Annotated Bibliography of the Will

An inspirational classic in character ethics and personal achievement. Marden demonstrates through historical biographies that resolute firmness of will, dogged persistence, and moral tenacity are the ultimate determinants of human success and character.

Seminal empirical study establishing the priority, consistency, and exclusivity principles that govern when human beings perceive themselves as causal agents of their actions, sparking extensive cognitive science debate.

Profound essays exploring the essential distinction between forceful 'willpower' and receptive 'willingness'. Warns against the toxic psychological distortions of the unbalanced strong will divorced from empathy and skillful means.

An educational psychology manual containing the seminal chapter 'Will Training'. Examines how children develop moral judgment, decision-making stamina, and self-restraint, offering pedagogical methods to strengthen children's volitional faculties.

Transcript from the broadcast series 'Inside the Creative Mind'. Discusses how deliberate choice, creative vision, and sustained intentionality interact in artistic breakthrough and personal transformation.

Comprehensive spiritual treatise containing extensive instructions on meditation, psychological training, and esoteric philosophy. Distinguishes personal self-will from the higher spiritual 'Will-to-Good' and provides guidelines for service and collective cooperation.

Foundational monograph presenting Roberto Assagioli's core architecture of psychosynthesis. Contrasts psychoanalytic reductionism with an expansive model of human consciousness that recognizes the central unifying role of the 'I' and personal volition in psychological synthesis.

Explores how psychosynthesis principles of the will can be directly applied within contemporary life coaching. Outlines coaching protocols for diagnosing volitional impediments, establishing realistic aims, and sustaining executive action.

Comprehensive reference survey documenting philosophical, psychological, and sociological treatments of human agency, from determinism and compatibilism to Nietzschean will to power and psychological theories of executive function.

Examines the dramatic psychological encounter between karmic necessity and conscious volitional response. Argues that human freedom is realized through courageous acceptance and ethical responsibility rather than fatalistic resignation.

Examines psychosynthesis as an empowering modality for pastoral counseling, personal growth, and holistic health, highlighting Assagioli's techniques for cultivating the will and discovering authentic spiritual purpose.

Documentary exploration examining the science of intention, belief systems, and consciousness studies. Features interviews with researchers, physicists, and philosophers exploring how focused emotional volition affects subjective and physical reality.

Explores somatic self-discipline through voluntary dietary restriction and juice fasting, detailing how mastering immediate physiological impulses strengthens mental endurance, volitional focus, and bodily self-governance.

Transcript of a presentation delivered to the Association for the Advancement of Psychosynthesis, exploring how to recognize, nurture, and constructively channel strong volitional impulses in developing children without crushing emergent autonomy or self-determination.

Classic speculative fiction novella depicting human consciousness and the untapped latent powers of mind and volition. Illustrates how awakening direct volitional command over cognitive processes liberates individuals from covert societal manipulation.

Profound existential analysis of modern cultural apathy and psychological disengagement. May argues that the divorce of love from will renders love sentimental and will manipulative, showing that genuine intentionality requires the creative reintegration of eros, daemonic passion, and deliberate agency.

Examines the diverse modalities through which volition expresses itself across personality levels, contrasting crude egoistic assertiveness with the balanced, harmonious expressions of skillful, good, and transpersonal will in everyday decisions.

A rigorous philosophical critique of Daniel Wegner's illusion-of-will hypothesis. Bayne analyzes the precise phenomenology of 'the feeling of doing', defending the cognitive and causal significance of agentive experience against epiphenomenalist reductionism.

Based on a lecture given before the Plenary Session of the International Psychosomatic Week in Rome (September 1967). Assagioli introduces bio-psychosynthesis, showing that somatic healing requires a patient's fundamental 'will to be cured'. Without addressing defective will or unconscious counter-will, medical interventions remain ineffective.

Bridges Roberto Assagioli's psychosynthesis with General Systems Theory and deep ecology. Explains how the will operates as a self-organizing feedback governor within open psychological and ecological systems.

Synthesizes Angeles Arrien's indigenous Four-Fold Way archetypes (Warrior, Healer, Visionary, Teacher) with psychosynthesis principles of the will, exploring how conscious intention aligns archetypal energies toward wholeness.

The seminal foundational sourcebook detailing the theoretical architecture and clinical techniques of psychosynthesis. Introduces the structural model of the psyche, disidentification exercises, and the central role of the 'I' as a unifying center of awareness and will.

An accessible, thorough guide to psychosynthesis psychology and self-development. Includes dedicated practical chapters on cultivating the skillful and good will, managing psychological crisis, and aligning personal goals with transpersonal purpose.

Explores the creative and expressive dimensions of the will, offering reflective exercises for clarifying life purpose, identifying psychological resistances, and developing a gentle, cooperative approach to intentional action.

Explores the metaphysical and psychological interplay between purposeful intention and volitional manifestation. Analyzes how higher purpose guides and informs the specific stages of willing, distinguishing willful stubbornness from enlightened, purposeful action.

Analyzes ritual as a symbolic vehicle for focusing and crystallizing intention. Explains how uniting artistic creativity with deliberate volition imprints conscious goals deeply upon the unconscious mind.

Foundational work on subconscious suggestion and the laws of imagination and the will. Formulates Coué's famous principle that whenever the will conflicts with the imagination, imagination unfailingly wins, demonstrating how to direct the imagination to empower volition without straining.

MIT OpenCourseWare course monograph analyzing the classical philosophical conundrum of akrasia (weakness of will) in Plato's Protagoras, examining the Socratic paradox that no person does wrong knowingly or voluntarily.

An early 20th-century psychological study and training handbook on volitional stamina. Outlines systematic mental and physical exercises, moral discipline regimes, and psychological techniques for converting irresolute intentions into decisive action.

The foundational masterwork of psychosynthesis and the primary intellectual source for The Will Project. Assagioli examines the existential reality of the will, its essential qualities (strong, skillful, good, transpersonal), and its six sequential stages: purpose, deliberation, decision, affirmation, planning, and execution.

Practical manuals detailing the Avatar consciousness management system. Defines will as the fundamental motivating force of awareness and details five progressive stages: awakening, disciplining, taking control, conquering worry, and transcendent willful control to recover the state of a self-determined 'source being'.

Empirical study evaluating the impact of structured psychosynthesis training on managerial self-actualization and executive volition. Demonstrates statistically significant improvements in self-regulative capacity and decision-making.

Groundbreaking humanistic and transpersonal psychology text exploring peak experiences, metamotivation, self-actualization, and human potential. Maslow explores how higher values (B-values) and transpersonal volition motivate integrated individuals toward societal transformation.

A comparative scholarly monograph examining the surprising philosophical convergences between Christian health pioneer Ellen G. White and Italian psychiatrist Roberto Assagioli regarding the sovereign role of the will in character, moral decision-making, and holistic health.

Historical translation of 18th-century Benedictine scholar and alchemical philosopher Dom Antoine-Joseph Pernety, analyzing the necessity of purified, unswerving volition in hermetic transformation.

Influential cognitive psychology paper summarizing experimental evidence for Wegner's theory of apparent mental causation, arguing that conscious intention is an emotion of authorship generated retrospectively by the brain.

Pioneering manual on mental discipline and subconscious suggestion. Leland details practical methods for using pre-sleep affirmations and intentional focus to strengthen memory, banish unconstructive habits, and awaken persistent volitional stamina.

Monographs examining the transpersonal concept of the 'Good Will'. Demonstrates how individual volitional drives can be elevated from self-centered aggression into altruistic, cooperative social energy.

Applies Roberto Assagioli's typology of the seven psychological types to organizational management, detailing how each type distinctively expresses the qualities of will, power, leadership, and decision-making.

Outlines Assagioli's practical methodology for awakening and training the will. Presents evocative words, reflective meditation, physical training disciplines, and 'useless exercises' designed to systematically cultivate mental concentration and volitional stamina.

Pioneering formal and cybernetic analysis of trance states. Wier defines trance as a cognitive loop of attention, analyzing how narrowed focus modifies volitional agency and how conscious intentionality can be utilized to enter and exit trance states at will.

A masterwork of phenomenological psychology and existential psychiatry. Farber introduces the crucial distinction between the 'first realm of will' (an unconscious, direction-setting intentionality) and the 'second realm of will' (isolated, self-conscious exertion), demonstrating how psychological disorders emerge from willing what cannot be willed.

Coaching paper demonstrating the vital difference between brute force willpower and calm, concentrated focus. Explains how effortless intentional alignment produces sustainable long-term results without burnout.

Expository treatise on esoteric volitional development, detailing how spiritual self-mastery requires the subjugation of reactive emotional drives to a steady, enlightened will.

Clinical exploration of the psychosomatic and neurobiological dimensions of volition. Discusses how willful intent correlates with autonomic regulation, neuroendocrine function, and bodily health.

Examines clinical methods for recognizing and working with volitional pathology in psychotherapeutic practice. Drawing on Roberto Assagioli's psychosynthesis, Alberti explores how clients can move from unconscious reactive complexes to intentional self-direction, rehabilitating the will as a central unifying function of the human psyche.

A monumental contribution to American pragmatism and moral psychology. James defends the rationality of taking an active, decisive leap of faith in matters of profound human importance where intellectual proof is unavailable, vindicating the volitional nature of belief.

Introductory essay outlining the central role of the will in organizing daily routines, establishing healthy interpersonal boundaries, and directing emotional energies toward constructive self-realization.

Scholarly overview of Roberto Assagioli's psychology of the will published in The Coaching Psychologist. Breaks down the four aspects and six sequential stages of willing, providing executive coaches with actionable frameworks for client development.

Details an experimental laboratory instrument known as the 'myergesthesiometer' designed by American inventor Elmer Gates to measure the mind's ability to discriminate slight variations in muscular effort and conscious volition.

Explores the higher stages of spiritual awakening, mystical crises, and the emergence of the transpersonal will. Analyzes how higher transpersonal insights must be harmonized with disciplined personal volition to achieve mature spiritual synthesis.

A philosophical inquiry into paradoxical volition, drawing parallels between Taoist non-action (wu wei) and esoteric will training, where aggressive ego-forcing is superseded by non-attached, effortless intentional alignment.

Groundbreaking rotoscoped philosophical animated feature examining lucid dreaming, the nature of consciousness, existential agency, and the eternal philosophical debate between determinism and free will.

An inquiry into personal agency, subpersonalities, and conscious intentionality. Analyzes how recognizing unconscious scripts allows individuals to cultivate an observing self that exercises genuine conscious choice.

Archived spoken presentation examining the psychological dynamics of personal autonomy, the observing self, and the intentional will. Discusses practical techniques for moving from unconscious automatic habits into active, purposeful self-direction.

Acclaimed dark ambient and electro-industrial musical recordings by Canadian musical project 'Will' (formed by John McRae and Front Line Assembly's Rhys Fulber). The compositions explore solemn liturgical chanting, neoclassical structures, and themes of focused volitional determination.

Comprehensive historical treatise on the Problem of Freedom in Western philosophy. Traces metaphysical, theological, psychological, and deterministic theories of volition from antiquity through Kant, Schopenhauer, and early 20th-century thought.

A contemplative masterpiece exploring the psychological dynamic between 'willingness' and 'willfulness'. May distinguishes between ego-driven willfulness (manipulation, tension, and control) and spiritual willingness (open surrender, deep listening, and spontaneous harmonious action).

Curated collection of lectures, presentations, conference talks, and guided exercises documenting Roberto Assagioli's psychosynthesis, the stages and qualities of the will, and practical methodologies for self-actualization.

A foundational trio of instructional essays exploring the complementary powers of focused mental imagery and sustained volitional force, analyzing how conscious intention coordinates with subconscious mental laws.

Curated historical survey tracing esoteric, hermetic, and occult doctrines of the trained will, analyzing how historic traditions viewed concentrated volition as the primary instrument for altering mental and physical states.

Kabbalistic treatise asserting that Will is the primal 'intention and desire to be', representing the fundamental blueprint of becoming that manifests desires and motivates physical reality from the Infinite.

Practical guide integrating psychosynthesis principles with strategies for personal autonomy and cognitive liberation, showing how to reclaim internal authority from societal conditioning.