Is my understanding of the Spiral Dynamics stages accurate?

[StardewValley]

It's been bugging me that I can't distinguish between green, yellow, and turquoise so well. What bugs me the most is that all of them are described as being spiritual, but I can't distinguish what's the difference in their spirituality. Here is my best guess of what they all mean:

Orange people value free speech and freedom to do what you want as long as you're not hurting anybody else (mainly physically). They tend to have rationalist, secular, reductionist minds. They tend to have a simple way of viewing the world when compared to Yellow. A yellow person might look at social media and see it as making people addicted to the dopamine hits they get from every notification; an Orange person would think that this theory is nonsense and that people only get addicted to drugs and alchohol - not simple things like social media. A yellow person might see a homeless person and blame multiple factors in his life, such as genetic inclination or poor economy, rather than blaming him directly; and orange person would blame the homeless person directly and not consider such factors.

Green people still mainly think in this simple, reductionist way. The main difference is not in how they think, but their values. Green people's values have shifted towards making everyone feel good about themselves and having equal rights. Liberal college students come to my mind, along with cool, hip adults who are friendly with everyone. They are generally just normal people except they're the ones who are friendly to everybody without discrimination. Some green people are open to spiritual things such as meditation and psychedelics now, but not all of them. Lastly, green people mainly work just to pay bills and don't have much aspiration for themselves. They might support equal rights and go to protests and start charities, but they aren't very interested in personal success. Life purpose and self-actualization don't really come to mind for green people. 

Yellow people want to make the world a better place too, but they do it by making themselves successful. What they want is to grow themselves and to see their growth naturally help the people around them. For example, Leo grows himself by following his dream of raising people's awareness. He is self-actualizing himself by going on this journey, benefiting himself, but it also helps humanity out as a by-product. Success is defined by yellow people as making a positive impact on the world, as opposed to Orange's success which was about having a good job and living comfortably. Like Green, some people are open to spiritual things such as psychedelics and the Law of Attraction, but not necessarily so. Somehow at this stage, Yellow people become open to systems thinking (what I described Orange as lacking), although I don't see the connection between systems thinking and self-actualization. 

Turquoise people are the ones who say things such as "your only job is to love whatever is presented to you in the current moment" or "true change is within; leave the outside as it is." The boundary between you and the world starts to break down; what goes on inside of you changes the outside world, and the outside world seems to be testing you or playing a game with you. This is my best guess of what Turquoise is like.

[CreamCat]

I think the claim that Green people are as reductionist as Orange people is quite close to the truth. Yellow people tend to consider multiple factors because they think integratively. Yellow people are systemic thinkers.

It seems that Tier 1 stages of Spiral Dynamics are reductionist with different values.

I don't know about the rest.

Edited August 17, 2018 by CreamCat

[Leo Gura]

The biggest difference between Green and Yellow is that Green believes its value system of equality for all should be universal, but Yellow understands it is just another perspective. Also, Yellow is self-aware of the stages whereas Green is not. Green believes it must conquer all the lower stages whereas Yellow understands that all stages have their place and that the entire Spiral has a purpose. Green tends to demonize lower stages whereas Yellow is above that.

Yellow tries to guide people up the Spiral whereas Green tries to get everyone to become Green. Green does not understand that a Blue person cannot become Green without first living through Orange.

[CreamCat]

9 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Green believes its value system of equality for all should be universal

It seems to me that Green still believes some people are more equal than others. Some Orange people think the rich are more equal than the poor in the perspective of the laws. The one with more money wins at the court of law because the rich are more equal than the rest.

I used to be neurotic about enforcing equality for all. At some point, you realize that equality of outcome becomes unfair. This made me question equality. Equality is not the ultimate value Green thinks it is. Reality is more complex than equality.

Perhaps, equality is just a myth like the myth of physical atom.

Edited August 17, 2018 by CreamCat

[Leo Gura]

@CreamCat Equality means: those who are part of a historically, systemically oppressed group, should no longer be oppressed.

Like, gay people should stop being demonized and denied jobs.

Or black people should not get shot by police for sneezing.

There is obvious discrimination which needs to be addressed.

[RendHeaven]

41 minutes ago, Feel Good said:

Reality is not complex at all. It's thinking that makes it appear complex. Reality is nothing. 

Lol sorry. "Reality is not complex" is a SORE understatement. If anything, the less you use your mind the more complexity is revealed to you. That complexity might go full circle and morph into simplicity, yes, but it is still complex nonetheless.

[RendHeaven]

1 minute ago, Feel Good said:

For you, maybe. For me, no.

Uh oh. Make sure you're not just regurgitating nonduality jargon Leo's told you. If you've had profound awakenings of your own, awesome. But I can see some ego doing the talking here

Don't make the mistake of proclaiming outright that existence is "not real." You don't actually know this. It's real and unreal superimposed upon each other at the same time. If you experience this directly, you might find it delightfully simple. But that in itself is complexity.

Remember, we're talking about literal infinity here! OF COURSE it's complex. And OF COURSE it's simple. It HAS to be both!

Try not to settle on definitive conclusions about reality, that's a telltale sign of delusion.

[Leo Gura]

2 hours ago, Feel Good said:

The problem green has is people taking orange to unhealthy extremes. 

But that too is part of Orange.

You can't have Orange without excesses any more than you can have a baby who doesn't poo.

Every stage will have its excesses, and that is part of the package of growing up. People do stupid and selfish things out of ignorance and lack of development.

[CreamCat]

18 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

You can't have Orange without excesses any more than you can have a baby who doesn't poo.

That's an apt analogy. People shitting with their ideologies.

[Joseph Maynor]

39 minutes ago, Feel Good said:

Take caution with studying spiral dynamics. It can make you blind to things. 

A CAVEAT FOR SPIRAL DYNAMICS IN PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT WORK

It's almost like you wanna write out the Spiral Dynamics map in detail and then crumple it up and burn it afterwards.  It's paradoxical.  It does give you some awareness, but you don't wanna cling to it either.  It can get you rigidly defining things which puts you back into Paradigm City.  And that's no good for Enlightenment Work.  But at the same time, it's good for Conceptual Understanding though.  It's useful to have some big-picture models.  It can cause you to have insights about your own life too, which is valuable.  If you don't know where you're going, chances are you'll never get there.  Spiral Dynamics increases awareness in that way.  Spiral Dynamics is much more of a tool in Conceptual Understanding Work than it is in Enlightenment Work.  A lot of Enlightened people don't do enough Conceptual Understanding Work and they stay at Stage Green as a result due to their lack of awareness.

Edited August 17, 2018 by Joseph Maynor

[CreamCat]

6 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

@CreamCat Equality means: those who are part of a historically, systemically oppressed group, should no longer be oppressed.

Like, gay people should stop being demonized and denied jobs.

Or black people should not get shot by police for sneezing.

There is obvious discrimination which needs to be addressed.

@Leo Gura That's a great definition. But, beware professional victims who are mostly psychopaths. Psychopaths(Red) know how to speak the language of Green. Psychopaths mimick other people by recording their emotions and their words. Psychopaths are intraspecies predators. You probably met them a lot in your life.

Edited August 17, 2018 by CreamCat

[Key Elements]

From my observations, the difference between green and yellow is mainly green could become too ideal. That's the drawback of green. If you, for example, talk to a fully green person without the yellow, you could relate to him/her on topics like the environment, pets, peaceful music, etc., whatever we talked about on the stage green thread, but if you go beyond that and get too profound, they won't be able to relate. If you try talking to them about entrepreneurship without being corrupt (to the environment or whatever), they might still think you're greedy without researching what's entrepreneurship. They will not take the effort to research the combination of new ideas or be open-minded to it. Another example: if you're moving to another country that they don't know or like and you tell them, they won't be able to relate. If things get too profound, they won't get it. They'll be shocked.

The main difference between yellow and turquoise, imo, is that yellows tend to overthink. Also, turquoise is much more open-minded and less likely to overlook things, esp profound stuff. When presented with profound info, a turquoise will not just reject it and pass it off. Turquoise, "I might be wrong; there must be a good reason why that particular person is saying that. I wonder if I could get to the bottom of it." A turquoise's advice on your spiritual path is one without a bias judgement, and the turquoise person knows your path well enough and profound enough to give you a sound advice or sound information if you ask for it. If not, then the person will be honest enough to let you know. You got to be very deep along your path for this person to meet you along the way or where you're at. 

 

[StardewValley]

On 8/17/2018 at 0:48 AM, Leo Gura said:

The biggest difference between Green and Yellow is that Green believes its value system of equality for all should be universal, but Yellow understands it is just another perspective. Also, Yellow is self-aware of the stages whereas Green is not. Green believes it must conquer all the lower stages whereas Yellow understands that all stages have their place and that the entire Spiral has a purpose. Green tends to demonize lower stages whereas Yellow is above that.

Yellow tries to guide people up the Spiral whereas Green tries to get everyone to become Green. Green does not understand that a Blue person cannot become Green without first living through Orange.

I disagree. I think that the difference between green and yellow is that green wants to make the world a better place and loses sight of its own self-expression. Green is so focused on helping people that it does not express its own potential. There is a lack of life purpose and passion because it is lost to helping others. Yellow have a sense of purpose in life such as beauty, truth, or possibly helping people but only because they truly want to. 

[StardewValley]

On 8/17/2018 at 0:48 AM, Leo Gura said:

The biggest difference between Green and Yellow is that Green believes its value system of equality for all should be universal, but Yellow understands it is just another perspective. Also, Yellow is self-aware of the stages whereas Green is not. Green believes it must conquer all the lower stages whereas Yellow understands that all stages have their place and that the entire Spiral has a purpose. Green tends to demonize lower stages whereas Yellow is above that.

Yellow tries to guide people up the Spiral whereas Green tries to get everyone to become Green. Green does not understand that a Blue person cannot become Green without first living through Orange.

Are you talking about pluralistic harmony? You mean that green wants harmony for everybody but only on green's terms (convert everyone to green), whereas tier 2 wants harmony between everyone's stages, religions, political systems etc?