Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2024

Abstract

Despite the power of the therapeutic alliance in effective therapy and its larger-thanthe- individuals-comprising-it (transpersonal) qualities, the client’s contribution to the therapeutic process has been largely overlooked in both conventional and transpersonal literatures. This study asked 35 transpersonal practitioners, what is the role of the client in transpersonal psychotherapy? The study examined client traits, attitudes and role demands in Jungian therapy, sandplay therapy, dream analysis, guided imagery, regression and hypnotherapy, nondual psychotherapy, and psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy using inductive thematic analysis. The results distinguish transpersonal therapy clients from conventional ones, indicating that the transpersonal client role characteristics and behaviors are unavoidably more developed by the very demands of transpersonal modalities—as are the demands on the therapist. For most, but not all, transpersonal modalities, the therapeutic alliance is a peer relationship, with the client firmly in the driver’s seat. The findings suggest that transpersonal psychotherapy may be adjunctive or complementary to conventional therapy, and that conventional therapy may only work for some clients up to a point. Finally, transpersonal modalities could be integrated into conventional therapy based on client need and therapist openness to trans-egoic dynamics.

Download

Share

COinS