R. D. Laing in the Twenty-First Century

M. Guy Thompson, PhD, received his psychoanalytic training from R. D. Laing in London, and is founder of the New School for Existential Psychoanalysis, a virtual training program based in San Francisco. He is the author of The Legacy of R. D. Laing [Ed.] (2015); The Death of Desire: An Existential Study in Sanity and Madness (2017; 2nd edition); and Essays in Existential Psychoanalysis (2024).Fritjof Capra, PhD, physicist and systems theorist, is the author of several international bestsellers, including The Tao of Physics and The Web of Life. He is coauthor, with Pier Luigi Luisi, of the multidisciplinary textbook, The Systems View of Life. Capra’s online course (www.capracourse.net) is based on his textbook.Douglas Kirsner, PhD, is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy and Psychoanalytic Studies at Deakin University, Melbourne. He is the author of The Schizoid World of Jean-Paul Sartre and R. D. Laing and Unfree Associations: Inside Psychoanalytic Institutes. His interest in Laing includes living in a Philadelphia Association household during the 1970s.

“How can there be a more relevant voice in our contemporary world than R. D. Laing? Is there anything to be more grateful for than sanity amidst this insanity, of healing amidst this suffering, of the altered states of psychosis amidst this lunacy, of love amidst this hatred? Laing was crucial to the founding of the human potential movement in the early 1960s. He is just as relevant today. Thompson, Capra, and Kirsner have brought us a series of essays, presented at Esalen over the past ten years, to remind us of this key legacy and why we should listen, intensely and carefully.”Jeffrey J. Kripal, author of Esalen: America and the Religion of No Religion“An authentic and scholarly work which greatly enriches the legacy of R.D. Laing’s contribution to the experience-orientated philosophy of madness.”Adrian C. Laing, Lawyer, author, son of R. D. Laing and author of R.D. Laing: A life (Amazon Kindle), President: The R.D. Laing Estate: www.rdlaingofficial.com“This fascinating book illuminates the influential work of the psychoanalyst and anti-psychiatrist R.D. Laing — a synthesizer of psychoanalysis with existentialist thought, Buddhism, family-systems theory, and cultural critique. Each essay in this volume was written by a thinker who knew Laing personally, knows his ideas intimately, and writes with clarity, sophistication, and verve. Laing was a crucial figure of the late 20th century. These erudite essays reveal his continuing relevance for our understanding of sanity and madness, of love and authenticity, of healing and altered states.”Louis Sass, author of Madness and Modernism and The Paradoxes of Delusion.“R.D. Laing in the 21st Century is essential reading for anyone concerned about the deeper levels of human freedom and community. The authors of this volume beautifully unpack Laing’s “live and let live” philosophy for a new generation mystified by, and too often suffering from, ever widening forms of social coercion. While Thompson and his colleagues do not offer pat answers to this monumental plight, their Laing-inspired insights provide hope for a more loving, honesty-based world.”Kirk Schneider, author of The Psychology of Existence (with Rollo May), The Polarized Mind, and Life-Enhancing Anxiety: Key to a Sane World.“The three authors, who knew and worked intimately with Laing, offer unique, illuminating understandings of his groundbreaking work. Importantly, they bring Laing into the 21st century to include our – hopefully not too late – ecological concerns of our interconnectedness, and such competing ideals as community and individual freedom. Through revisiting and contextually updating Laing’s seminal writings, this stimulating and engaging book can help us come more to our senses with and through others, in our otherwise increasingly lonely and alienating world.”Del Loewenthal, Emeritus Professor of Psychotherapy and Counselling, University of Roehampton, U.K., Chair of Existential Analytic Psychotherapy Training at the Southern Association for Psychotherapy and Counselling (SAFPAC) U.K., author of Existential Psychotherapy and Counselling after Postmodernism (Routledge, 2018). www.delloewenthal.com.

• PREFACE. Themes From The Esalen Lectures Part I. What Is Sanity? What Is Madness? 1. Sanity and Friendship: The Therapeutic Feature of Communal Living 2. Laing on Sanity, Liberty, Freedom 3. Sanity and the State of the World Part II. What Is Therapeutic? 4. On Sympathy: The Role of Love in the Therapeutic Encounter 5. Laing’s Conception of Therapy 6. Science and Spirituality Part III. What Are Altered States? 7. The Nature of Reality 8. Falling in Love as an Altered State. 9. Laing on Altered States. Part IV. What Is Love? 10. Eros and Agape 11. The Biology of Love. 12. Laing on Love. Part V. What Is Authenticity? 13. Laing on Authenticity 14. The Dark Side of Authenticity: Laing as Provocateur 15. Authentic Community Part VI. What Is Healing? 16. What is Called Healing? 17. Healing and the Regeneration of Life 18. Laing on the Human Condition