Watts, 1970) talks about differences between the 'sudden' school, and the 'gradual' school of awakening as being both a 'gradual' development, to a 'sudden' awareness. With gradual development, one develops capabilities to attend to certain parameters, that when competence is developed in attending to these parameters, that is, a basis from which to attend to these certain parameters is developed, then a sudden shift to a meta perspective from this basis becomes possible. A sudden shift of consciousness to a transcendent level of awareness which occurs without first developing a context from which to attend and discern context and transcendence can be problematic. The experience of transcendence from the personal to the spiritual without context and capability to discern between them may be correlated with mental illness, such as schizophrenia. Without this context, people who think they are the Godhead are correct, though they may mistake their experience of the personal for the transcendent. The error comes in transcending the personal without releasing the identification with the ego, which implies an erroneous exclusivity. To say God is within me is correct, even 'I' am God is ok, but the pronoun 'I' in English presupposes an exclusivity- and to say "I, alone am God" is an error. We are keenly interested in assisting in developing discernment that invites a reframe of experience and recognition of inherent capabilities in useful and generative ways in our lives. We presuppose in our work with people that not only are we capable of experiencing the "tone" of the "secret ground", but that we are capable of becoming functionally transparent to it, in an ongoing, moment-to-moment unfoldment. This presupposition facilitates the development of a generative process of functional transparency of personality so that it is self-sustaining and radiates from one's person, modeling and resonating. This state of functional transparency happens both gradually and suddenly. Sometimes we have had the sudden experience and need assistance to go through the gradual work to contextualize it. The sudden experience of Spiritual Awakening cannot be commanded to occur, it can only be prepared for. (Please see John Welwood's article "Double Vision: Duality and Nonduality in Human Experience") Though talk is involved, this process is direct, experiential, and immediate- facilitating our discovery and utilization of previously unrecognized deep and natural internal resources. The understanding, activation, and alignment of these resources at multiple levels continues to iterate long after the initial session or sessions, and many return from time to time as useful for additional 'tune-ups' as we grow through life's ups and downs. References: Batchelor, Stephen. (1990). The Faith to Doubt. Berkeley. Parallax Press. Buber, Martin. (1970). I and Thou. New York. Charles Scribner's Sons. Watts, Alan. (1970). The Philosophies of Asia., http://madphilosopher.ca/doc/philosophies_of_asia.html, accessed 2/22/08. Training and Experience: Anthony Wright was legally ordained a Minister on Novmber 30th, 2003, and is in good standing in the Universal Life Church at Modesto, Califorina. Anthony has earned a Master of Arts degree in East-West Psychology, with an emphasis in Spiritual Counseling. (May 12, 2008), and Doctorate in Philosophy and Religion (Ph.D.)(May 18, 2014) from the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco. Please see Cirriculum Vitae for complete details of Anthony's Education and Training. His forty-four years of involvement with musical instruments and their owners translates directly in the process of attunement of the psyche, as more than a metaphor for bringing forth deep, stable harmony through functional transparency in soul growth. As an active audio engineer and radio producer of interviews with prominent scientists, academicians, psychologists, artists, and musicians, listening trans-temporally and at depth in the moment guides him in active evocation of unexpected and fruitful awareness. A single parent who had custody of two children, one of whom is developmentally disabled, he has deep compassion and reverence with a fierce advocacy for young people. Anthony S. Wright, Ph.D, is a Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist (CCHT, No.308-249), Certified through the American Council of Hypnotist Examiners. Anthony Wright is not a licensed marriage & family therapist, psychologist, or physician. Scheduling Please click Here to schedule a spiritual counseling session. The usual preferred consultation time for clients is 90 minutes. Home
Spiritual Counseling: Time The 90 minute session is preferred, as most current issues can be addressed in that time frame. As with other counseling professionals, all client information is kept strictly confidential. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DISCLAIMER Anthony Wright is NOT a licensed psycholgist, marriage and family therapist, or physician. SPIRITUAL COUNSELING IS OFFERED SOLELY AS AN ALTERNATIVE AND COMPLEMENT TO OTHER FORMS OF COUNSELING. CLIENTS AGREE THAT THEY ARE ENTIRELY RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR OWN THOUGHTS, ACTIONS, AND CONCLUSIONS BEFORE DURING AND AFTER ANY SPIRITUAL COUNSELING SESSION. Home
Future Plans
Spiritual Counseling workshops under development.
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