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Conference- Our first in Long Beach, CA |
Overcoming Toxic Leadership: Leading with Integrity and Self-Awareness
California State University, Long Beach
Co-Sponsors:
CSULB College of Business Administration
Ukleja Center for Ethical Leadership
Ernest Becker Foundation
9 a.m. ~ 4:30 p.m.
Friday, September 24, 2010
The Pointe at The Walter Pyramid ~ CSULB
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By Neil Elgee
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Posted on June 29 2010 |
 Steen Halling opened the doors to Seattle U for the newly–born EBF way back in 1993. With me, a liberal Baptist, espousing the synthesis of a Jewish academic nomad, it was with trepidation that I ventured onto a Jesuit campus. But Steen, the genial genius of humanistic thought, dispelled my misgivings and gave the EBF a warm welcome in which we still bask. The only hard part was memorizing the name of the program in which he worked -- the Existential Phenomenological Therapeutic Psychology Masters Degree Program. Boiling this down to Humanistic Psychology, it was through Steen that we connected with Kirk Schneider. Through Kirk, we connected with Jim Hernandez, and on the SU campus not only with the wonderful people of the EPTPMP, but also with Jacqueline Helfgott of Criminal Justice, Paul Kidder of Philosophy, and many others. Steen also hosted lectures, moderated panels, wrote up presentations and graces our website with 13 entries including his essay “Meaning beyond ‘heroic’ illusion? Transcendence in the everyday.” So thanks Steen, congratulations on the paperback edition of Intimacy, Transcendence, and Psychology, and here’s to many more years of our intimacy. |
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Kirk Schneider's "Awakening to Awe" |
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By Daniel Liechty
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Posted on June 29 2010 |
 Of Recent Interest… is the new book by Kirk J. Schneider, Awakening to Awe: Personal Stories of Profound Transformation (Jason Aronson 2009). Those acquainted with Schneider’s previous book, Rediscovery of Awe, will immediately recognize this as a valuable companion volume. In that earlier book, Schneider laid out the “theory” of his humanistic, existential approach to human psychology, spirituality, and the process of change in individuals and communities. The introductory chapters of this work summarize and extend many of the insights from that book, subtly diagnosing the modern malaise as a loss of the sacred mystery of life — the triumph of the mundane, the profane, and the routine. A child experiences life much differently than this. To a child, each day is fresh and new, full of opportunities for learning and surprises. But tutored largely by anxiety and the strictures of society, we grow into adults who are suspicious of the unfamiliar, doubtful about our own emotional and spiritual powers, frightened by and even ashamed of the potentially creative urges that periodically bubble up within us. We become “productive citizens” at the expense of the best part of ourselves, and too often remain stuck in that mode of existence with little hope or worse, finally — even little desire — for truly transformative change. So we pretend that this is what life is really all about and, with Freud, accept a state of low-level depression as about the best we can do.
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Steen Halling's "Intimacy, Transcendence and Psychology" |
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By Daniel Liechty
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Posted on June 29 2010 |
 Of Recent Interest… is the new book by Steen Halling, Intimacy, Transcendence and Psychology: Closeness and Openness in Everyday Life (Palgrave/Macmillan, 2008) which is now available in a $29 paperback version. Prof. Halling is professor of psychology at Seattle University and an old friend of the EBF. This book represents the culmination of years of life experience, as well as academic acumen, written in a style accessible to a wide audience of readers. The heart of this work is to have us recognize that as human beings, we live, breath and have our existence inextricably within a complex web of human relationships. Stated so naively, this hardly seems astute–any grade school child could tell you that! But clearly it is something that as scientific-minded academics we tend to forget along the way. The leading contemporary theories in psychology and human behavior assume that the brain is divided up into distinct “modules,” or activity centers, each of which was honed during the course of evolution to govern particular sets of emotions and behaviors in the world. Current scientific research method encourages the investigator to break down as much as possible each area of investigation. Being able to demonstrate that what had previously been assumed to be one set of neural functions is actually composed of two or more discreet modules is sure to bring one success, credibility and notoriety in the field.
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By Steen Halling
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Posted on June 29 2010 |
Often the best things in life come as surprises. Seventeen years ago Neil Elgee asked me if we could set up a collaboration between the Ernest Becker Foundation and the Psychology program at Seattle University. One of the graduates of our MA program, Richard Kortsep, had meet Neil and pointed out that the SU graduate program had an existential orientation (that is, a concern with fundamental issues in human existence), as did Ernest Becker. This was the beginning of a wonderful co-operative relationship. Thanks to the EBF, numerous Becker events have been held at Seattle University, giving our students and faculty, as well as the general public, a chance to be exposed to the insights of scholars and speakers such as Sheldon Solomon, Daniel Liechty, Lloyd Averill, Jean Lipman-Blumen, Greg Bennick, and Kirk Schneider. For me attending these events was rather like going back to university (without paying tuition or taking exams) and hearing people who had thought deeply about the issues that really matter in life. This, in my view, is what liberal arts education is about most fundamentally and I am grateful that these events were available –right on our campus--to my colleagues and students and me.
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Review: Korean translation of "Denial of Death" |
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By Suk Choo Chang
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Posted on June 29 2010 |
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Jugum ei Boojeong [The Denial of Death], translated by Kim Jae-Yeong, 486 pp.
Ingan Sarang Co., Seoul., Won 20,000.
In publishing the 2008 Korean translation of Ernest Becker’s Denial of Death, the translator, Kim Jae-Young observes a recently increasing interest in thanatology in Korea and the birth of the Korean Thanatology Association and associated activities including relevant courses in departments of religious studies and philosophy in a few universities. The issues involve many disciplines and so far there is no publication that deals with the matter better than does Becker. Though prophetic, Becker’s work has not been sufficiently appreciated by the academic world.
Becker’s influences include his experience in WWII, the ideas of Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), William James (1842-1910), Otto Rank (1884-1939) and Thomas Szasz (1920-). In contrast to Freud’s sexual theory, Becker saw the source of basic human behavior in the fear of death.
He outlines a wide range of responses to the fear of death, from positive to negative. On one hand, it can help improve one’s personality and creative contribution to culture. On the other, suppression of this fear is the source of an array of defensive behaviors. The opinions and personalities based on the denial contribute to a false sense of self and the person may become intolerant of the contrary opinions of others. This intolerance, in turn, is the source of various conflicts, including the currently popular notion of “the clash of civilizations” and religious conflicts.
The person, culture, religion or civilization that does not honestly face the problem of death is ultimately superficial. A source of human suffering, in Becker’s view, is realization of one’s limitation in power. It is this realization that makes the person other-directed, to seek out and reach toward others. Kim’s own subtitle to this translation is “beyond Freud’s understanding of humanity,” thus indicating questions about usefulness, if not the validity, of Freud’s perspective.
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