Reflections on Transactional Analysis (TA) World Conference 2014

To be in San Francisco for the World Transactional Analysis (TA) conference meant a lot to me.

Early in the Nineteen fifties it was here in San Francisco that the TA theory originated! Getting to meet in San Francisco many contemporaries of Eric Berne the originator of TA theory was a fabulous experience of being at this conference. I felt honored and privileged to meet in person Fanita English, Claude Steiner, Steve Karpman and Richard Erskine and Muriel James. To hear from the originators of the theory about how they developed the theory was exciting. This conference was the celebration of the 50th year of Berne's best Selling book "Games People Play" and hence the Conference theme was chosen as " TA Now a Game Changer". The presentations were all woven around this theme. Hearing so many perspectives of the same theory helped me to widen and deepen my thought processes.

Another important highlight for me was to meet TA practitioners from all the continents of the world (about 30 countries). That made it truly international!! In spite of the fact that English was mother tongue only for about 25% of the participants at the conference we communicated well. The impact and importance of nonverbal communications was obvious. To hear TA theory spoken in so many languages was tremendous! The voluntary work of the translators who painstakingly spread themselves around for people who needed help with English is remarkable. I sat on a CTA Examination board with examiners from three other countries and examined a candidate from a fifth country with the help of a translator. It was truly an enlightening experience for me. I felt very human and aware of the fact that all people are similar at the core of their being! What a wonderful theory Berne created from his awareness of this human similarity! I realized the power of body language as well as the need for language for humans to communicate internal experiences like thoughts and feelings! I felt honored to do a workshop along with stalwarts in TA like Jean Clarke and July Hay. I realized once more the value and meaning of the concept of Okay-Okay stance that the TA community stands for!

From the 'Child' point of view the pleasant weather of San Francisco sitting in the front yard of the Airport Marriott was very relaxing and invigorating at the same time!! Lucy Freedman and her colleagues chose a beautiful location and took care of the physical arrangements exquisitely.

On a personal note, I enjoyed spending a week with my son and had the privilege of being chauffeured by him to and fro for all the days of the conference. I swelled with pride to see him grown up to be on his own and even take care of me . I felt happy and thankful to be his mother!

Sister Annie Maria

My first trainer, supervisor and mentor in transactional analysis passed away today morning. I dedicate this post to her memory. 

A Pioneer & Entrepreneur

Sr. Annie Maria, a member of the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate (CMI), was one of the first and few TSTAs from India and was probably the first nun to become a TA professional. She was trained by Fr. George Kandathil, who was trained by Muriel James, and was the pioneer who brought TA theory to India. She organized the first International TA conference in India in 1992 at Cochin. She passed her TSTA examination in the year 1995. She was a Master trainer in NLP, and teacher of theology as well.

She will perhaps be remembered most fondly by the people, including myself, whom she worked with and who's lives she touched at the Avila School of Counseling and Indian Institute of Transactional Analysis which she started in 1997 at Palai, Kottayam. Supported initially by a small group of local educators and professionals, the institute still continues it's work in counseling and healing, carrying on Sr. Annie Maria's legacy.

A Great Organizer & Generous Spirit

Sr. Annie Maria has touched many lives and facilitated the healing of hundreds of broken spirits through her years of TA practice. Initially, she trained many people with Fr. George Kandathil and many passed their CTA examinations, in the early years of TA in India, under her supervision.

She organized a regional process for certification with the help of many TA trainers whom she had contact with. She certified 9 practitioners through this process and organized a board to certify a trainer for her institute. She trained without any reservations and used to do her best to bring her trainees into contact with trainers from around the country and the world.

I was one of her first trainees at Palai and the first to choose to become a trainer (PTSTA Edu). She trained me in counseling and psychotherapy and certified me as a TA trainer. Philosophical differences, particularly regarding training fees, caused Sr. Annie Maria to break away from the International Transactional Analysis Association (ITAA) early on. However, when I wanted to undergo an international certification, Sr. Annie Maria was extremely supportive and generous enough to reinstate her connections with ITAA to help me. When I chose to get certified by the Training & Certification Council (T&CC) I was able to appreciate the quality of the processes set up by Sr. Annie Maria better!

Books and Publications

Sr. Annie Maria has written many books on subjects such as Counseling, Transactional Analysis, Neurolinguistic Programming and The Enneagram. They are some of the first and most authentic works in Malayalam on these topics. 

2009 - Death

Sr. Annie Maria had about a hundred trainees at the Avila School of Counseling and Indian Institute of Transactional Analysis before she became sick and unable to work in the year 2009. She has been bedridden ever since and losing her health slowly. She has always been an inspiration to me and today, when she has gone to her eternal home, I am grateful and bow down respectfully for all that she has given me and guided me to. I am happy her struggle with illness in this world has come to end but I also feel the pain of loss intensely. May she rest in peace.

TA practice - A great tool for growing in self awareness.

Transactional Analysis (TA) practice  is a great tool for growing in self awareness. TA theory was developed by Dr. Eric Berne in the late 1950s and early 1960s. He developed the theory from his training in psychoanalysis, learning experiences from his patients, and his wide and deep reading and travel. In spite of the depth of the concepts he was explaining, he used very commonplace and simple terms to explain the concepts. This lead to evolution of simple tools and models to understand the human mind. This in turn has made it easy for everyone (the sophisticated academicians as well as common persons and even patients with psychiatric problems) to practice the models and tools developed by the theory. In the 50th year of his best selling book 'Games People play' I am making an effort to reflect on this eidetic theory and edifying models & tools developed by this theory for personal growth and development.

Self Awareness

Much of our social behaviors are guided by unconscious motivations. They are beyond our awareness. As a result many of us live in the 'then and there' than in the 'here and now'. Especially the problems experienced in our social interactions are results of this kind of living. If we are able to get in touch with our unconscious (including preconscious and  subconscious) motivations we will be able to understand the problems we experience and ways to get out of them. The more we do that the deeper we are able to understand ourselves. With consistent practice the better we will be oriented to the 'present' or function in the 'here and now'. Here is a tool to begin the practice!

The PAC model of Personality and Structural Analysis of Mind.

The difficulty to understand the human mind has been considerably reduced by the PAC model developed by Dr. Berne ( Berne E (1961) Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy, Grove press, New York). This model speaks of the mind having three basic parts. The Child part that feels, thinks and behaves like children: the Adult part that feels, thinks and behaves like rational grown ups: the Parent part that feels, thinks and behaves like any one of the parenting figures a person has experienced. At any given moment every human being will be functioning from any one of this aspect of the mind which has been technically named as 'ego states'. Structural Analysis is the process of understanding the structure of our feelings, thoughts and behaviors using this frame work. An effort to understand ourselves using this tool is easy and rewarding. This can be done intuitively or using  an objective questionnaire developed for the same. As soon as one starts doing this, thoughts starts getting organized and one gets a new language to communicate about internal experiences. This is the beginning of regaining of awareness about  our motivations. Consistently practicing this, and experimenting this in contractual groups helps moving forward in this awareness. This is the basic learning in any experiential TA training programs. More on this later.

Self Help and Self Awareness for Abundant Living

Earlier, I wrote about abundant living and also self awareness practice. Today I am making an effort to understand  abundance experience and connect the same with self awareness practice. I am also exploring here how one can help himself/herself to achieve this. Self help is the personal responsibility of each individual to self awareness.
Though the law of nature is abundance many of us are brought up in a belief system of 'scarcity'. This is probably because there have been times of material scarcity in history due to various reasons. Experiencing material scarcity while growing up may cause an attitude of scarcity in the lives of people because that is the reality of everyday life they were experiencing. I am making an effort here to  explore the attitude of abundance versus scarcity. Now, it is important to understand how attitudes develop in humans. Attitudes are  learned from the conditioning experiences one goes through. They are not hardwired in the genes (for that matter today's understanding is that even the hardwire of the genes is not so hard! They might be altered over a few generations of interaction with environment!!) So a child brought up in times of material scarcity by parents who were poor in resources may have internalized a concept of scarcity internally as well as externally. Economists explain every situation of material scarcity using the demand Vs availability equilibrium.
The theory of hungers in TA (http://www.claudesteiner.com/tainfo.htm) explains the desire for recognitions that every human mind has. This hunger of the mind is as real as hunger for food that the physical body experiences. The child that is brought up with plenty of recognitions grows with plenty of self affirmations and an attitude of abundance internally. On the other hand when recognitions are scarce child learns to compete for available recognitions in order to survive! This is the cause of the power plays and negativity seeking that is rampant among humans. However as the child grows up s/he is free to acknowledge himself/herself or seek recognitions from wherever available. This requires awareness about one's internal experience whether it is one of scarcity or abundance. Once this awareness happens one can take proactive steps to change this by self recognition and seeking recognition in healthy ways. This is self help! This will lead to an experience of self affirmation and abundance attitude inside. Thus self awareness leads to self help in seeking what is required. When abundance come internally it will flow out externally also. The moment this change happens inside immediately competition dies out & s/he can experience sufficiency everywhere. It is possible to enhance and strengthen this experience through self awareness practices and mutual affirmation (stroking in TA language) practices. Research in neurology on mirror neurons explain the neurophysiology of this phenomenon (http://www.allsouls.ox.ac.uk/users/heyesc/Celia's%20pdfs/9%202014%20Cook%20et%20al%20BBS.pdf).
Affirmations or appreciation for whatever s/he is  from the people around  strengthens experience of internal abundance. Self reflection using appropriate tools to understand ourselves better followed by affirming the positivity in the other human beings around us is the key to abundance in living. Even though it is all about self awareness and self help we need the people around to practice these.
At SHALOM we strive to practice this in the training groups! This leads to self helped experience of abundant living as persons and professionals! More on this later.

Abundant Living at SHALOM

"Abundant Living" is a phrase taken from the Bible (John 10:10). It is used here to explain the quality of spiritual life and how to achieve the same. It is basically about being truthful to oneself and life around which will reflect the abundance nature has provided.

Transactional Analysis (TA) is a practice of an edifying theory based on certain universal principles like the basic "okayness" of every human being and ability of a healthy brain to think, make or change decisions. These principles also reflect the abundance naturally available to humans! Stimulus hunger and stroke hunger derived from stimulus hunger is a central concept in TA theory. All life forms require some kind of stimulation to survive and life forms endowed with a nervous system even more so. When the nervous system is as highly evolved as in the case of humans there are various ways in which stimuli may be given and received that are also highly evolved. In nature, stimulations are many like the coming and going of light, a light breeze, a comfortable shift in temperature etc. They are abundantly present and when a person is open to feel and receive them he/she experiences the abundance in nature!

A simple touch, a loving gaze or a sincere act of appreciation for something done well are all common ways of positive stimulation among human beings. These are the building blocks of human relationships! To experience the abundance of human living it is essential to have plenty of such positive exchanges. However many of us seem to be at a loss to practice this positive exchanges. Human beings seem to be in competition for resources. Competition spoils relationships. As a result the free flow of positive stimulation among humans dwindles. Lack of positive exchanges results in  scarcity experience and more competition. This leads to seeking negatives which may be better than not having any stimulation. This gets cyclically reinforced through repeated behavior or habit formations. Gradually it becomes so hard for persons to see the good in others and support it. This comes to stay as a vicious cycle that perpetuates itself leading to 'scarcity 'experience as against the natural law of 'abundance'. Claude Steiner a pioneer TA  scientist and colleague of Eric Berne has elaborated this concept. Anyone who desires a deeper understanding on this may refer to his writings on 'power play in humans' (http://www.claudesteiner.com/osp.htm)

Re-experiencing and regaining of abundance in life is possible!!

To re experience abundance, the vicious cycle needs to be broken. Old habits must be unlearned and new habit of finding the good in others and promoting it must be practiced. This can be learned through TA training. Self analysis and physical relaxation practices in the training enables one to rediscover the okayness in oneself and others. This in turn strengthens the self, and helps one to  realize one’s own power. The new learned habits become second nature. This leads to re experience of abundance in relationships. This is precisely what abundant living is about. At SHALOM the emphasis of training is centered on the theme of 'abundance'.