“The basic exercise is for us to list about a dozen meaningful events [from birth to our current circumstance] in the movement of our life up to the present point in time. . . . it gives us a perspective of our life as a whole from the time of our birth to our situation at the time when we are listing our Steppingstones. The listing of the Steppingstones of our life is the basic step in positioning ourselves between our past and our future.” [“Steppingstones are the meaningful events that mark off the movement of a person’s life from that person’s own point of view . . . not objectively important . . . always personally important . . . perceived through the eyes and through the experience of the person who is living the life.”] –Ira Progoff, Life-Study (Dialogue House, 1983)
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Ira Progoff (1921-1998) was an American psychotherapist best known for his development of the Intensive Journal Method; his main interest was in depth psychology. A humanist, who studied privately with Carl Jung in Switzerland, he founded Dialogue House in New York City to help promote this method. In 1966, Progoff introduced the Intensive Journal method of personal development, the innovation for which he is most remembered. The public use of the method increased, and the National Intensive Journal Program was formed in 1977. It supplied materials and leaders to provide Intensive Journal workshops in the United States and other countries. The Intensive Journal education program was expanded upon in 1983 with the publication of Life-Study. [See Wikipedia and http://intensivejournal.org for more introduction to the Method.]
“. . . I was drawn further toward the conclusion that a private journal is the essential instrument for personal growth . . . I began in 1957 to use a journal as an adjunct to psychotherapy in my private practice.”
[My purpose is to have you use] “techniques to help you become your own person and find a way of living that will validate itself to you both in terms of your inner sense of truth and the actualities of your outer experience.”
“The Steppingstones of our life are those events that come to our minds when we spontaneously reflect on the course that our life has taken from its beginning to the present moment.”
List no more than a dozen: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.
“We go back into the past of our lives, not because of fascination with the past . . . not to lose ourselves in the field of memory . . . [but] in order to reconnect ourselves with the movement of our personal Time/Life, and so that we can move more adequately into our future.”
“The listing of our Steppingstones is the first step that we take in order to position ourselves in the full continuity of our lives. Each set of Steppingstones that we draw together reflects the interior view of our life as it is perceived from the vantage point of a particular moment. By being expressed spontaneously and concisely without self-conscious analysis, the Steppingstones list gives us a direct, inner perception of the movement of our life.”
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At a Journal Workshop: The Basic Text and Guide for Using the Intensive Journal Process (Dialogue House, 1975)
The Practice of Process Meditation: The Intensive Journal Way to Spiritual Experience (Dialogue House, 1980)
Life Study: Experiencing Creative Lives by the Intensive Journal Method (Dialogue House, 1983)
The Progoff Intensive Journal ® Program: http://intensivejournal.org/index.php
I reveal all, having taken the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test at various times in my life, under counselor supervision, online, and just recently with my wife (using the printed tests in Please Understand Me: Character and Temperaments Types by Keirsey and Bates and Understand Me II by Keirsey, both still in print). The recent scoring was my strongest ever, my “most solid.” I find the indicator questions fascinating and intellectually challenging, even though a few might seem simple or simplistic: “Are you more firm than gentle, more gentle than firm.” “Do you put more emphasis on the definite [or] the open ended.” I’ve always liked, when I was younger (and drinking): “At parties do you stay late, with increasing energy [or] leave early, with decreased energy.” How about, as a writer, do I “prefer the more literal [or] the more figurative.”
I had even planned to take the MCAT. Counselors had me undergo a series of tests, including the MMPI, the Myers-Briggs, and a few others that helped determine I had the desire, but not the “right stuff” to be encouraged to pursue a career in medicine.
Memories of a Time 