Akhter Ahsen, Ph.D. is a therapist with a vision. This vision translated into the formulation of Image Psychology, spanning the disciplines — psychology, clinical and experimental, philosophy, literature, mythology, sports and learning — and the publication of over 30 books in the field. Dr. Ahsen’s work in imagery, specifically the eidetic image, began in the 1950’s and has continued through this new millennium.

In the late 1970’s Dr. Ahsen founded and is the editor of  The Journal of Mental Imagery, a prestigious scientific journal which deals with imagery and its advancement of human consciousness. At that time he also founded the International Imagery Association, a not for profit organization, which promotes conferences, seminars, workshops to further a similar aim. In 1980, at The 4th American Imagery Conference, sponsored by the IIA, Joseph Campbell, the noted mythologist, related to the audience, “I am a storyteller about mythology, a synthesizer, while you (Ahsen) are an originator.”

Akhter Ahsen and Joseph Campbell met casually one day on the Sarah Lawrence campus where Campbell was a Professor for many years. Joseph Campbell was already a very well known lecturer and author in his field, although the meeting preceded the Bill Moyers’ interviews with him on mythology which brought the topic into millions of homes throughout America. (This series still remains one of Channel 13’s most popular ever.) Joseph Campbell was a genuine human being whose eyes lit up when telling a story and who had a lightness to his demeanor which reflected a spirit of connectedness, a life force that had spontaneity and playfulness in it. When Dr. Ahsen, at that time not known to Professor Campbell, rung him up at Sarah Lawrence and asked if he could come over and read him a piece of his work, Campbell said, “Sure,” unaware that Dr. Ahsen would be over in just a few moments as Ahsen’s Image Institute was only ten minutes away. Within a few more moments Dr. Ahsen began reading from Manhunt in the Desert, a work that Joseph Campbell would later write in the introduction: “You did not write this; you received it.”

Ernest R. Hilgard and Akhter Ahsen at Stanford University

Over the years Dr. Ahsen has been associated with men and women of distinguished stature in their fields. Dr. Ernest R. Hilgard, Professor Emeritus of Stanford University and past President of the APA, has stated regarding eidetics, “The principles of this approach rely on bright visual images and the feeling of ‘reality’ they project inside the mind, so that the inner and outer realities are bound together in the body of a single image operation...(one becomes aware) of the fascination inherent in imagery, the tricks that it can play with consciousness, and the benefits that may lie in its understanding and use.”

The two men discussed many issues in psychology over the years and Dr. Hilgard, Senior Associate Editor of the  JMI’s distinguished International Board of Editors has also said, “Akhter Ahsen, a psychologist active as a clinician, experimentalist and theoretician ...As Ahsen’s study established important links between various constellations of the myth, a far-reaching clinical interpretation of the underlying motivational principles emerges. Ahsen invites the leader to enrich the concept of the image well beyond any prior concept he or she may have had.”