Psychological Commentaries on the

Nicoll, M. Psychological Commentaries on the Teachings of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. London Stuart Watkins, 1970. 

While the work of Carl Jung and others have underscored the archetypal power and universal significance of alchemical symbols, alchemy itself is much more than a psychological commentary on the nature of the human psyche. It is true that alchemy reflects the highest aspirations of the human soul, for our gold has always symbolized the hastened perfection of Man as well as matter. However, any alchemist worth his salt knows that lasting transformation only takes place when the work is accomplished on all levels of reality—the mental, the spiritual, and the physical. The Great Work is actual work to be done with the hands, the heart, and the soul, and not just understood with the mind. 

What is compassion Standard dictionaries trace its origin to the Latin roots com, with, and pati, to bear or suffer, and define the word as meaning a sympathetic consciousness of the suffering of others and a desire to help them. It is a sad commentary on our times that a major encyclopedic dictionary of psychology I turned to for more clarification doesn t even list compassion, a lack reflected in most introductory psychology textbooks. 

Friedman, Ml, Hamblen, JL, Eoa, EB, Chamey, DS. Eighting the Psychological War on Terrorism. Commentary on A National Longitudinal Study on the Psychological Consequences of the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks Reactions, Impairment and Help Seeking. Psychiatry, 67(2) 123-136, 2004... 

From a psychological point of view, we can see Cosmas map as a mandala and wonder whether the medieval psyche, faced with a world of conflict and much misery, might have needed the reassurance that the earth itself did have a basic order. (In our commentary on Plate II-4, we shall discuss mandala symbolism in relation to individual psychology)... 

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