What is, and what is not, to be Integral?

Hi everybody!

In this thread I will try to explore, based on my own experience and drawing from the most complete and updated version of Integral Theory available at this moment (Core Integral course), what is the Integral level of consciousness, and what is not.

I will try this to be a “practical” guide for discernment and I invite everyone to discuss and to add more ideas into it.

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1) Is Integral a Spiritual Awakening?

No! Integral is another name for the Teal level of vertical development in Integral Theory, which tends to be Secular.

There are many definitions of Spirituality (Integral Theory use 5), and I’m using here
the Horizontal developmental Axis of Integral Theory (development trough State-Stages from Gross to Subtle to Causal to Non Dual) as Spiritual Awakening.

Since both axis, Vertical (fullness) axis and Horizontal (freedom) axis are independent to a large degree, one can be Teal (Integral) and even Turquoise without having ANY spiritual Awakening at all.

In fact, descriptions of Integral (Teal) and Turquoise levels of development in Integral Theory tell us that usually, commonly, most people that arrive to these vertical levels don’t have interest yet for spiritual awakening as an Experience.

While Teal (Integral) level usually is Secular, Turquoise usually is interested in “spiritual talking”; but only Third tier levels actually imply, necessarily, a Spiritual Awakening; meaning, an actual jump into ways of being beyond Ego.

And that is why all first and second tier levels are called Personal levels; while only third tier levels are called Trans-personal levels.

 

2) I hate green views! Does it mean I’m Integral?

It could be. As a general rule, you could be feeling rejection for some level views in one of two situations: if it is over your head (and then you re-interpret it as coming from below) or if it is really below your current developmental altitude.

In other words: because development work with the pattern “integrate the structures, throw the view”, it is always a given that you have (to a certain degree) a rejection for previous levels views.

If that rejection goes out the board it becomes Segregation, or Repression, or other Pathology.
In some cases, the Ego splits when developmental processes take place forming sub personalities and shadow elements (see question 4).

But there IS indeed a healthy rejection going on always, all the way up, for the VIEWS of the previous levels, because the views are NOT integrated, but denied, in Healthy development. What is integrated are the Structures, not the Views.

So, coming back to the question: if you have feel a rejection for green views you could be below it (probably Orange, but also could be blue…or others) or above it (Teal or beyond).

You can do a quick check list for testing this: if you have all qualities of a Green person -namely, all that structure is working inside of you-, but still feel rejection for green views, then probably you are arriving Integral (Teal) altitude.

Then WATCH OUT! Going off the board into negation, repression, and segregation is a very typical pitfall for Integral level people. In fact, I would say that most of us go into that in one or another degree.

BUT the fact that you have a Second Tier pathology doesn’t make you a First Tier person.

It just makes you an Integral person with Second tier pathologies.

 

3) I have a strong rejection for green, orange, blue, red…views. Does it means I’m NOT Integral?

NO. As said before, pathologies in the Integral level could make you feel rejection for lower level views to a degree that is unhealthy. That should be worked out in order for Integral to not create a “Mean Teal” wave, in the same way previous levels did in the past.

You could have strong rejection and even hate for lower visions and still be an Integral person, but one going into a type of Mean Teal pathology.

However, it should be said again that there are HEALHY levels of rejection also possible.

For example, if you are a 30 years old adult and a 4 years child catches fire on your Picasso painting, IT WILL BOTHER YOU; and you may be angry with him, at least for some minutes if not more. And that doesn’t mean you “didn’t integrate 4 years childhood altitude in your development". It simply means that a 4 year child’s view and behavior sometimes piss of a 30 years adult.

In the same way, Blue views and behaviors WILL PISS OFF Integral people. And that’s normal, and it is not an indicative of Pathology. An Integral person could suffer, and maybe reject and even hate, seeing a Blue person negating rights to homosexuals in mainstream television. He/she will understand why the person is doing it; he/she will even understand that it is "ok"; but still may feel rejection at the moment the blue view is being expressed or the behavior executed.

That’s not evidence that you are not integral. Nor evidence that you are in a mean Teal pathology.

It is simply the natural and healthy way one higher view denies the lower ones.

 

4) What about Shadows? If I reject views from lower levels then I am full of Shadow?

      Not necessarily. But probably yes.

A shadow in this case will help pathology to emerge if not treated properly with Shadow work (some kind of therapy!).

In the cases I had been discussing, you could go into Integral, but have some parts of your Green ego attached and not letting go Green. Then you think you moved completely into Second Tier, but you have some parts of you still at the green level, parts that you don’t see any more; they became Shadow elements.

Having a green shadow will make you probably project it onto others and even into the world at large; you will hate green in a pronounced unhealthy way (remember, there are HEALTHY degrees of rejection of lower level views)  because really what’s happening is that you are rejecting your Green shadow, your Green sub personality; not the green view out there, but the  green view inside.

 

 

5) But Integral was supposed to love everybody in the spiral right?

mmm I don't think so. It IS supposed to understand their value. The need for them to exist. And to understand how those very structures are not only out there, but inside us as Integral people.

Sometimes in popular Integral culture people simply ask too much from the Integral (Teal) level.

We tend to conflate in it quasi-spiritual expectations.

I would argue that those expectations will never be fulfilled by vertical development alone.

There is a need for Spiritual, Horizontal state-stage training for achieving those expectations of Compassion, love, altruism and disinterested good action.

It’s the person as a whole, and no so much the person's level, what’s in the way of true love and full acceptance of the other as it is. The problem is not the level of the ego; the problem is the ego.

Not that I’m saying that Vertical development is not important.

But, if your expectations go as high as to dream of Integral as a level that “loves” all the spiral, then well, that is only if the Integral person you are thinking of has gone trough state-stage training, which is mostly NOT the case; as said before, Integral teal level tends to be secular, and therefore to act from Gross identification with own’s bodymind.

 

6) I use to embrace a lot of different perspectives in my approaches to things. Does it make me an Integral person?

Not necessarily. First tier levels of development also can embrace very diverse perspectives.

 The issue is not so much about if you do or do not embrace many perspectives; but if you do (and if you feel yourself impelled to) connect them; rank them; organize them; map them; Integrate them into a bigger whole; know how they work together.

In other words Integral is not about the quantity of things you embrace, but more about the quality of that embrace.

Is it your embrace one that values all that things you embrace in an equal manner? You don’t compare one with another because they are simply different, beautiful things in and by themselves? You are not interested in know how one thing could communicate and complete the other, but instead feel that each thing have a coherence of it own and that it's ok like that?

These are all signs of non integral kinds of multi-perspectival embrace.

 

7) Is Integral just a container of all previous levels? Or it is a level on its own right?

Of course it is NOT a container! And some people fall in this mistake.

In popular Integral culture, this mistake goes something like this:

• Blue love tradition, most of the time religion, dogma…
• Orange love science, reason, business, progress…
  
• Green loves nature, relationship, ecology, multi-culturalism..
  
• and Teal: …….ejem…….well, it loves all that too!

That is simply a mistake.

Teal is not an empty container of First tear values.

But instead it’s a level in its own right, with its own contents, culture, needs, likes and dislikes, and so on.

Normally an Integral person will not enjoy that much lower levels culture for many reasons; it needs to create a new one.

One example of Teal Cultural content is the very “Integral Movement”, containing Integral Life site, Ken Wilber’s books, and all the media that has been created about that. There are many other contents as well, of course.

Teal and Turquoise needs are Maslow’s Self Actualization needs!

So the popular belief that if you are ego (personally) driven you are not integral is absurd.

In fact, if you are NOT ego driven then probably you are NOT integral, but probably Third tier (or, in some cases, a person that stabilized Causal or Nondual horizontal state-stages but still fly at a first tier altitude).

 

8) Is Integral level the Integration of all the CONTENTS of all previous levels?

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! That would be impossible.

Integral is the integration of all the STRUCTURES of the previous levels. While structures are limited in number and can be described in fairly appropriate ways, contents are as infinite as the countless stars; no one ever could include “all contents”.

 

This accounts for a popular mistake; some people think that an Integral person should be able to have all previous levels capacities; I remember a friend of mine thought that if a person at Integral level can’t have a Red sexual encounter, then he/she is not Integral (he/she would be, according to him,  not including Red contents).

That is obviously a mistake. You could have red structure incorporated in you, but yet there are myriad of particular expressions of red, and not necessarily being Integral implicates you included all of them; in fact, you could be integral without having any ability whatsoever in Green eco sciences. Why? Because not all Green people are really good at Eco sciences.
Similarly, you can integrate all the Blue structure and still don’t know any page of the bible.

 

Bottom line here: there are contents and structures. You have to include all first tier structures in order to be Integral; but that doesn’t give you necessarily access to all the limitedless contents of every level of development. That shouldn’t be expected from an Integral person.

 

 

9)  I don’t like hierarchies at all. I like some Integral ideas, but I react against categories and rankings. Does it mean I’m not integral?

Probably yes. One of the main characteristics of the Integral level is the introduction of Hierarchies. Many fail to think that this is a particularity in Ken Wilber’s view of Integral. But it is simply a defining characteristic of Teal level of consciousness as it appears worldwide.

So if you have problems with Hierarchies as a whole (if you simply “feel bad about them”) that is probably an indicative that you are not still at the Integral level.

 

10) If I am at first tier then: what should I do?

Be happy about it! Enjoy!

Every level in the spiral is a beautiful manifestation of Spirit in action. Enjoy it!

From every level of the spiral you can climb the “other spiral” up to the top; namely, the Spiritual Awakening Horizontal developmental scale that goes from Gross to Subtle to Causal to Nondual.

Doesn’t matter if you are Orange or Blue or even Red: you can navigate all that State-Stages training up to the end. And in my opinion: That is AS IMPORTANT (or maybe, arguably more important!) than vertical development.

And, if you are interested in going beyond where you are now in vertical development, I would suggest then that a good place to start is cognitively. Read, investigate and literally “eat” Integral Theory. My suggestion: start with Wilber (“and friends”) version of it. It’s the most complete out there.

And take your time for all of that. There is plenty of time!

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Please, come back with critics; add-ons, and updates to this brief practical post.
This was not intended as a comprehensive guide; nor as an academic text. But simply as a pointing out of some mistakes that I see appearing in “popular Integral Culture”.

Blessings and love for everybody!!

Federico