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Chapter 3 - States of Consciousness
Contributor: Ken Wilber 
States form a key element of Ken Wilber’s AQAL model, and states of consciousness are perhaps some of the most abiding features of human awareness. As Ken points out, every individual, every day, journeys through the great states of consciousness: waking, dreaming, and deep sleep. Viewed one way, the world’s religious traditions provide means of consciously navigating this journey, ushering us into ever deepening meditative states that bear an incredibly close resemblance to waking, dreaming, and deep sleep.
States form a key element of Ken Wilber’s AQAL model, and states of consciousness are perhaps some of the most abiding features of human awareness. As Ken points out, every individual, every day, journeys through the great states of consciousness: waking, dreaming, and deep sleep. Viewed one way, the world’s religious traditions provide means of consciously navigating this journey, ushering us into ever deepening meditative states that bear an incredibly close resemblance to waking, dreaming, and deep sleep.
States of consciousness are disclosed by means of introspection, which provides an inside view of the interior of the individual (as opposed to structuralism, the outside view of the interior of the individual, which disclosed stages of consciousness). This ancient technique is common to most cultures and religious traditions, resulting in the development of extraordinary cartographies tracking individuals’ experience of journeying through states of consciousness. While these maps were challenged by modernity (with its demand for objective evidence) and postmodernity (with its demand of recognition for intersubjective factors), the AQAL approach can help to situate them appropriately (in the upper-left quadrant), allowing their truths to endure.
While states of consciousness come and go (distinguishing them from stages, which persist), some states can in fact be trained and stabilized. Many religious practices actually have this as their goal. Observation of this unfolding in countless individuals and numerous cultures indicates that some states do in fact emerge in a predictable order; thus, the term “state-stages,” as opposed to “structure-stages.” This is not to discount the fact that states can be encountered as peak experiences, whereas structures cannot. And this leads to another incredibly important observation: a state experience will necessarily be interpreted from the stage at which an individual is at.
Tom Bougsty, a psychologist from Wyoming, asks a riveting question about masculine and feminine routes to arriving at state of Nondual awareness. Could a spiritual map be developed that outlines and honors practices from different spiritual traditions, including practices along both the masculine and feminine routes, so we can help people make more informed choices regarding their particular spiritual path, and at the same time, promote their growth in conscious development?
Tom and Ken continue...
Ken and Mike Ginn embark upon a "phenomenal" discussion of the structuralist and hermeneutical approaches to the ways people perceive, understand, and make meaning. The dialogue goes deep, and at the root, we find perspectives.
Ken and Mike Ginn continue their "States" discussion. Mike speculates that perhaps Husserl was, in fact, aware of Pure Awareness, but that his students were unable to take the perspective of "perspectives." Ken concurs....
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