ATP AHP Sofia

Peace is based on love. To understand peace, there must be a foundation for understanding what love is.

When you begin with a love for who you are at this moment, not a love for who you wish we were, or who you used to be, then you can discover that long sought for peace within yourself. From there you can move toward being at peace with others and with the world.

Families play a most significant role in establishing and nurturing this foundation. When parents - or the people in charge of raising children - accept children and youth for who and what they are, a foundation for loving oneself is established, leading to self-acceptance. This love and acceptance of oneself opens us up to loving others and seeing ourselves as part of the larger community beyond our families and in the world.

Peace is something that grows out of the way in which we as individuals deal with our lives personally and in relationship to the world around us. It’s a way in which life can flow and grow and move, and it involves being comfortable with how we feel about what’s going on in our lives.

Dr. Gladys will share her wisdom gained over 103 years of life, including her concepts of the 5 Ls and the 6 secrets for living a long, fulfilling, peaceful life. Her examples of the impact the family has on the individual may provoke both laughter and tears while also showing how this impact can create a ripple effect that flows across the globe.

Kogi elders issued a prophecy on November 17, 2023, stating that starting December 2023, humans have six months, until June, 2024, to answer the call of Mother Earth for help in her regeneration or she will take action. The essential message is that humanity has run out of time for ignoring the signs of ecological destruction through unsustainable lifestyles and corporations. We can align with Mother Earth or humanity will largely be wiped out by 2026.

This prophetic warning is corroborated by many indigenous prophecies concerning the gravity of the current world situation. It corroborates with growing scientific data that humanity’s day of reckoning with climate change has come. We no longer have the luxury of time. The stark reality is that every critical ecological tipping point has been passed and is getting worse. Simultaneously, our world is convulsed by wars and the entire global infrastructure for international cooperation and peace is being ripped apart.

It is profoundly synchronistic that the Unidentified Anomalous Records Collection Act was passed by the US Congress last December 14 , 2023, and signed by President Biden into law on December 22. In one of the most consequential works of legislation in history, the US Government codified into law that all the evidence US government agencies and contracting corporations have obtained about UFOs since the end of the Second World War must be turned over to the National Archives and disseminated into the public domain.

The world will now be given evidence that we are not alone, that Extraterrestrials exist, that they have been present on planet Earth, and that there has been sustained contact and communication. There is a deep connection between humanity’s imminent destruction and the inception of humanity’s ET Moment.

The underlying essence of the Kogi prophecy is a call for humanity to co-create more collaborative and peaceful connections with one another, with Mother Earth, and with the larger cosmic eco-system in the Universe before it is too late. It is time for us to come together to co-create a new peaceful and harmonious reality through a new, expanded Consciousness.

Psycho-oncology is a specialized field within psychology that addresses the emotional and social aspects of cancer, helping individuals and their loved ones to deal with the disease and treatment, by providing support through the entire journey, from the diagnosis to the end-of-life. By focusing on the spiritual dimensions of the cancer experience, particularly on the aspects related to the process of dying, transpersonal psycho-oncology recognizes and encourages the experience of spiritual and anomalous phenomena, such as mystical and transformative encounters, allowing patients to find a deep sense of meaning, connection, acceptance, and love in their transition to death.

A defining feature of the human species is its ability to create and perpetuate stories. Wars are as much about conflicts in narratives as they are about conflicts over land, religion, or resources. The description of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as three Abrahamic faiths encourages us to focus on what unites these religions, but effective integration requires a deeper analysis—of their narratives and the worldviews that underpin those narratives.

In this presentation, I focus on the schism between Christianity and Judaism, probing the clash of worldviews which fuelled anti-Semitic tropes and resulted in a fundamental rift in the western psyche. Jews and Judaism represented Christianity’s shadow, understood in Jungian terms. Just as in the individual psyche recognition and integration of the shadow is a first step towards individuation, so too the collective, western psyche cannot evolve towards wholeness without integration of the shadow. In this context, mysticism plays a critical role since it represents the feature of the religious impulse that is most attuned to the psyche. Kabbalah in particular became a mysticism of the unconscious, and I explore the role it has played, and continues to play, in the integration of the western psyche.

In more recent times, Islamic publications have increasingly incorporated the anti-Semitic tropes that grew in Christian Europe. As my analysis of the resolution of tension between Christianity and Judaism suggests, we need to look towards the mystical cores of Islam and Judaism in the hope of finding resolution of present crises. In fact, the history of dialogue between Sufism and Kabbalah, and the shared narratives they both articulate, offers hopeful pointers. The goal of reaching accord between the Abrahamic faiths will require the kinds of insight into mysticism and psychology that transpersonal psychology addresses.

Within the reservoir of indigenous practices and beliefs (Indigenous knowledge) in West Africa is the concept of asé/ashé (cosmic energy or vibration), the force embodied in everything in the universe that connects humans and the divine, and the natural and invisible worlds. This all-embracing epistemological concept of the universe presents an integrative, holistic lens which is often employed in indigenous communities to resolve issues and conflicts in families and societies.

Indigenous knowledge systems, like those of many West African societies, are grounded in a conceptual reality where the non-human, the spiritual, and the material extends from the original asé/creative energy. This presentation draws on research on indigenous forms of justice and conflict resolution carried out over a period of 20 years in the Republic of Benin. Indigenous knowledge is a potential archival reservoir of humanistic and transpersonal interventions, e.g., the West African tradition of masks and masquerades as agents of justice, security, peace-making, and relational repair. As representatives of the divine and the ancestors, the concern is with family and communal harmony, stability, and socio-political order. The masquerade functions to defend, purify, and secure the community and prevent threats to theirs and the society’s existence.

One example of such masquerades and its function of ensuring peace and justice is the revered Zangbeto mask in the Republic of Benin. It is perceived as a Vodoun spirit which is le guardian de la nuit (the night watchman or police), said to be a manifestation of sacred Asé/energy and mysterious power of nature to protect the community and the environment, keep peace, render justice, ensure proper behavior, protect women and children, and frighten off enemies.

Zangbeto can essentially be interpreted as a visual narrative for order, justice, historical memory, and proper social behavior understood by the community. Its impact on peace-keeping is just one example for an argument to extend Humanistic & transpersonal psychology research to the area of indigenous knowledges. In essence, it echoes Einstein’s truth that we "cannot solve problems of a world in conflict with the same consciousness and [colonialist strategies] that created it.

For the first time in history, all the major threats to society and civilization are human caused. As such, they are expressions of our individual and collective psychological dysfunctions and immaturities. What we call our social and global problems are therefore actually social and global symptoms. This means that if we are to address these challenges effectively, we will need to correct both the outer problems-symptoms and also the inner psychological dysfunctions which created them. What does this mean for us individually and as transpersonal psychologists?

Given our social turmoil and imperiled planet, the gnawing question for each of us has become, "What can I do?" This is a crucial question, but is best viewed as a starting point for a deeper inquiry to find the responses that call us most deeply and are most effective.

The most effective responses will do several things simultaneously. They will work to heal both outer crises and inner psychological dysfunctions. They will also use our work and service in the world as part of our spiritual practice. As such, skillful responses will transform our contributions into the practice of sacred service, or as it is traditionally known, karma yoga. Contributing in this way enables us to go out into the world in order to go deeper into ourselves, and to go deeper into ourselves in order to go more effectively out into the world. In The result is a transpersonally inspired combination of service to the world, healing of the collective, and learning for ourselves. This result can help bring about more peace in the world.

With regard to the goal of the conference itself. Any processes meant to unite positive forces are certainly noble and deserve respect. However, the following questions arise:

1. For the sake of what future are these processes being created? What exactly should this best possible Future be like, the one more perfect than modern Democracy?
2. What should the unifying idea be? The fact is that no private process is capable of solving any global problem. To solve a global problem, a global idea is needed.

Within the framework of the ideas and theories developed by our School, there can only be one idea capable of incorporating all special cases - and namely - the best possible Society of the Future: one based on strict scientific laws, with deep spiritual foundations and free of the problems of modern Democracy.

As everyone knows perfectly well, the task of describing and modeling the Society of the Future has not yet been completed in science: both due to the complexity of the task itself and due to the need to solve the numerous spiritual issues that science has not coped with, either.

Key answers to the questions posed will be presented in the speech. We have also developed a strategy, i.e. logical stages of the transition to the Society of the Future, as well as the tasks that need to be solved for this (projects).

This presentation considers intention and proportionality in peacebuilding from a transpersonal perspective. Here the focus is on interconnectedness, spiritual awakening, and the evolution of consciousness to foster harmony and promote the resolution of conflicts. Intention can be used to enhance the purity and sincerity of motives driving the peacebuilding process. Higher values such as compassion, empathy, and a genuine desire for reconciliation can replace agendas driven by power or self-interest. A transpersonal perspective emphasizes the importance of cultivating inner peace and embodying these qualities oneself to effectively contribute to peace in the outer world.

Proportionality refers to the balance and fairness of methods and responses used in peacebuilding efforts. From a transpersonal perspective, this involves actions that are congruent with the values of interconnectedness and unity. Proportional intentions aim to elicit responses that are commensurate with any given situation, avoiding excessive force or retaliation, and seeking solutions that honor the dignity and rights of all involved parties.

A transpersonal approach to peacebuilding encourages practices like mindfulness, empathy, social intelligence, and conflict resolution methods that incorporate spiritual or contemplative elements. The resolution of conflicts is seen as not just a societal or political issue but as a deeply interconnected, interdependent, and transformative process involving the growth and evolution of consciousness through self-actualization and self-transcendence. Efforts to enhance peacebuilding take a long view that envisions human flourishing and the cultivation of compassionate motivations and intentions to promote harmony for all living beings.

The hypothesis is that humanity is on the threshold of an awakening.

This is a bizarre assertion, considering the wars and pandemics, the climatic and economic crises, the environmental and cultural degradation that appears to our eyes everywhere we look. The fact is that, at a closer look, the fundamentals, as one would say in economics, seem healthy and en route for an evolutionary leap, a sort of Copernican, humanistic, integral, transpersonal, revolution. Nothing new to affirm that a condition of connection with our true Self, of consciousness awakening seems to be one of the most significant aspects in achieving integral, i.e., psycho-spiritual, organismic, and social peace.

The good news is that beside the extraordinary technological progress, never before has humankind had at its disposal an unprecedented source of information and knowledge, as well as epistemological maps and models, experiential methodologies oriented towards unity and full realization.

We are also witnessing extraordinary discoveries in various fields such as archaeology and quantum physics, one of which opens up a past where the logic of domination has not always prevailed, and the other offers us a solid basis for claiming that consciousness, and not matter, is at the basis of the universe.

I will present here the Integral Transpersonal Vision a psychological approach, both ancient and innovative, a further mode of managing the hyper-complexity. This is a possible way among others of applying the new paradigm, in order to transcend and include conflict, diversity, and dualism, to live in peace with ourselves and others.

As human beings, there is a simplicity and complexity to how we co-create our individual and collective realities. Ultimately, however, it boils down to what we "believe" is possible or not, and those beliefs are enmeshed in and derived from the paradigms and cultural scripts that we have co-created and use consciously and unconsciously to structure our human experiences. In that light, ultimately our inhumane acts toward one another boils down to how our individual and collective thoughts are "created and formed" in our individual and Collective Consciousness and "acted out" in our what can be called the three life spaces in which we simultaneously live—our personal life space, our societal life space, and our global life space. As a human species, we currently have a "thought problem" underlying and clouding our individual and Collective Consciousness in how we view one another and how we relate to one another, manifesting as a less than peaceful world.

Based on his award-winning book, Evolving The Human Race Game: A Spiritual and Soul-Centered Perspective, Dr. Ferguson will discuss what he calls Archetypal Energies as a framework to assist humanity in evolving our individual and Collective Consciousness and in moving toward a more peaceful and harmonious world. He will discuss what Archetypal Energies are, their three basic functions, how we can access them, and how they might assist humanity in evolving our individual and Collective Consciousness and move us toward our Optimal Selves and Optimal Realities to co-create a more peaceful and harmonious world. In his book, "Peace" and its function is one of the twenty-five Archetypal Energies that he identifies and discusses. In this presentation, Dr. Ferguson will discuss the essence of "Peace" as an Archetypal Energy and how it and other Archetypal Energies can be accessed.