Travesía Foundation [est. 1989] (Psychoanalysis for Maturescence and Middle Age) is an Argentine non-profit organization devoted to the psychoanalytic research and understanding of maturescence and middle age.
The Spanish word travesía means journey. In Dante Alighieri's first verse of The Divine Comedy he said: "In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost". Although we consider all of life, from birth to death to be a journey of change and discovery that must be understood, the focus and scope of the research of the Travesía Foundation has been centered on the stage of life referred to by Dante, namely middle age; maturescence as we called this psychic process after our metapsychological research outcomes.
The range of our Foundation encompasses not only specific psychoanalytic treatment but also an ongoing research project. Our international purpose is to be in contact with other groups or organizations dealing with the same interests, especially with those engaged in research projects and studies like ours. In this way our Research Department is looking forward to answering all messages received. Travesía Foundation will share the hypotheses and frames of work in a private way with those interested in maturescent and middle age psychoanalytic understanding.
Travesía Foundation is not only constituted by our Research Department. Our Assistance Department, our yearly Clinical-Theoretical Chair, our Vocational-Professional Department, and our Reflection Workshops also coordinate its efforts towards the main aims of the Foundation.
The activities of the Travesía Foundation include:
- Research:
- A major focus of the research activities of the Foundation is a metapsychological understanding of the working-through processes that are specific to maturescence, with particular reference to psycho-genetic processes, variations in presentation and outcome. Scientific papers on the subject are presented at national and international meetings.
- Annual Fall Meeting:
- At a yearly, all-day conference, scientific papers are presented both by members of the Foundation and prominent international guests.
- Vocational-Professional Activities:
- Professional orientation for midlife individuals trying to find their authenticity when they feel the need of re-centering their interests and lives.
- Community Orientation:
- Through presentations and publications the Foundation attempts to communicate ideas about maturescence to the general public in the hopes of enhancing individual middle age experience through an understanding of the powerful, quasi-universal processes which determine health and pathology.
- Psychotherapy:
- The Foundation offers psychoanalytic treatment to the general public through the staff members while they are trained and supervised by several of the members of our board.
Our President, Dr Guillermo Julio Montero, is an Argentine psychoanalyst, and a member of the Argentine Psychoanalytic Association. He was the one who formed the first early group when he wrote "La travesía por la mitad de la vida" in 1989, that is "The Crossing through Midlife" if we put it into English. This starting point made the Foundation begin as a group of study, which was carried to a Foundation legal frame two years later. So far we have never received a different sponsoring but our personal monthly contributions.
We will also thank each bibliographic information we receive, because we have been organizing a data base specially pointing at midlife and adult psychoanalytic books and papers.
Montero, Guillermo Julio: Psychoanalysis of Maturescence (definition, metapsychology and clinical practice). The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, Volume 96, Number 6, pages 1491-1513, December 2015.
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Guillermo Julio Montero PhD
PhD in Psychology (Universidad del Salvador) with a thesis on "Maturescence", Magister in Psychoanalysis (APA/CAECE) with a thesis on "Midlife Transition and Crisis", and PsyD in Psychology (Universidad de Buenos Aires). He is a full member, training and supervising analyst of the International Psychoanalytical Association by virtue of belonging to the Argentine Psychoanalytical Association, and also a member of the Latin American Psychoanalytical Federation.
He is the founder and the President of Fundación Travesía (Psychoanalysis for Maturescence and Middle Age) since 1989, where he also is the head of the Research Department. He is the International Chair of the International Psychoanalytical Association's Committee: Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Aging of Patients and Analysts. He is the author of La travesía por la mitad de la vida: Exégesis psicoanalítica (Homo Sapiens, 2005) [The Journey Through Midlife: Psychoanalytic Exegesis]; co-author of the books Para comprender la mediana edad: Historias de vida (Entrevía Editorial, 2008) [Understanding Midlife: Histories of Life]; Mediana Edad: Estudios psicoanalíticos (Entrevía Editorial, 2009) [Midlife: Psychoanalytical Studies]; as well as the compilator and author of a chapter in Updating Midlife: Psychoanalytic Perspectives (Karnac Books, 2013) [Spanish version: Actualizando la mediana edad: perspectivas psicoanalíticas, Karnac Books Spanish Editions, 2015]; and also an author of a chapter in O ciclo da vida humana: uma perspectiva psicodinâmica (McGraw Hill, 2012) [Human Life Cycle: A Psychodynamic Perspective]. He has just published: The Psychoanalysis of Aging and Maturity: The Concept of Maturescence (Routledge, 2020), his new book.
He has also published several papers in Argentine, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro, San Pablo and Korea's psychoanalytic magazines, and in The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, among others. He delivers papers at different international congresses, especially the International Psychoanalytical Association's ones (Rio de Janeiro, Chicago, Praga, Buenos Aires, London, etc.). His paper Psychoanalysis of Maturescence: Definition, Matrapsychology and Clinical Practice was peer reviewed and published at The International Journal of Psychoanalaysis (2015, volume 96, number 6, pages: 1491-1513).
As a writer he won the Honorary Prize at the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz International Literary Contest with his novel: Zurcido invisible, which was published twice in Mexico (first as a result of the contest by FOEM: Fondo Editor del Estado de México; and then through Ediciones B) and it was translated as Invisible Mending and published in London (Karnac Books, 2014). As a playwright he wrote and staged in the off-circuit in Buenos Aires The Entire Life, an adaptation of his play Blenorraghia.
