Apppah Honors ~ Verny Award

 

The Thomas R. Verny Award for Outstanding Contributions to Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health in 2010 this year is awarded to: Stanislav Grof, M.D.

Dr. Stan Grof is a pioneering researcher who examined the effects of birth trauma and the roots of anxiety through his well-known LSD (and later breathwork) investigations. Describing this phenomenon that Grof labeled the BIRTH COEX-system, he also confirmed that reliving the birth experience can be a powerful healing process for psychopathology. Thus, Dr. Stan Grof has been chosen to receive the Thomas R. Verny Award for Outstanding Contributions to Prenatal and Perinatal Psychology and Health. The recognition ceremony followed by his address on “Implications of the Prenatal and Perinatal Period for Psychology: Observations from Modern Consciousness Research” will be the highlight of the 2010 APPPAH International Congress.

See lectures: Stanislav Grof "Holotropic" and “Stan Grof about his LSD experience” and “Stan Grof on LSD – Part 2” at:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mA1hDI5IiJQ


Dr. Grof is a psychiatrist with more than five decades of experience in research of non-ordinary states of consciousness. In the past, he was Principal Investigator in a psychedelic research program at the Psychiatric Research Institute in Prague, Czechoslovakia, Chief of Psychiatric Research at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and Scholar-in-Residence at the Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. Currently, he is Professor of Psychology in the Department Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco and at Wisdom University in Oakland, CA, conducts professional training programs in holotropic breathwork and transpersonal psychology, and gives lectures and seminars worldwide. He is one of the founders and chief theoreticians of transpersonal psychology and the founding president of the International Transpersonal Association (ITA).

Among his publications are over 140 papers in professional journals and the books Realms of the Human Unconscious; LSD Psychotherapy; The Adventure of Self-Discovery; Beyond the Brain; Books of the Dead; The Holotropic Mind; The Cosmic Game; The Consciousness Revolution (with Ervin Laszlo and Peter Russell); Psychology of the Future; The Ultimate Journey; When the Impossible Happens; Beyond Death; and The Stormy Search for the Self (the last two with Christina Grof). He also edited the books Ancient Wisdom and Modern Science; Consciousness Evolution and Human Survival; and Spiritual Emergency (the last with Christina Grof).


"Thomas R. Verny Award" to be given every two years in Dr. Verny's honor to someone making extraordinary contributions to prenatal and perinatal psychology.

In making the announcement, David Chamberlain presented Thomas with the first "Oscar," a dark stone statuette of Imhotep, chosen to symbolize virtuosity in leadership and public service. The real Imhotep was an extraordinary Egyptian physician, writer, scholar, and advisor to Pharaohs about 500 B.C. His influence was so great that succeeding generations of Egyptians were not sure if he had been human or divine!
The gold-framed citation read,

"The Board of Directors presents the first Association "Oscar" to Thomas R. Verny, M.D., D.Psych., physician, psychologist, scholar, valued advisor, communicator to the multitudes, and accoucheur to pre- and perinatal psychology. We honor you today, July 19, 1991 at the 5th Congress in Atlanta, Georgia."

Thomas organized the 1st International Congress of Pre- and Perinatal Psychology in Toronto in 1983 and in 1986 became founder and first editor of the Journal of the Association. Beyond the bounds of the organization, his ambitious speaking schedule abroad and his classic work, The Secret Life of the Unborn Child (1981) drew world attention (ultimately in over 25 languages) to the vital but overlooked field of prenatal psychology. In the Verny tradition of "Extraordinary Contributions" we have been pleased to recognize the distinguished work of  Ashley Montagu (1993),  Beatriz Manrique (1995),  Michel Odent (1997),  David Chamberlain (1999), Ludwig Janus (2001), Laura Huxley (2003), Tiffany Field (2005), Peter Hepper (2007), and Gladys T. McGarey (2009).