Center For Studies of the Person

Welcome to Center for the Studies of the Person! We are a face-to-face community of people for whom the Person-Centered Approach plays an important role in our personal and professional lives—as a way of being and doing. Our commitment is to maintain/build/create an environment where each of us can be heard, where we can be fully ourselves, and where we accept and embrace each other as we are.

The purpose of the Center for Studies of the Person (CSP) is to explore the richness and complexity of the person, to help individuals discover and experience more fully in their own lives, relationships, and organizations the wealth of what it means to be personal—of what it means, for example, to be private as well as open, to be accepting and present to others, to be self-affirming. The Center is concerned with new experiences and with old truths. It is a center of scientific and humanistic search and a center of informal education. As members, we intend to experience anew and in our own lives, the meanings of democracy and community. We intend to invent and submit to the public our understanding of what it is to be fully human.

Carl Rogers Library and Store

The Carl Rogers Memorial Library is a public resource featuring works by Carl R. Rogers, his contemporaries, students, critics and colleagues, and people…

On Becoming a Member

Enjoy the benefits of our CSP membership. Exclusive discounts at our CSP store and events, priority access to our events, and exclusive members-only content…

CSP Events

CSP hosts numerous workshops and conferences, including the Carl Rogers Annual Conference, Person-Centered Psychotherapy, as well as encounter groups.

“Psychologically, we are a close community, supporting each other but criticizing each other just as openly. Although our director has routine responsibilities, no one is in authority over anyone else. Everyone can do as he wishes, alone or in concert with others. Everyone is responsible for his own support…

There is absolutely nothing holding us together except a common interest in the dignity and capacity of persons and the continuing possibility of deep and real communications with each other. To me it is a great experiment in building a functioning group – a non-organization really—entirely based on the strength of interpersonal sharing.”

A Way of Being, Carl Rogers, 1980

CSP Projects

Person-Centered Psychotherapy

The Person-Centered Psychotherapy Project has been in existence for the last five years, and we have trained people from many parts of the world, including India, Europe, South America, and North America. Our work has been to provide high-quality training in the Person-Centered Psychotherapy that emerged from the Person-Centered Approach developed by Carl Rogers.

The La Jolla Program

For more than half a century, The La Jolla Program has been at the world forefront of practicing our versions of interpersonal encounters. We convene together, facing one another, using the opportunity to talk and otherwise communicate. Our aim is to understand and experience our personal relatedness to happenings that concern us.

BIOSYNERGY PROJECT

The natural quest for biosynergy – the synergy of all life – has been ongoing for endless eons. Long before Aristotle’s illumination of the concept of synergy – the whole is greater than the sum of its parts —  explorers, seekers, & scientists have seen earthlings from micro-organism clouds to human communities to natural ecosystems collaborating in mutual biosynergy for the greater good.

Recurring CSP Meetings

LGBTQIA+ and Allies Encounter

This group meets every other Monday from 4 PM to 5:30 PM PST and is focused on providing a supportive environment for discussing various LGBTQIA+ issues or experiences, as well as fostering community with one another. We also hope that allies, family, and loved ones join our encounter group, for we want this group to be a safe space for all to connect.

Encounter With Self

Encounter with Self is a group designed, supported, and facilitated to promote personal growth through witnessing (primarily listening and observing oneself in a “sacred I space”) and a sharing of self in a sacred “we space” of a group encounter. Our time also will provide opportunities for intermittent silent introspection.

PCA International

Antonio Santos hosts a weekly PCA International Zoom meeting, Sunday mornings at 6 AM Pacific Daylight Time. This accommodates the needs of attendees who are spread across the globe. The meeting runs for two hours and is well attended by members of the International PCA Community, CSP, and others.

CSP Encounter

In an effort to bring the Center’s encounter group experience to the general public, CSP facilitators currently offer a two-and-a-half-hour sampling of what it is like in CSP’s more intensive face-to-face experiences. Will Stillwell is facilitating CSP Encounter meetings on the first and third Wednesdays of the month.

CSP E-Community

These meetings take place on the 2nd and 4th Fridays of each month from 10 AM to 12 PM, Pacific Daylight Time. We generally have around 14 people attending from around the US and the world. The purpose is to allow attendees to feel Community and Support as we encounter one another. The meeting is open to all CSP members, as well as to others who the members may recommend.

FROM THE CSP BLOG

Anti-War Statement and Peace Movement

The full-scale invasion of Ukraine ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin is a direct violation of the principles of the international legal order, which aims to maintain international peace and security…

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What Is the Person-Centered Approach?

The Person-Centered Approach was developed from the work of the psychologist Dr. Carl Rogers (1902–1987). He advanced an approach to psychotherapy and counseling that, at the time (the 1940s–1960s), was considered extremely radical, if not revolutionary. Originally described as non-directive, this therapy moved away from the idea that the therapist was the expert and towards…

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On Transitioning a Person

I sat in the classroom with my stomach churning in angst, my heart fluttering, sweat seeping through my skin, and a visceral tension that seemed to travel all over my body. My brain told me not to do it. Despite my logic, my heart always told me that nothing is worth doing unless it’s meaningful,…

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The Psychology of Carl Rogers: The Father of Humanistic Psychology

Carl Rogers was a humanistic psychologist who is best known for his client-centered approach to therapy. He believed that people are innately good and that the therapist’s job is to create a safe…

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