Dr. Ran Lahav - Philosophical Practitioner and Philosophical Counselor
Welcome to Ran Lahav’s Trans-Sophia website,
This website is devoted to the spiritual-philosophical approach which combines philosophical self-examination with the spiritual search. The process starts with a philosophical inquiry into ourselves, in the spirit of philosophical practice and philosophical counseling, but continues beyond the realm of philosophy and beyond the boundaries of analytic thought, in order to open us to broader horizons of life. This is the way of Trans-Sophia: philosophy and beyond, trans-philosophy.
On this website you will find various texts designed to explain the philosophical and Trans-Sophic process, and to help in philosophical self-examination and spiritual exercises. The series Voices of Human Reality deals with approaches to aspects of everyday life. The series Course on Philosophical Practice and Trans-Sophia presents the main stages of the philosophical and Trans-Sophic process. The series What Lu Told Me includes a brief text for contemplation on the process of going out of our cave.
Thank you for visiting this website,
Ran Lahav
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From philosophical practice (and philosophical counseling) to Trans-Sophia
Anybody who has been impressed by the power of philosophical inquiry to help us examine ourselves and our world – but has also encountered the limitations of philosophy, would appreciate Philo-Sophia. Such a person would seek to examine himself or herself philosophically, but would also want to go beyond it, to realms that lay beyond analytic thought.
This is how I, too, arrived at Trans-Sophia. For years I have been practicing philosophical practice and philosophical counseling – I worked as a counselor, led workshops in many countries, organized conferences, taught and lectured in universities, wrote and published articles and books. During those years I came to realize how powerful philosophy is in investigating ourselves. But I also came to realize its boundaries. Philosophical self-examination can expose what Plato calls our ‘cave’, or what I call our ‘perimeter’: the narrow world we construct for ourselves with our rigid patterns of understanding. But from this point onwards philosophy cannot help anymore. In order to step out of our ‘cave’ we need more than philosophical thinking tools, because this is a spiritual step that requires not only thinking differently, but also being differently. It requires that we live from deeper, unfamiliar parts of our being and give them voice in our lives. Philosophical investigation can take us through great insights to its boundaries, but from then on the road continues beyond philosophy, beyond sophia, trans-sophia.
Trans-sophia is based on the realization that I am imprisoned in a narrow and rigid ‘perimeter’, but that I am also capable of going beyond it. I am enclosed in a world constructed by my patterns of thinking and feeling and behaving, but I can also transcend my boundaries. I can be more than myself and take part in broader horizons of reality.
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The material on this website has been published starting September 20th, 2005 (initially at www.ranlahav.com).
Last change: November 15, 2009
