Dan Tomasulo (C’12) Steps Up to Lead the Spirituality Mind Body Institute (SMBI) at Columbia University

You might say that at midnight of May 31, 2020, the stars aligned for Dr. Dan Tomasulo (C’12). Earlier that day, he had received an invitation to become the Academic Director of the Spirituality Mind Body Institute (SMBI) at Columbia University. And on the following day his book Learned Hopefulness was released, soon to become Amazon’s #1 new release for the month of June. Indeed, Dan muses, it was a moment when everything came together. The job offer and the release of the book “are really like a surge in energy, an explosion of change and possibility,” he said in our July 20 interview. Now his inbox is full with requests for talks, articles and book proposals – true riches for this lifelong clinician and researcher of psychology.

The Journey To This Moment

“A lot of things that I had been working for my whole life sort of showed up on my doorstep,” Dan laughed in his signature modest style. But after talking with him, there can be no mistake: this starburst did not come out of nowhere. It has been years in the making, and born not only of hard work professionally, but also of a personal journey of introspection and growth. “I went through a really bad time 15 years ago, and then about 10 years ago, it became clear to me that I needed to do something to change my mood. There’s really nothing worse than a depressed psychologist, right?”

Those years of personal struggle culminated in a quest to learn about positive psychology and what the then decade-old field had discovered about helping with depression. “I went to the first IPPA conference, and it was mind-boggling.” The wealth of ideas he took away led him to try new behaviors, things that the speakers, including founder of positive psychology Dr. Martin Seligman and positive emotion expert Dr. Barbara Frederickson, were recommending. “It was simple stuff, like gratitude lists, and it started to change how I felt.” Positive psychology interventions were the only strategies that were effective in finally lifting the depression under which he had been suffering.

Dan then applied to MAPP to continue his learning about this new and hopeful discipline and was accepted for the fall of 2011. He was blown away by the program’s effective structure and content and its rigor. “I think I worked harder in MAPP than I did on my Ph.D.,” reflected Dan. After graduation, he was invited to be an Assistant Instructor, working under Penn’s MAPP founder Dr. Seligman (Marty) and its founding director Dr. James Pawelski and has continued in the role for the past 10 years. Then, about five years ago, Founder and Faculty at SMBI, Lisa Miller, who was once Marty’s student, was looking for someone to teach a positive psychology course, and Marty recommended Dan. Dan began teaching and then became a core faculty member at the Institute, which offers a Master of Arts degree in Psychology and Education with a concentration in Spirituality and Mind-Body Practice, the first master’s degree focused on spirituality offered by an Ivy League institution.

When SMBI went through a global search for a new Academic Director earlier this year, they came up empty-handed, until they realized that all along, they had the right person in Dan. And the timing was right for Dan, too. He had been feeling a pull to go into academia full-time and had been decreasing his clinical hours to free up time for research, writing and teaching. The match was made.

Dan’s New Role

The Spirituality Mind Body Institute, housed at the Teachers College at Columbia, “is pioneering the emerging field of universal spirituality through transformative inner work for outer change,” according to its welcome statement. Dan explained that SMBI’s mission has, at its core, the teaching of spiritual and religious practices, all the things that help people develop a sense of spirit. Then there are a number of different components and concentrations, including business applications and spiritual entrepreneurship, a health and wellbeing track, and a more scientific focus. “The students attracted to our program are very similar to those who apply to MAPP, and there is definitely overlap in our applicant pool. There is a similar dynamic energy and diverse professional interests. Students want the knowledge so that they can make changes in their own field,” he stated.

In his role, Dan envisions extending the reach of SMBI in the community. “My role will be to be out there with workshops and certificates, working with agencies and groups, and bringing the body of work to the community much more,” he said. For example, a certificate program could be strongly based in spirituality, with a heavy component of evidence-based positive psychology. “Going forward, it will be very interesting to start blending positive psychology more deeply with spiritual growth.” He cited the work of David Yaden and Tal Ben-Shahar as guideposts for embarking on this journey.

A Trove of Experience

The decade-long immersion in positive psychology has prepared Dan well for this moment, but his experience prior to MAPP is deep and rich, too. After completing his doctorate in developmental psychology in 1981, Dan trained for 13 years in a post-doctoral program for psychodrama, a form of psychotherapy in which participants act out events from their past. In addition to using psychodrama in his clinical work, Dan incorporated psychodrama into his teaching of positive psychology in his classes at Columbia. And now he envisions bringing this expertise to bear as he charts a direction for SMBI. For example, when psychodrama interfaces with the realm of the spiritual, it is termed axiodrama, which provides an emotional, psychological and physical platform to creatively explore philosophical questions, such as the existence of God or how to live out the ideals of democracy in a community.

Dan sees rich opportunity to incorporate psychodrama and axiodrama into to SMBI’s master’s degree program, and more broadly to contribute to the task at hand for the human community: “The moment has come for us to help people heal themselves, and in turn, for communities to heal themselves. It’s less about finding good leaders and more about letting the group – and that includes all of us – heal itself,” said Dan. “We’re going to need much more group process, something that psychodrama and particularly, axiodrama, provides.” At best, the pandemic and sociopolitical crises we are facing will lead to an awakening, one in which learning how to truncate negative spirals and extend the positive will be central, Dan reflected.

As for the “B” for “body” in SMBI, Dan has some more surprises. Certainly, he is current on the latest science supporting the importance of nutrition and exercise, “from lengthening telomeres to increasing brain-derived neurotrophic factors (BDNF)” to promote health and longevity. But he is also a Master of Reiki, a Japanese energy healing technique, and a practitioner of Rolfing® Structural Integration, a form of bodywork named after founder Dr. Ida Rolf that reorganizes the connective tissue or fascia throughout the body. And he is an ongoing student of A Course in Miracles, a curriculum for spiritual transformation written by Dr. Helen Schucman in 1976. In combination with his rigorous training in psychodrama and longtime meditation practice, these additional credentials put Dan in good company with his SMBI colleagues, most of whom have backgrounds in energy healing and alternative therapies. And if all this training was not extensive enough, Dan also holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in writing, further strengthening his kinship with SMBI colleagues, many of whom are also musicians or artists. “SMBI is academic at its core, but spherical in its influence and very eclectic,” which Dan loves.

And Dan is delighted to work under Dr. Lisa Miller, Founder of SMBI and Professor of Psychology & Education at Columbia. “Lisa is a pioneer in the true sense of the word. She is probably to the field of spirituality what Marty is to positive psychology,” he said. Dr. Miller’s groundbreaking and wide-ranging contributions to the study of spirituality include demonstrating that spirituality can be a protective factor against depression in youth and exploring postmaterial spiritual psychology. Furthermore, Dan is enamored with the history of the neighborhood where SMBI is located. “Within SMBI’s building or in adjacent buildings have worked Dr. Abraham Maslow, Dr. Carl Rogers, Dr. Helen Schucman and Dr. Jacob Moreno,” said Dan in wonderment.

A Vision For Spiritual Growth

What is at the heart of Dan’s vision for his future and that of SMBI? “I am thoroughly convinced that trauma can be a disinhibitor or a portal into accelerated growth. It’s really important to understand that it does not have to be a fait accomplis.” In other words, someone who has experienced trauma is not destined for a post-traumatic stress reaction. The pain might be a necessary passage. He likened the process of spiritual growth to a chick hammering through an eggshell, a butterfly coming out of a cocoon, and a child standing up to walk. “There is always a crisis or a struggle before growth. So why wouldn’t it be that way psychologically or spiritually? That is what Learned Hopefulness is about.” And there is another book that Dan sees on his horizon, focusing on spiritual growth and development and exploring the principles that allow people to transform. “We’ve heard of ‘no mud, no lotus.’ What provides the nutrients in the dirt for that growth?”

To learn more about Dan, visit his website and explore his books, including Learned Hopefulness, American Snakepit: Hope, Grit, and Resilience in the Wake of Willowbrook and Confessions of A Former Child: A Therapist’s Memoir, among others.

About the Author

Carolyn Biondi (C’19) is Founder and Facilitator at Well Beyond, sharing practices from positive psychology and yoga with individuals seeking personal growth. Whether facilitating a workshop for recovering addicts, offering professional development in a corporate setting, or leading a wellness retreat for lovers of yoga, Carolyn brings her strongest character strengths of love, hope, curiosity and creativity to inspire others to learn about themselves and move toward a flourishing life.