Importance of The Birth Process
One aspect of Grof's extensive theory is the belief that there is a connection between a person's life experiences and experiences in the birth process. In his book The Holotropic Mind, Grof (1992) separated this process into four stages known as the Perinatal Matrices:
- Amniotic Universe — The womb. The only world that life knows at this point. Blissful feelings of peace and joy, in a healthy womb.
- Cosmic Engulfment; No Exit — Equilibrium disturbed; contractions begin. Unbearable feeling of being stuck in hell with no way of escaping.
- Death versus Rebirth Struggle — Second clinical stage of childbirth; intense struggle for survival.
- Death versus Rebirth Experience — The child is born. Intense ecstatic feelings of liberation and love. New world begins.
Read more about this topic: Holotropic Breathwork
Famous quotes containing the words importance of, importance, birth and/or process:
“There is, I think, no point in the philosophy of progressive education which is sounder than its emphasis upon the importance of the participation of the learner in the formation of the purposes which direct his activities in the learning process, just as there is no defect in traditional education greater than its failure to secure the active cooperation of the pupil in construction of the purposes involved in his studying.”
—John Dewey (1859–1952)
“I am not sure that it is of the first importance that you should be happy. Many an unhappy man has been of deep service to himself and to the world.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“The warped, distorted frame we have put around every Negro child from birth is around every white child also. Each is on a different side of the frame but each is pinioned there. And ... what cruelly shapes and cripples the personality of one is as cruelly shaping and crippling the personality of the other.”
—Lillian Smith (1897–1966)
“A man had better starve at once than lose his innocence in the process of getting his bread.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)