THE PAST IN THE FUTURE: CONSCIOUSNESS AND TRADITION.

SUMMARY If we complicate the psychological process by insisting that consciousness counts in human behavior, then the phenomena of remembering and anticipating become central problems for psychology Remembering and anticipating are relations that are very different from the cause-effect relation that frames the work of science Remembering and anticipating ate dialectical relations. The implications of this complication go beyond the usual humanistic critique of natural science models Specifically, they Include (a) a new vision of how our work is related to tradition, (b) a new vision of remembering and anticipating as psychological processes, and (c) a new vision of the meaning of humanistic psychological work. This article broaches these three implications. With respect to our relation to tradition, I argue that our forgetting of the prebehaviorist psychologies has led us to define humanistic psychology in merely a nunscientific terms. Our tradition was not born as opposition to John Watson humanistic psychology is not the afterbirth of behaviorism. With respect to remembering and anticipating, a distinction is made between reflective and prereflective consciousness and a dialectical relationship between these experiences is outlined. With respect to the meaning of humanistic-psychological work, I argue that the dialectic we see in psychotherapy between reflective sell-consciousness and prereflective perceptions of others engages our clients in crises risks, and self-transformations much more profound than we psychologists are willing to undergo For humanistic psychologists seriously to undergo these risks and possibilities for growth, our collective history (tradition) must be confronted as rigorously as the therapy client must confront his or her personal past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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