Great Interview w/Ken Wilber on Ego Development

[purerogue]

1 hour ago, David Hammond said:

I don't think he does understand enlightenment. His integral model isn't about realization. Psychotherapy has absolutely nothing to do with enlightenment. Psychotherapy is a dogma, it never came from consciousness. That's not to say he hasn't helped people, but he can't help a person become realized. He even says so himself.

I think his point was that sometimes you need to strengthen personality, because it can be very difficult to progress in spirituality, I think he gave good enough explanation at the beginning of video what he means by it, because people get confused why you would want to build on top of personality , if your goal is to transcend it, which is very confusing for most , theoretically it is true that you job is to transcend attachment, not personality itself, but sometimes it can be extremely hard  if you do not posses certain traits that can loosen up your attachment to other trait.

[David Hammond]

@purerogue Have you done any psychotherapy? 

[David Hammond]

@purerogue I think it's wise to read more wilber because you will see he contradicts himself on this point. He says in one volume of work that psychotherapy can develop an orange ego, but in another volume he says that psychotherapy cannot move one up the stages - Only mediation or non dual experiences can. That in and of itself should rise a massive red flag. 

Don beck and Chris Cowan don't support him. He has endorsed abusive unenlightned cult gurus like Andrew Cohen and didn't even notice how Cohen was treating his students. He wrote about Adi Da and endorsed his teaching too. I don't want to sound like a gossip, just go research it for yourself and then decide from your own heart if you think ken wilber is worth listening to

 

Read a bit more. 

Edited April 16, 2019 by David Hammond

[purerogue]

7 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

@purerogue Have you done any psychotherapy? 

 

2 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

@purerogue I think it's wise to read more wilber because you will see he contradicts himself on this point. He says in one volume of work that psychotherapy can develop an orange ego, but in another volume he says that psychotherapy cannot move one up the stages - Only mediation or non dual experiences can. That in and of itself should rise a massive red flag. 

Read a bit more. 

I am not here to defend all of his work, I was just commenting on this particular video.

I have not done any psychotherapy, never felt need to, you are probably going now in direction of how much bs there is in this profession and how it is matter of luck if you are going to get psychotherapist who actually has deep knowledge of human psychology and is there to help, not just for money and following written rules of identifying  "mental illnesses" , making drug  prescriptions for them.

Or how lots of them use silly methods that do not deal with problem, but are more of a affirmation methods.  

[kieranperez]

24 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

Only mediation or non dual experiences can. That in and of itself should rise a massive red flag. 

This is why I call you guys non dual keyboard warriors. 

Thats not true at all. You can meet many enlightened people who are awake as fuck in India who are still very ethnocentric Stage Blue people. You understand that Albert Einstein didn’t reach Yellow by having nondual experiences. You realize this right? Spiral Dynamics is about how your sense of self becomes more and more all inclusive and yes that does eventually lead require spiritual work once you reach higher stages in order to keep developing. This idea (and it is an idea - false one at that) that the only way you go from say Orange to Green is through enlightenment experiences is just flat out not true. Go to San Francisco where I live and you tell me that these people needed a nondual experience to go to Green lol. Do you understand that you still have a self? It’s not who are you but you have one. Spiral Dynamics is tracking how all inclusive that is. What @purerogue is saying about Wilber is correct. Psychotherapy today is largely a very Green practice these days with practices like DBT, CBT, etc. These practices actually help a lot of people move into Green. You can see that transformation in people and then people more open to love, self-acceptance and even more compassionate and soft with other people and also more open to the relativity and pluralism which is actually very much needed for A LOT of Stage Orange & Blue people. 

Wilber acknowledges this and this is what he’s addressing. Psychotherapy helps really ramp people in their awareness in the lower stages. Also it’s a necessary tool and there’s DOZENS of psycbotherapeutic techniques that work great in conjunction with deep spiritual work in the modern day. 

You have a self. You always will have a self so long as you operate in this relative world of illusion. Or we can call it embodied perspective. It’s not what you are but you have it and will have it until this self “dies.” If you want to be in denial of that, be my guest lol. How all inclusive is it? How many shadows does it have? How ideological is it? What beliefs are still there? What emotional buttons does it have? Enlightenment experiences and even liberation does not grant human perfection upon you. You can be deeply enlightened and still be an emotional child. 

Psycbotherapy has its problems and it’s blunders in the way it’s practiced and by the practitioners themselves. Granted. So are spiritual teachers though. If you think there isn’t bullshit in spirituality and even spiritual masters, man... would that be a joke lol. 

Edited April 16, 2019 by kieranperez

[David Hammond]

21 minutes ago, purerogue said:

 

I am not here to defend all of his work, I was just commenting on this particular video.

I have not done any psychotherapy, never felt need to, you are probably going now in direction of how much bs there is in this profession and how it is matter of luck if you are going to get psychotherapist who actually has deep knowledge of human psychology and is there to help, not just for money and following written rules of identifying  "mental illnesses" , making drug  prescriptions for them.

Or how lots of them use silly methods that do not deal with problem, but are more of a affirmation methods.  

Therapy, even existential therapy does not strengthen the witness. It's a dogmatic belief system. You want to know the best kind of therapy? Do nothing meditation. It's actually a scientifically sound method for dealing with thoughts and traumas. Talk therapy is pointless. But ken is unaware of this, and unaware of many things.

[David Hammond]

29 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

This is why I call you guys non dual keyboard warriors. 

Thats not true at all. You can meet many enlightened people who are awake as fuck in India who are still very ethnocentric Stage Blue people. You understand that Albert Einstein didn’t reach Yellow by having nondual experiences. You realize this right? Spiral Dynamics is about how your sense of self becomes more and more all inclusive and yes that does eventually lead require spiritual work once you reach higher stages in order to keep developing. This idea (and it is an idea - false one at that) that the only way you go from say Orange to Green is through enlightenment experiences is just flat out not true. Go to San Francisco where I live and you tell me that these people needed a nondual experience to go to Green lol. Do you understand that you still have a self? It’s not who are you but you have one. Spiral Dynamics is tracking how all inclusive that is. What @purerogue is saying about Wilber is correct. Psychotherapy today is largely a very Green practice these days with practices like DBT, CBT, etc. These practices actually help a lot of people move into Green. You can see that transformation in people and then people more open to love, self-acceptance and even more compassionate and soft with other people and also more open to the relativity and pluralism which is actually very much needed for A LOT of Stage Orange & Blue people. 

Wilber acknowledges this and this is what he’s addressing. Psychotherapy helps really ramp people in their awareness in the lower stages. Also it’s a necessary tool and there’s DOZENS of psycbotherapeutic techniques that work great in conjunction with deep spiritual work in the modern day. 

You have a self. You always will have a self so long as you operate in this relative world of illusion. Or we can call it embodied perspective. It’s not what you are but you have it and will have it until this self “dies.” If you want to be in denial of that, be my guest lol. How all inclusive is it? How many shadows does it have? How ideological is it? What beliefs are still there? What emotional buttons does it have? Enlightenment experiences and even liberation does not grant human perfection upon you. You can be deeply enlightened and still be an emotional child. 

Psycbotherapy has its problems and it’s blunders in the way it’s practiced and by the practitioners themselves. Granted. So are spiritual teachers though. If you think there isn’t bullshit in spirituality and even spiritual masters, man... would that be a joke lol. 

Dude, none of this is coming from your direct experience, is it? You're talking about ideas about ideas. So what is the point? 

"You can be deeply enlightened and an emotional child". This is an oxymoron and indicitive of how disconnected ken wilber is. Where did you get this from? One of ken wilbers books? 

 

[Forestluv]

@kieranperez I think he makes an interesting point about ego deconstruction and construction. And how he relates both to reaching "witness + object" states of awareness. I hadn't thought about how ego construction can be used to reach entry levels of "witness + object". From that space, I can see how a "witness + object" state of consciousness could arise in which it is very difficult to see one's own egoic framework. The subjective experience would be "witness + object", which would seem like an awakened state. 

I think Rupert Spira describes a similar dynamic which he refers to as "enlightened duality". It describes it as a halfway point. Wilbur also seems to be describing it as an intermediate level.

Thanks for sharing the video.

[David Hammond]

46 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

This is why I call you guys non dual keyboard warriors. 

Thats not true at all. You can meet many enlightened people who are awake as fuck in India who are still very ethnocentric Stage Blue people. You understand that Albert Einstein didn’t reach Yellow by having nondual experiences. You realize this right? Spiral Dynamics is about how your sense of self becomes more and more all inclusive and yes that does eventually lead require spiritual work once you reach higher stages in order to keep developing. This idea (and it is an idea - false one at that) that the only way you go from say Orange to Green is through enlightenment experiences is just flat out not true. Go to San Francisco where I live and you tell me that these people needed a nondual experience to go to Green lol. Do you understand that you still have a self? It’s not who are you but you have one. Spiral Dynamics is tracking how all inclusive that is. What @purerogue is saying about Wilber is correct. Psychotherapy today is largely a very Green practice these days with practices like DBT, CBT, etc. These practices actually help a lot of people move into Green. You can see that transformation in people and then people more open to love, self-acceptance and even more compassionate and soft with other people and also more open to the relativity and pluralism which is actually very much needed for A LOT of Stage Orange & Blue people. 

Wilber acknowledges this and this is what he’s addressing. Psychotherapy helps really ramp people in their awareness in the lower stages. Also it’s a necessary tool and there’s DOZENS of psycbotherapeutic techniques that work great in conjunction with deep spiritual work in the modern day. 

You have a self. You always will have a self so long as you operate in this relative world of illusion. Or we can call it embodied perspective. It’s not what you are but you have it and will have it until this self “dies.” If you want to be in denial of that, be my guest lol. How all inclusive is it? How many shadows does it have? How ideological is it? What beliefs are still there? What emotional buttons does it have? Enlightenment experiences and even liberation does not grant human perfection upon you. You can be deeply enlightened and still be an emotional child. 

Psycbotherapy has its problems and it’s blunders in the way it’s practiced and by the practitioners themselves. Granted. So are spiritual teachers though. If you think there isn’t bullshit in spirituality and even spiritual masters, man... would that be a joke lol. 

You know, when you get lost on this stuff you might not ever find your way out of it.

If every single person became enlightened on the planet today, they would all have access to timeless enlightenment principles - not this stuff. Think about that for a while. 

[kieranperez]

14 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

Therapy, even existential therapy does not strengthen the witness. It's a dogmatic belief system. You want to know the best kind of therapy? Do nothing meditation. It's actually a scientifically sound method for dealing with thoughts and traumas. Talk therapy is pointless. But ken is unaware of this, and unaware of many things.

I’m very thankful you’re not in a position where you’re in a position where people suicidal and truly struggling from certain traumas and what not are paying you for their help because you could literally ruin peoples lives. You can listen to the same thing from people like Shinzen Young, Adyashanti, Leo, etc. 

But of course, when your dogmatic over your positions, you don’t care what evidence is presented to you. Just like a theist who doesn’t want to admit and introspect into God as a belief system that they’ve been indoctrinated in or tbeg indoctrinated themselves in. Or like some nondual keyboard jockey Zen Devil who thinks enlightenment is all there is and all those suffering egos who may have been abused as a kid or bullied or had a rough household just need to sit down shut up and meditate to solve all their problems. That’s a belief system and a false one at that.

Your worldview is black and white. You lack compassion. You lack depth. You lack epistemic introspection. You lack big picture understanding. 

Do you understand Buddha was not some multicultural relativistic dude that understand the arbitrary nature of gender roles? Do you understand Buddha didn’t even know he lived on a planet? This doesn’t diminish his impact. He left an extordinary impact. Understand Buddha today would NOT be fully enlightened. 

4 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

If every single person became enlightened on the planet today, they would all have access to timeless enlightenment principles

Except they wouldn’t LOL. I suggest you read more about how corrupt even nondua masters can be lol. Read about the history of Mt. Hiei in the Marathon Monks book. You can still enlightened and commit atrocities. 

Joshu Sasaki Roshi was a HIGHLY advanced Zen master who was a Zen master for over 70 YEARS and just took it deeper and deeper. Even people like Shinzen Young talk about how awake this guy was. Despite all that, in 2007 he finally was called out in his late 90s for decades of groping women and fondling their tits in the name of dharma BECAUSE THATS WHAT THE MIND DOES. You can be incredibly spiritually awake and still have an immature juvenile embodied perspective or ego that has not developed much. 

How many more examples do you need of advanced enlightened masters and other enlightened people who’ve abused their power and commit atrocities? Enlightenment does not solve that. Call it whatever you want. That’s a fantasy you have. 

17 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

You're talking about ideas about ideas. So what is the point? 

Notice how you backwards rationalize all that’s presented to you as “just ideas”. Clever how devilry creeps in after an awakening some glimpses into the nondual  ... assuming you’ve even gone that far.

7 minutes ago, Serotoninluv said:

@kieranperez I think he makes an interesting point about ego deconstruction and construction. And how he relates both to reaching "witness + object" states of awareness. I hadn't thought about how ego construction can be used to reach entry levels of "witness + object". I find it to be an interesting view. Thanks for sharing the video.

My point exactly. No problem.

[David Hammond]

@kieranperez

2 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

I’m very thankful you’re not in a position where you’re in a position where people suicidal and truly struggling from certain traumas and what not are paying you for their help because you could literally ruin peoples lives. You can listen to the same thing from people like Shinzen Young, Adyashanti, Leo, etc. 

But of course, when your dogmatic over your positions, you don’t care what evidence is presented to you. Just like a theist who doesn’t want to admit and introspect into God as a belief system that they’ve been indoctrinated in or tbeg indoctrinated themselves in. Or like some nondual keyboard jockey Zen Devil who thinks enlightenment is all there is and all those suffering egos who may have been abused as a kid or bullied or had a rough household just need to sit down shut up and meditate to solve all their problems. That’s a belief system and a false one at that.

Your worldview is black and white. You lack compassion. You lack depth. You lack epistemic introspection. You lack big picture understanding. 

Do you understand Buddha was not some multicultural relativistic dude that understand the arbitrary nature of gender roles? Do you understand Buddha didn’t even know he lived on a planet? This doesn’t diminish his impact. He left an extordinary impact. Understand Buddha today would NOT be fully enlightened. 

Except they wouldn’t LOL. I suggest you read more about how corrupt even nondua masters can be lol. Read about the history of Mt. Hiei in the Marathon Monks book. You can still enlightened and commit atrocities. 

Joshu Sasaki Roshi was a HIGHLY advanced Zen master who was a Zen master for over 70 YEARS and just took it deeper and deeper. Even people like Shinzen Young talk about how awake this guy was. Despite all that, in 2007 he finally was called out in his late 90s for decades of groping women and fondling their tits in the name of dharma BECAUSE THATS WHAT THE MIND DOES. You can be incredibly spiritually awake and still have an immature juvenile embodied perspective or ego that has not developed much. 

How many more examples do you need of advanced enlightened masters and other enlightened people who’ve abused their power and commit atrocities? Enlightenment does not solve that. Call it whatever you want. That’s a fantasy you have. 

Notice how you backwards rationalize all that’s presented to you as “just ideas”. Clever how devilry creeps in after an awakening some glimpses into the nondual  ... assuming you’ve even gone that far.

My point exactly. No problem.

But I'm not the one who is attached and feels a need to verbally attack people because they criticize a teacher I follow. Am I?

Think about that also. What has tbis ideology actually done for YOU personally? 

You're regurgitating ideas about ideas about ideas and imagining you calling someone else out where you think they embody your maze of projections.

That's my 2 cents of feedback for you. 

[kieranperez]

11 minutes ago, David Hammond said:

@kieranperez

But I'm not the one who is attached and feels a need to verbally attack people because they criticize a teacher I follow. Am I?

Think about that also. What has tbis ideology actually done for YOU personally? 

You're regurgitating ideas about ideas about ideas and imagining you calling someone else out where you think they embody your maze of projections.

That's my 2 cents of feedback for you. 

Dude... I’m calling out your bullshit ideas, fantasies, and dogmas. I don’t know you at all. You think because I’m direct and don’t play coy that I have some emotional vestment in you. 

Every time you’re thoroughly called out, even with evidence that you yourself can clarify for yourself for you’re honest and you introspect, you go regurgitate “it’s all ideas” and how I’m “attacking you”. I’m not here to prove anything to you though. If you don’t want to learn and empty your cup, that’s your problem. That’s your job to discover the proof for yourself. Not my job. 

I  don’t play games and I don’t care to treat a pile of bullshit fantasies as anything other than that - bullshit fantasies. I don’t need to respect bullshit.

I have direct experience with how therapy done effectively (and it’s often not - I have HUGE qualms with the health care industry... don’t even get me started on that. So I have no side in this) can transform a person because I’ve been there for me and also in DOZENS of people. I’ve seen directly how group therapy can radically transform and widen a persons point of view. This isn’t a silly theory for me. This isn’t an idea for me. It is FOR YOU clearly and yeah I don’t really care to caress your bullshit. You can be a great guy to hang out with. I’m sure you’re a sweetheart in your intentions but that doesn’t excuse dogma.

I’m done here. 

Mods, feel free to close this thread. Apologies if this got off topic. This thread clearly doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. 

[David Hammond]

@kieranperez Just want to ask you one more thing buddy.

You mention all these realized masters who had big egos (really strange concept!) But why do you assume that Ken wilbers work will solve these "issues"?

Ken wilber contradicts himself a lot, and 2 of his own spiritual leaders were taken down by their own people. Cohen was taken down by his ashram and genpo roshi had his monk title removed from him.

You have basically joined a cult.

[David Hammond]

1 minute ago, kieranperez said:

Dude... I’m calling out your bullshit ideas, fantasies, and dogmas. I don’t know you at all. You think because I’m direct and don’t play coy that I have some emotional vestment in you. 

Every time you’re thoroughly called out, even with evidence that you yourself can clarify for yourself for you’re honest and you introspect, you go regurgitate “it’s all ideas” and how I’m “attacking you”. I’m not here to prove anything to you though. If you don’t want to learn and empty your cup, that’s your problem. That’s your job to discover the proof for yourself. Not my job. 

I  don’t play games and I don’t care to treat a pile of bullshit fantasies as anything other than that - bullshit fantasies. I don’t need to respect bullshit.

I have direct experience with how therapy done effectively (and it’s often not - I have HUGE qualms with the health care industry... don’t even get me started on that. So I have no side in this) can transform a person because I’ve been there for me and also in DOZENS of people. I’ve seen directly how group therapy can radically transform and widen a persons point of view. This isn’t a silly theory for me. This isn’t an idea for me. It is FOR YOU clearly and yeah I don’t really care to caress your bullshit. You can be a great guy to hang out with. I’m sure you’re a sweetheart in your intentions but that doesn’t excuse dogma.

I’m done here. 

Mods, feel free to close this thread. Apologies if this got off topic. This thread clearly doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. 

I can see you have done a lot of therapy. 

You kind of prove my point in a way. You're a few biscuits short of a barrel

 

[David Hammond]

@kieranperez So I have a few question marks over ken wilbers work (and how it resembles nothing of reality and doesn't resonate with any timeless spiritual teaching on the planet) and you verbally attack me because I say wilber got his philosophy from smoking weed and I'm the dogmatic one? 

 

[David Hammond]

@kieranperez I was perfectly happy to have a civil discussion about ken wilber. Still Am. But you had to make it personal. 

Another great amdertisement for therapy and the integral model! 

 

[David Hammond]

4 hours ago, kieranperez said:

@David Hammond your ignorance and arrogance is nauseating

 

3 hours ago, kieranperez said:

Nondual keyboard warriors infest another post LOL...

I’m out ✌?

 

3 hours ago, kieranperez said:

All your down is projecting your own lack of introspection and deluding yourself. You’re the only one your fooling. I’d put money down you haven’t read Wilber’s books. Hell, I’d even bet you didn’t even listen to the interview. Even if you have though, so long as you cling to your nondual elitist fantasies and beliefs (and what you’re regurgitating are beliefs and fantasies. Not going to play coy with your nonsense) you’re not in a position to learn anything. Empty your cup. 

 

3 hours ago, kieranperez said:

That’s your projection right there. You actually think I even have some sort of master LOL. 

What you’re calling “intuition” in this case is just your egoic biases because your little character likes to stroked with nondual talk and fantasies. 

Again, you’re only deluding yourself and projecting your stuff on me. I have no master. I am no master. 

I’m DIRECT. I have no emotional barring on you. I don’t know you. You don’t know me. If you don’t want to learn, your problem at the end of the day (in the end it’s the worlds problem but that’s another rabbit hole). I’m direct because a lot of you nondual keyboard warriors spout a lot of zen devilry on here and its nauseating and yeah I don’t play coy that much when I see that. 

But of course, you spout your nonsense and then I call you out on it and then you try to play the nondual cool front like I’m trying to bash you or something and that you’re above such “antics”. I’m sure you’re a nice guy who means well. I’m calling out your behavior. I’m calling your fantasies and beliefs and ignprance. It has nothing to do with you. 

I stopped there.

You really think that this delivery doesn't resemble a personal attack?

Calling out my ideas looks like what I purerogue did. He talked about the ideas and came with his own ideas so we can both chew. He said nothing of me. He didn't call me names. And he didn't spew a bitter diatribe.

Come one dude, who are you kidding? You really can't see how aggressive you have been?

Not that it has offended me, but I just can't take you seriously or ken seriously when you say you have not been personal when you clearly have been personal.

If you had done any real consciousness work you wouldn't be lying to yourself like this. 

 

[outlandish]

@kieranperez cool video, thanks.

[DnoReally]

The video is a snippet from an Audiobook called Kosmic Consciousness (very recommended btw)

[Leo Gura]

Ken has a very robust grasp of awakening and nonduality, and much more.

His work is not just about awakening, it is about stages of development and various kinds of pathologies in this work.

Awakening is independent of one's stage of development. Both are important. To awaken but still be stuck at a low level of development is very common and dangerous.

If your teaching only emphasizes awakening and nothing else, it is a narrow and incomplete teaching which will produce a lot of problems if it's taught to lots of people.

Stages of development are extremely important and yet they are virtually unknown to most teachers and traditional teachings. Which is why so many spiritual practioners come out half-baked.

You cannot understand stages of development by sitting on a meditation cushion, even if you are the best meditator in the world. Introspection is not enough.