Christoph is a native of Switzerland, where he studied, as an undergraduate, psychology, philosophy and religion. At age twenty-five, he left his country and arrived in the United States with the intention to become a Zen Buddhist monk. Two years later, he was compelled to leave that path and thereafter took up the study of Sufism under the tutelage of an Iranian master teacher. This was followed by a year-long sojourn through India and his engagement with Tibetan Buddhism. Read more on his website sourcepointintegral.com

Integral from
the Inside-Out

Or the Center of Gravity of Human Development

Christoph Schaub

This essay is dedicated to Ken Wilber, who has been like a mirror for this writer. Mirrors don't talk; they simply reflect “what is.” That which is seen in a mirror isn't our interpretation thereof, which is mere commentary. Seeing transcends language; seeing is immediate; seeing is meeting in spirit. Seeing is to re-cognize that our reflection held by a mirror isn't us, nor a representation of who we are. Seeing is the driving element of human development, called insight.

Introduction

Being human is an intricate affair that encompasses all aspects of life—our immediate experience and interpretation thereof, as well as our relationship to and our embeddedness in it. Our immediate experience of life is always subjective, no matter how highly evolved we are; our immediate experience is always partial, no matter how enlightened we are. Likewise, our interpretation of our immediate experience is always objective and always individual, in contrast to relating, which is inter-subjective. Relating takes place in-between; relating is dialogical, which speaks to the inter-dependent arising of creation that is selfless in nature. The same applies to our intrinsic wakefulness, which lies at the source of consciousness—the structure or matrix that both contains and defines us. Consciousness is co-creative and, to that end, inter-objective. Consciousness is the operating system of our manifest existence; consciousness is language-in-action or, said differently, language-in-action is what consciousness amounts to in regard to our humanity.

It is natural that we experience, make meaning of, relate to and apprehend life according to the stage of consciousness we have evolved to, both as an individual and a collective. If it were otherwise, our life would be in chaos. The collective isn't the greater whole of individuals; the collective doesn't transcend and include the individual; the collective is the greater whole we co-create through our inter-dependent relationships in body, mind and spirit. The collective is as integral to our individual being as our individual being is to the inter-dependent arising of creation. The collective and the individual belong together like agency and communion, knowledge and wisdom, energy and matter. In essence, the collective and the individual are the same, but different, just like men and women are the same in consciousness, but different in form. Becoming conscious of such distinctions is a natural process of our human development. To dispense with them doesn't facilitate insight, but simply allows us to remain ignorant, causing us to confuse the adual experience of a baby with the non-dual apprehension of a mature person. This is like judging our human reality as absolute, relative to that of God, Emptiness or the like. Ultimate and relative truths are two sides of the same coin, while “what is” is neither ultimate, nor relative truth; it simply is. “What is” is can not be owned by you and me, us and them, nor all of us; “what is” isn't a concept we can study or a philosophy we can propagate. We can only awaken to it; awaken to our intrinsic wakefulness of consciousness or the selfless reflection held by a mirror.

Integral from the Inside-Out

What do we relate “integral” to when referencing it? Is it a map of consciousness; a perspective; a stage of human development; a cultural movement; or a philosophy, according to which we make meaning or interpret “what is?” Do we refrain from defining our use of “integral” and, if so, why would we do that? Is it due to lack of knowledge, understanding, wisdom, awareness, insight or is it simply because this question has never faced us? Similarly, from what quadrant and direction do we approach “integral” when relating to it? Irrespective of how we make meaning and put “integral” into perspective, “integral” is partial, which is why such questions matter. Our apprehension of “integral” changes according to the direction we approach it from, as illustrated in the following graphics:

The distinctions between the outside-in and inside-out approach to “integral” may appear subtle at first, yet they become more pronounced when put further into perspective. Since Wilber's outside-in realization of “integral” has been articulated in his many books, the author of this essay will dispense with further elaborations on it and, instead, simply outline the inside-out awareness of “integral;” leaving it to the reader to discern the differences between these two perspectives, which are the same in consciousness, but different in form.

Our “I-” or “ego-based” experience is always subjective, which, strictly speaking, implies that we cannot take a perspective on it, because perspective-taking involves the objectification of our subjective experience. Objectifying our phenomenological reality of being is, fundamentally, a cognitive process, while the experience of our ego-derived existence pertains to awareness. Being aware of who we are is different than our interpretation thereof; for the latter neither simply expresses, nor reflects our awareness of who we are. “Me” isn't merely the translation of “I;” “me” isn't purely the outward representation of “I,” because “me” pertains to an altogether different aspect of reality than “I.” If our subjective experience were entirely congruent with our objective representation thereof, then we would be happier and more contented people than we actually are. “I” and “me” don't fit together the way we like to make ourselves believe; “I” and “me” relate to different realities of our human experience. “Me” is the outward conceptualization of my self-identity; just like “I' is the outward apprehension of my “ego,” the internal manifestation of my phenomenological experience. If I want to know what level of self-development I operate from, I can choose to take Susan Cook Greuter's sentence completion test. If, however, I want to assess my awareness of my phenomenological experience of being, I have no other choice than to consult the insights revealed by our spiritual or mystical traditions, which focus on the realization of our ego-based existence.

In contrast to our self-identity, which is developmental, because it is, fundamentally, conceptual, our ego doesn't evolve. Our ego is that which makes us the individual we are, to whom we can only awaken, because we can't become that which we already and always are. Awakening to our true nature doesn't render us egoless; on the contrary, it makes us aware of it. Becoming ego-aware is not to be confused with becoming self-aware, which happens in relationships. Self-awareness is derived from the realization of opposites; self-awareness is equally introspective, as it is dialogical. Self-awareness is both inter- and intra-personal, while it isn't individual. Self-awareness isn't monological, but an expression of the interdependent manifestations of relationships; self-awareness is collective, which can be as challenging to understand, as difficult it is to communicate the significance thereof in language. How we make meaning of “what is” is one thing; how we relate to it another. Relating not only takes place among, but also within us. Meaning-making doesn't speak to how we relate to ourselves; meaning-making involves how we interpret or conceptualize “what is,” according to the cognitive development we have evolved to and operate at, which is distinct from how we relate to ourselves. For example, if we prepare ourselves for a dinner date with a person who we value important, be it because we are physically attracted to them, mentally inspired by them and/or because we consider them instrumental in our own becoming, we tune, in preparation for this meeting, into our shared self-awareness, so to speak. Put differently, the simple thought or act to invite another for a dinner date is derived from our shared self-awareness and not from our self-identity or from our ego-based reality of being. Self-awareness lacks a nexus agency, in contrast to our individual reality. This is not to mean that self-awareness resides outside our individuality; self-awareness is both intra- as well as inter-personal; in other words, self-awareness is an integral aspect of our own being, which neither relates to our phenomenological, nor our psychological existence, but to our relational or inter-subjective awareness of being; the lower-left quadrant in Wilber's integral map of consciousness.

Self-awareness doesn't evolve, in the strict sense of the word; self-awareness increases in depth, just like our awareness of the ego increases in height, which means it becomes increasingly sublime, all the way to the realization of our true nature where we witness that the ego and God, or form and emptiness, as one. The ego is like an uncut diamond, which doesn't grow once removed from the earth; so too, the ego doesn't develop once it is born, but we can become increasingly aware of it, until we realize that “I and God” are one. Understanding that a diamond reflects the rays of the sun once it has been cut and polished isn't the same as actually cutting and polishing it ourselves, which involves some work. Becoming aware of our ego isn't facilitated by reading books about it or by being smart; becoming aware of our ego is facilitated by inquiring into who we are. Similarly, cultivating self-awareness isn't achieved by contemplating emptiness, but by learning to listen to what transpires in our intra- and inter-personal relationships. Listening is to relating what meditating is to the awakening to our ego; listening isn't a quality we are born with, but a propensity we can choose to develop, like a gardener tends to the seedlings in her flowerbed by providing them with what they need to become what they already and always are—a flower.

Listening is relational and the same applies to our self-awareness, which becomes increasingly inclusive the more we avail ourselves to merge into it, until self-awareness is all there is. Self-awareness is like a mighty river that runs within and between us. In order to let ourselves be carried by its current, we have no other choice than to step into it, and to do so we have to take off our clothes; otherwise we are weighted down and drown. Stepping into the river of self-awareness comes at the price of self-disclosure; stepping into the river of self-awareness requires that we show our face, which is how we acknowledge that “I am.” Acknowledging our interdependent manifestation of creation is the first step toward transcending our self-based existence; acknowledging that “I am” is the first step into the mighty river of self-awareness that runs within and between us; self-awareness is derived from acknowledging “what is.” Self-awareness is to our relational being what the ego is to our phenomenological experience and our self-identity is to our individual person. Confusing our self-identity with our self-awareness is confusing the upper right quadrant with the lower left in Wilber's integral map of consciousness, which amounts to a boundary violation that results in suffering.

Consciousness encompasses the manifest realm of our interdependent arising of creation, in contrast to the reality of our individual, ego-based or phenomenological existence, which relates to the eternal or the ever-present moment of being. Consciousness, like self-awareness, isn't self-based; if it were, the transcendence of self would be a mere dream or a bad joke. Consciousness is to our creation what the microcode is to a computer. On the one hand, the microcode of a computer constitutes its hardware, while, on the other, it is a numerical code. The same is true for consciousness, which, on the one hand, is the hardware or form of the interdependent manifestation of creation and, on the other, is language in action. Consciousness, in contrast to language, is purely structural, in nature. Consciousness, and its evolving stages, needs to be distinguished from our meaning-making or self-identity, which, simply put, is like our operating system, to continue the computer analogy. While most everyone can be trained to use a computer, not everyone can, nor would like to, write numerical computer codes; the same goes for how we, fundamentally, approach life. Some do so from the lower right quadrant or consciousness, as in the case of Wilber, while others approach it from the lower left, upper left or upper right quadrant. No quadrant excludes the others, yet this doesn't mean that we can reduce life to a singular quadrant, especially since all of them are integral to our human reality of being. Valuing spiritual realization over the cultivation of self-awareness doesn't prove us to be enlightened and knowing everything about integral philosophy doesn't mean that we are highly evolved in our self-identity.

Being human means drawing a line or becoming guilty; the price of being human is acknowledging that “I am.” Attempting to avoid our partiality doesn't make us more whole, it only leads us to self-righteousness. Whatever can be said will be misunderstood, yet, in spite of it, we are required to participate and, to that end, communicate our insights in language, regardless of what others do with it or how they interpret it. Life comes at a price and the same applies to awakening to our intrinsic wakefulness, which is easy to understand, but far more difficult to embody in reality, because to awaken to our intrinsic wakefulness comes at the expense of our belongingness.

Being highly evolved in one quadrant doesn't make us equally evolved in another. Understanding Wilber's integral philosophy doesn't mean that we have evolved to the stage of consciousness from which it is derived. Similarly, having the ability to assume multiple perspectives doesn't mean that we have ever stepped into the river of self-awareness. We can, as Wilber alludes to in Integral Spirituality, be highly conscious of our individual or phenomenological reality of being and equally aware in the realm of self-awareness, as in the case of the Dalai Lama, while the microcode of our manifest existence processes the mythic-rational stage of consciousness, in which case we might conclude, as the Dalai Lama did, that homosexuality is a sin or violates the sanctity of the Buddha-Dharma. Whether we wear a T-shirt with AQAL or Jesus written on it, or promote “integral” over Islam makes, essentially, no difference because, for those who can see and listen, our actions speak louder than the words we use to define them. Promoting is derived from or pertains to a particular stage of consciousness, irrespective of what we promote. For instance, once we realize that babies aren't brought by a stork, we don't continue searching the sky for them; instead, we may become interested in the reality of sex. Similarly, once we reach a certain stage of development, promoting our philosophy is simply out of the question, because it would violate our own integrity.

How we make meaning of or interpret “what is” is different than the structure of consciousness that informs our meaning-making, or how we put “what is” into perspective. For example, as a gifted writer, we may write a story that is not only read by millions of people across the spectrum of human development, but then becomes a classic for ages, like Shakespeare's Hamlet. This does not necessarily indicate, however, that this story is derived from an advanced stage of consciousness. The same applies, for instance, to Hitler's Third Reich ideology, which proved to be inspirational for millions of people; not just in Nazi Germany, but around the globe. This is a fact that tends to be gladly overlooked and hastily dismissed rather than acknowledged and owned, which leaves the people of Israel and Palestine to carry this unresolved burden; each fighting for their survival and right to exist, while failing to re-cognize the source of their discord. While this is not the subject of this paper, ask yourself this: Who is it that profits from the battle between the Arabs and Jews?

From the outside-in perspective—in other words, how Wilber expresses “integral” in language—cognition, or more precisely, re-cognition, is indeed the driving element that leads human development. This is not the case from the inside-out perspective, because re-cognition doesn't communicate anything, whereas insight does; as demonstrated by Wilber's integral philosophy, which doesn't deal with the cognitive aspect of “integral,” but instead focuses on the big picture. Wilber doesn't describe, as such, the structure of his own consciousness, but the insights gained from it and there is nothing wrong with this—quite the opposite. Cognition leads human development in the upper right quadrant, just like inquiry into our human nature facilitates the deepening of awareness of our ego-based existence in the upper left quadrant, as illustrated in the diagram below.

The purpose of this diagram is merely to graphically distinguish the different aspects of our being to avoid confusing our self-identity with our ontological experience, or our operational stage of consciousness with our self-awareness. The exterior dimension of self-awareness, which isn't displayed in the diagram above, increases in depth, inclusiveness and complexity in a likewise fashion to Don Beck's Spiral Dynamics model of cultural emergence. This is not to say that his is the only model that depicts this process, just as Cook-Greuter's sentence-completion test is not the only way to access the action-logic that defines one's meaning-making. These models just happen to be known to this writer who, in contrast to Wilber, is neither a pundit, nor a theoretician, but simply a person who inquires. Cook-Greuter's sentence-completion test doesn't disclose how aware we are of our self-identity, but rather how many perspectives are involved in our self-definition. A “strategist” or even an “ironist” can be as attached to their self-identity, as a “diplomat” or an “expert.” A “strategist” or “ironist” can take, however, more perspectives than a “diplomat” or an “expert” can; hence, their meaning-making is more complex and more inclusive, yet this doesn't say anything about their awareness of “what is.” “Strategists” and “ironists” tend to be as married to their perspective-taking as anyone else is, for better or worse. If, as an “ironist” I can only make meaning as an “ironist,” I will have difficulty communicating with anybody who hasn't evolved to this level of perspective-taking, in which case I would be had by my perspective-taking, rather than having it; and the same is true for all the previous action-logics.   Cook-Greuter's sentence-completion test, simply put, relates to the second-person zone, the conceptual perspective of our self-identity, or the meaning-making that is the objectified conceptualization of our immediate experience. The immediate experience referred to here is not to be confused with our phenomenological or ontological apprehension of being. Similarly, the cultural or exterior aspect of our self-awareness is not to be confused with its inter-personal and intra-personal zones. Bert Hellinger's constellation approach—which is as well-known to some people as Wilber's integral philosophy is to others—relates to the inter-personal dynamics of a social organism, be it family, business or nation, while Don Beck's Spiral Dynamics pertains to the cultural emergence thereof. This leaves the intra-personal aspect of self-awareness, which is rather difficult to communicate in language, especially since we are so accustomed to associating self-awareness with ourselves instead of the inter-subjective quadrant to which it actually relates and is derived from.

Self-awareness isn't simply cultivated by interacting with lots of people, which is a mere behavior. The cultivation of self-awareness is relational, which implies it is cultivated by inquiring into and becoming conscious of the relational aspect of our human being. For example, as I prepare myself for a dinner date with a person I care about, I'm not concerned about the master thesis I am in the process of writing, or how I will do at my presentation tomorrow at work. In other words, I utilize a different reality of my being when getting together with another person, be it in body, mind or spirit, which means I don't have to actually meet with another person in flesh to cultivate or step into the river of self-awareness. The ivory-tower mentality of academics speaks to the lack of stepping into this aspect of our being. Compassion isn't developed through study, but by learning to acknowledge and contain “what is.” Compassion isn't necessarily cultivated by sitting in a cave and meditating emptiness; likewise, having gained spiritual insight doesn't make us a compassionate person; many of our spiritual teachers and guides are proof for this statement. The cultivation and realization of compassion is what the intra-personal dimension of self-awareness is, essentially, all about. To map its increasing zones of embracing “what is” is beyond the capacity of this writer, hence, they are left unnamed in the diagrams.

Depending on the focus of our inquiry, we develop and, to that end, define and express ourselves differently. Practicing meditation won't gain us entry into Harvard and studying at Harvard doesn't give us insight into our ego-based or phenomenological reality of being. Becoming a scholar requires the cultivation of certain skills and the same applies to becoming a mystic or a theoretician, like Wilber. In an ideal or an integral world, theory and practice are valued equally, yet this isn't exactly the case in ours.

Neither compassion, nor human development can be mass engineered. Becoming aware of our ego, phenomenologically speaking, requires the cultivation of our spiritual nature; there is, quite frankly, no way around it. Knowing about our ego conceptually is like knowing about Einstein's theorem of relativity, which even for the majority of physicists remains beyond their practical understanding. Knowing about ourselves is not the same as being aware of who we are; knowing about ourselves speaks to our stories and myths we believe in and subscribe to; in short, it speaks to our self-identity, while it says nothing about the awareness of our true nature. It's presumptuous to think that we awaken to our intrinsic wakefulness simply by reaching a certain action-logic; this isn't the case. Similarly, being highly evolved in the spiritual realm doesn't mean that we are equally highly evolved in the cognitive one. The spiritual dimension of our being isn't merely a developmental line of our self-system, but, in essence, encompasses the entirety of our phenomenological existence; the reality of the upper left quadrant. The same applies to our self-identity, self-awareness and stages of consciousness, which are all fundamental or encompassing aspects of our embodied being; like the orders and manifestation of consciousness—Logos and Eros, respectively—and the dimensions of intimacy and belonging. (Belonging and intimacy are elaborated on in a different essay on Integral World).

Designing our own program for growth and development gets us as far as trying to coach ourselves to master an instrument. By nature, we are attracted to approaches for human development and spiritual growth that resonate with our self-identity, but which may not be the medicine we need to become aware of who we are and/or to take the next step in our evolutionary journey. Spiritual growth requires a teacher or coach, just like psychotherapy is conducted with a therapist and not the books we might read about it, or shows we watch on TV. Growth and development are equally based on challenge and support, the rest is mere commentary.

Performing surgery on ourselves is not a good idea, yet when it comes to human development this is exactly what we tend to do; and then think that our surgery was successful even if we expire in the course of the procedure rather than become more com-passionately alive and more deeply aware of our true nature. Our endless striving to evolve or be happy and fulfilled is exhausting. Development happens on its own accord if we allow it to take its course rather than standing in its way by thinking that we know best what it is that we need—a fallacy of belief. Becoming aware of, or awakening to our intrinsic wakefulness doesn't render us with an eternal smile, nor does it relieve us of all our worries; it simply makes us aware of them, which most of us seek to avoid; hence, our striving. Striving won't lead to happiness, even if we attain all the things that we strive for, because striving is like a fire; the more we feed it, the larger it gets, until we can no longer control it—like an addiction that, left unattended, will consume us.

Being human is an intricate and mind-boggling affair; reducing it to developmental stages of consciousness, spiritual practice, cognition, typologies (like the Ennegram or Astrology), biology, or what have you, neither helps us to acknowledge who we are, nor allows us to embrace the entirety of ourselves. Each quadrant, or fundamental dimension of our human reality of being, not only has a conscience, but also thoughts, feelings and behaviors, or an action-logic of its own. In other words, “the good, the true and the beautiful” are innate to each quadrant or each of the four fundamental dimensions of consciousness. The “true” pertains to the essential quality of the quadrant in question; the true in the upper left quadrant is the ego. The “good” is our gaining insight into that essential “true;” while the “beautiful” is witnessed when we awaken to it—in the case of the upper left quadrant, this is awakening to our ego, which enables us to see our true nature. Similarly, the true in the lower right quadrant consists of the stages of consciousness; the good is our becoming aware of them, while the beautiful is witnessed when we realize them, as in the case of Wilber. His realization of “integral” isn't what is books are about; they put the previous stages of consciousness into perspective. To gain insight into “integral,” we have to go behind the words Wilber uses to articulate his realization of consciousness, because going behind his words, so to speak, allows us to see the structure they are based on. Seeing is more inclusive than conceptual understanding; seeing transcends and includes rationality; seeing, in other words, is trans-rational, which is deeply paradoxical, but not self-contradictory. Self-contradiction is what is found in all the previous stages of human development, which are derived from and an expression of our “self” rather than the selfless awareness of consciousness or our intrinsic wakefulness of being.

Transcending our self-identity doesn't render us egoless; transcending our self-identity comes at the expense of believing our constructs, which are, in essence, just that—a construct. “Integral” as a theory, is just a construct and the same can be said of this paper; but there is more to both of these things, namely their ontological reality. This also applies to the transcendence of our self-identity and our phenomenological existence; transcending our self-identity doesn't mean we transcend the four quadrants; we merely re-name them according to a higher logical order of consciousness, but that is not the subject of this essay. “We” doesn't signify “you and me,” “us” or “all of us;” if it did we wouldn't distinguish them. Yet, distinguishing one thing from another isn't done merely to distinguish them; all of our linguistic distinctions speak, in essence, to our evolution of consciousness. “We” represents both a higher logical order and deeper, more inclusive awareness than “you and me,” “us” or “all of us.” This may be rather abstract for us to understand without a proper explanation, but such is the difference that makes a difference between cognitive understanding and seeing, or rationality and trans-rationality, which goes beyond story, opinion and lofty ideals.

A reader versed in integral theory may think that this writer confuses developmental lines with quadrants, but for those who can see, it can be seen that this writer doesn't confuse them. Put differently, our cognitive understanding is further evolved than the stage of consciousness we inhabit and operate from. Cognition pertains to the upper right quadrant, whereas the stages of development relate to the lower right quadrant. Cognitively understanding integral theory doesn't imply that our consciousness is integrally-informed, which is the case when we have evolved to the integral stage of consciousness. “Integral,” as it is currently taught and propagated, is a mere theory and will remain such until a certain number of people have actually arrived at this stage of consciousness, which is when “integral” becomes a reality. Wilber's theory is to humanity what the insights of mystics are to our phenomenological experience or our ego. Wilber's theory and the mystical insights revealed by contemplatives are the same in essence, but different in form, because Wilber's realization of consciousness relates to a different quadrant of our human existence than that of mystics. Wilber's realization of consciousness relates to the lower right quadrant, whereas that of mystics relates to the upper left. Making such distinctions helps us to become aware of what we are actually talking about; drawing such distinctions is much more practical than we may think and once we understand them, they become second nature, like the language we speak and are embedded in. Once learned, most of us never give much thought to our language, because the words we use to express ourselves come effortlessly out of our mouth.

Cognitive understanding tends to be further evolved than the stage of consciousness we inhabit. While we may be able to take numerous perspectives and, to that effect, make meaning at a rather complex level of development or action-logic, we might still be no further evolved than the rational-mythic level of consciousness, as in Wilber's example of the bright Nazi doctor. To simply conclude that Nazi doctors could do what they did due to their lack of moral development, is to dismiss the complexity of Fascism in general, and the propaganda machinery of Nazi Germany in its entirety. With the exception of Hitler, the leaders of Nazi Germany, among whom quite a few were physicians, were more advanced, in most cases, than the lower levels in Kohlberg's line of moral development; otherwise the Third Reich would have been nothing more than a street gang. Morality is an aspect of cognition, which means we can't be highly evolved cognitively, while holding a low complexity of moral reasoning. Making meaning at the strategist action-logic doesn't render us a compassionate person; the same applies to operating from a worldcentric level of moral development. Our morality is enacted in the world we live, according to the stage of consciousness we inhabit. We can be bright at each level of human development, as in the case of the leaders of Nazi Germany who were, by no means, idiots; however, most of them weren't further evolved than the mythic-rational stage of consciousness, where genocides aren't viewed as bad; on the contrary, they are perceived as necessary.

Like every family tends to have a black sheep, so to speak, humanity as a whole has one as well, because how could it be different? The black sheep of humanity are the Jews, who, from the perspective of the Christians, resist embracing Jesus as their savior and who, from the perspective of the Muslims, resent Mohammad as the Prophet, whom they ought to follow. Now, ask yourself, Where does that leave the Jews, as a people, phenomenologically speaking? It leaves them fighting for their survival and way of life. Nazi Germany couldn't have happened without the support of the entire world, who all turned a blind eye when it began, including the Church. Families depend on their black sheep for their functioning and balance, and the same is the case for our humanity as a whole. We depend on the fighting between the Israelis and the Palestinians for the sake of our control. It is left to the reader to determine to whom “our” relates; “our” is part of the problem, because in order to transcend the conflicts we are faced with as a people, we have to evolve to the understanding of “we.” “We” is how we resolve our problems; “we” is the perspective to assume for transcending our separations that lead to bloodshed, civil war and genocide. The world isn't ours, it belongs to all of us, or, put differently, we belong equally to this world, regardless of our religious or sexual orientation, ethnicity or skin color. “We” is all-inclusive, without negating the differences that define it and from which it is derived. “We” enables us to acknowledge “what is;” “we” is the current of compassion that guides the mighty river of self-awareness. “We” is inter-subjective; “we” is the relational aspect of our individual being, just as it is the internal dimension of our social organism, called culture. “We” isn't you and me, us or all of us; “we” isn't a reality for which any individual can take responsibility, because “we” is co-creative. When Jesus walked this planet, he didn't reject his Jewish heritage; he actually confirmed it. Just like Wilber, in a different context, acknowledges all the existing stages of development without calling them wrong. Having transcended “what was” isn't signified by invalidating “what is;” it is quite the opposite, but just like people made another religion out of Jesus' insight, so people, inspired by Wilber's writing, turn it into another belief system. Who is responsible for that? It isn't Jesus, in the case of Christianity, nor is it Wilber in regard to his integral philosophy. Similarly, the emergence of “we” doesn't invalidate you and me, us, or all of us, which can be difficult to follow, for some. But does that excuse us from attempting to understand the analogies employed?

Learning is derived from confusion, not clarity. Containing our confusion is part and parcel of human development; creating confusion is essential to cultivating understanding. Being human is an intricate affair and the same goes for assessing our developmental center of gravity, both as an individual and a collective, as illustrated in the diagram below:

The center of gravity speaks to our conscience, which is comprised of our ego, our self-identity, our self-awareness and the stage of consciousness we inhabit. Our conscience is neither individual, nor collective; it is both personal and relational. Our conscience is non-dual and, in that respect, transcends separation. Our conscience is all-inclusive and is as intricate as being human. Our conscience is the child of knowledge and wisdom, past and future, in-sight and re-cognition; our conscience is where Logos and Eros meet. Our conscience is both relative and absolute, concrete and fluid—like water and air. Our conscience is what distinguishes us from other sentient beings, which have their own conscience that isn't human. Our conscience is not to be confused with our intrinsic wakefulness, which relates to our ego; nor is it to be confused with our self-identity, which relates to our meaning-making. Our conscience isn't our self-awareness, which pertains to our inter-subjective reality as an individual and a people; nor is our conscience our stage of development, which speaks to the microcode that structures our consciousness.

We have yet to evolve to the point where we do not turn our stories into truth and worship our theories as God; by which we drain them of their life, like we hang Jesus on a cross. Speaking in the name of a corpse is neither what life, nor human development is about. Words don't derive their validity from their definition in a dictionary, but by how we use them to express and define who we are. Words are to humanity what water is to a fish and the sky is to a bird. It is up to us to use them wisely, or abuse them to fill our own emptiness. Words can illuminate our ignorance, just as they can prevent us from seeing “what is.” Words are the last memory we recall prior to our death; words are the guiding principle of humanity. We can follow them, according to what they reveal to us, or we can blow them in the wind as a mere construct. We are so effortlessly fooled by the apparent that we often neglect inquiring into the hidden and then act surprised that we are met with suffering rather than insight and enlightenment.

If we were God, we would know why the things that happened in the past took place. If we were God, we would know what we have to do next, both as an individual and a collective. However, the fact is that none of us are God; hence, none of us really know nor could say why things happened in the past; nor do any of us know for certain what we have to do to evolve and take the next step in our journey. Thus, what we are left with is to inquire into “what is,” for which we neither have to be God, nor enlightened. What we are left with is to acknowledge “what is,” simply because that is the only reality that we can bank on or invest in without having to be God, or enlightened. Our frantic pursuit of the manifestation our dreams and our endless pushing ourselves to evolve does not really serve us, yet we will go on to do exactly that, because relinquishing our hopes runs counter to what drives us. Insight isn't derived from hopes, but inquiry, just like awareness isn't cultivated through believing, but by contemplating “what is.” We have barely scratched the surface of our human nature and yet we act as if we had already digested the fruit that grows on the tree of wisdom, when, in fact, we have merely bitten in the apple of re-cognition.

When we subscribe to the integral philosophy of Wilber like fundamentalist Christians interpret the Bible, our stage of consciousness isn't any more or less evolved than theirs. On the contrary, whether we clutch a crucifix or an integral theory to make meaning of “what is” makes no difference, essentially, because what matters is our attachment to and grasping after our opinions, beliefs and pictures. No construct, approach, theology or theory can explain “what is,” for “what is” is a reality that we, ourselves, have to awaken to in body, mind and spirit. Maps merely help us to chart this journey, be it relation to our ego, our self-identity, our self-awareness or our stage of consciousness, as illustrated in following graphic.

The purpose of this essay was not to explain the finer points of the included diagrams, nor was it to exhaust what might be said about the inside-out perspective of “integral,” since little, if anything, would be gained by that. Instead, the intent was to simply point to the inside-out awareness of an integrally-informed consciousness. May this writer have achieved this purpose for the benefit of those who have read it.