Now a few years after publishing my dissertation, it occurred to me that this site needs a final post. The publication of the dissertation was an appropriate end to the period of deepest thinking I will likely have in my life. I was in graduate school in clinical psychology, a field revealed by the dissertation to still be mostly a philosophical rather than scientific field. I was living alone on a sailboat and meditating three hours a day, which gave me some of the most efficient, clearest, and broadest thinking a person can have. I made few friends and grew few roots. I was totally emerged in my work.
But the thread did not end there. This period produced a philosophical, epistemological, and theoretical model deep enough that it continues to produce an overwhelming number of new projects, products, and articles. I use this model every day in the software field, organizational development, systems coaching, and most of all in personal life. The work from this thread continues formally at alaskafamilysystems.com.
Alaska Family Systems focuses on Bowen theory, the Family Diagram app, and its supporting programs, research, and projects. While the list of articles to write includes some on vipassana meditation, AFS is focused on projects that are more explicit and based on the engineering principles of induction and evidence toward material things that can be built.
There is a book in the works, or at least a set of topics that could become a book given the headspace to work on it. These include a theoretical synthesis of Bowen theory, vipassana, and the collective intelligence and collective behavior research. It is clear that these ideas are viable and probably even important. But these deep and novel topics take a lot of time and a social life has been fun to live since narrow focus of graduate school.
It is possible, and even likely, that I will require a place to put more philosophical or speculative musings. If that is so then I will begin adding to this site again. But until then, it will hold a special place in my heart, as all projects of a calling do.
-Patrick Stinson, Psy.D.
