This book summarizes the research and application of the Theory of Positive Disintegration, one of the most influential theories in gifted education, and compares it to other theories of personality and psychological development.

Kazimierz Dabrowski refers to his view of personality development as the theory of positive disintegration. Dabrowski feels that no growth takes place without previous disintegration. He regards symptoms of anxiety, psychoneurosis, and even some symptoms of psychosis as the signs of the disintegration stage, and therefore not always pathological.

This book describes the overexcitabilities often associated with gifted children and adults, as well as strategies for dealing with children and adults who experience them. It also provides essential information on Dabrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration. Learn practical methods for nurturing sensitivity, intensity, perfectionism.

In his Theory of Positive Disintegration, Polish psychiatrist and psychologist Dr. Kazimierz Dąbrowski (1902-1980) proposed an approach to personality development in which crises are not only necessary but fundamental in creating opportunities for individual development. Crises force our focus inward, leading us to challenge our established beliefs, roles and routines. While crises often resolve with a return to the status quo, recovery is sometimes stymied and posttraumatic stress results. In other cases, however, the outcome is posttraumatic growth. The individual experiences a process of disintegration, a loosening of the components of personality that allows for an examination and re-evaluation of the self. One rebuilds after a crisis, implementing conscious and deliberate changes to reshape the personality toward increased autonomy, uniqueness and the realization of one's ideal personality. This work provides a comprehensive yet balanced overview of Dąbrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration in its historical and present-day contexts and demonstrates its continued relevance in today's most vital areas of psychology, including posttraumatic growth, education, neuroscience, and personality theory.

Rumi is now acknowledged as one of the great mystical poets of the Western world, with huge sales of the many collections of his poetry. Not much is known about his life except that he lived in thirteenth-century Anatolia (now Turkey), had a great spiritual friendship with a wild man called Shams, brought an adopted daughter into his family, and was distraught when Shams finally disappeared. Rumi's Daughter is the delightful novel about Kimya, the girl who was sent from her rural village to live in Rumi's home. She already had mystical tendencies, and learned a great deal under Rumi's tutelage. Eventually she married Shams, an unusual husband, almost totally absorbed by his longings for God. Their marriage was fiery and different and, in the end, dissolved by Kimya's death - after which Shams vanished. Rumi's Daughter tells Kimya's story with great charm and tenderness. Well written and thought-provoking, it is sure to draw comparison with Paolho Coelho's The Alchemist, and also to add something fresh and new to what is so far known about Rumi.