| The researcher hypothesized that participants engaged in a method informed by Greek mystical philosophy could experience measurable increases in their levels of personal or transpersonal awareness. Thematic Content Analysis, Narrative Analysis, and statistically significant t-tests all confirmed the hypothesis that the Methodos Philosophia could increase levels of awareness. Participants described meaningfully increased levels of personal as well as transpersonal levels of awareness, and the Greyson/Ring Life Changes Inventory-Revised (LCI-R) yielded statistically significant increases in values associated with an appreciation for life as well as death, a quest for meaning or a sense of purpose, concern for others, spirituality, self-acceptance, and a concern with social or planetary values. Metaphysical ancient Greek philosophers had emphasized an almost-forgotten integral practice of deep "transrational" contemplation by which they used the rational, reasoning mind as a key to unlock the noetic awareness of the higher Mind. These mystical philosophers ranged their contemplations along a broad spectrum of subjects such as cosmology, mathematics, philosophy, and music. Ancient Greek philosophers such as Pythagoras, Plato, and Plotinus believed that such contemplative meditations could have profound consciousness-expanding effects wherein the individual could have a deeper, more direct awareness of personal and cosmological reality. For this study, the researcher developed a modern contemplative method, the Methodos Philosophia, which was an interpretive revisioning of Greek philosophical mystical contemplation. This 3-step method involved participants doing weekly readings, engaging in weekly dialectically active group discussions wherein the assigned readings were discussed, and then sitting for a guided contemplative meditation. Twelve persons, 6 males and 6 females, ranging in age from 23 to 67, of varying spiritual and transpersonal temperaments, participated over an 8-week period in a mixed-methods study that examined the experience as well as the accompaniments and outcomes of the practice of this contemplative method. The researcher collected 4 types of data: weekly qualitative questionnaires, poststudy semistructured interviews, phenomenologically informed weekly interviews, and a postonly standardized assessment of life changes (LCI-R). |
