A Systemic History of the Middle Way - Its Biological, Psycho-developmental, and Cultural Conditions - Robert M. Ellis

A Systemic History of the Middle Way - Its Biological, Psycho-developmental, and Cultural Conditions - Robert M. Ellis

Stages of Psychological Development

A Systemic History of the Middle Way - Its Biological, Psycho-developmental, and Cultural Conditions - Robert M. Ellis

Robert M. Ellis [+-]
Middle Way Society
Robert M. Ellis is author of a range of interdisciplinary books on Middle Way Philosophy, both within and beyond Buddhism. These have included The Buddha’s Middle Way: Experiential Judgement in His Life and Teaching (Equinox Publishing, 2019) and Archetypes in Religion and Beyond: A Practical Theory of Human Integration and Inspiration (Equinox Publishing, 2022). He is also founder of the Middle Way Society and of Tirylan House Retreat Centre in Wales.

Description

My second, psychological, section follows the continuing impact of reinforcing and balancing feedback loops in the development of each individual human being in response to their culture and environment. The history in this section is thus once more a cyclic history, replayed as each of us grows. The reinforcing feedback process tends to make our development reach a series of plateaus as we reach a mode of thinking and behaving that works sufficiently well, given our bodily development and situation, for the moment. However, these temporary points of stability are disrupted by new conditions that begin to make our old mode frustrating, and trigger adaptive balancing loops. After a period of transition, these balancing loops then settle back into a new phase of relative stability. This punctuated equilibrium in human psychological development was first tracked by Piaget, and has more recently been pursued into adult development by Robert Kegan.

Notify A Colleague

Citation

Ellis, Robert. Stages of Psychological Development. A Systemic History of the Middle Way - Its Biological, Psycho-developmental, and Cultural Conditions. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 72-117 Aug 2024. ISBN 9781800504493. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=46327. Date accessed: 10 Oct 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.46327. Aug 2024

Dublin Core Metadata