ABSTRACT
The modern concept of holistic education derives from Rousseau’s EMILE: Or On Education and emphasizes personality development. This implies compliance with recapitulation theory, of which C.G. Jung says, ‘...we still recapitulate in childhood reminiscences of the prehistory of the race and of mankind in general.’ These ‘reminiscences’ are made up of instinctive, sentient, and imaginal components of the psyche. Drawing these components together to arrive at a holistic personality is the Jungian process of individuation.
Jung says the first half of life should be dedicated to ego-conscious development. This seeming contradiction has not escaped holistic educators. The dilemma lies in the suggestion that personality development cannot be both egocentric and holistic. Or can it? For example, Jolande Jacobi says, ‘Individuation ... is more important for us than ever today if we are not only to endure the present but also shape a better future.’ And cultural historian Jean Gebser argues that the instinctive, sentient and imaginal components of the psyche are ‘structures of consciousness’ relevant to both phylogenetic and ontogenetic development. For Mitchell, these suggest that personality development in the young and individuation belong together in a lifelong developmental process that can begin in the earliest stages of life.
