Social anthropologist, consciousness researcher, Professor at Sofia Univ, and curious explorer of culture, science, and the wonder of it all.

Blog

08 Nov

Posted at 10:00h in Featured, Transformation

Expanding Worldviews For nearly two decades, I have engaged in research on worldview transformations. Working with a multi-disciplinary team of scientists, we have systematically explored the dynamics of transformation. These include the identification of catalysts for worldview shifts, the elements of transformational practices shared across diverse spiritual and psychological traditions, and the outcomes and consequences of conscious worldview transformations for individuals and social institutions, including science, education and healthcare. Worldview transformation practices have been seen to increase self-reflection, personal and social awareness, cultural competence, innovation, resilience, collaborative inquiry, collective problem solving, and prosocial behaviors such as compassion and empathy (Schlitz et al.,...

01 Nov

Posted at 20:43h in Featured, Transformation

 Taking the Hit as a Gift Within every culture throughout history, people have developed modes of economic exchange. Today, business is the dominant institution in the world. Engaging in business encompasses a vital flow of commerce, global exchange, means of livelihood, and the lifeblood of many people who define themselves through their work. Business is a common denominator in our complex and interconnected world. It is also an institution that is experiencing profound transformation that is shaking everyone’s worldview. This is the first in a series of blogs about the application of research on transformative practices on the development of conscious...

01 Oct

Posted at 05:11h in Featured, Healing, Transformation

How can we thrive and flourish when we are constantly bombarded by weapons of mass distraction? How do we find the inner resources to match the complexities of the outer world?  When we are confronted with challenges that pull us off course, what are some simple tools for navigating our way toward healing and positive transformation? Here are some insights I have gained through my years of consciousness research: 1. Examine Your Worldview. As you consider your work and life, it is clear that we all have a unique worldview, belief system, and way of understanding that hinders or promotes our...

20 Sep

Posted at 00:58h in Featured, healthcare, Research, Transformation

Over the past few decades, the field of mind-body medicine has moved beyond the counter culture and into the mainstream. The scientific focus has shifted from the reductionistic view of health as a process based on discrete biological systems to a complex network of dynamic and interrelated systems. It involves the integration of the nervous, immune and endocrine systems, with insights from psychology and emotions research.  This field, that has become known as psychoneuroimmunology (PNI), was informed by the pioneering work of revolutionary scientists. Among them, pharmacologist Candace Pert helped add vital new perspectives on the model of health based...

03 Sep

Posted at 19:39h in Death Makes Life Possible, Featured

Our production team is excited to be moving forward on the Death Makes Life Possible film project!  In collaboration Deepak Chopra and the Chopra Foundation, Co Director, Mark Krigbaum, I am thrilled by the progress that our team has made.  Over the past few months we have received feedback and made many changes to the film. We showed rough cuts to a small group of film makers and producers, such as Steve Michelson, Founder of The Video Project and producer of many films, and Jay Wood, producer and writer of Crude Impact. We also showed it at the IONS Conference...

28 Aug

Posted at 20:32h in cancer, healthcare, prayer

 Adapted from the book Breast Cancer: Beyond Convention. This article, Chapter 12, written by Marilyn Schlitz, Ph.D., and Nola Lewis, M.S. Introduction, pg 315-7. People who face serious illness value their time in a new, more urgent way, and do not wish to waste it. If you are in treatment for breast cancer, you no doubt understand this very well. Like many women at this juncture, you may be feeling a greater-than-ever longing for a spiritual connection in your life. Illness often represents a spiritual turning point for patients, leading them to seek out new sources of comfort, strength, and purpose. It's too bad...

23 Aug

Posted at 19:49h in healthcare

Adapted from the Preface to Consciousness & Healing: Integral Approaches to Mind-Body Medicine As we prepared this collection of essays, we identified the following as key tenets of the integral impulse currently emerging within modern healthcare.   Integral medicine does not just refer to the science of diagnosing, treating, or preventing disease and damage of the body or mind, but to a medicine that heals. It is a dynamic, holistic, life-long process that exists in widening and deepening relationships with self, culture, and nature. Integral medicine is about transformation, growth, and the restoration of wholeness. Health is seen not as the absence of disease, but...

19 Aug

Posted at 20:16h in Featured, healthcare

[caption id="attachment_938" align="alignleft" width="233"] Shri Aurobindo (1872-1950)[/caption] Adapted from the Preface to Consciousness & Healing: Integral Approaches to Mind-Body Medicine While science has contributed to our understanding and treatment of disease, it has also served to limit the development of a model in which personal relationships, emotions, meaning, and belief systems are viewed as fundamental points of connection between body, mind, spirit, society, and nature. For increasing numbers of health-care consumers and professionals alike, the biomedical model fails to offer a system for understanding the fullness of lived experiences—minimizing or negating completely the possibility for human transcendence in the face of illness and...

14 Aug

Posted at 20:12h in Featured

I'm delighted to announce that I'm a new board member of the esteemed academic institution, Pacifica Graduate Institute in Carpinteria, California. Pacifica's focus on depth psychology compliments my career in consciousness studies and health and well-being. The motto, "Animae Mundi Colendae Gratia," is a beautiful framework for the spirit of the institution: By creating an educational environment with a spirit of free and open inquiry, consistent with the recognized values of academic freedom, Pacifica is dedicated to cultivating and harvesting the gifts of the human imagination. So that these insights may influence the personal, cultural, and planetary concerns of our era, this...

12 Aug

Posted at 20:11h in Featured, healthcare

Adapted from the Preface to Consciousness & Healing: Integral Approaches to Mind-Body Medicine Centuries ago, adventurers exploring the frontiers of our planet discovered, again and again, that they lived in a wider world than previously assumed. During this period, the art of map-making made tremendous strides. Fictitious lines of latitude and longitude became as important to navigators as the force of currents and the direction of winds. Perceptions of the world changed as new tools were discovered and new ideas unfolded. More recently, the quest to understand the universe and our place in it follows a similar pushing of boundaries with its...

08 Jul

Posted at 22:25h in Buddhism, Death and Afterlife, Death Makes Life Possible, Featured, Lectures, Transformation

Wonderful Enlightenment Mountain The three thousand great thousand worlds arise in a single thought. When the great manifests within the small, another world is reached. As the breeze blows through Ukiah, fragrant flowers smile. When it rains in Talmage, moistened plants rejoice. With boundless joy and giving, bring benefit to the multitudes. With vows of kindness and compassion, alleviate suffering and bestow happiness. The constant changes of the land are speaking the great Dharma. Wonderful Enlightenment Mountain wells forth from the earth. --Composed by Venerable Master Hua on April 20, 1978 As a public speaker, I have had the opportunity to teach in many venues, from the United Nations to...

26 Jun

Posted at 20:29h in Featured, Gardening

My holistic doctor offered me the best cure for stress: get lost in nature. While he may not have been speaking directly to my love for gardening, that is where I find my greatest reprieve from the stresses of life. The pumpkins, grown from heirloom seeds that date back centuries, are making great strides. With an awesome force of nature, they are running wild in a controlled kind of way. The vast vines push through the fence, finding wide-open spaces to make their mark. Like my ancestors who came to American before the American Revolution (see Seeding Our Future, Minding Our...

21 Jun

Posted at 17:06h in Death and Afterlife, Featured, healthcare

by Marilyn Schlitz & Elizabeth Valentina Introduction Welcome to Part Three of three. In Part Two we reviewed 5 – 8 of twelve basic tools that are important in practicing whole person healthcare, based on the tremendous insights of health care practitioners. These include: cultivate loving kindness, model optimal health, develop a support system, and create healing rituals. Tools: 9 – 12 (visit Part One for 1 – 4; visit Part Two for 5 – 8) 9. Set intentions for optimal healing. Ask yourself, “What matters most?  What values do I want to adhere to?”  Based on these reflections, you can craft an...

14 Jun

Posted at 16:50h in Featured, healthcare

by Marilyn Schlitz & Elizabeth Valentina Introduction Welcome back for Part Two of three. In Part One we reviewed 1 – 4 of twelve basic tools that are important in practicing whole person healthcare, based on the tremendous insights of health care practitioners. These included: examine your worldview, take an integral perspective, develop healing relationships, and deep listening. Tools: 5 – 8 5. Cultivate loving kindness. Many healing practitioners note that the greatest source of healing in the world is love.  Offering human to human, heart centered care is at the core of the healing relationship.  Delivering care with loving kindness may transform...

07 Jun

Posted at 00:11h in Featured, healthcare

by Marilyn Schlitz & Elizabeth Valentina Introduction Great strides have been made in the study of whole person healthcare. Integrating body, mind and spirit has become a key dimension of health education, prevention and treatment. Despite many advances in a wide range of holistic approaches, however, our health care system remains primarily disease-centered rather than focused on the well-being of the whole person. To thrive as individuals and as communities of caring, we are called to develop an appreciation for both the inner wisdom of direct personal experiences of illness and health (your own and your patients), and for scientific and technological developments that...