Spiral dynamics stages in women, stage orange and relationships, etc.

[Elisabeth]

It seems to me Leo and the founders of spiral dynamics have (ironically) once again left out some of the more feminine manifestations of the stages... I want to hear what you think - especially girls. 

I'm convinced an overlooked facet of orange is serial monogamy, soap-opera style drama and the whole fairytale "romantic love" ideal. Leo said orange doesn't believe in love or care about emotion, and he gave us the stereotypical pick-up guy who treats sex as an achievement picture for orange relationships, but hey - some girls also go screw a lot of guys, but most have other patterns. Like trying to find THE ONE who can make her feel love and be happy. 

My take on spiral dynamics and relationships

tl;dr: There's plenty of orange relationships which are not empty of romance but where people still treat each other as a means to an end. 

IMHO all stages are capable of having some compassion for their nearest and dearest, of pair-bonding or being non-monogamous etc. 

Blue will place restrictions on relationships to comply with the group's structure.  Monogamous marriage, as an institution, is the ideological child of blue, designed partly to protect property and inheritance. I'm not saying monogamous people today can't be further in their development, however, the structure they adopt is one that has served as the religious one-true-way and a social obligation. That's quite clear.

Orange, IMHO, breads the romantic love ideal - only you choose the best partner for you. Think about it, marriage based on love and choosing your loved one yourself actually becomes popular around the same time as capitalism does.

It also gives rise to serial monogamy. Now the individual is more important than the relationship (structure), so “moving on when a relationship no longer suits you” is celebrated sometimes as the right thing to do. So what you get is people just dating and sleeping around, but also relationships which were born from the belief in one true love ... ending in bitter divorce after a few years when the new and exciting vanishes and people failed to develop deep intimacy. 

In orange you may have the guy who judges women on their looks and the girl who is attracted to money and power and the teenage girl who worships a pop-star, but also the woman who reads romantic fiction and is looking for "true love" - where loving her is of course measured by her personal standards of behaviour. "If he truly loved her, he would/wouldn't..." Heck, we don't even have to read romantic fiction to buy into this set of beliefs, it's everywhere in the pop-culture starting with fairy-tales (purple?), and encompassing fantasy literature and romantic movies (orange/green).

Notice how this perception of love is equally objectifying to man as the "male gaze" to women - the man here also becomes a means to an end, he's the one to provide the love I want, to bring my "happily ever after", the one to earn money and care for family and give me sex, cuddles, flowers and dates, and the one who's to blame if I'm not feeling the love I expect from a relationship. What he's NOT, unless in love, is a fascinating being of his own to connect with - hence sometimes marriages of mostly stage orange people turn into a fight for influence and "whose way is the right way" after the initial infatuation wears off. And then people say "he/she wasn't right for me".

At orange, we also get narcissism as a couple, the "two against the world", where people manage to get absorbed with each other and just merge into codependence without having any helpful impact on the world as a unit. 

Orange also has a tolerance or even looks for, drama. After all, the emotions you suppress in your work-life have to come out somewhere. Hence conflicts with your spouse, and hence soap-opera and gossip. 

There are also guys who buy into the romantic love ideal. A lot of them. Guys also want love and know they want love, not everyone is completely cut off from their emotion at orange.

IMHO for women, the transition into green in relationships is not necessarily about starting to focus on emotion and believe in "love" - though the word certainly gets a redefinition - but rather realizing that participation has to be truly voluntary and you can't change your lover. Only from that realization people can find an appreciation for true connection and start to base their relationships at that quality.

Green development in relationships is imho finding true intimacy. Also, grasping how love comes from inside, not from the person you're in relationship with. Sometimes you do that with your spouse, sometimes you skew a bit more communal even in your love life. Green is also about going global with your empathy and applying the loving-kindness you've learned in your personal relationships to the whole world.

As an aside, polyamory in my view is a funny blend of green and orange values. The ideology of abundant love must be an ideal of green, as are more communal forms of poly. Also the emphasis on processing feelings, everyone being heard and valued etc. 
However for most people, I the main motivations are more individualistic. Personal freedom to pursue your attractions. Sexual variety. Not being bound by any convention. Needless to say, orange polyamory not heavily tempered by green compassion doesn't work that great. But living the "green" ideas also seems difficult for most people. It could be we are simply not there yet, or it could be an example of a green ideal which is not that easily brought into practice. 

I wonder what yellow relationships are like. Maybe the dilemma between monogamy and non-monogamy proves itself false somehow?

Well, if you've read all that, thanks for your time and please tell me if I'm getting some interesting points right or if I'm re-inventing my own spiral

Edited July 1, 2018 by Elisabeth

[Leo Gura]

Some good insights there. I definitely could have said a lot more about women and relationships with respect to Spiral Dynamics. That could be an entire episode all on its own.

Cliche examples of the Orange woman is a slutty club girl or a gold-digger wife who marries more for security than for love. Then she cheats behind his back with the fun, adventurous, romantic, artistic Green guy who actually makes her wet.

Melania Trump seems pretty Orange to me. As is Trump's daughter, Ivanka.

The female character in House Of Cards -- Claire Underwood -- is a great example of a manipulative Orange woman.

Orange women like to wear business-suits and compete with the boys in the corporate boardroom. Orange women can feel like they have to compete with men in a masculine way, over-arresting themselves.

Orange women are different from Blue women in that they often have their own big careers, like men.

[DoubleYou]

@Elisabeth Interesting read. Thanks for this. 

I guess I might have been one of those guy's that was constantly craving that perfect romantic relationship while at orange. For years I've completely externalised all my happiness into that ideal. Unsuccesfully of course. But it's always been love I was after. Even if my ideas of it were completely skewed.

I guess that's why I feel so at home at green right now. Like you said, its so empowering to find out about this true intimacy, and how it's always been there on the inside. And now I just want to share it. Instead of needing it from someone else.

[Leo Gura]

@DoubleYou Yeah, that's very true. Orange looks for love externally rather than internally. Because Orange is materialistic, it treats love as just another kind of material.

[billiesimon]

Definitely a lot of great insights!

In my humble experience of getting to know girls with dates and also conversations with random girls at the bars, I see that the fully orange girl is the worst!

It might sound retarded, but as a orange/green guy myself, I find the blue or blue/slight orange girls the best ones. They are loving, caring, respectful of your boundaries, and are fascinated by your more evolved understanding of the world. Also they have a hidden sex drive that they can explore with you if you are between orange/green. 
Green girls... I've had only one experience and she was mostly polarized (in a good way) by my orange side, because she felt excited by it by contrast.

Fully green guys are too feminine in my opinion. They don't bring excitement to the woman, only positive feelings, but not so much polarizing emotions. Girls also need to be with the energetic guy who can bring her to excitement and a little bit of drama. Being overly feminine turns women off.

[Leo Gura]

@billiesimon Girls love artistic hippie guys. They love the long-haired chaotic musician stereotype.

A Green guy can easily steal a girl away from an Orange guy. Girls want emotional connection, not your Orange logic and business-suit.

Don't confuse PUA emotional manipulation tactics with true emotional connection. PUAs are not able to build deep emotional connection. They just know how to manipulate her emotional buttons to create drama. Which works short-term, but not long-term.

And 99% of Orange guys don't know pick-up, so they are the boring logical nerd guy who cannot get laid.

[Emerald]

7 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

@billiesimon Girls love artistic hippie guys. They love the long-haired chaotic musician stereotype.

A Green guy can easily steal a girl away from an Orange guy. Girls want emotional connection, not your Orange logic and business-suit.

Don't confuse PUA emotional manipulation tactics with true emotional connection. PUAs are not able to build deep emotional connection. They just know how to manipulate her emotional buttons to create drama. Which works short-term, but not long-term.

@billiesimon

I agree with this. Orange guys tend to be very competitive and robotic. So, they don't have a lot of heart. It's almost like you're in the same room as him, but not really in the same room as him at the same time. He can't appreciate much.

That said, Orange guys will have a lot more success with picking up women than Green guys, because there are more Orange women than Green women. So, Orange women will fall for the Orange man's games. Also, running game itself is very Orange. This is what give the illusion of the Orange way as being the best way to attract women.

But Green women (and women in the stages above), will find these types artificial, cold, and unattractive. They will not admire Orange men. 

[billiesimon]

18 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

And 99% of Orange guys don't know pick-up, so they are the boring logical nerd guy who cannot get laid.

Oh yeah, that's completely true! 

@Emerald a trigger warning relationship with you  (i'm joking)

I think that PUA mixed with compassion and peaceful attitude towards the world is very effective and constructive in a relationship. 
I'm talking about mixing a deep understanding of female psychology with true compassion and heart. And intimate - caring sex.

With orange energy I mean the attitude of excitement and polarizing male - female energy, not the robotic rational vibe of classic orange. I agree with you on that.

I'm talking about a healthy mix of the two stages. I've had a very very deep and honest connection with my last gf thanks to this mixed stage I'm in right now

[Brittany]

I do not fully understand romantic love. It is the most complex ego mechanism we have. 

It's a beautiful expression of duality. 

And it's most confusing part of the dream.

The most tempting part of the dream. 

It can be extremely beautiful and/or extremely destructive.

Romantic love is the yin and yang. It is the dark and light. 

It points people to all of their shadows and emotional hunger. 

I have not seen any non-duality teacher, philosopher, or psychology do this subject justice.

[Brittany]

10 minutes ago, billiesimon said:

@Emerald a trigger warning relationship with you  (i'm joking)

I can't speak for Emerald.

But you and Leo are triggering the crap out of me. haha

Romantic love pulls us all into ego. And when I read your posts, I can't read them from the perspective of "the void". Romantic relationships are noise from the perspective of "the void". I have to go back into ego-mind and view them from the perspective of a woman. 

But I think it's divine. Like nature wants us to be triggered. And deal with our shadows. 

Romantic relationships are an excellent way to self actualized and face all of your demons.

[Leo Gura]

The biggest trick with romantic love is that for it to really work, you have to convert it into Platonic love. Romantic love is usually needy love. You need something from the relationship which you lack. Platonic love is the love you GIVE, not receive. So the goal of the game is to make yourself less and less selfish, and to love more and more unconditionally without expectation.

The big trap for women with this advice, though, is they become doormats for douchey guys who cannot appreciate unconditional love. And women use the excuse of "unconditional love" to stay in bad relationships and not enforce boundaries. You have to find a guy at your level who is willing to love back, and you need a boost up your self-esteem so you do not let the guy transgress over your boundaries. Then things should work.

I know a Western yogi who's married to a hot wife. But he never has sex with her. It's purely Platonic. Of course he is enlightened and developed as hell, so he can pull something like that off. It also helps to be in your 60s.

[Sparkist]

I think this Western yogi has the right idea. Deep platonic connection overrides inevitably fleeting lust connection.

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

A Green guy can easily steal a girl away from an Orange guy. Girls want emotional connection, not your Orange logic and business-suit.

If women aren't really into Orange guys, why is 50 Shades so popular?  I think many women would like to take an Orange guy and soften him up to Green and take full credit for it. That's the dream. Ha.

 

 

[Leo Gura]

6 minutes ago, Sparkist said:

If women aren't really into Orange guys, why is 50 Shades so popular?  

Many women are naive and underdeveloped themselves. And also, Green guys are pretty rare. Most guys are Blue/Orange. And since women don't do pickup on guys, they don't have many choices a lot of times.

An Orange woman is not conscious enough to realize that what she really wants is a Green guy. She will keep getting attracted to Orange assholes for a long time, until she learns her lesson the hard way.

Like attracts like.

The best way to attract a Green guy or girl is to become solidly Green yourself. Hang out where Green people hang out.

Quote

I think many women would like to take an Orange guy and soften him up to Green and take full credit for it. That's the dream. Ha.

Oh, definitely!

The problem is it rarely works. Most Orange guys are stuck being Orange. Much easier to find a guy who's already Green.

[Elisabeth]

Some good discussions here, thanks a lot everyone!

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Some good insights there.

 

Thanks  I hope I'm not misapplying the model too much 

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Cliche examples of the Orange woman is a slutty club girl or a gold-digger wife who marries more for security than for love. Then she cheats behind his back with the fun, adventurous, romantic, artistic Green guy who actually makes her wet.

Melania Trump seems pretty Orange to me. As is Trump's daughter, Ivanka.

The female character in House Of Cards -- Claire Underwood -- is a great example of a manipulative Orange woman.

Orange women like to wear business-suits and compete with the boys in the corporate boardroom. Orange women can feel like they have to compete with men in a masculine way, over-arresting themselves.

Orange women are different from Blue women in that they often have their own big careers, like men.

 

I didn't know house of cards, but this video is quite comprehensive. My trouble with cliché examples is, they are not typical examples, and I'm trying to understand the typical as I see it going on around me, with the people I know from everyday life, to see if the model fits at all. And it's harder with women. Outside the context of their carriers, they generally don't seem orange. Heck, I can't tell if my own mom is more blue or green. She's caring and liberal to the point of doing voluntary work for immigrants, but otherwise quite blue-orange in her morals and worldview. It's like watered down green without any radical shifts of perspective. Do women go emotionally into green faster? 

I do get the competition thing, I really do. It has been my driving force for ... so much of my studying and even hobbies.

It does make sense to me that healthily developing women (and men) in our society become orange in their early teens, questioning their parents and some of the rules and striving for some success. But it seems that as soon as women have children, or earlier, they have to either become green or revert into this blue-greenish mixture if they're not ready - otherwise, they and/or their children get really unhappy, not to mention all the judgement an ambitious mom is fighting against. 

Blah, it's a heavy topic for me. Struggling to reconcile both my remaining success orientation and even personal development "ambition" with possibly wanting children. Maybe this really is the female version of orange-green transition.

@Brittany Thanks for your writing. It's dreamy, almost poetic. I really do like it. 

14 minutes ago, Sparkist said:

If women aren't really into Orange guys, why is 50 Shades so popular?  I think many women would like to take an Orange guy and soften him up to Green and take full credit for it. That's the dream. Ha.

1

Great insight 

Edited July 1, 2018 by Elisabeth

[Emerald]

26 minutes ago, Brittany said:

I can't speak for Emerald.

But you and Leo are triggering the crap out of me. haha

Romantic love pulls us all into ego. And when I read your posts, I can't read them from the perspective of "the void". Romantic relationships are noise from the perspective of "the void". I have to go back into ego-mind and view them from the perspective of a woman. 

But I think it's divine. Like nature wants us to be triggered. And deal with our shadows. 

Romantic relationships are an excellent way to self actualized and face all of your demons.

He made the triggered joke because wrote to him (not Leo) on another thread and I suspect he mischaracterized me a bit because I was talking about women's issues... as I typically do. I think it's the most important things to focus on relative to the evolution of humanity, as the Divine Feminine has been repressed in the collective consciousness for many thousands of years. 

But there is more a slant toward Divine Masculine on here sometimes at the expense of the Divine Feminine, and not so much of an integration between the two. But it's really good to observe through the triggering, and being on here can help show you some of the barriers toward the integration of the Divine Feminine. It's hard to integrate the Feminine in our era because there's so much misinformation and reductionism going on relative to it. 

I talked about this dichotomy a bit in one of my recent videos. Where there is a the duality of Form (Feminine) and Formlessness (Masculine), which are really both the same thing. Then there is the dichotomy of Love (Feminine) and Emptiness (Masculine), which are also just two aspects of God. And it makes sense that Leo would focus more on the emptiness aspect of it, because it seems like Leo's experiences beyond ego were experiences of the Divine Masculine, which my experiences were less geared toward.

But I have experienced the Divine Feminine during my experiences of ego transcendence, and they were more about unconditional love and fuller embodiment of myself as a human being. I had access to divine wisdom that seemed to come from outside of me and inside me at the same time. And I already knew that I had always known.

And because I had no fear or suffering, I was very open instead of shut up like I normally am. Because of this my intuition become very sensitive and I was receptive to larger social patterns just by looking at people around me. There was also a deep connection between myself and everything else. I recognized this first in the trees and the grass that were around me. And my emotions were able to play out at full stretch within me, and conveyed wisdom to me. And I experienced all the repressed feminine traits that I had locked away just to be able to exist in society. And despite thinking of feminine and masculine as mere social constructs, I detected an energy buzzing inside me and outside that I immediately identified as feminine which was erotic but not explicitly sexual. It was life-giving and gave me access to my animal instincts. And I felt completely at home in the mundane world, which I recognized as a literal heaven. And I didn't have to prove myself worthy of anything or fear death. My existence was already unshakably valid. 

So, relationships are an aspect of Divine Feminine and they're also an aspect of the Illusion. So, they are empty in that sense. But there is no distinction between Divine Masculine and Divine Feminine at the end of the day. Duality is not separate from Non-Duality. Form is not separate from Formlessness. It's all one thing, and that one thing is infinite. So, it has all things... including the finite. So, embodiment in this life is just as much part of the path as transcendence. 

[Emerald]

45 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

I know a Western yogi who's married to a hot wife. But he never has sex with her. It's purely Platonic. Of course he is enlightened and developed as hell, so he can pull something like that off. It also helps to be in your 60s.

If it's the one I'm thinking about, it's because he's probably gay. That's always the vibe I got from him. 

[Sparkist]

6 minutes ago, Emerald said:

But I have experienced the Divine Feminine during my experiences of ego transcendence, and they were more about unconditional love and fuller embodiment of myself as a human being. I had access to divine wisdom that seemed to come from outside of me and inside me at the same time. And I already knew that I had always known.

And because I had no fear or suffering, I was very open instead of shut up like I normally am. Because of this my intuition become very sensitive and I was receptive to larger social patterns just by looking at people around me. There was also a deep connection between myself and everything else. I recognized this first in the trees and the grass that were around me. And my emotions were able to play out at full stretch within me, and conveyed wisdom to me. And I experienced all the repressed feminine traits that I had locked away just to be able to exist in society. And despite thinking of feminine and masculine as mere social constructs, I detected an energy buzzing inside me and outside that I immediately identified as feminine which was erotic but not explicitly sexual. It was life-giving and gave me access to my animal instincts. And I felt completely at home in the mundane world, which I recognized as a literal heaven. And I didn't have to prove myself worthy of anything or fear death. My existence was already unshakably valid. 

This sounds so beautiful!

 

[Emerald]

2 minutes ago, Sparkist said:

This sounds so beautiful!

That's why I seek to drop the ego permanently. I am not interested in transcending life itself or extricating myself from the experience of life. That seems quite silly to me, considering the fact that I have an eternity to be the infinite thing that I am, have always been, and will always be. What I want is the integration between a life of complete embodiment as a finite person and that which simply is, just like I had before. To realize that while I'm on my journey that I've never actually left home. 

[Leo Gura]

31 minutes ago, Emerald said:

it seems like Leo's experiences beyond ego were experiences of the Divine Masculine

I've had experiences of Infinite nondual love. It's awesome thing.

Male teachers will of course tend to be more rational and less lovey-dovey. Matt Kahn being an obvious exception to the rule.

24 minutes ago, Emerald said:

If it's the one I'm thinking about, it's because he's probably gay.

No, the guy I was talking about is celibate. Gandhi-style.

[Emerald]

25 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

No, the guy I was talking about is celibate. Gandhi-style.

Okay. But is it Shinzen Young? I'm sure he has the iron-clad discipline to be celibate. I'm not questioning that. But he also has always pinged on my gaydar. So, perhaps practicing celibacy with a hot wife is not as much of a challenge for him as it would be for others.