At the dawn of modern civilization, says Riane Eisler, humanity shifted from a partnership model of social interaction to a dominator model. In a partnership model men and women treat each other as equals. Ms. Eisler details the archeological findings suggesting that neolithic and Cretan societies had a significantly different social organization from that of modern times. Fertility goddesses were the major objects of religious worship, suggesting a reverence for the creative principle of nature. Cities were unfortified and yet survived peaceably for thousands of years.
As the civilizations of the fertile crescent arose, warfare and male domination became established social institutions. Since that time they have been such an integral part of our culture that we rarely imagine things could be otherwise.
Riane Eisler's book, The Chalice and the Blade, has been described by anthropologist Ashley Montague as "the most important book since Darwin's Origin of Species." Ms. Eisler is an attorney and legal scholar.

Working to change your personal philosophy is a valid therapeutic technique -- one which can lead to genuine growth. Behavior, emotion and cognition, says Albert Ellis, are all interrelated. He tells us how to recognize irrational belief patterns based on "musts" and "shoulds." He then presents methods for self-analysis and therapy.
Dr. Ellis discusses and demonstrates the modeling approach, the use of humor, the use of cognitive homework, unconditional acceptance of clients, the use of strong language and dealing with low frustration tolerance. In a moving manner, he also describes the application of these principles in his own life experience. (A program in two parts)
Born in 1913, Albert Ellis, Ph.D., is one of the most influential figures in the history of psychology. He is author of over 600 academic papers and more than 50 books including A Guide to Rational Living, How to Live with a Neurotic, Humanistic Psychotherapy, The Art and Science of Love and Sex Without Guilt. Dr. Ellis is considered the grandfather of cognitive behavior therapy, the founder of Rational-Emotive Therapy (RET) and one of the architects of the sexual revolution.

What connection do we really have with the souls of those who have lived here before? Psychologist Edith Fiore describes how, working with her clients, she has come to diagnose and treat cases of apparent spirit possession. She demonstrates an actual depossession technique, a method entirely different from the classical notion of "exorcism." Dr. Fiore's is a loving process whereby the possessing spirit is encouraged to enter the "light" to further its own spiritual evolution.
In Part II of the program, she describes hypnotic regression to the time when the entity first joined with the patient or to the death of the possessing entity. She also looks at cases in which the patient has a karmic connection with the possessing entity, and offers an imagery technique for treating patients who feel they are victims of a "curse".
Edith Fiore, a licensed clinical psychologist, is author of You Have Been Here Before: A Psychologist Looks at Past Lives and The Unquiet Dead: A Psychologist Looks at Spirit Depossession.

What is the origin of individual behavior and personality? Stanislav Grof proposes that individuals have systems of condensed experience (COEX systems) which become anchored to aspects of the birth trauma. In Part I of this program, he describes four different basic stages of the birth process and shows how they relate to attitudes developed later in life.
In Part II he discusses the development of his "holotropic" approach to therapy as an outgrowth of his early work with psychedelic drugs. Simple breathing exercises enable individuals to achieve an altered state which can lead to self-healing of emotional blocks. The unconscious, according to Grof, cannot be limited to the merely personal and biographical aspects of self, but can be seen from a transpersonal perspective as being identified with all of creation.
Stanislav Grof is author of LSD Psychotherapy, Beyond the Brain, and The Adventure of Self-Discovery and co-author of The Human Encounter with Death. A former professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University, he has been scholar in residence for fourteen years at the Esalen Institute. With his wife, ChristinaGrof, he has developed a psychotherapeutic approach known as Holotropic Therapy.

According to Thomas Hanna, many of the effects of aging -- aching muscles and joints, stooped posture, stiffness and weakness -- are unnecessary and reversible. These problems are not due to structural weaknesses in the body but to sensory-motor amnesia which can be corrected. He demonstrates several reflex responses which can become locked into the human body under conditions of stress. He then demonstrates a process whereby we can become aware of previously unconscious muscle contractions. By establishing conscious awareness, we can then relax muscle groups which have been "permanently" contracted for years.
In Part II, Thomas explains how you can establish body awareness and release contracted muscles through a few simple exercises. Using a live model, he demonstrates how fundamental, habitual muscle contractions occur in the center of the body and effect the entire body. He also discusses the relationship between somatic exercises and other forms of bodywork including biofeedback, Feldenkreis exercises and Reichian therapy.
The late Thomas Hanna, Ph.D., was the founder of the discipline of somatics, author of the book Somatics, editor of the magazine Somatics and director of the Institute for Somatic Training and Research in Novato, California.

We are living at a unique historical moment when the cultures of the entire world are available to us, and we are challenged as we have never before been. In part one of this two-part program, Dr. Jean Houston describes the range of human capacities that are found in different cultures. She focuses on language as an expression of the way societies cultivate human potential.
In part two, Jean expands upon the learning experiences she had with Margaret Mead, elaborating on her own experiences working with different cultures. To illustrate her work in human capacities training, she leads an exercise called "Cleansing the Doors of Perception." Then follows a powerful poetic reading by actress Peggy Nash Rubin. Jean then elaborates on how these experiences may call forth within the viewer new visions and deeper understandings.
Jean Houston, Ph.D., is founder and director of The Mystery School, a program of mythology and culture. She is past-president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology and also director of the Human Capacities Training Program. She is author of numerous books including Search for the Beloved, Godseed, Lifeforce, Mindgames, Listening to the Body (coauthored with Robert Masters), The Hero and the Goddess and The Possible Human.

The unconscious, says Dr. Brugh Joy, is composed of multiple, autonomous personalities. These personalities affect our state of health -- from allergic response to disease states such as diabetes and cancer. He suggests that the unconscious mind is far more extensive and powerful than is generally acknowledged, and that the normal conscious mind cannot hope to control the personalities within. Esoteric rites and initiations, he maintains, were designed to call forth particular personalities from the unconscious at appropriate stages of development.
In the second part of this program, Brugh Joy describes how our dreams reveal the unconscious dynamics underlying health and illness. Illness, he says, is always there for a purpose. If we simply try to remove illness, without understanding how we are served by it, we fail to grasp its lesson. As we explore our unconscious mind, we face the disowned parts of ourselves which may appear to us as hideous or demonic. Joy suggests that if we are able to withhold our conventional judgments regarding these aspects, we can gain new perspectives on personal and social issues -- and appreciate them as manifestations of our wholeness.
W. Brugh Joy, M.D., is author of Joy's Way: A Map For the Transformational Journey and Avalanche: Further Awakening Into Beinghood. A specialist in internal medicine, for the past fifteen years he has been a teacher of the art of "beinghood." He leads conferences at the Feather Mountain Conference Center near Prescott, Arizona.

The Sufi path, says Pir Vilayat, is one of merging our individual existence with the divine reality. The dancing of Sufis is an expression of the dynamic shifting equilibriums of life, striving, from moment to moment, toward higher states of being. As we come to understand our true being, we realize that we partake of the divine rapture. Choirs of angels sing within us and we know ourselves as beings of radiant light whose boundaries extend to infinity.
In Part II, Pir Vilayat focuses on the details of Sufi meditation practices which lead to inner self-awareness, unfurling the potential being and divine realization. He discusses exercises that allow our consciousness to become one with nature and to share the awareness of other human beings.
Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, initiate of an Indian Sufi Order, is author of Toward The One, Call of the Dervish, The Message in Our Time: The Life and Teaching of the Sufi Master Pir-O-Murshid Inayat Khan and Introducing Spirituality into Counseling and Therapy.

What is the difference between management and leadership? While effective management is needed to maintain the status quo, it is leadership that moves us forward to a new vision of the future. The path to leadership, says James Kouzes, is an inner process much like the mythological hero's journey.
Leadership is based more on personal power than on power derived from position. Thus leadership can emerge from any level within an organization. In Part II of this program, Mr. Kouzes suggests that in order to live in a manner that exemplifies the values they espouse, leaders must be clear about their own values. He offers several exercises for values clarification and self-understanding.
James M. Kouzes is President of Tom Peters Group Learning Systems. Since 1969 he has trained more than 15,000 executives and professionals. A former Director of the Executive Development Center of Santa Clara University's School of Business, he is author of The Leadership Challenge: How to Get Extraordinary Things Done in Organizations.

Those who offer enlightenment or salvation appear to often operate more as businessmen than as authentic spiritual teachers. In part one of this two-part series, U. G. Krishnamurti he denies any possibility of knowledge of enlightenment. The very attempt to achieve enlightenment is an obstacle in the path of the proclaimed goal. The search for enlightenment is a device of the mind to perpetuate itself, in denial of its mortality.
In part two, he critiques various disciplines, both mystical and psychotherapeutic, which are said to lead to states of enlightenment. He proposes that states of enlightenment, if they are to be attained, must be gained in spite of--not because of--meditation, devotion, prayer, acceptance, forgiveness, or compassion. Stripped of all our pretenses, facing the despair of the human condition, freed of the imaginary diseases from which "enlightenment" may save us, we can build realistic and practical lives.
U. G. Krishnamurti is a world traveler and author of Mind Is a Myth and The Mystique of Enlightenment. Viewed by many as a liberated individual, he eschews all gurus, teachings and followers.