online Biography Course
The Sophia Institute online Biography Program includes several courses as specified below and leads the student through sequentially structured lessons that will help to process, help to heal and help to clarify the student's life story and at the same time introduce and deepen the understanding of Anthroposophical biography work. As part of the studies the student creates a beautiful online booklet/webpage that includes all the lessons, assignments, feedback and visual artwork to form a sort of chronicle of the student's life story and the deeper meaning of the biography. The booklet/webpage will be made available online via the student’s page/portal and will be available as a downloadable file.
This courses is of interest to anyone
who seeks an introduction to Anthroposophical biography work, wants to understand the basic ideas
and concepts of Anthroposophical biography work, wants to work on self-development through bringing consciousness to the riddles of our biography, work on healing, or to students who long to understand Anthroposophy and the significance of Rudolf
Steiner for our time.
The course also prepares the student to engage in biography group work or counseling. The courses consist of two parts. Firstly, several lessons reflect on and gather information concerning the student's biography in phases, and process and work on the biographical reality that emerges. Secondly, lessons and feedback, counseling and further study lead the student to a deepening and into a trans-formative phase ideally touching on the guiding principles and tasks of the individual and his/her biography. Each lesson includes presentations and study material from several sources including lectures by Rudolf Steiner, assignments, artistic work and tasks. Lesson 1: 0 - 7 Childhood/physical body/willing - Moon Lesson 2: 7 - 14 Grades school/childhood/etheric body/feeling - Mercury Lesson 3: 14 - 21 High school/college/etc./adolescence/astral body/thinking - Venus Lesson 4: 21 - 28 Sentient soul age - Sun Lesson 5: 28 - 35 Intellectual soul age - Sun Lesson 6: 35 - 42 Consciousness soul age - Sun Lesson 7: 42 - 49 Spirit self age/transformed astral body - Mars Lesson 8: 49 - 56 Life spirit age/transformed etheric body - Jupiter Lesson 9: 56 - 63 Spirit man age/transformed physical body - Saturn Lesson 10: 63 - old age/wisdom Lesson 11: Lunar Nodes Lesson 12: Summary and Conclusions |
D'où Venons Nous / Que Sommes Nous / Où Allons Nous Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? is a painting by French artist Paul Gauguin. Gauguin inscribed the original French title in the upper left corner: D'où Venons Nous / Que Sommes Nous / Où Allons Nous. The inscription the artist wrote on his canvas has no question mark, no dash, and all words are capitalized. In the upper right corner he signed and dated the painting: P. Gauguin / 1897. The painting was created in Tahiti, and is in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. These three questions, ”Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?" are perhaps of the most deepest nature possible and touch upon all the questions there are in the world of philosophy and psychology. Getting closer to answers to these questions is the purpose of the Sophia Institute Biography Course.
Recommended Reading
"The Veiled Pulse of Time" by William Bryant
"Phases" by Bernard Lievegoed "Theosophy" by Rudolf Steiner "Facing Karma" by Rudolf Steiner "Biographical Work: The Anthroposophical Basis" by Gudrun Burkhard "The First Three Years of The Child: Walking, Speaking, Thinking" by Karl König 
"Our biography is our most precious, intimate possession, yet how much do we really know about ourselves?" - William Bryant
Credits: 4
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All study materials will be made available online and via email.
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Sophia Institute online Biography Course
Introduction
"How much do we really know about ourselves?" as William Bryant puts it in his groundbreaking work "The Veiled Pulse of Time" is one of the main questions that we will encounter when turning to biography work.
This Biography course will help to get somewhat closer to this subject by lifting into our consciousness patterns and significant threads that can be revealed from the treasure chest that holds our biography as if someone (we ourselves?) has discarded a bunch of memories and thrown them into this chest and time has added some dust and made some of the pictures fade. One of the mysteries that we all encounter in our lives, even though we might not always be aware of it, is indeed our own biography. In our day to day life, we might pay little attention to this mystery, and only if dramatic events enter our life and cause us to stop and reflect, we may become aware of underlying currents or tendencies that reveal themselves to us upon examining our life. Using a diary or journal, or at least to reflect from time to time on our life, is an important practice in becoming more conscious of our biography. In this course, we try to turn to our life’s story in a particular way, trying to detect patterns and gain insights into our biography by looking at it through the lens of the seven year periods. While during the first three seven year periods obvious and significant changes occur at the transition from one into the next, as the change of teeth around age seven, and the entry into grade school at that time, or the onset of puberty around age fourteen, later in life we might not be so aware of these transitions, and we might need to make extra efforts in order to become conscious of these changes in ourselves and in our biography. Consider your biography and the 7 year rhythm drawing on your own experience and study. In the book “Phases” by Bernard Lievegoed, Lievegoed states: “The human biography is a symphony which each individual personally composes." While each person's path in life is a unique and individual 'work of art', the human being meets certain milestones - from the period of adolescence to old age - which are universal in nature. Regardless of background, critical outer and inner stages must be passed through. "Phases" describes each period of life - adolescence, the twenties, thirties, forties, etc. - and looks at the inner qualities and challenges that arise at each stage. The author argues that the various biological and psychological explanations of the human being are incomplete. If the inner self, the ego, of each individual is recognized and acknowledged, then the peculiarities of one's particular life-path and its challenges take on new meaning. Bernard Lievegoed - psychiatrist, educator and anthroposophist - brought half a century of clinical practice, studious observation and personal insight into the writing of the book "Phases." His overview of the course of human life and professional career, of male-female relationships, and the sometimes misleading picture of the human being presented by the various psychological schools of thought, has made this book essential reading for all those interested in attaining an insight into the mysteries of life. |
The 7 Year Phases
In Anthroposophical parlance we find the life phases structured and depicted in the following way. For those already familiar with some of the concepts and ideas of Anthroposophy, this division and description of the life phases will be easily recognized, for those less familiar with these concepts, it may serve as a guide that can be referred back to.
0 - 7 Childhood/physical body/willing 7 - 14 Grades school/childhood/etheric body/feeling 14 - 21 High school/college/etc./adolescence/astral body/thinking 21 - 28 Sentient soul age 28 - 35 Intellectual soul age 35 - 42 Consciousness soul age 42 - 49 Spirit self age/transformed astral body 49 - 56 Life spirit age/transformed etheric body 56 - 63 Spirit man age/transformed physical body 63 - Old age/wisdom |
Sophia Institute online Biography Course
Lesson 3
Phase: 14 - 21 Years
High school/college/etc./adolescence/astral body/thinking
“ ... goodness, beauty and truth ... (are) ... the foundations of humanity. In youth they must be given the chance to unfold in order later to grow into morality, creativity and wisdom.” -Bernard Lievegoed
This 3rd 7 year phase which includes puberty and adolescence then usually provides the great breakthrough to reality and the wider world.
Leaving the protective child-world the young person finds himself or herself faced with a reality and so-called world of the adult that is more often perceived as unfriendly, foreign and sometimes even dangerous and hostile. Loneliness, the sense of being understood by no one, but also a tendency towards hero worship sets in. Finding the right (or in some cases any) attitude towards the world becomes one of the tasks for the young person to accomplish and much depends on being able to arrive at such an arrangement with the outer world that does not inhibit the growing and now more conscious inner world and inner development.
Ideologies, a picture of the world, religious striving and political striving are often tried on like a pair of shoes and the young person makes some steps in these new shoes only to discard them for different ones ... or we may say, the young persons tries out these shoes for a little dance, sometimes appearing awkward and at other times right in their element, but it is only a trying out, not to be taken too serious ...
The main questions that arise during this phase are:
- Where do I stand in the world?
- What is the world really like?
- What forces are at play in it?
- What is the balance of power?
- What do I mean in the world?
The new ego experience during this time leads us to turn more inwards and to our own experiences. In asking ourselves what we mean in the world and for the world, we then turn our attention more to the outside again, but in uncertainty.
We experience the conflict and contradiction of things and events being at the same time absolute and yet temporary. Much of our experience has the quality of being provisional and in the moment.
Often unexpected turns enter our biography during this time which may be outer or inner events. An unusual situation might lift us out of our rut or on a whim we make a change that has far reaching consequences without us being aware of this at the time.
Rudolf Steiner states the following concerning education for this period of life in "The Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy."
"With the age of puberty the astral body is first born. Henceforth the astral body in its development is open to the outside world. Only now, therefore, can we approach the child from without with all that opens up the world of abstract ideas, the faculty of judgement and independent thought. It has already been pointed out, how up to this time these faculties of soul should be developing — free from outer influence — within the environment provided by the education proper to the earlier years, even as the eyes and ears develop, free from outer influence, within the organism of the mother. With puberty the time has arrived when the human being is ripe for the formation of his own judgements about the things he has already learned. Nothing more harmful can be done to a child than to awaken too early his independent judgement. Man is not in a position to judge until he has collected in his inner life material for judgement and comparison. If he forms his own conclusions before doing so, his conclusions will lack foundation. Educational mistakes of this kind are the cause of all narrow onesidedness in life, all barren creeds that take their stand on a few scraps of knowledge and are ready on this basis to condemn ideas experienced and proved by man often through long ages. In order to be ripe for thought, one must have learned to be full of respect for what others have thought. There is no healthy thought which has not been preceded by a healthy feeling for the truth, a feeling for the truth supported by faith in authorities accepted naturally. Were this principle observed in education, there would no longer be so many people, who, imagining too soon that they are ripe for judgement, spoil their own power to receive openly and without bias the all-round impressions of life. Every judgement that is not built on a sufficient foundation of gathered knowledge and experience of soul throws a stumbling-block in the way of him who forms it. For having once pronounced a judgement concerning a matter, we are ever after influenced by this judgement. We no longer receive a new experience as we should have done, had we not already formed a judgement connected with it. The thought must take living hold in the child's mind, that he has first to learn and then to judge. What the intellect has to say concerning any matter, should only be said when all the other faculties of the soul have spoken. Before that time the intellect has only an intermediary part to play: its business is to grasp what takes place and is experienced in feeling, to receive it exactly as it is, not letting the unripe judgement come in at once and take possession. For this reason, up to the age of puberty the child should be spared all theories about things; the main consideration is that he should simply meet the experiences of life, receiving them into his soul. Certainly he can be told what different men have thought about this and that, but one must avoid his associating himself through a too early exercise of judgement with the one view or the other. Thus the opinions of men he should also receive with the feeling power of the soul. He should be able, without jumping to a decision or taking sides with this or that person, to listen to all, saying to himself: ‘This man said this, and that man that.’ The cultivation of such a mind in a boy or girl certainly demands the exercise of great tact from teachers and educators; but tact is just what anthroposophical thought can give."
This 3rd 7 year phase which includes puberty and adolescence then usually provides the great breakthrough to reality and the wider world.
Leaving the protective child-world the young person finds himself or herself faced with a reality and so-called world of the adult that is more often perceived as unfriendly, foreign and sometimes even dangerous and hostile. Loneliness, the sense of being understood by no one, but also a tendency towards hero worship sets in. Finding the right (or in some cases any) attitude towards the world becomes one of the tasks for the young person to accomplish and much depends on being able to arrive at such an arrangement with the outer world that does not inhibit the growing and now more conscious inner world and inner development.
Ideologies, a picture of the world, religious striving and political striving are often tried on like a pair of shoes and the young person makes some steps in these new shoes only to discard them for different ones ... or we may say, the young persons tries out these shoes for a little dance, sometimes appearing awkward and at other times right in their element, but it is only a trying out, not to be taken too serious ...
The main questions that arise during this phase are:
- Where do I stand in the world?
- What is the world really like?
- What forces are at play in it?
- What is the balance of power?
- What do I mean in the world?
The new ego experience during this time leads us to turn more inwards and to our own experiences. In asking ourselves what we mean in the world and for the world, we then turn our attention more to the outside again, but in uncertainty.
We experience the conflict and contradiction of things and events being at the same time absolute and yet temporary. Much of our experience has the quality of being provisional and in the moment.
Often unexpected turns enter our biography during this time which may be outer or inner events. An unusual situation might lift us out of our rut or on a whim we make a change that has far reaching consequences without us being aware of this at the time.
Rudolf Steiner states the following concerning education for this period of life in "The Education of the Child in the Light of Anthroposophy."
"With the age of puberty the astral body is first born. Henceforth the astral body in its development is open to the outside world. Only now, therefore, can we approach the child from without with all that opens up the world of abstract ideas, the faculty of judgement and independent thought. It has already been pointed out, how up to this time these faculties of soul should be developing — free from outer influence — within the environment provided by the education proper to the earlier years, even as the eyes and ears develop, free from outer influence, within the organism of the mother. With puberty the time has arrived when the human being is ripe for the formation of his own judgements about the things he has already learned. Nothing more harmful can be done to a child than to awaken too early his independent judgement. Man is not in a position to judge until he has collected in his inner life material for judgement and comparison. If he forms his own conclusions before doing so, his conclusions will lack foundation. Educational mistakes of this kind are the cause of all narrow onesidedness in life, all barren creeds that take their stand on a few scraps of knowledge and are ready on this basis to condemn ideas experienced and proved by man often through long ages. In order to be ripe for thought, one must have learned to be full of respect for what others have thought. There is no healthy thought which has not been preceded by a healthy feeling for the truth, a feeling for the truth supported by faith in authorities accepted naturally. Were this principle observed in education, there would no longer be so many people, who, imagining too soon that they are ripe for judgement, spoil their own power to receive openly and without bias the all-round impressions of life. Every judgement that is not built on a sufficient foundation of gathered knowledge and experience of soul throws a stumbling-block in the way of him who forms it. For having once pronounced a judgement concerning a matter, we are ever after influenced by this judgement. We no longer receive a new experience as we should have done, had we not already formed a judgement connected with it. The thought must take living hold in the child's mind, that he has first to learn and then to judge. What the intellect has to say concerning any matter, should only be said when all the other faculties of the soul have spoken. Before that time the intellect has only an intermediary part to play: its business is to grasp what takes place and is experienced in feeling, to receive it exactly as it is, not letting the unripe judgement come in at once and take possession. For this reason, up to the age of puberty the child should be spared all theories about things; the main consideration is that he should simply meet the experiences of life, receiving them into his soul. Certainly he can be told what different men have thought about this and that, but one must avoid his associating himself through a too early exercise of judgement with the one view or the other. Thus the opinions of men he should also receive with the feeling power of the soul. He should be able, without jumping to a decision or taking sides with this or that person, to listen to all, saying to himself: ‘This man said this, and that man that.’ The cultivation of such a mind in a boy or girl certainly demands the exercise of great tact from teachers and educators; but tact is just what anthroposophical thought can give."
Tasks and Assignments for this Lesson
Reflect deeply on this 7 year period of your life. What were some of the significant events during this time? What were some of the significant experiences? Where were you? Where did you travel? Who were the important people that you encountered and were influenced by? What was your education like? Jobs and career? Important books or other artwork that left a lasting impression? Were there accidents or trials that changed the course of events? What ideas and ideals inspired you?
Attempt to do this reflection in a somewhat detached manner but with compassion and love - as if examining the life and biography of someone else.
Once you have arrived at an overview and awareness of significant aspects of this life phase, use the the form found below to record, and send in your completed assignment for this lesson. Please complete tasks 1 through 4 as described below.
1. Create descriptions as follows. Please structure your descriptions in a threefold approach using the three categories below. The categories may be regarded as pertaining to the physical world, the soul world and the spirit world. The three categories are: Events, People and Ideas. In the Events section, please enter descriptions of the facts, events, occurrences, places, etc. The People section should include descriptions of people that were of importance or were influential during the period in question. Lastly the Ideas section is there to record important ideas and ideals that were of significance at different times in your life. Ideas and ideals that might have an influence on our development include those ideas and ideals that live in our environment. For instance, our childhood experiences might include living in a household where strong religious beliefs are present, or growing up in a society that is free and liberal. Other examples include ideas and ideals that we have discovered in ourselves or found through other people, books, the media, etc. and that we might have made our own, like social justice, or “the survival of the fittest”, charity and empathy, freedom of the individual, moral convictions, equality, Anthroposophy, spontaneity, artistic expression, sports, etc. Please enter the descriptions in the form below.
2. In addition to the descriptions pertaining to this phase, create a short summary that best describes the essential aspects of this life phase.
3. Create a motto or sentence that best describes this life phase.
4. Create artwork that relates to this period/phase in your life.
Attempt to do this reflection in a somewhat detached manner but with compassion and love - as if examining the life and biography of someone else.
Once you have arrived at an overview and awareness of significant aspects of this life phase, use the the form found below to record, and send in your completed assignment for this lesson. Please complete tasks 1 through 4 as described below.
1. Create descriptions as follows. Please structure your descriptions in a threefold approach using the three categories below. The categories may be regarded as pertaining to the physical world, the soul world and the spirit world. The three categories are: Events, People and Ideas. In the Events section, please enter descriptions of the facts, events, occurrences, places, etc. The People section should include descriptions of people that were of importance or were influential during the period in question. Lastly the Ideas section is there to record important ideas and ideals that were of significance at different times in your life. Ideas and ideals that might have an influence on our development include those ideas and ideals that live in our environment. For instance, our childhood experiences might include living in a household where strong religious beliefs are present, or growing up in a society that is free and liberal. Other examples include ideas and ideals that we have discovered in ourselves or found through other people, books, the media, etc. and that we might have made our own, like social justice, or “the survival of the fittest”, charity and empathy, freedom of the individual, moral convictions, equality, Anthroposophy, spontaneity, artistic expression, sports, etc. Please enter the descriptions in the form below.
2. In addition to the descriptions pertaining to this phase, create a short summary that best describes the essential aspects of this life phase.
3. Create a motto or sentence that best describes this life phase.
4. Create artwork that relates to this period/phase in your life.
Please send your completed assignment via the online form or via email.