ABSTRACT
Transpersonal psychologists define their field as the study of experiences in which one's sense of identity extends beyond the personal to encompass wider, broader, higher, and/or deeper aspects of humankind, life, and the cosmos. Many other psychologists would agree that these experiences are worthy of study, even though they have been ignored by most mainstream psychologists over the years, despite William James' interest in the varieties of religious experiences and related human capacities. However, the transpersonalists have built an entire school of psychology around these reports and their implications, using them as the building blocks for a model of the complete person and his or her social environment. Typically, they insist that "the transpersonal model ... is not necessarily expected to replace or challenge the validity of earlier ones but rather to set them within an expanded context of human nature." 40 For me, transpersonal psychology is most usefully thought of as the disciplined study of behaviors and experiences that appear to transcend those hypothetical constructs associated with individual identities and self-concepts, as well as their developmental antecedents, and the implications of these behaviors and experiences for education, training, and psychotherapy.
