Integral spirituality: the book

I'm in the process of readin the last KW book “Integral Spirituality”.

Some of you are certainly reading it as well. I was wondering if anyone might be interested in discussing some of it's ideas along the way.

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

- What a relief that the 4 quadrants give us 8 position in the end. It's the first time he explains it in a book(or do I mistake?). And that was a point that was bothering me and I really thought this AQAL was not working. Now with the 8 position it fits again…

- I think he sometimes goes a bit fast to say that meditation does not liberate one from culture: ”And while contemplative prayer or vipassana might free you from your ego, it will not free you from your culture, whose prejudices remain in the hidden intersubjective background(…)“  (KW,p.48) What does that mean? That freed from your ego you're stil culturally embedded? Well, I'm not so sure of that and history is full of stories of Master who do not follow the cultural rules they live in. Or did I get it wrong.

The solution will probably appear later in the book

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Sure Patrick, I'll chime in. :-)

The 4 quadrants => 8 indigenous perspectives thing has been living in a virtual life-support system called wilber.shambhala.com for a few years now, but this is the first time (that I know of) that a complete formulation has occured in print.  It will be a big part of the next book in the Kosmos trilogy, I hear.  I like it too, it's an important evolution of AQAL.

About contemplation and culture – the point is that the ego exists in the UL (upper-left quadrant), so contemplation – being a UL practice – is designed to transcend it.  But contemplation per se doesn't dislodge you from your cultural context, which is LL.  It's a technical point – it doesn't mean that contemplation doesn't often accompany liberation from cultural contexts.  What it means is that contemplation itself isn't addressed to that aspect of who you are.  Which is why (KW argues) the most spiritual teachers of premodern ages, despite their incredible grasp of UL space, tended to project their own culturally reinforced descriptions of spiritual reality onto their experience, and say, “This is how spiritual reality actually, objectively, is.”  And more contemplation doesn't dislodge it – it just reinforces it more, exposes more levels of the UL for you to objectify, etc.

Does that help at all?
–Fred

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

2 thoughts…

1) 8 potential position for a human beeing. Then 8 for another… which makes 16 in a relationship.


2) If we suppose that the goal of human life is peace, or harmony, can that state be achieved by all quadrant? UR and LR: science tries to bring peace but fails to provide it fully. LL: peace within a community for ALL it's members has never been achieved. UL: this is the only part of the quadrant were total peace has been achieved (Sages, illumination and so on).
So it seems to me that this UL is the most important. When KW states that meditation fails to bring knowledge about Spyral dynamics(UL #2), or cultural determinant he is right. But this knowledges is of no worth if illumination has been attained. Basically, if there is no peace in UL#1, no amount of higher stage in any other quadrant is of any importance.
Example: Your body might function very well, you may be well connected socialy, but if the mind is in turmoil…. then what.
On the other end, if a higher stage has been reached in UL, the other quadrant might be in unrest, but the mind is above it.
Of course, as the word Integral denotes it, we should assume that a healthy evolution would implie all quadrant. But the points I've raised here suggest that one could see differently.

There should be a hierarchy in the importance of the quadrant, or a holarchy…as of course, all are important.

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Hello

I would put it to you that the reason the ul seems ost iportartant (especially in the post modern world) is that there is a infrastructure for your LR needs (getting you food and shelter) there is an infrastructure for UR (carreer conseling, etc.)  their is the infrastructure for LL (multiculture senstivity).  But the UR you are on your own and the people and infrastructure that should be helping with are fighting over semantics rather than helping people.  For example you can find endless debates on science versus religion, but an infrastructure that isn't busy bashing somebody else world view is usually in hiding so there is extra work on the individual part to find it.

Joe

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Hello Joe and thanks for stepping by.
I agree with you and it makes me thinks of Maslow's pyramid: at each stage certain things are most important, and as you say, in our post-modern societies our physical, and cultural needs tend to be met, so UL can be developped.

But I had the idea that only one quadrant (UL) could put us above any problem. But I think now that I have mistaken the goal that can be reached by following an upper left technique(i.e. illumination) and the way to this goal. The final goal seems to be non-dual realisation, the I of God , and I tended to think this I was in UL. But it's probably not true: This non-dual consciousness permeates equally all quadrant. By definition it is not dual (so not I nor we) and there is no interior or exterior.
So I now think that UL deals with the evolving ego, and not specially with God, or non-dual consciousness. Basically I have put God in the UL….LOL
I don't know if this is clear, but I'll think more about it.

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Patrick–

This non-dual consciousness permeates equally all quadrant. By definition it is not dual (so not I nor we) and there is no interior or exterior.

Bingo!  It is an unfortunate semantic problem that “consciousness,” “awareness,” “witness,” etc. are forced to perform two different duties here – as the subject who transcends and objectifies, and as the causal “Self” who transcends the subject/object polarity entirely.  I think this double-usage of consciousness has created more confusion than is generally realized, and is most likely the cause of the current New Age foolishness [sorry, but I'm not one to sugar-coat!] that the objective world is nothing but a projection of your mind.  Subjective and objective reality are simply the twin inner and outer projections of the Nondual.  Your mind is just as much of a projection as that chair you're sitting on, and is most certainly not the cause of it's existence.

So I now think that UL deals with the evolving ego, and not specially with God, or non-dual consciousness. Basically I have put God in the UL….LOL

You're in good company, Patrick!  This was actually something in Sex, Ecology, Spirituality that caused a big collective cringe in many readers (including myself) when we came across it.  Wilber basically took the Nondual contemplative traditions – Plotinus, Shankara, Nagarjuna, etc. – and just threw them into the UL!  I understand what he was trying to do, but I think he painted a confusing picture.  God is not in the UL – only the UL of God is!  The rest of SES was clear enough, but still.  Anyway, Integral Spirituality does a much less confusing job of bringing this out.

If I may be permitted a little self-aggrandizement, I've been posting quite a bit on this subject in the Integral Christianity boards.

http://pods.zaadz.com/integral_christianity/discussions/view/73352
http://pods.zaadz.com/integral_christianity/discussions/view/74192

Pax,
–Fred

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Fred,

Yes, I'm slowly getting that. One thing though I don't understant is why UL practice would reinforce a LL fixation?

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Any tendency you (the egoic you) is unaware of (either repressed or not yet uncovered) will be reinforced, if only slightly, by overall positive UL practices.  Once these tendencies are made conciuos the same upper left practice can often help resolve any problems with these tendencies.

For example in order for meditation to help you ethnocentric divisions somewhere you need to know about the problems cognitively and consciosly.

Joe

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Fred,

Thanks for your answer. It confirms my idea and the confusion I was in. I'm at page 60 of the book, so some light may come after, but why not a little struggle….Now it seems much clearer.

Joe,

I got it now. But I guess I have to accept it!! I had a tendecie to believe that meditation can cure all….I forgot the shadow….And I have a well fed one…

Both your input is very very valuable to me. That's the wonder of internet. In which other period in time would have I been able to share some questions and get them resolved so quickly?

I'm going to read more, but I'm trying now this exercise:

I have loads of data during the day, and they fit in any part of the quadrant. Some here, some there…. I'm in the process of recognizing in which part of the quadrant they fit. It's a funny exercise which seems impossible, but it's actually a nice game.
My conclusion is that, at least at my work, we use an unconscious and unorganized AQAL.
I leave the developpemental lines for later, as it will be too much for the moment, although I work with them.

More on that later, and I hope I'll be one day able to give back and bring you something.

Let's continue this discussion…

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

KW gives a few time his definition on enlightenment, which is becoming one with all stages and states. On page 141p. he  even adds “…at any given time in history”.

Here are some questions which arise from this definition:

- What are the stages (let's say LL)  present at any given time? What were the stages in middle east 2000 years ago? But more specifically what were the higher stages available?

- Same for 2500 years ago in Northern India?

- So now the question is: Are all the stages (LL as SD for example) potentially present at any given time or not ?
- are there infinite (infinite higher levels) or finite?
- so is illumination different now than it was 2000 years ago?
- you can decide that X has gone through all the States (gross, subtle etc..), but what about all the stages?

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

The basic idea of the new Enlightenment, Wilber-Cohen-style, is that, to take the idea of evolution radically seriously, higher stages of development don't actually exist until they become actualized as “Kosmic Habits.”

Let's say, for example, that 2,000 years ago most of the civilized world was at a red or amber [formerly blue – AQAL colors have been retrofitted to the rainbow now] level of development, with some small pockets pushing the envelope into early orange.  The point is, being one with mature orange, green, teal, turquoise, etc. structures could not have been a requirement for enlightenment, because they didn't exist yet.  Illumination is the same in the sense that it is a direct experience of oneness with all that is; it's different in the sense that all that is is different now than it was then.

The infinite/finite question is semantic.  It's infinite in the sense that there is no “final stage” (there is always one more beyond wherever you are), and finite in the sense that the cosmos is bounded by space and time and therefore cannot generate an infinite number of structures.

The qualification “all stages and states” fixes a problem in Up From Eden and The Atman Project, where the gross, subtle, and causal states were stacked on top of the magic, mythic, rational, etc. structures.  This implies that either 1) the advanced sages actually did evolve through the orange, green, teal, turquoise, etc. structures, which appears unlikely; or 2) they jumped over the intermediate structures to get to subtle, causal, and nondual, which doesn't jive with the whole meaning of stages.  Furthermore, the phenomenological evidence suggests that movement between states of consciousness is much more fluid than movement between structures, and that “peak experiences” of any state are possible for virtually anyone – though prolonged access to states does follow a loose kind of directionality.  Wilber and Allan Combs came up with the idea of plotting state-stages (gross, subtle, causal, nondual) along one axis, and structure-stages (magic, mythic, rational, pluralistic, integral, etc.) along the other, to incorporate the available data a lot better.  Long story short – I know, too late – to be enlightened is to have realized oneness with all states and structures are available in the Kosmos at moment in time.

Does that clear anything up?
–Fred

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Yes, it certainly does.

I've seen the change of this stacking up in “Atman project” and “Up from Eden” to the new approach in “Integral Spirituality”- It's quite a new idea for me and I'm not sure yet what to think of it.
My experience of meditation has led me to experience (certainly gross, maybe subtle,One flash of causal, and no non-dual) meditative states. When I return to wakefull consciousness I really experience that I am more installed in the next state. Back in ordinary consciousness I am well aware that I am in a less subtle state, but I feel that some of my potential are more present: more love, understanding, lucidity, distance and joy (an important one I think). So this mixing up of stages and states seems induced by the nature of our experience with meditation or any other such practice.

It is easy then to think that meditative stages show us the next evolutionnary state step. But I understand it can be different.
If I get it right, what this Wilber-combs lattice shows is that there are two dimensions (at least). One is the unfolding of the Prakriti (I don't know how to use any other words - I think Wilber calls it Kosmos) in states. Another dimension is available to human beeings and that is to distance oneself from this unofoldment by going away from the gross aspect of parkriti, the subtle one, the causal one and finally reaching the non dual.
Which is interesting 'cause: Samkhya and some other indian philosophy school say that the universe is non dual (God resting in itself), then causal, then subtle, then gross.

So: state developement would be a descending approach (or evolution) and stages an ascending one (or involution). Wilber states in another book the conflict of those 2 approaches in spirituality.
But here, both would be taken care of.
So states is going further, and stages going back. But going back (bathing in non-dual) would allow more energy and joy to go further.
An interesting game would be to put into this map (W-C. lattice) the Christian notion of trinity.

Stacking up the meditative stages on top of the states is then a definite mistake.

I'd be glad to know what you think about that.
This map KW offers obliges me to bring all my data into it, but it's fun and amazing.

Patrick
 

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

So this mixing up of stages and states seems induced by the nature of our experience with meditation or any other such practice.

Yes, it does, and Wilber admits in Integral Spirituality that this is why it was so difficult to see the difference between structures and stages.  The Eden/Atman scheme never quite fit exactly, yet it was so tantalizingly close.  It's far easier to diagnose the problem with something that's totally wrong. ;-)

I think you're exactly right that the states (gross, subtle, causal, nondual) represent essentially the involution, or enfolding, of formless Godhead into the manifest world of form.  I would say structures, on the other hand, represent the evolutionary development of any holon in the direction of more depth (UL/LL) and more complexity (UR/LR).  In other words, while evolution through state-stages is a return to union with the formless Unmanifest; evolution through structure-stages is a seeking out of further, fuller expression in the world of form.  So structures and stages are actually totally orthogonal to each other, and can be matched up in virtually any combination – hence the Wilber-Combs lattice, and all that jazz…

This is a good discussion, I've actually been in the process of trying to come to terms with this stuff for awhile!  It helps to have other heads to bang against.

–Fred

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Thanks for your response. Yes, it helps a lot to get together on this. I' m in Switzerland in the fench speaking part of the country, and KW is totally unknown. A brief history of E is the only french translation of KW's work, and it's out of print. There seem to be no interest here for the moment. My wife is reading KW and we have nice interaction, but that's it.

I'm glad to see, according to your answer, that I'm on the right track. I'm at page 150p. and I will pause for a couple of days. I need to think about it, and I want it to last a bit…It's such an interesting book. A bit dry though! I have to activate some devotionnal path reading. A little “Imitation of Christ” by Thomas A. Kempis will do me good.

If you have questions of your own I'll be glad to try to think about it, although it seems I'm less fluent with these ideas.

Yours,
Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Great discussion guys!  I'm currently in the middle of Integral Spirituality,  so this is great.  We have a little book club,  yes?

As to enlightenment changing,  etc.  I can't remember where,  weather I read it or heard it in one of the II dialogs,  Wilber says that there are basically two types of enlightenment.  One is Agapic and the other is Erotic.  The Agapic,  feminine,  kind of enlightenment is union with all that is - and thus as the world evolves and changes,  so too does this enlightenment.  We today can have a greater Agapic enlightenment because the world is greater than in the past.

On the other hand,  the Erotic,  masculine kind of enlightenment - radical freedom,  radical liberation,  radical emptiness - that is the same at all times.  Where Agapic enlightenment is the loving embrace and integration with the temporal,  Erotic enlightenment is an awakening to the eternal.

As to I.S. - you are all a bit ahead of me.  I'll have to catch up!

Later,
Enkidu

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Welcome! Yes, it's the reading room!

I've seen these ideas in ” A brief history of everything”, I think! Good that you bring that in.

Agapic is the descending kind of spirituality, embracing the world, and Erotic is the ascending one.

Actually it seems that in IS he suggests the idea that enlightenment would implie both of those drives, or path.  It seems if both dynamics are not fully realized the enlightenment is not complete.

Questions are welcome, and good reading.

Patrick

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Hi Patrick

I'm so glad you started this thread.  I'm really preoccupied right now, but I plan to read through this thread and hopefully contribute something intelligible.  I have been slowly reading IS and love it.  It has some great new concepts in it and I think it's groundbreaking.  I hope billions of people read it.  :)

arthur

Re: Integral spirituality: the book

Okay,  I just read about the W-C lattice and it has blown my mind.  It makes so much sense!  The way the three or four or five states were stacked on top of the stages always gave me trouble and I didn't know why. 

The w-c lattice is also a great explanation for the numbered cards of the Tarot for anyone who likes Tarot.  Discs/Earth is Gross,  Swords/Air is Subtle,  Water/Cups is Causal,  and Fire/Wands is the Witness - the non-dual isn't represented by a suit but by The Fool.  The numbers are the various stage structures.  This gives a matrix of 40 stage-states.  This makes more sense than trying to make the four suits represent four different lines - although you can do that,  you end up leaving most of them out.

I can't believe how delicious this book is.  When the heck is Volume II of the Kosmos Trilogy coming out?

Later,
Enkidu

Re: Integral Spirituality: the book

I'm so tickled by this book. One of my favorite parts is the Kosmic Address of an event, stating that in order to locate something in the matrix of reality, we must determine its altitude and perspective. What I love about it is that suddenly every argument, every choice a person makes in the attempt to act rightly, every attempt at explaining reality can be seen in a hierarchical, perspectival fasion. It's not just true or false, it's “where is this coming from?” Because obviously something is energizing that position or action. And it feels bad to say, “I don't see it that way so it must be wrong.” Or “So and so is an expert and they don't see that point, so it must be wrong.”

Specifying the Kosmic address, which is the very real place that something resides, points to the infinite depth of revelation and truth that has occurred and is occurring in the manifest domain. And the opportunity to take truths that are partial or exclusive and relate to them in their proper position in a matrix of wholeness is so satisfying.