Advanced Autogenic Training and Primal Awareness:
Techniques for Wellness, Deeper Connection to Nature, and Higher Consciousness
By
James Endredy
I’m a big fan of Autogenic Training. I cut my teeth on this process as a fresh
Ph.D. looking for an alternative to hypnosis to explore altered states of
consciousness and the psychic/spiritual realms. Hypnosis, as popular and
effective as it is, nevertheless has an aura of ambiguity around it—What is
hypnosis? How can you tell if someone is hypnotized and how “deeply”?—our
answers to such questions are more matters of operative convenience than
necessarily agreed upon specific realities, such as a saying it is a state of
heightened suggestibility. Besides, being “suggestible” doesn’t sound like a
positive attribute. Autogenic Training, however, has very specific steps in a
mind-body process of disengaging the conscious-sensory mind and activating the
subliminal mind, the subconscious and its imagination and ability to affect
bodily functions. The training also gives specific focus to developing the skill
of “passive volition.”
Set your intention, and then let go and let the intention do the work. I’m sure
you’ve heard of such advice. In Autogenic Training, we learn this specific
skill. To the wise, passive volition actually is suggestibility, but one
voluntarily engaged as a positive, creative act. This same ability underlies the
various improvisational arts, including “channeling,” although this fact may be
hard to recognize by folks who maintain a dualistic notion of reality. I have
found Autogenic Training opens an important doorway to higher consciousness. I’m
glad to come across a book that focuses on this spiritual dimension of Autogenic
Training.
Advanced Autogenic Training and
Primal Awareness: Techniques for Wellness, Deeper Connection to Nature, and
Higher Consciousness,
by James Endredy is truly a new and innovative
approach to AT, one that respects the important basics, but which goes far
beyond what the creators of AT had originally imagined. The author has written
previously on the subject and knows it well, but he has brought to it an
entirely new (to AT) dimension, one that I have been familiar with and am glad
to see the connection I’ve experienced be explored—“primal awareness.” The
author shows us how to use AT to develop this special relationship to the outer
world. Primal awareness has to do with a very fundamental response that we have
(but often ignore) to the outer world. It is easiest to recognize when I give as
an example, “the vibes we feel when we walk into a forest.” It is a direct
experience of inner relatedness. Something about the forest “speaks to us.” It
is not what we see, and it is not “feeling” in the sense of emotionality, but
something we perceive nevertheless. In my work, I call it “seeing with heart
awareness,” but regardless of the name we give to it, it is a dimension of
consciousness that has the effect of uniting us with the world, rather than
separating us as our senses do.
The first half of the book gives the Autogenic Training part. He has expanded
its applicability in many ways, going beyond generalized healing to working with
the subtle energies of the body parts, and introduces color and other modalities
to accomplish a wide variety of goals. The second half of the book he explains
how to build upon the AT skills to develop your primal awareness of your
surroundings and how to interact with it accordingly. This work takes us into
many types of initiation rituals that allow us to form working alliances with
nature. Reading his accounts of making a primal connection with the elements,
water, air, fire, and water, I found that even imagining it as I read to be a
very inspirational experience.
If you have the time to spend alone exploring your consciousness, this book will
keep you busy and entertained for several years! Think of the money you’ll save
from not bothering to go to the movies!