The cosmic game : explorations of the frontiers of human consciousness

270 Pages·2010·1.63 MB·English

by  Grof

The Cosmic Game
SUNY Series in Transpersonal and Humanistic Psychology
Richard D. Mann, editor
The Cosmic Game
Explorations of the Frontiers of Human Consciousness
Stanislav Grof
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Cover Illustration : Plate 48 from Rawson, Philip, Tantra: The Indian Cult of
Ecstasy, (London: Thames & Hudson, Ltd, 1973). Copyright © Thames &
Hudson. Used by permission. From the Collection of Ajit Mookerjee, New
Delhi.
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
© 1998 State University of New York
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Grof, Stanislav, 1931–
The cosmic game : explorations of the frontiers of human
consciousness / Stanislav Grof.
p. cm. — (SUNY series in transpersonal and humanistic psychology)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-7914-3875-9 (hardcover : alk. paper). — ISBN 0-7914-3876-7
(pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Spiritual life. 2. Altered states of consciousness.
I. Title. II. Series.
BL625.G697 1998
200’.1’9—dc21 97-41502
CIP
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
1. Introduction
2. Cosmos, Consciousness, and Spirit
3. The Cosmic Creative Principle
4. The Process of Creation
5. The Ways to Reunion with the Cosmic Source
6. The Problem of Good and Evil
7. Birth, Sex, and Death: The Cosmic Connection
8. The Mystery of Karma and Reincarnation
9. The Taboo against Knowing Who You Are
10. Playing the Cosmic Game
11. The Sacred and the Profane
Bibliography
Index
Experiential Holotropic Breathwork Workshops and Training for Facilitators
Those readers who are interested in a personal experience of the Holotropic
Breathwork or would like to participate in a training program for Holotropic
Breathwork facilitators can obtain the necessary information from:
Cary Sparks
Director
Grof Transpersonal Training
20 Sunnyside Ave, #A 314
Mill Valley, California 94941
tel.: [phone]
fax.: [phone]
e-mail: [email protected]
website: www.holotropic.com
List of Illustrations

Figure 1. Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca
Figure 2. Purushakara Yantra
Figure 3. The Hermetic Cosmic Man
Figure 4. Adam Kadmon
Figure 5. The Tibetan Wheel of Life
Figure 6. The Sorcerer of Les Trois Frères
Figure 7. Beast Master from Les Trois Frères
Figure 8. Hunting Scene from Lascaux
Figure 9. The Dancer from La Gabillou
Acknowledgments

This book is an attempt to summarize the philosophical and spiritual insights
from forty years of my personal and professional journey that involved
exploration of uncharted frontiers of the human psyche. It has been a complex,
difficult, and at times challenging pilgrimage that I could not have undertaken
alone. Over the years, I have received invaluable help, inspiration, and
encouragement from many people. Some of them have been my close friends,
others important teachers, and most of them have played an important part in my
life in both roles. I cannot acknowledge all of them individually, but some of
them deserve special notice.
Angeles Arrien, an anthropologist and daughter of a “vision maker”—a spiritual
teacher from the Basque mystical tradition—has been for many years a true
friend and an important teacher. Drawing on forty years of her spiritual training,
she has been a living example of how to integrate the feminine and masculine
aspects of one’s psyche and how to “walk the mystical path with practical feet.”
Gregory Bateson, an original and seminal thinker, with whom I had the privilege
of spending hundreds of hours in personal and professional discussions during
the two and half years when we were both scholars-in-residence at the Esalen
Institute in Big Sur, California, was for me an important teacher and a special
friend. In our talks, he never wholeheartedly embraced the mystical realm.
However, the relentless logic of his inquisititive mind produced an incisive
critique of mechanistic thinking in science that provided a large opening for the
transpersonal vision.
David Bohm’s work has been one of the most important contributions to my
efforts to establish connections between my own findings concerning the nature
and dimensions of human consciousness, on the one hand, and the scientific
worldview, on the other. I found his holographic model of the universe
invaluable for my own theoretical formulations. The fact that Karl Pribram’s
model of the brain is also based on holographic principles has been particularly
important for this bridging work.