What is Integral?

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[jimtzu]

part of the problem with pandits, pundits, teachers, what have you, is that  their systems, dharmas, opinions all result from their egos trying to convince themselves that they already know what they're searching for...  wilbers own atman project... or as jana  said a universe unto themselves. in wilbers case, his own true but partial (where he can cherry pick ideas to fit whatever result he wants) idea also applies to him. so the end result is that there can't be one theory of everything that applies to everyone, everywhere. 

the problem with big egos (and wilber's acknowleged his) is that it comes with and equally big shadow, which is more easily seen by someone with distance and a perspective away from the subject. so if there is Truth with a capital T, it can only be view in parts by looking in the reflection of the web of mirrors, of which we have and are one small piece to emcompass the whole, integrated whether we realize it or not.

[Jana]

What I like about Wilber is that he is an event cloud, a wave and not a particle, he is an orbit of potentiality, that is you cannot really say what he is, and what he is not. As a psychopomp...there has not been someone as potent as this since St. Germain. Therefore he doesn't have to say anymore, because the psychic heat that is generated in Wilberland is enough to burn for another 2000 years as (mostly youngish men) get caught up in the Wilberweb and strenuously extend their self-definition system through finding the holes in their projection of Wilberland. I know, because I did this myself for 10 years, and I wasn't even a serious student, but I know about the enormous psychic heat generated from this psychopompous alchemy. I see it not about a righteous crusade for some holy Grail of Truth, but the metamorphic alchemy itself that is the defining undercurrent to this process.

It is a misunderstanding to think that there is one reality...reality is perceived via a cognitive lens...there are nearly 7 billion cognitive lenses on the planet right now. If there is a consensus on various points of a jointly believed reality then this is a zeitgeist, a religion, a dictatorship or what have you.

In America and in many other countries of the world there is a degeneration of "reality" due to special interest appropriation of the media by the political-military machine. aka 1984...The US hasn't been this sick since I don't know when...I just hope it is the fat that is skimmed off not the muscle.

These zeitgeist, whether it be "hang loose" "holism" "integral" or "sustainability" reflect an unconscious desire in the collective to swing the pendulum back toward something that makes greater sense as we are battered about on the sea of chaos. "Integral" is the emotional movement toward a deep feeling sense of alignment and truth, having spent 50 years unpacking the interiors that we weren't supposed to look at back in the 1950's.

Bit of a ramble, but I do want to say that I have no trouble digesting both Wilber-Brown into one perfect system of balance. Though the guys themselves might find issues to fight over if they were not appropriately inebriated. In fact if I had a child I would name it Wilber Brown to ensure that it was well equipped for the complexities of shifting reality...in a world gone almost completely mad.

Algosaibi adds: "I don't deny that change is needed. But it should be left for societies to sort it out in their own time. It's no good telling the Taliban they're violating UN resolutions. They'll just turn around and shoot you."

[Jana]

We cannot let Ken's predjuciouses define what integral is to us...Integral is pretty weak without Jung, weak without Reich, weak without Stiener, weak without Osho etc... etc...
Though it is great to have meta forums that theorize about theory and philosophize into tight corners...what is needed now is an action-forum, which  is applied to outreach, worldly projects and how integral might inform our activities in the world.
With rampent political and economic corruption and the demise of the American way, the integralists are going to have to become leaders in some form or another, without being simply another self obsessed cult.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CJoTcYZpqE  —Orwell Rolls in his Grave, State of corporatized media

An opportunity that I-I has not taken up yet is to have an annual world conference on integral like the Bioneers do. This would really get things moving through the opportunity to network...his seminars have been for the economic elite, but integral needs to be opened to everyone. And Ken the person is a potential nexus to make that happen. Media/web coverage etc...talks, products, classes, entertainment...DVD of the event.

Call it the Integral World Forum
http://www.fourwinds10.com/siterun_data/health/abuse/news.php?q=48712489e230d150f3ac14ca9741b653
Family attacked by criminal medical-political industry for using alternative medicine

[Michael]

An opportunity that I-I has not taken up yet is to have an annual world conference on integral like the Bioneers do. This would really get things moving through the opportunity to network...his seminars have been for the economic elite, but integral needs to be opened to everyone. And Ken the person is a potential nexus to make that happen. Media/web coverage etc...talks, products, classes, entertainment...DVD of the event.

Call it the Integral World Forum

Who needs I-I to do that?

A Call for Papers
for The First Integral Theory Conference
Integral Theory in Action: Serving Self, Community, and Kosmos
John F. Kennedy University, Pleasant Hill, California
August 7 – 10, 2008

Now doesn't that sound exciting as hell?

edit:  I guess I-I IS involved with that.

[henry]

heartmind is integral ..henry

[Jana]

I doubt integral lifestyle is possible for those caught in the bottom of the industrial economy...where you have to spend 99% of your energy just surviving. Where the application of AQUAL is a job in each quadrant. If people don't have the initative to change over to the new economy in which there is plenty of potential in green products and services, then it is doing to get even harder. Those still living in a traditional culture ARE already integral in traditional kind of way.

I prefer "World Conference on Integral Action"

[jimtzu]

an excellent article from Integralworld by Christof Shaub 
http://www.integralworld.net/index.html?schaub11.html

Life, human life, is about choice, so we claim. Hence, imagine that you had to make a choice between awakening to your true nature or advancing to the most evolved level of consciousness in our age, known as integral. To refrain from making a decision would be to invalidate the orders of life and, therefore, create chaos, while choosing one option over the other would amount to endorsing an extreme perspective, from which pain and suffering is derived. To simply apply reason to explain our choice or lack thereof between one or the other decision would be nothing other than a reaction-formation or the defense of our person, which prevents growth from happening and, in turn, results in self-righteousness, arrogance, pride, gluttony and the like. That said, what would you chose?

Ken Wilber's insight into this riddle led to the articulation of “integral,” which does not mean that “integral” is the correct response to the posed question. There is no easy answer to the riddle, nor to the purpose for asking it, “because, you see, as Wilber writes, “the alarming fact is that any realization of depth carries a terrible burden: Those who are allowed to see are simultaneously saddled with the obligation to communicate that vision in no uncertain terms: that is the bargain.” Seeing enables one to discern “what is” or what matters; seeing prompts one to be decisive and, to that end, take a stance. Seeing is what distinguishes knowledge from in-sight or darkness from light. Seeing is discerning, which is a never-ending process. Discerning is what defines us as human and is innate to our being. Seeing is ever-present, if we are aware of it; seeing is how consciousness re-cognizes itself in form and, thus, becomes self-aware of “what is.”

[Jana]

Aurobindo's is probably the best work out there on what actually constitutes integral in the highest sense of the word.


“Pain is in the nature of a nervous and physical recoil from a dangerous or harmful contact; it is a part of what the Upanishad calls jugupsa, the shrinking of the limited being from that which is not himself and not sympathetic or in harmony with himself, it impulse of self-defense against others.” 117, Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine

The crux of the issue of will is within Aurobindo's The Life Divine
"All that we are on the outside is indeed conditioned by what is within, occult, in our inner depths and recesses....but the use we make of these emergent powers and these influences is conditioned, largely determined and, above all, very much limited by our outermost nature."553

Deflation~Self Diminishment
Self criticism is a reverse or negative egoism that generates paradoxical intent. Paradoxical intent being a con-voluted self fulfilling prophesy of reverse-will. Self-doubt is a surefire way to abort the possibility of success. We thus generate the level of success we feel we deserve by our degree of self-acceptance, degree of unresolved tension in our pain-body and the degree to which we love through the separation between inner and outer, self and other. The transparency to spirit in avoiding either egoic inflation or deflation helps us to simply be Present and to see through the multiple escape routes we use to be anywhere else but here now.

Temporal distortions related to longing and search mode. As consciousness brightens we feel things are speeding up because we gain a greater perception of the inertia (grossness and resistance) we still embody, which is now being brought to awareness. We have the sense of “waiting” or “urgency” because we are not registering the patience (non push/pull) that you can only get with Presence. Deprivation mode is simply a lack of Presence, and so Presence is the only thing that satisfies. Presence is a prior necessity to success in life.

I go into radical ecstasy and kundi-heat for the 4-5 days in which a huge hurricane or cyclone is occurring in other parts of the world such as the Caribbean or Bangladesh. I think however that I may only register a significant charge from storms that are occurring in the same hemisphere of the globe to me. This peak in ecstasy may be due to the particular frequency of the subaudible sound of Schumann harmonic which must affect everything from the atoms in the body to the resonance within the cavity of the skull.


Energy Tapping by Fred P. Gallo, Harry Vincenzi. How to rapidly eliminate anxiety, depression, cravings and more using energy psychology

Deep Listeners: Music, Emotion, and Trancing (Paperback)
by Judith Becker

[Michael]

Very enjoyable evolutionary debate continues at Visser's site:
http://www.integralworld.net/index.html?visser21.html

I'm almost starting to feel sorry for poor Ken.  But not too damned sorry! 

[jimtzu]

i think his ego can take it, metaphorically speaking that is.  in wilberland you don't even need a metaphor to be speaking metaphorically, any statement will do. 

even i know that the process of science is to come from a place of not knowing, coming up with a hypothosis to explain something and trying to disprove it, which is what usually happens, and if you can't you hold onto it until a better explanation comes along.   the self-organizing that wilber attributes to Eros is much different than the way i look at things when i talk about self organizing dynamics (SOD).  his Eros does seem to have something behind it,whether it be a force, creator or what have you, something seperate from life, that is spurring evolution on from the outside. the chinese have a word, Li, that roughly translates as pattern, like the grains and swirls in a piece of wood. that is how i look at self organizing dynamics, in it and of it, a part of the process.  this is what i think wilber's missing in his view of evolution.

i always thought of creative emergence as more of a quantum leap, from possibly a combination of the next logical "step" and morphic resonance. the so called randomness only looks that way on our level, on the quantum level it's all about probabilities and possibilites, a matter of perspective.

[Michael]

Interesting Jim…I like the contrast you draw there.

It seems the page I referenced above is now not the one I meant, which is Visser's latest "Wilber on Wings".  I wanted to grab some quotes from that, but can't access it now...

So I'll carry on regardless and grab the quotes later perhaps.


So what is Ken Wilber?

“A storyteller”,  he assures Tami Simon in that famous interview. 

He’s also often called a mapmaker, a theorist, or more abstractly, “a meta-theorist”, and other things along those lines.  And he does all of them at various times, but what he consistently does more than anything else is EXPLAIN.  He’s an explainer.  That’s what I always hear him doing whenever his mouth is moving.

He’s an explainer of all the human knowledge modalities, and he weaves them all together into a grand explanation called integral theory.  And so of course, he explains science’s roll in the human knowledge system along with all the other modes of knowledge.  And to do that properly, he becomes a scientist of sorts.  A scientist with a much larger vision than mere science invokes alone.  And in order to be this expert explainer of science, he has to have the minimum requisite credentials…the degrees of course, but more importantly, the unquestionable inborn capacity to 'effortlessly digest and integrate' the whole field.

When he does his business of explaining, he sometimes becomes the scientist, sometimes the philosopher-cartographer, sometimes the meta-theorist, and sometimes the storyteller.

But we are now clearly seeing instances of roll-confusion more and more as Wilber’s edifice is challenged ever more deeply.  And as this happens, and his intellectual dishonesty and carelessness is exposed for all to see, his grand synthesis is revealed more and more to be a faith-based theory. 

He uses the storytellers tool of metaphor when he’s supposedly being the scientist, and then excuses that gaffe with an offhanded assurance as to his academic credentials and inborn genius.   He “knows the subject of evolution inside out”, and has already long ago integrated its essentials into his grand synthesis -  I mean meta-theory – er, rather his grand STORY.

To me, this is yet another crystal clear case of the storyteller falling in love with, and completely believing his own storys.

[Nickeson]

Hey, y'all
The critical point here is that we have all learned over the long run not to accept Wilber on his own terms.

Somewhere in the dim distant past I posted a little something that said (essentially) KW was a media-based evangelist. This assessment is based on observing his overall style. There was at the time a couple of youtube vids of the man welcoming folks into a workshop situation and they reminded me of nothing more than a slightly secularized Come to Jesus oration--he was saying that only a contemplative practice could save one's moral soul from damnation here and now and that of the species over time.

Since then I've taken a different view of KW. Media-vangelists like televangelists can say essentially anything they care too as long as the sinners come to Christ or the contemplative practice depending on the pitch. We should not put any faith in their veracity, or the historical or scientific validity of the words and statements that cloak their essential message--"Come to Jesus" is all that counts. The rest is just filler like the "vacables" of an auctioneer. Something in the overall show will catch a media junky's eye or ear and the cloaking device, whether it is a proclamation on evolution or a discourse on the great post modern chain of being, will hook them...for the moment.

There is the secondary level of the pitch and that is to build a personal following. The Televangelists know that out of the total of people their message reaches, out of the full number that fall on their knees in front of the screen, weeping and gnashing their teeth and accepting Jesus as their personal savior, a certain percentage will tune in tomorrow and the next day and the next and then will start writing checks. Wilber's pitch is designed for the more thoughtful among that percentage of the population that are looking for a metaphysical "truth." And when it comes to metaphysics one can say just about anything and get away with it.

This perspective complements Michael's Storyteller assessment. A theorist, particularly a metaphysical theorist, is much like a story teller. Perhaps we can get a back-up analysis from the old "Like a Duck" application. Does he, or does he not, waddle, swim, quack,  and have feathers like a Scientist? He can tell us he's a scientist and he can justify that as an expedient for bringing the lost lambs back to the fold. In that way he is being an authentic evangelist rather than a veritable scientist, and that, for him, is the truth.

[jimtzu]

interesting reading for those who might have missed it:

http://opensourceintegral.ning.com/forum/topic/show?id=1615967%3ATopic%3A5044

Second-Tier Community—Or the Myth of Unity
We're sorry, but this discussion has just been closed to further replies.
Second-Tier Community

Assisting people in becoming aware of how they relate to and put “integral” into perspective is different than discussing the rights and wrongs of integral theory. Learning theory is one thing, building community another. If our communal efforts consist of the proper dissemination of integral theory in practice, we don’t build community, but are committed to the propagation of a dogma. This dogma reads that “integral” is the medicine our world needs to develop and change for the better, which is as presumptuous as the notion that everyone has to convert to Islam or Christianity to establish global peace. The conflicts witnessed in the world are also within us, in each and every one of us and integral theory won’t resolve them; it merely puts them into perspective and that is how far any theory or revelation goes. Inquiring into what attracts us to “integral” is as crucial as studying the particulars of this realization and conceptualization of consciousness. Learning about the reality of love is disturbing, because it challenges who we are, in contrast to falling in love, which is easy, because it confirms our self-identity. Falling in love is biologically conditioned, while learning about the reality of love isn’t. The same applies to falling in love with “integral,” be it in theory or practice.

There are as many different and correct understandings of “integral,” as there are currently colors in Spiral Dynamics, to put it simply. Second-tier isn’t about the actualization of a super-organism in body, mind and spirit, but the integration of the preceding levels of development in self, culture and society. Integral theory helps us to understand such differences, but integral theory doesn’t build community; it puts community building into perspective, as illustrated, for instance, by Spiral Dynamics, which, in and of itself, isn’t “integral.” Gaining insight into such differences is what “integral” education entails, because “integral” isn’t a belief system, but a trans-disciplinary map of consciousness, inter-objectively speaking.

Second-tier community is not to be confused with how highly evolved we are in our self-identity or action-logic. A bunch of “strategists” or “magicians” don’t make a second-tier community, which is assessed according to its patterned mode of interaction and not by how highly evolved its individual members thereof are. It goes without saying that you can’t have a patterned-mode of interaction at the strategist level, so to speak, without a “strategist” present. Likewise, three “strategists” and one “diplomat” don’t make for a second-tier community; not if the “diplomat” runs the show; as in the case of our current U.S. administration where Colin Powell, as a “strategist” in this scenario, advocated going to war against Iraq in the name of a “diplomat.” Our ability to take multiple perspectives and implement complex strategies, as, for instance, in the case of Karl Rove, doesn’t render us equally evolved in regard to the stage of consciousness that informs our actions. The essay Integral from the Inside-Out (posted at http://www.integralworld.net/index.html?schaub14.html) considers more concisely these distinctions, which are important to understand, be it in regard to fostering a second-tier patterned mode of interaction or the cultivation of an integrally-informed consciousness. Social accomplishment doesn’t reflect the stage of consciousness by which we are informed. Being a celebrity doesn’t mean that we are highly developed, just as being socially unaccomplished doesn’t render us unevolved. Having earned a fortune makes us influential in the world we live, but it doesn’t qualify us as enlightened. Similarly, writing a best-seller doesn’t imply that we have realized our true nature, even if we title our book Conversations With God.

Becoming aware of our culturally enforced delusions is much harder than it sounds, because it, ultimately, entails that we withdraw from playing the games our society, of which we are a member. This option, however, is not for us to choose even if we renounce the world and, to that end, become a monk or nun. Just as we can’t disown ourselves from the family into which we are born, so we can’t disassociate ourselves from the social organism that governs our inter-objective existence. This leaves us with the only other option we have, which is called collaboration that is derived from education. Collaboration is not to be confused with the implementation or propagation of a particular theory or theology in practice; this isn’t what collaboration is about, but the dissemination of our worldview. This is what organizational consultants do when working with companies, which, in most instances, revert back to the status quo once the consultants are done with their job. Companies hire consultants for the same reasons people see a therapist; change in both cases is accomplished if the company, or the patient, adapts to the worldview of the consultant or therapist, in question. But, ask yourself, Is this what change amounts to, namely the ex-change of our current belief-system with another?

Changing our beliefs isn’t what change is about; this is called the ex-change of our belief system, known as “translation” in integral theory. Change is the result of development, which is facilitated through inquiry, as demonstrated, for instance, by Otto Scharmer’s U-Process. Inquiry is crucial to development; inquiry is essential in order to evolve, be it as an individual or a social organism. Inquiry is what leadership amounts to, which simply put, involves raising our consciousness, because we cannot solve the problems and challenges we face with the same thinking that caused them. Leadership isn’t the propagation of our own ideas, constructs and theories, however complex they might be. It is the raising of consciousness—in body, mind and spirit—in self, culture and society.

Leadership involves the ability to see beyond the tip of our own nose; see beyond the apparent; beyond our own thoughts, feelings and beliefs. Leading involves awareness of who is running the show; it is a continuous inquiry into the status quo or myths-of-the-given that all of us are prone to follow blindly, due to our need for belonging. Leading is to raise consciousness; how we do that is mere commentary. Ask yourself: How many leaders fit this profile, versus simply pushing the execution of their own agenda? The latter does not amount to leadership; it is called politics.

Second-tier community necessitates a comprehensive understanding of integral theory, without which second-tier community is just a pipe-dream. Integral theory and second-tier community go hand-in-hand; one without the other is a mere construct. What distinguishes a second-tier from a first-tier community is that it includes all the previous levels of human development without negating their differences, nor viewing them as a mere foreplay to its own establishment. Second-tier community is trans-disciplinary, which means there is ultimately no single leader in charge of and, to that end, defining a second-tier community as a whole. Second-tier community doesn’t dispense with leadership, for it is a natural expression of the developmental stages of consciousness that characterize our human emergence and existence. Second-tier community transcends the myth of unity.

more.....

[jimtzu]

here's some integral food for thought....

Integral Ideology
by Rich on Fri 11 Apr 2008 06:23 PM PDT  |  Permanent Link
a revised article previously posted to SCIY:


Since one of the concerns of this forum has been to consider the blind spots and couched ideological agendas in what are otherwise enlightened philosophical or spiritual practices, below is a consideration of some “blind spots” which can be associated with certain practices formally called “new age” or "wholistic" but now also popularly known as “integral”.

 Most of these “integral” or wholistic theories and practices have a tremendous amount of useful insights to offer and of course I do not wish to dismiss this aspect of them. Rather my concern is to consider certain problems which can arise when these practices are applied non-critically to social contexts.

 The shadow side of these integral theories or practices I have narrowed to three main thrusts which for lack of better terms I will define as:

1) Fundamentalist

2) Neo-liberal

3) Neo-conservative

Since I am contesting the very notion of reification, categorization, stereotyping or name calling these categories should not be taken too literally or necessarily identical with how they are understood in the habitus of streamed media culture. In an attempt to uncover correspondences, affinities, relationships of these ideological drivers of world culture and specific “new age” or “integral theories” I’ve spun off some improvised associations, which can be accepted, augmented or contested! The list below is not meant to be exhaustive but, with caveats not withstanding, here are some affinities I perceive:

1) Fundamentalist = Western followers of Eastern Religions


2) Neo-Liberal = The Society for Organizational Learning (MIT), The Integral Institute, Meditation for Management

3) Neo-Conservative = Ken Wilber, Spiral Dynamics (as grand narrative of reality.

for more (with links and discussion):
http://www.sciy.org/blog/_archives/2008/4/11/3633725.html

[Michael]

Thanks for posting that Jim.  I still enjoy critiques of integral and KW in particular.  Frank Vissor's produced some good ones lately.  This one is mediocre IMO.  But it does make a few good points here and there.

He expressed the Spiral Dynamics tautology fairly well, but that's an easy one.  There are some other points that he makes, that I think have merit - but there's so much wrong and annoying about this critique, that for me, they tend to get lost in the mud.  There's too many ways this critique is flawed for me to try to enumerate...what with time constraints and general laziness...still, it was a pleasure to read nonetheless...and might make a few people think twice.