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The Institute Vision
Many of the people who have worked with the Institute have experienced continuous states of being far above the norm for extended periods of time. As Kate Sorensen puts it, "Leaving any one of those states and returning to ordinary consciousness is like getting kicked out of heaven!" We are dedicated to bringing ourselves and others to these states permanently and teaching others how to use them effectively for radical physical and emotional healing.
- "We have a great yearning for some thing within us that we can’t readily define: like an untouchable quantum it is a mystery beyond our sense of time. We search for culturally sanctioned ways to satisfy it without success. In some of us this yearning manifests as a knowing feeling that there must be much more to life than we are experiencing. In others it becomes a deep need to explore our inner spirituality.
"Still others have a different motivation – deep in their hearts, they know that the world can be a much better place. They know that decent people across the world should experience the simple joy in being alive while in quiet harmony with others and the natural world.
"They know that traumatized minds and injured bodies should be healed in ways undreamed of in conventional practices. My dream is to find the theoretical basis for this mystery by treating it like engineering and to apply it for the evolution of ourselves and the betterment of all mankind.
"I know, too, that this planet called earth can be a better place for all and that mankind’s true birthright has yet to be realized. Won’t you join me and my colleagues in this new voyage of inner discovery? It is a voyage quite unlike any that man has attempted before. Join my passion, my life, my earnest quest. Welcome to my vision of man’s greater future."
Specifically, the Institute's goals are:
- find ways to heal humanity as a species (the core purpose of the Institute);
- find cures for diseases and conditions currently considered incurable (our Clinical Projects);
- change the way that the field of psychology and healing work by promoting a new way - charging clients only for results, not time spent;
- develop simple techniques to reduce people's suffering by giving them peak states of consciousness;
- find the causes of mental illness, and derive cures for the conditions;
- expand on our understanding of the underlying basis for consciousness, psychology, spirituality, and healing;
- explore this new field of study to find facts and applications never before imagined or expected - both for practical reasons and for the joy of understanding and exploring the unknown;
- grow as a business so as to effectively make change in the larger culture and dominant paradigm.
The importance of the Beauty Way state
The talk below (Being Human is a Spectrum Disorder: Beauty Way vs Normal Consciousness by Dr. Kirsten Lykkegaard 2023) describes a major goal of the Institute - It explains the Beauty Way state of consciousness and why it is important.
Working for the Institute
As we make a transition from pure research into more application, we find that we are definitely looking for people to join us who share our vision. There are currently three typical ways to become involved with the Institute. In descending order of commitment, they are: core staff, either in research or administration; as a healer (employee) for the Clinical Projects; or as a therapist certified in our techniques.
Now that we have a professional training in place, the simplest and best way to become involved with the Institute is to take our professional training class. This gives you a taste of the work, a chance to explore it without major commitments, and allows you to see if you work easily and pleasurably with the staff who teach, who would become your colleagues if you join the Institute.
Core staff
Since we are a startup doing this work on a shoestring, there are no paid positions yet for core staff. But if you see the potential in what we’re doing and can pay your own way we’d like to talk with you. We’ve been making a huge number of discoveries, but in most cases we don't have the staff to follow them up with - so we are looking for the people who share our vision and enthusiasm to join in. We have an obvious need for several categories of people:
- teachers for Whole Hearted Healing and other workshops;
- directors and staff for the various Projects (regenerative healing, autism, addiction, etc.), especially MD’s;
- people who have vision and are able to see applications that we haven’t even imagined are welcome to contribute in this highly rewarding work.
- "Those involved with the ISPS must be committed to continually striving to heal themselves and their colleagues, and engage in ISPS activities with courage, commitment and cooperation."
Project staff and volunteers
Our different projects have different levels of involvement. For example, the addictions project is only licensing the processes to people who are already working in the field of addictions. Other projects involve becoming an employee of the Institute - for example, the Gene Clinic or Regenerative Healing projects would be like this. This occurs because of several factors: the safety risks of the procedures; the degree of experimental work still involved; our need to make sure of quality control in some of the projects.
We also need volunteer subjects to test out the Project therapies we're developing. The best subjects are ones who have taken our professional training, but due to the unusual nature of some of the diseases (MS, autism), we are happy to work with anyone who understands that the work is experimental, has potential risks as we explore the unknown, and is willing to put up with the paperwork, measurements, and long time periods between treatment sessions.
The Institute's Origins
Dr. Grant McFetridge founded the Institute for the Study of Peak States (ISPS) in the early 1990's to test and explore his hypothesis that peak states were blocked by developmental event trauma. He initially had two motivations - to regain his own lost peak state, and to eliminate or reduce suffering in other people by sharing the peak states that he'd once had.
For the first decade a steady stream of constantly changing volunteers would get personal training from Grant, and in return would act as experimental prototypes for his work. During this period many courageous volunteers took the risks of this exploration into the unknown with no reward in sight - tragically, some died or were left harmed for years as he tried to find ways to help them. Most volunteer involvement was short lived, especially in the early days when the theory and techniques were just being derived, and there was as yet no evidence to support the hypothesis. Wes Gietz was involved during this period, and made the first verification of the model.
Later, when the model started to produce testable results, a few people heard of Grant's work and made major efforts to donate their scarce time and energy to help explore it - working for free, following their deepest dreams and visions as they saw the potential of this work to help humanity. Kate Sorensen, Dr. Marie Green, and Dr. Deola Perry were key people during this period. Later, Frank Downey, who became the chairman of the Institute, Dr. Mary Pellicer, Dr. Adam Waisel and Matt Fox became involved and were also significant contributors. Reverend Colleen Engel, Meryl Beck, Patsy de Courcy-Ireland, Debbie York and others also volunteered their time, energy and reputations toward making the Whole-Hearted Healing workshops with the early, primitive peak states process tests a success. Our workshop participants and many other hard working volunteers also donated their time, energy and expertise as researchers or as research subjects investigating the peak state material. Of special mention are (in chronological order): Jorge Aldana, Maarten Willemsen, Dr. David MacQuarrie, Paula Courteau, Karen Gould, and Dr. Kashi Rai. Many, many others people have also contributed time, energy, and money to this project. It couldn't have happened without all the other wonderful and courageous volunteers and workshop participants who have explored and tested our work over the years!
Currently, the Institute and its volunteers are again changing as we make the transition towards a more business orientation.
You can listen to a question and answer interview with Dr. Grant McFetridge, the founder of the Institute for the Study of Peak States, speaking about the Institute. Hear just specific questions from the talk, or hear (or download) the entire 30 minute recording. It was taped in Denmark in the spring of 2008.
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