The Road Less Traveled: Addresses Discipline, Love, Growth and Religion and Grace
M Scott Peck's 1978 book The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth became an instant classic of self-help and popular psychology. In fact, the book helped to kick-start a revolution in the American publishing world, which since Peck's book has been flooded with books on similar topics addressing relationship issues, self-improvement, and the fusion of clinical psychology with new age spirituality. Peck's book addresses four main issues: discipline, love, growth and religion; and grace. The Road Less Traveled is subsequently divided into those four sections. The underlying premise of Peck's work is that psychological health equals spiritual health and that much mental illness signals a disconnection from fundamental spiritual truths. The Road Less Traveled synthesizes Peck's clinical observations with his understanding about diverse spiritual paths, ranging from Christianity to Buddhism. Consequently, the author infuses the book with a myriad of theoretical viewpoints that improve readers' ability to approach psychological, social, and emotional problems. Important not only for the validity of what Peck says throughout the book, but also because of its centrality in the
Depression and other mental illnesses provide impetus for change and usually cause clients to seek professional psychological help. The spiritual crises inspire change and growth, forcing the individual to realize that they need to make changes. Motivated by intense psychological pain, the individual feels motivated to change, to restore balance in their lives, and experience the letting go and "giving up the self" that becomes the goal of spiritual growth and healing. In the last chapter of the "Discipline" part of the book, Peck uses the metaphors of birth and death to describe psychological healing and transformation, and his analogies as well as Peck's concrete advice parallel those of the world's major spiritual and religious traditions, especially Buddhism. Section Two of The Road Less Traveled is titled simply "Love." The author shows that what is usually construed primarily as chivalric romance in our culture is a far more complex and heady issue with regards to spiritual growth and psychological healing. First, Peck ties in the concept of love to the concept of discipline, stating that love is the "motive, the energy for discipline," (p. 81). Peck therefore links the second section to the first. Furthermore, Peck's definition of love is expansive: "The will to extend one's self for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth," (p. 81). With this definition of love, Peck describes how the individual can cultivate love and direct it toward spiritual growth and psychological healing. Love involves effort and will, and is not a passive process. Peck bases his definition of love on his clinical observations. Peck's book lacks academic jargon, which work to its advantage as a trade publication geared for a general audience. While scholars might balk at the clinical relevance of the text, The Road Less Traveled is based on truths that transcend the DSM. In fact, Peck's clinical experience provides the credibility necessary for scholars to take the book seriously. The Road Less Traveled offers a qualitative study of the broad problems underlying the bulk of mental illnesses that plague people in the modern world. Its principles do not necessarily extend to serious illnesses like schizophrenia but the majority of Americans who seek psychological treatment do so because of depression, anxiety, and relationship issues that can be addressed through the principles in The Road Less Traveled. Romantic love can trigger genuine love, though. The dissolution of ego boundaries can encourage profound spiritual experiences of union and unity. At the same time, romantic love can lead to unhealthy emotional dependence and the blurring of healthy psychological boundaries. What Peck calls "passive dependency" has become a common feature of many intimate relationships: individuals look to their partners for a sense of fulfillment and wholeness. This delusion usually "has its genesis in a parental failure to love," (p. 105). Deluded love precludes genuine love because it is self-centered and selfish, too. Frequently, individuals pretend to be martyrs when their seeming selflessness translates only into self-g
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Approximate Word count = 2117
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)
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