This brief article is based upon the teaching and therapeutic work of Edith Stauffer1. Edith was the founder of the High Point Center in Pasadena, CA., she taught in the Psychosynthesis training program and maintained a busy private practice. Edith trained with Roberto Assagioli, the founder of Psychosynthesis, and was a long-term student of the teachings of the ancient wisdom as taught by Alice Bailey.
In the 1990’s this writer attended a two-day workshop done by Dr. Stauffer in Los Angeles on the topic of “Unconditional Love and Forgiveness”. Near the end of the first day, she did a demonstration of the technique using a volunteer from the audience. The demonstration was very powerful and moving. The work of forgiveness concerned an incident from the volunteer’s childhood in which she said her stepfather had tried to poison her. The woman had cut off all contact and relationship with her stepfather.
As it was her custom, Edith began the second day of the workshop by asking if partocrats had any dreams to report or questions.
The lady from the previous day’s demonstration stood up and reported that something quite remarkable had occurred. She had not spoken with her stepfather for many years. But, on the last night the man had called her from the opposite coast of America and said that he felt that he must make contact with her and find out how she was doing. Of course, this was also very moving to all of us and was a clear demonstration of the power of Unconditional Love and Forgiveness to heal our wounds.
I can say from my own work with clients that the process here described is often experienced as a great weight or burden having been lifted to the person and sometimes as a marked improvement in the relationship with the one forgiven.
The Essene Background
Dr. Stauffer was introduced to the Unconditional Love and Forgiveness work by a man named Dan MacDougald in 1970. MacDougald had become a student of the writings of the Essenes and particularly a work called the Code of Conduct.
MacDougald had developed a training course for prison inmates which he called the “Emotional Maturity Instruction”. MacDougald reported that the recidivism rate of those who had gone through the course was much lower than for those who had not.
Dr. Stauffer trained with Mr. McDougald and applied the teachings to her Psychosynthesis work. Edith viewed the Essene teachings as very similar to the Transpersonal Psychology of Roberto Assagioli. Both held that the true self was the Higher Self, the which the Essenes called the Naphsha. The Essenes, Dr. Stauffer taught, similarly to the esoteric student, attempted to fill their minds with positive thoughts of their divine nature and of all aspects of life.
Dr. Stauffer continued, as Mr. MacDougald had done, to use the Essene terms for the various spiritual and psychological aspects. The writer of this present article concluded that this arcane approach was not necessary and preferred to use the term Higher Self or Soul and Personality in accordance to modern esoteric teachings.
Making Higher Self Contact
What makes Dr. Stauffer’s approach different from other psychological approaches to forgiveness is the emphasis on making Soul contact in the work of forgiveness. The view is that it is, in fact, the Higher Self or Soul, that supplies the energy and realization to makes forgiveness possible. In keeping with this, it is imperative that the therapist, or person conducting, this work has their own sense of realization of the nature of the Higher Self. This writer having often observed the work of Dr. Stauffer, it was evident that she has such Soul contact, was a “Soul Infused Personality” and was often guided by clear sense of Intuition coming from that Higher Self contact.
The Forgiveness Formula
Dr. Stauffer said that her approach to Forgiveness was learned from Mr. MacDougald who had himself learned it from the Essene teachings. They stated that forgiveness is an attitude.2
The forgiveness formula is as follows:
The Process of Forgiveness
Step 1: Say to yourself “I choose to stop punishing myself and feeling bad for what (name the person) has done or is doing.”
Step 2: Imagine that the person you need to forgive is in front of you. You may wish to close your eyes. As you hold the image of this person in front of you, say aloud “I would have preferred you had said (or done) ____.”
Step 3: Say: “But you didn’t do that, so I now will release this incident. I choose to let it go and feel free.”
Step 4: Say: “Therefore, I cancel all demands, expectations and conditions that do (or say, or be) _____ in the past and now. I cancel the demand that you be (any certain way). You are totally responsible for your actions and deeds, and I release you to your own good.”
Step 5: Close your eyes and raise your consciousness into the Higher Self (Naphsha). Imagine the love that the Higher Self (Naphsha) has for you. Feel that compassion and love from the Higher Self; allow it to flow into you and release all the conditions and expectations and demands. Really feel the positive qualities of the Higher Self (Naphsha), that part of you that has protected, loved, and nurtured you all the days of your life.
Step 6: With your eyes still closed, continue to feel love from the Higher Self and now say to the person you are to forgiving: “I send you this love from the Higher Self (Naphsha) out to you just as you are and have been.” “Feel this love flowing out from you to this person. Take your time feel and experience this.
Step 7: Now be aware of your body and how it feels. See if you are holding on to any demands that this person change in any way. If you do not feel release, repeat the process. Repeat the process for each action you are holding against the person. The mind cannot do a blanket forgiveness-each incident must be treated separately. Always examine your willingness to be free. If you do not feel release, there may be another incident that is not yet in your conscious mind. Ask: “Is something else blocking this process?” If so, it will usually come up immediately. Process what comes. IF nothing comes, feel deep gratitude that you can feel for from your Higher Self and can send it out to the forgiven one. The sense of relief will come.
This exercise can be done often. It works for small hurts and disappointments and it works for deep emotional trauma. It works anytime we feel love is blocked.
Edith also used a Self-Forgiveness formula.
An Exercise in Self-Forgiveness
Step 1: Sit in a comfortable chair or kneel, holding the attitude of openness. Reach up in consciousness to the Higher Self (Naphsha), which has watched over you all your life. Tell the Higher Self what you feel at the moment. Take separately each incident needing forgiveness.
Step 2: Stand with your eyes closed. Identify with the Higher Self (Naphsha), that all-wise part of you. Identify with its qualities and feel compassion. Let this energy of compassion fill you. Identify with understanding, wisdom, and unconditional love. Take plenty of time to feel this. With your eyes still closed, look down upon your personal self, who may have acted unwisely or even foolishly and is asking for forgiveness. Speak to the personal self from that position of compassion. Understanding, wisdom and unconditional love, assuring the personal self of your forgiveness. From this wise and elevated place, you can see the past clearly. You can see why and how everything happened as it did. Now in your great compassion as the Higher Self, send your unconditional love out in great abundance to the personal self, and cancel all conditions the personal self is holding against itself. Assure the personal self that no expectation, demand, or condition the personal self has put on itself can separate your love from it. Continue sending uncondoned love, assuring the that it is not its actions, but is a personal self in the process of learning life’s lessons. Surround it with peace or mind and comfort.
Step 3: Take the position you assumed when you asked the Higher Self for forgiveness, sitting on the chair or kneeling. Take time now to identify with the personal self that has just been forgiven. Feel how it feels to be forgiven, have your slate clean. Feel your freedom. Feel the relief and goodness of what has just happened. With deep gratitude in your heart, thank the Higher Self for the forgiveness you have just experienced. Let the gratitude flood your whole being.
“At this point you may wish to make a will statement, such as ‘I will to comfortably that I am free of this past experience, and I will to remember how to avoid such circumstances in the future.’ In order to impress your new goal upon the unconscious mind, read or say aloud the will statement several times a day.”
Literature:
1 Edith Stauffer, Ph.D. (1909-2004) was a person of great wisdom and strength. Though she spent much of her life teaching about Love and Forgiveness she was a person of great will and determination. After raising her children, she decided she wanted practice counseling. She turned her attention to getting a bachelor’s degree studied with several leaders in the field. Having achieved that degree (she subsequently achieved the Master and Doctoral degrees), she set up her own counseling practice, designing a building and overseeing its construction, she hired a professional staff including a psychiatrist. During this period Edith discovered the work or Roberto Assagioli, the Italian psychiatrist who founded Psychosynthesis, a Transpersonal Psychological system that included the knowledge that our real identity is the Higher Self, the Higher Self.
Edith made several trips to Italy to study with Assagioli and, seeing the great wisdom in this approach, made this the central focus of her practice. Subsequently she established the High Point Foundation in Pasadena, CA., where she trained practitioners in Psychosynthesis. Later in her career Edith established Psychosynthesis International which allowed for a long-distance study of Psychosynthesis.
This present writer often said to his students that Edith Stuffer was a person who did not know meaning of “you can’t do it.” She could and did. She made her visions a reality.
Edith’s book Unconditional Love and Forgiveness, Triangle Publishers (1987) is now out of print. A book by one of her students unconditional Forgiveness, Astria Paperback (2011) by Mary Hayes Greco, is recommended.
2 “Attitude” defined. Edith defined an attitude as “a mind set (neural structure) of feelings, thoughts, and memories that color our perceptions, life and environment.”
3 Other terms used in this teaching include the following.
“Forgiveness.” To cancel demands and expectations one makes on the Source, others, and the self as a condition for expressing love and positive attitudes.
“Essenes.” Members of an ancient sect, known for their ability to apply transpersonal qualities to their lives, thus creating a peaceful, effective, productive society. They recorded their rules for harmonious existence in the Code of Conduct, written in Aramaic, their native language.
“Gratitude.” A transpersonal quality which can change our attitudes and elevate our consciousness; a feeling of joy and appreciation for the good in self, others, and the environment.
“Heart Center.” Located in the center of the chest (not to be mistaken for the physical heart), it emits and distributes energy; a center of transmutation when it is open and functioning. It is directly related to the Higher Self( Naphsha).
“Humility.” An attitude which enables us to see the needs of others as they see them or will see them, and a desire to fulfill those needs, if possible.
“Judgement.” The mental act of comparison and discrimination by which knowledge of values and relations is mentally formulated; the power of arriving at a wise decision; the minds process of incorporating sensory input, memory, and reason into a decision for action.
“Meditation.” Reaching within and making contact with one’s own Higher Self (Naphsha), and beyond to the Source, in a search for truth and harmony with one’s life, talents, abilities, opportunities, and for solutions to personal and global problems.
“Naphsha.” Higher Self or Soul, essence, the ‘breath of life.’ Every person has a Naphsha, and is a Naphsha, by virtue of existence. Naphsha cannot be destroyed, it is a controlling core, the organizing center of energy, the managing agent, the source of mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual development. The Naphsha is the source of serenity, harmony, wisdom, forgiveness, and healing; it is in contact with universal laws and laws of the individual being.
“Rakhma Love.” Love without demand, request, or reward. Rakhma love is universal love; it includes reason, thought, judgement and action.
“Rakhmanii.” Love expressed without conditions.
“Rukha.” Spirit; an aspect of the Source which is available to the personal self and Naphsha; an unseen force that operates on an exalted or transpersonal level and is available to those who elevate themselves to that level of consciousness.
“Sin.” An archery term for missing the mark.
“Source.” The creator; Author; Divine Authority; Essence of Life; God; Divine Mind; the Higher Essence, the one in whom we live, move, and have our being.
“Transpersonal Self.” Higher Self, Naphsha, Soul; the Self that is above the personality.
“Unconditional Love.” Love for self, others, the Source, and inanimate objects which is given without demands, expectations, or conditions as a requisite for receiving the love.
“Will.” The means by which the individual establishes and maintain goals and controls attitudes; that part of the self which makes choices and decisions, initiates actions and helps fulfill goals.
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