What does integral "feel" like?

[Scott Payne]

Over beers with Ryan recently I talked a bit about the trajectory I've experienced in my relationship to an "integral" way of life that has led me to the question posed at the title of this particular thread. That trajectory, which seems to have manifested in others' lives close to me, started with an initial introduction to integral theory through Ken Wilber, feeding into a total immersion into "Ken's" world for some time, inluding but not limited to: an almost addiction to reading any and all of Ken's work, obsession with I-Naked, moving into an intentional community organized around Ken's ideas/work (as well as those of Don Beck and Andrew Cohen), and the inability to speak more than three sentences without saying the name Ken Wilber."

All of which was very useful insofar as it goes, but about a year ago I felt (and have heard close friends express) the need to move away from a "Ken-centred" notion of integral living. Reflection in hindsight revealed a feeling that I was experiencing and trying to manifest a notion of integral that was pre-articulated for me and that, as a result, left me feeling a bit insincere about the process. I didn't find myself leaning into my own development, primarily, and then looking to articulate what I found going on there, so much as I was looking to see what I had had articulated for me.

The biggest indicator was a lack of subjective feeling to the way that I described my notions of integral sensations/experiences/notions/etc. It all came out in a third-person, removed description that bore only some relationship to my own observed and arising experiences. In other words, I was describing a set of experiences that were not my own (and not in a healthy expanded, beyond-ego sense).

So where I'm at right now is in trying, without anyone esle's prompting, to look into the movements of my own consciousness as it moves from certain stabilized behavioural orbits into novel, creative, and emergent spaces that feel fresh and generate a rough articulation of what the looks, and particularly, feels like from this particular perspective - as well as contrasting that witnessing to some generalized descriptions of how that movement has manifested (Ken's included).

I'm curious what integral feels like to others on this site who are clearly operating with a very impressive degree of both intellectual and spiritual honesty on these and other topics. (recognizing that in this post I have not myself offered any description of my own feelings of integral...yet).

Cheers,

sp

[M Alan Kazlev]

Yeah i do feel Wilber has played and still plays an important role as a catalyst; revealing that there's a larger reality beyond the conservative mainstream; introducing it, putting everything in a bigger picture (AQAL etc); but its important not to get stuck at that level :-)

For me Integral is defined in terms of the Integral Yoga and Transformation of the whole being; but this also reflects my own Aurobindonian frame of reference.

But as you say it has to be a living experience; it can't be someone else's third person mental experience or explanation. I do find the Integral Yoga path one of actual and first hand experience; if it wasn't, I wouldn't be interested in it!

best regards :-)
alan

[Scott Payne]

Thanks for the comment Alan. I have a copy of Aurobindo's The Life Divine that I have not cracked staring at me as I type this. Perhaps now would be a good time to dive in. Any comments on that particular text given your familiarity with his work?

[shaman sun]

The Language is Important,

I feel that it is alright to have a map - but at the same time, if we wish to communicate the meaning behind the map, the awareness behind the language - then our communication has to be dynamic and organic. It's alright to use a complex language, but not in every instance. I know that Wilber as mentioned he seeks to create the AQAL language in order to have a commonground for everyone. But, the irony is that the language is intimidating and perhaps too analytical for a majority of people to sink their teeth into. That being said, what is left to do? What better forms of language do we wish to see utilized or created?

[Scott Payne]

Great point Shaman. Lest we forget that for many (though by no means all) of us, the language that Ken has developed has provided a platform via which we are able to speak about these ideas/states with some sense of shared meaning. Perhaps the question focuses in on what the relationship between the experience/terrain and the map/language we use to describe it is and should be. Is it possible that in some cases the language begins to override our attention to that which arises and that we allow, out of a deep desire to "know", our perceptual equipment/software to see that which the language says should be there. On the flip side, how do we make sense of and communicate what we have experienced arising without an agreed upon language?

Really nice nuance you fleshed out there.

Cheers,

sp

[Bob D.]

Hey Scott,

I was just thinking along these lines myself, so forgive me for repeating some things I've recently written on other blogs.

It helps me to get clear about what I mean by "Integral." Normally, when I think "Integral," I'm thinking of a conceptual orientation, a way of looking at things characterized by a few general principles: 1) taking into account multiple perspectives (particularly the interior and exterior dimensions of the individual and collective); 2) grounding theory in direct experience (integrating theory and practice); and 3) acknowledging some form of developmental depth (which does not necessarily mean buying into Beck's or Wilber's versions, which I don't. For instance, I think "Second Tier" is a completely bogus concept.)

As a conceptual map, "Integral" doesn't really "feel" like anything to me. It's just a useful set of ideas. "Integral," in terms of a directly felt experience, brings to my mind a sense of personal integrity, a harmony of body and mind, thinking and feeling, the transcendence of the typical sense of egoic separation and alienation.

There comes a point (I think) when AQAL ceases to be a tool for orientation and instead conditions us to see things from a particular perspective, i.e. Wilber's, and holding the model too tightly (which I believe Wilber and many of his followers often do), it can start to filter out as much as it illuminates.

It’s like this: If I want to know how to hike my way to a secret swimming hole, there’s a point where a map can become TOO instructive. I’d like to know how to get there and back, and maybe what to expect in terms of dangers in the environment (poison ivy, bears, etc.). But if you tried to construct some computer generated, virtual tour through the woods and gave me detailed instructions on what to look at and how to swim and on and on, then that would take away from my experience, the value of which may be in the open-minded and open hearted journey of discovery I would undertake. Too many details on a map makes it cumbersome and takes the fun out of the journey. And it biases a person to attend to this and to ignore that, causing us to repeat the same errors as the map-maker, to miss out on the same things.

[MetroPunk]

I like this. How do we "feel" about integral?

IMO, integral feels like it should: embracing. That is to say, as manifestations of kosmos we are already ONE with everything, so tapping into "integral" is tapping into our own true natures. Ergo: integral feels like HOME.

Now, of course, we can make a distinction between integral theory (e.g., AQAL) and integral consciousness (teal/yellow or higher), because I know of many people who are into AQAL but very much centered in amber and orange waves. Just because someone diggs AQAL doesn't mean they are "integral".

I am an example of that. I'm still stuck in GREEN but worshiping teal/yellow and trying to open up my being to more ebbs and flows.

So, in essence what I'm saying is that "integral" as a theory feels different from whatever place (altitude) you are at, but for me "integral" as a peak experience or wave of consciousness feels like HOME. It feels like brahman. It feels like kosmos.

[Scott Payne]

Metro,

A quick note: I don't think that you are "stuck" at green, you are where you are. The momentum of yr own development will bring you to different places at different times that should probably be simultaneously honoured for that which they illuminate and held in perspective as one resting point along the way.

A paraphrasing of the old adage: "blue/organge dominated" children in China would be happy to "be working with a green centre of gravity!"

;)

Cheers,

sp

[shaman sun]

Feeling? Well let's see. When I feel integral, it's when I am in a state of mind that is relaxed and open, when I am aware of my thoughts but not lost in them, when I'm in a more meditative state in which I soak up words by the sages easier; Alan Watts, Krishnamurti, Rumi, etc. It is the state of mind that is induced when there is no necessary language, just a perceiving. It's a flowing state, sort of like water, yet also like wind and air - open to the expanse. I don't know. This is just the general "feeling," I experience. When reading Wilber's work, this may or may not occur. Sometimes Wilber's work, like many other scholars in this area, put me into that heavy thinking state which I become engrossed in a book and its concepts. It's significantly different than the "openness" feeling... But they are related. I suppose that is why I like Wilber. Until then I hadn't found someone who could dance between heavy exercises of intellect and the simple expression of "being." Even so . . . I find myself drawn to Alan Watt's "This is It," and classical Zen writings these days . . .

I guess it comes down to this: A state of awareness that intellect is welcome to bubble into, but if it doesn't? There is no complaint. In fact, I am sure this "awareness" is itself something that arose before I learned about Integral theory. There is a difference between a theory and a state of mind.

[Heru]

Hi Scott. Nice post--I too have gone through a similar trajectory, although I started with rebellion of Wilber and ended with rebellion of Wilber ;-) Or to map it out a bit:

Heru I - Rebellion of Wilber
Heru II - Wilber Orthodoxy
Heru III - Differentiation from Wilber
Heru IV - Autonomy

Anyways, all half-joking aside, you bring up a very important point: that discussion of integralism tends to be rather abstract, third-person, and intellectual, more a matter of "aping the party line" than something fresh and vital and...lived. Nothing wrong with this, but it is very partial. Now to go beyond this a bit, let me posit three differentiations of what "integral" means:

1) Integral consciousness
2) Integral visions/theories/maps of reality
3) AQALism, aka Wilberian Integral Theory

I have gone into this somewhat before elsewhere, but a problem comes about when we
A) equate any particular map (2) with the territory (1), and/or
B) Subsume all possible integral visions (2) into AQALism (3), and then equate it (3) with the territory (1), if only unconsciously.

The Wilberian term "transcend and include" has a "light" and "dark" side. The light side is to open, acknowledge, and not limit oneself, to any and all possible perspectives. Kill the Buddha on the road, but first acknowledge that "he" is a valid perspective of reality, that is "AQAL situated" (i.e. embedded within consciousness-reality). The dark side is a kind of intellectual colonialism that is reminiscent of the Borg from Star Trek: Prepare to be assimilated! This "Dark side" of transcend-and-include, and thus AQALism in general, only sees surfaces--it never really enters into another perspective, but objectifies it and situates it within one's own mental map (AQAL).

Is this integral? I think not, or rather it is what could be described as "low integral"--the yellow/teal vmeme, in Wilberian lingo.

But your question is specific, I think, not to (2) or (3), but to (1). What does integral consciousness "feel" like? What is the first-person, subjective experience? Let's go back to Wilber's term from his old Wilber-IV days (SES), based upon Jean Gebser: integral-aperspectival. Integral consciousness is based in aperspectivism, which is related to the Buddhist notion of emptiness; to quote Nagarjuna: All Dharmas are empty (even that one). All mental constructions, all maps and theories and mind forms, are "empty," that is they are not final or complete, they have no inherent or independent existence. The map, any map, is not the territory.

Integral consciousness is based in this recognition (of emptiness). But it also plays within (and as) form--it is not afraid to "jump in and play", to build castles made of sand because it is understood that they are "only" sand (which is also Spirit manifest).

But this still doesn't really address your inquiry. What does this feel like? I cannot speak for anyone else, but for myself it feels open and spacious and...unlimited. It feels like "I" am no one (or solid) thing, specific form or configuration of thoughts, feelings, ideas, memories. Yet it is also life, it is movement and flow...it is a creative energy to become, to manifest, to actualize. "I" am the container in which all of my parts (thoughts, feelings, etc) arise, yet I am also the life-essence, the energetic movement of becoming--the continuity within all forms. I am being-in-becoming.

Now the beauty of integral consciousness is that there are so many different possible ways to express and manifest it (or rather, you could say, it manifests itself in different forms, through different vehicles). There is a kind of symbiotic relationship between what Wilber calls Spirit-in-Action--the very movement and energy of God--and the individual soul, and its actualization. It is a marriage, if you will, of Spirit and Soul, of the Light of God and the prism of Soul...each of our expressions/manifestations will look different. But I think there will be commonalities, as light is light, no matter what form it expresses itself in. As far as integral consciousness goes, one such commonality will be something similar to what I described: feeling empty and full at the same time; empty of solid notions about self and world, but full of energy and spirit. There are degrees of this, of course, and "early integral" is more focused on aperspectivism--on existentialism, really. But this, ideally, deepens--so that the emptiness begins to dance (to rip off a term used by Adyashanti). The key, of course, is consciousness: engaging in life with as much awareness as one can muster, to go forward with "eyes wide open."

[Scott Payne]

Heru,

Beautifully written, thank you for the insights. The questions that floats to the surface for me is are we creating trouble by equating the map and the territory by using the common identifier "integral" with both. Should we shy away from taking a word that (barring perhaps Aurobindo's work, with which I am still woefully unfamiliar) has arisen within the context theoretical machinations, and applying it to the mystery of conscious development?

Cheers,

sp

[Heru]

Scott,
For better or worse "integral" is the catch-phrase these days, which originated in both Aurobindo's and Gebser's work. I see nothing wrong with using the word, as long as we don't narrowly equate it with this or that movement or usage--whether Wilber OR Aurobindo, or both--but recognize what it refers to: An emerging consciousness space that is, as Wilber himself says, still to be defined.

Now what I am leery of is referring everything back to a specific, single map and language. An aspect of this is equating the following:

integral consciousness = being "integrally informed" = being well-read in (and in agreement with) Wilber

This might sound like a caricature, but I have run across some people who do this. The point being, there are many ways to express and explore integral consciousness and we should be careful not to become too specialized and identified with a specific formulation. I would even say that the more we do that, the more we miss the mark of what integral consciousness is all about.

[M Alan Kazlev]

Heru, I agree with you re the dangers of specialisation and identification only with particular forms.

But the problem is, without a specific frame of reference, "Integral" becomes a meaningless buzz-word, like "holistic" and "quantum", one of those faddy new age words that are applied everywhere and mean nothing. OTOH, if a frame of reference is used, then there is reductionism to a particualr dogma, as you rightly point our re Wilberism

Even to say Integral is "an emerging consciousness space" implies certain New Age/New Paradigm / Transpersonal Psychology / Wilberian beliefs and biases, such as that consciousness evolves (I'm not saying it doesn't, mind you), that it works in such and such a way, that reality is ultimately nondual (space = emptiness), and so on.

This is the whole paradox. Perhaps the emerging Integral Movement (as opposed to IM sensu stricto) is unique in this way; an ascent of consciousness, rather than just a new belief-system. But can the Integral Movement (sensu lato) even be distingusihed from the New Age/ New Paradigm / Rising Culture? Or is it just a new name for, and a cluster of subcultures in, something already established and evolving?