What Is Enlightenment? Magazine (WIE?)

Now known as Enlightened Next Magazine.

WIE? Published an article by Eliot and Jana called "The 5 Top Misconceptions of Ken Wilber" for the June/August 2006; Issue #33. This is a spectacular issue (articles and graphics), all about Integral Theory (Wilber-5 stuff), promoting the Fall release of Ken Wilber’s Integral Spirituality.

http://www.wie.org/j33/

The Top 7 Misconceptions about Ken Wilber:

By Eliot Bissey and Jana Espiritu Santo

1. Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory is complicated and useless ( like Philosophy in general ).

The word is not the thing, and the map is not the territory. Walking the territory is really what matters, and Ken knows this. He understands that adequate and accurate maps can exponentially increase the efficiency and joy of our evolutionary “walk” up the spiral of development. Integral Theory can seem rather cognitively laborious with its terminology and concepts, as it is first an education, and then a practice, and finally an actual living perspective (1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd person; see through all, attach to none). This can give people the erroneous impression that Integral is about “being stuck in your head”, especially with the mental masturbation by intellectual elitists going on in some of the so-called Integral circles. The more recent models from Integral Institute have prioritized simplicity, clarity and elegance in communication to help “spread the word”. We are beginning to understand that we must move the bulk of humanity up the spiral; that until the average mode consciousness center-of-gravity moves upward, very little that is truly “Integral” content can be stably and adequately “held” by and arise in the supporting cultural structure. The cutting edge is fun; the center is life and death.

2. Wilber may be bright, maybe even a genius, but where is his heart? Where’s the love in Wilber? Don’t the truly spiritual teachers impart a feeling of love?

It seems that love and spirituality are often loaded words, and we attach "meaning baggage" to them, from our perspective (self-system center of gravity, our own unique psychograph). When I ask myself that question: "Where is the love?" (Motown group background vocals notwithstanding), I think of two lines/streams: 1. Intellectual/cognitive, and 2. Astral/emotional. Intellectually, I "feel" love and tenderness in the way Ken so carefully and delicately "teases apart the threads" of complex subject matter, grounding his perspectives, models and language every step of the way, so as not to mislead, while candidly admitting the evolution of his perspective (i.e. "Wilber I through Wilber V") where a more truly Integral view has emerged. Emotionally, I resonate with the beautiful poetic verse he tosses in every once in a while, and the passionate love(s) of his in "Boomeritis", and in real life. His love shows in the care with which he makes his maps, but his true love is the actual territory itself.

Every developmental line is, in a sense, its own context, and so we perceive "love" contextually from our embeddedness at whatever stage or state we happen to occupy along that particular line, when making that judgement/discernment (walks like a duck, talks like a duck, but is it love?). For example, we feel psycho-socially loved when our friends include us in group activities, value us and our input, listen to us (really listen), pick us up, take us out and treat us, etc.

People’s emotional/sentimental criticisms of Wilber often reveal their own shadow work that needs to be done. We must also remember that Wilber himself is an evolving human being.

Ultimately, Wilber understands that lasting change only comes with stage evolution, not merely peak states, although adding some nice content can be delightful and make one feel good momentarily. The structural perspective “big picture” being genealogically understood helps this to occur efficiently and stably.

3. Is “Integral” a religion, or in conflict with religion?

Some people are afraid that their religion won’t fit into Integral, like Christianity for example. The book “Integral Spirituality” will clear that up nicely, upon its immanent release. The post-modernists have shown us that we can not intelligently examine and understand content without also understanding the context that set the stage for that content’s emergence. The point is, to use our example, to get closer to Christ’s consciousness (by following the methodologies and injunctions of the particular wisdom tradition in question, in this example, Christianity), not to become his top media/P.R. boy and myth distributor.

What would Jesus want?

4. Is Integral Theory just another perspective/belief? I met someone who said that they knew Integral Theory, but they were a horrible obnoxious asshole.

In Misconception #2 we find that people unconsciously throw their dissociated content/baggage onto Wilber… but people can also use integral theory as the content to their own (1^st tier) structure (2^nd tier map in the hands of the 1^st tier center-of-gravity). Integral theory becomes something witty to talk about at parties, feeding the contracted self-sense and causing more embeddedness, in a universe-sized gilded cage, which surprisingly is just barely large enough to contain the ego that inhabits it. Integral theory can be (and often is) used for narcissistic delight: “I know Integral Theory. It’s amazing. I’m amazing! And you’re amazingly lucky!!!” And Integral is about more than the link between content and context, form and emptiness: to have a beautiful and healthy content emerge through a beautiful and healthy structure, to free egoic stuckness and liberate one from selective blindness; the ability to elegantly move from one perspective to another; freed from a 1^st tier sense of (digital: ones and zeroes) right VERSUS wrong; becoming aware of the expansiveness of functional fit, efficiency and appropriateness (multi-dimensional analog: the infinitely detailed and subtle full spectrum) that is NOT merely situational ethics and contracted pragmatism. People always play the magician’s game, “Look here, and don’t look there”. They say, “You can not find an error in this content I present.” Objective facts are selected by subjective perspectives, and don’t forget it unless you don’t mind being referred to as “the victim”! Bad philosophers and good used car salesmen know that NO AMOUNT of objective facts can move a stuck subjective perspective. The “error” or center-of-contraction is not to be found in the content, it is “hiding in-between the walls” of the structure of consciousness that holds it. This differentiation/integration needs to be made for authentic spiritual growth and carries the highest price tag of all: self-awareness. Once again we come to the interesting fact that psychographs (standardized/comparative line/level evaluations) are “all over the place” and we are witness to the horrific beauty of free will, enacted. But take heart! Just as the Value Memes of Spiral Dynamics all have a good and bad side, so too does “Integral”! Some people are, and/or can be, kind AND intelligent AND spiritual, with health in every quadrant, including the Lower Left.

5. Ken seems like an asshole.

Many who have met him have commented that while he may have seemed dry, aloof, and somewhat less-than-personable in print, upon meeting him, they were struck by his “regular guy” humanity, laughing, cracking jokes, enjoying wine or a beer. The neuro-linguistic programming practitioners and adepts share with us the incredibly low (less than 30!) percentages of meaning communicated through words. Without the natural meta-message (the intonation, eye movement and body language that reveal process, not content), we must attempt to adequately decrypt the interior intentional transmission through these crude exterior correlates. You could be right or wrong, totally depending on whether or not you “know this grapevine” (“Johnny Dangerously” reference, LOL!). People who know him seem to genuinely like, admire and respect him.

6. Wilber doesn't understand that MY particular area of expertise is the most foundation and fundamental piece of the puzzle.

There are strong (these Wilber critics assert that he misunderstands their view if he can not see that it is the ONLY correct and accurate view) and weak (Wilber's critics here say that he includes too many other less significant views, not that he misunderstands their view) versions of this misconception. Their real objection is not about objective accuracy, it is about the internal prioritization of values, and they all want to be the "top dog" in an intellectual dominator hierarchy, which reveals their underlying 1st tier exclusivist and absolutist tendencies, to varying degrees (strong and weak).

An evolutionary perspectival shift is needed here, which I often compare to the immature logic that has difficulty with the wave/particle duality of physics: as Albert Einstein, Spiral Dynamics and Robert Kegan have clearly explained to us all, the "unsolvable" problem of one level is solved at the next higher level, which presents us with yet another "unsolvable" problem, all the way up!

What we can learn from this is that the highest and best truth available to us in a manifest (and therefore absolutely relative) universe is always evolving both internally (as our content and structure alternatively leverage growth within, with and from each other; upper and lower left quadrants) and externally (as form progresses with time, more knowledge and ignorance emerge together; upper and lower right quadrants), so the elegant and intelligent choice in terms of facilitating our own evolution is to understand that today’s truth is (or can become) tomorrows belly laugh or cute sentiment. In other words, let's not get so attached to "truth" that we stop growing, shall we? The genealogical perspective helps us to discern the difference between real growth (which "meanders" seemingly unpredictably AND allows wonderfully fresh questions and perspectives) and mere logical progression (which may or may not signal more narrow embeddedness, stuck attachment and imprisoning identification).

These serious theorists might like (and be enlightened by?) the old saying "How do the Angels fly? They take themselves lightly". The martial arts analogy would be that a higher stance allows more fluid mobility, while a lower stance can afford more power. We seem to squat in the center of perspectives and vMemes, and stand up to walk over the transitions, don't we? As we embrace this, the breathing of spirit as evolution, we can learn the less dualistic practice of squatting and remembering standing, and standing while remembering squatting. All immanence and no transcendence makes Jack ungrounded, fragmented, narcissistic and socially retarded.

7. Wilber's Theory of Everything is the epitome of narcissism.

When Ken began his quest he did not know what he was to find, in the openness to a more integral (less fragmented) framework for truth. He has described himself as swimming in a mess of yellow legal pads spread across his floor, when discovering the Four Quadrants. Written on the pads were the “orienting generalities” (generally agreed upon truths) of all the systems of knowledge he could find. Through vision-logic the holistic map emerged to integrate them all, revealing the structure underneath. Rather than arranging the content to fit his own agenda, a deep integral/aperspectival shift in awareness allowed him to grasp an underlying all-inclusive pattern: Integral Methodological (genealogical, as opposed to relativistic) Pluralism. His radical method was to sensitively “listen” to the data, rather than to confidently “talk”.

Because Wilber is one of the first recognized integral geniuses, people might become jealous: "Why didn't I think of that first! It seems so obvious now". It takes a big ego to spend so much time on such an encompassing endeavor; so we find that egoic drive with spiritual motive is vitally important to make a significant global difference; who's in the driver’s seat (Spirit) and how good is the engine (ego)? Also, Wilber's "3 strands of truth" (the All Quadrant scientific method: 1. Run the experiment 2. Experience the phenomena 3. Check with others to verify accurate/repeatable results) and openness to contrary opinions are the "self-correcting feedback loops" that prevent his potential narcissism from infecting the theory, as some might propose or accuse.

Wilber's ego is in the beautifully balanced and detailed egolessness of his dynamic multi-dimensional meta-model. His “mental sword” is highly polished, and he is a true philosophical samurai (exhibiting beauty, propriety and humility to the outside world of form and discourse, and keeping any pride hidden within). Trans-egoic includes ego in its fullness and power and it couldn’t be any other way. Revolutionaries find a way to overcome shyness, or their revolutions aren’t very successful: Christ’s fearless expression of his truth was not hiding in Christian dogma, but out in the messianic openness: “I and the Father are One”, which got him killed. Giordano Bruno chose death before regression, and Gandhi was non-violently up in people’s faces. So far, Wilber’s ego isn’t trying to create a fuss like those guys, but it could just be the appropriate (enlightened?) response to external life conditions such as they may be; our society today is slightly more tolerant of those with the bad taste to be right too soon, killing them a little less quickly and frequently than before.

Evolution, indeed.

Hope you enjoyed it!

Sincerely,
Eliot and Jana