Looking at encounters that can puncture or jolt us, this volume uses art as a lens through which to register and understand exceptional experiences. The volume also includes the fieldworker’s experience of unexpected events that can lead to key understandings, as well as revelatory moments that happen during artistic creation and while looking at art. By exploring exceptional experiences through art, the volume asks probing questions for anthropology. In recognizing that art is all-encompassing – including, as it does, narrative, performance, dance and images – Exceptional Experiences situates itself within a number of conversations on methodological and conceptual issues in anthropology and beyond.

The study of the effect of "exceptional" experiences and beliefs on health--including anomalous, placebo, or hypnotic healing and mystical, religious, transpersonal, and creative experiences--is attracting increasing academic and public interest. This collection of essays explores the nature of mind, its impact on the body, and the relationship between "exceptional" experiences and physical health, mental health, and the potential for other types of perception. Examining the influence of spiritual practices, mental imagery, and alternative healing methods such as Reiki and Johrei, the essays encourage the expansion of mental health practice to include the full range of exceptional experiences. By normalizing experiences that are often pathologized, this book recognizes that exceptional human experiences can and do have value for physical and mental health.

THE WILEY-BLACKWELL HANDBOOK OF Transpersonal Psychology "The new Handbook of Transpersonal Psychology is a necessity today. Many transpersonal psychologists and psychotherapists have been waiting for such a comprehensive work. Congratulations to Harris Friedman and Glenn Hartelius. May this book contribute to an increasingly adventurous, creative, and vibrant universe." —Ingo B. Jahrsetz, President, The European Transpersonal Association "The Handbook of Transpersonal Psychology is an outstanding, comprehensive overview of the field. It is a valuable resource for professional transpersonal practitioners, and an excellent introduction for those who are new to this wide-ranging discipline." —Frances Vaughan, PhD. Psychologist, author of Shadows of the Sacred: Seeing Through Spiritual Illusions "Finally, the vast literature on transpersonal psychology has been collected in what is clearly the essential handbook for psychologists and others who have either too apologetically endorsed or too critically rejected what undoubtedly will define psychology in the future. If you are not a transpersonal psychologist now, you will be after exploring this handbook. No longer can one dismiss the range of topics confronted by transpersonal psychologists nor demand methodological restraints that refuse to confront the realities transpersonal psychologists explore. This is a marvelous handbook—critical, expansive, and like much of what transpersonal psychologists study, sublime." —Ralph W. Hood Jr., University of Tennessee, Chattanooga With contributions from more than fifty scholars, this is the most inclusive resource yet published on transpersonal psychology, which advocates a rounded approach to human well-being, integrating ancient beliefs and modern knowledge. Proponents view the field as encompassing Jungian principles, psychotherapeutic techniques such as Holotropic Breathwork, and the meditative practices found in Hinduism and Buddhism. Alongside the core commentary on transpersonal theories—including holotropic states; science, with chapters on neurobiology and psychometrics; and relevance to feminism or concepts of social justice—the volume includes sections describing transpersonal experiences, accounts of differing approaches to healing, wellness, and personal development, and material addressing the emerging field of transpersonal studies. Chapters on shamanism and psychedelic therapies evoke the multifarious interests of the transpersonal psychology community. The result is a richly flavored distillation of the underlying principles and active ingredients in the field.

WE TRIED 1,000 PLACES. AND KEPT ONLY 30.30 UNFORGETTABLE EXPERIENCES THAT CAPTURE THE SOUL OF LISBON.Drink a cocktail that takes you back in time, slip into a pocket-sized bookstore, unlock the secrets of bacalhau, run with the clouds, make a stopover in the tropics, track down the restaurant whose address we won't tell you, clink glasses with an old-timer, awaken your inner ceramics-maker, scuffle with a spider crab, infiltrate the secret hide-away of the city's fado singers, bite into an elephant-ear cookie made to linger in your memory forever ...

Clinical Parapsychology: Extrasensory Exceptional Experiences is a graduate-level textbook designed to facilitate more reliable diagnosis, classification, treatment, and research. It is designed for clinicians, educators, and researchers challenged with investigating into the nature of distressing extrasensory (psychic) exceptional experiences. This textbook assists in interpreting extrasensory experiences reported in a wide diversity of context that are often viewed as religious, spiritual, anomalous, or transpersonal, and that vary greatly in subjective experience. This textbook is a valuable resource for both students and experienced professionals and is designed to be utilized by both individuals and educational institutions. Part I: Diagnosis (Differential & Co-Diagnosis), Part II: Classification (Dimensional & Categorical), Part III: Treatment Options (Recovery & Prevention), and Part IV: Research Methods & Measures.

Beginning with an introduction to the methodology, this book provides the reader with a sympathetic yet critical overview of current research into unexplained phenomena including visions, telepathy, psychokinesis, and out-of-body experiences.

Fasting An Exceptional Human Experience Since prehistory, fasting has been used in various ways as a means of transformation. As a spiritual practice, it is the oldest and most common form of asceticism and is found in virtually every religion and spiritual tradition. In psychology, studies have suggested that fasting can alleviate the symptoms of some psychiatric conditions, including depression and schizophrenia. In medicine, fasting is one of the most promising therapies, with research suggesting that fasting can cause certain drugs, such as chemotherapy, to work better while reducing drug side-effects. Hunger striking, sometimes called political fasting, may be the most powerful application of fasting. Proof of this occurred in 1948 when Gandhis hunger strike caused millions of Hindus and Muslims in India to cease their fighting. As a practical guide, Randi Fredricks, Ph.D. provides detailed information on the different types of fasting, where people fast, the physiological process of fasting, and the contraindications and criticisms of fasting. Using existing literature and original research, Dr. Fredricks focuses on the transformative characteristics of fasting in the contexts of psychology, medicine, and spirituality. The relationship between fasting and transpersonal psychology is examined, with a focus on peak experiences, self-realization, and other exceptional human experiences. Dr. Fredricks demonstrates how fasting can be profoundly therapeutic, create global paradigm shifts, and provide personal mystical phenomena.

"On a group hiking trip in the Buscegi Mountains of Romania in 2007, John and Katie Evans were unaware they'd be passing through an active brown bear habitat. Encountering a bear that night after dusk, Katie is separated from the group and trapped by the bear. Hearing her screams as the animal attacked her, John was unable to distract the bear and watched helplessly from a distance as it slowly crushed his wife to death. Katie was thirty years old. "Young Widower" is John Evans's memoir not just of one day, but of six years spent with a wife he loved, and the days and months that followed the tragedy. A widower at age twenty-nine, John finds himself living with Katie's family in the year after her death, discovering the cyclical nature of grief, the guilt of surviving, and what it means to lose a marriage. His desire to remember Katie is many things: devoted, empathic, needy, lonely, self-important, critical, nostalgic; he is a young widower negotiating a world that understands elderly widows, but doesn't know what to do with an angst-ridden young man worried about continuing to live without his wife for a very long time. Unflinching and unsentimental, "Young Widower" is a heartbreaking witness of living daily with grief, a rumination on the fragility of the human experience"--

Optimize the customer experience via the cloud to gain a powerful competitive advantage Customer Obsessed looks at customer experience through the lens of the cloud to bring you a cutting-edge handbook for customer experience. Cloud technology has been hailed as a game-changer, but a recent IDC report shows that it accounts for less than three percent of total IT spending; why are so many companies neglecting such an enormous asset? This book provides a high-level overview of how the cloud can give you a competitive advantage. You'll learn how to integrate cloud technology into sound customer experience strategy to achieve unprecedented levels of success. More than just a state-of-the-field assessment, this book offers a set of concrete actions you can take today to leverage cloud computing into technical innovation and better business outcomes at all levels of your organization. You'll examine the many factors that influence the customer experience, and emerge with the insight to fine-tune your approach using the power of the cloud. What kind of advantage is your company leaving on the table? This book guides you through the key drivers of customer success to help you optimize your approach and leverage the future of global technology. Learn the keys to competitive advantage in the digital era Gain insight into each element that affects customer experience Harness the power of the cloud to achieve customer success Follow a prescriptive framework for optimizing customer experience We are in the golden age of IT innovation, but the majority of companies haven't even adopted cloud technology, much less begun to utilize its full business capabilities. Jump into the gap now, and reap the benefits as other struggle to catch up. Customer Obsessed gives you the guidance you need to achieve sustainable success in today's digital world.

Your desk reference for success with exceptional students Today’s teachers, especially the many who work with students with special needs, are pressed to know a little something about everything. Expertise is needed in different content and pedagogical areas, but knowledge of different types of disabilities is required as well. Wendy Murawski and Kathy Lynn Scott have assembled another reader-friendly What Really Works resource full of experiences and evidence-based practices to empower any educator. Each chapter is presented in an easy-access and practical format suited for busy professionals. The editors and authors examine how special educational needs affect Content areas like reading and math Specialization areas like autism and learning disabilities Pedagogical areas like culturally responsive practices and accommodations Other critical areas like legal issues, behavior challenges, and home-school collaboration As education trends promote the inclusion of students with exceptionalities, this book is the perfect resource for teachers and administrators who need to know what works...and what doesn’t.