Esalen and the Human Potential Movement
The Esalen Institute was co-founded by Michael Murphy in 1973, to "help broaden the perspective in athletics and physical education . . . [to effect] a psychosynthesis of sports . . . increase participation in sports . . . and [to explore] the potential of athletic experiences for eliciting higher levels of awareness [by] centering in athletics, developing concentration, new ways of limbering up, body awareness and movement" ("The Esalen Catalog," Esalen Institute 11:2 [March-April 1973]).
From Michael Murphy's The Future of the Body [begun in 1970, published in 1992]: "Volition, self-awareness, imagination, emotions, the senses, and motor control are involved in surpassing performance. To be successful, sports training must harmonize countless psychological and physical systems. It needs to establish new kinds of ordered functioning, yet allow spontaneous action. It must take our repertoires apart and reassemble them with new power and beauty" (447).
From Terence McKenna, "Psychedelic Salon 201-206: Appreciating Imagination at Esalen" (Internet Archive): "And so we are on the brink of a time . . . we are at the time where the human imagination now need meet no barriers to its intent. And so we are going to find out who we are. We are going to discover what it means to be human when there is no resistance to human will. . . . The major adventure is to claim your authentic, true being, which is not culturally given to you. The culture will not explain to you how to be a real human being. It will tell you how to be a banker, politician, Indian chief, masseuse, actress, whatever, but it will not give you true being."
