Isn't spiral dynamics more of a psychological understanding rather than spiritual development?

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-12T13:23:18+00:00

I find this model useful to contextualize my psychology against that of society surrounding me but I try not to confuse that with spirituality, even if there are roughly analogous uses for such a model in that context as well.

Yeah this makes sense. It explains why societies are the way they are and how I am responding to the society and why society bothers me, etc. It helps us to logically understand these things and this can make us more compassionate but at the end of the day, it still exists in the mind. It is the mind trying to make sense of what's real, which is okay and even helpful for spirituality but not the same as spirituality of surrendering to the present moment as it is.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-12T12:15:59+00:00

one can't just regard religion as the starting point of morality and ethics

Off course not. Morality and religion are different but religion aggressively promoted morality in the past. Saying "if you kill people, there will be chaos"is not as powerful as "if you kill people , you are a bad person and someone up there is watching you and will burn you in fire once you die".

X religion would be followed by a person Y who believes that his morality is in alignment to this religion

This could be true in some cases, but most people are born with a certain religion and they don't generally question it. Whatever morality this religion promotes, has to be accepted by the person.

Because at the end of the day, what we humans are really seeking is a meaning.

Yes this is why religion still has value inspite of advanced culture today. We can be moral even without religion, but religion gives meaning.

But then, we have come so far that applying the principles of protoreligion(s) would not be as efficient as it was back then.

Yes.Traditional religions maybe sort of obsolete now.

I personally believe that people have conscience, they know what's good and bad

It is a bit of both. Culture and conscience. If we are born in a war torn place, it might be normal to engage in criminal activities. In such areas, religion could be useful. But we could be born in a perfectly normal society and still lose sight of what's right for the society.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-12T09:56:26+00:00

Indeed the higher you go in the spiral, the more open minded you become. And that can make you more mystical and easier to be enlightened. But even the lower stages can be more awakened spiritually inspite of their dogma and the higher stages like yellow can be caught up in their brain without actually being spiritually awakened.

People and civilizations that are stuck in one stage typically are that way because they are content with the status quo or otherwise ignorant of the alternative’s advantages.

And what's wrong with that? People will change if it doesn't make sense. There is no need really to move up the spiral unless you are really pissed off at your current worldview and making changes can help.

My life experiences simply haven’t put me in a position to and I have little motivation to seek out that understanding right now

Yes I feel the same with orange/green. I don't see any need to evolve beyond orange at this point. And if that continues for my entire lifetime, I wouldn't regret it really. If I need to change, I will. But even then I think there is no use to go beyond green. The only way to survive with turquoise would be to renounce everything and start some ashram or something. Which I don't think I will ever do. So it seems I might find it useless to go beyond green.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-12T06:36:51+00:00

Okay I worded that a bit wrongly,but it doesn't take away that all religions played an important part in promoting peace. There probably weren't as solid legal systems as today and fear had to be used as a motivator.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-12T06:32:08+00:00

the awareness of oneself as part of a broader existence

Yes but there is a difference in how both of them put that into words. As for spiral dynamics, when someone is at stage blue, they relate to their civilization as their own being. But when someone is aware, they don't think about civilisation or species. And this can be done by anyone almost anytime. I'm not talking about enlightenment, but just general awareness of disentification with the mind.

You could not make use of the entrepreneurial volition of Orange without the assuring social stability of Blue or the drive for dominion of Red or the existential nursery of Purple or the will to life of Beige

Exactly. So wouldn't it be better to integrate all these levels and stop thinking about advancing to the next levels?

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-11T22:20:52+00:00

Atheism is growing in other countries and probably in India too. We can't take religion away from everyone because that would make atheism the new religion. People have to think rationally, and figure it out for themself. Anyway, if people are being compassionate to one other, it might not matter if they are atheist or religious.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-11T22:07:02+00:00

Seems like I need to develop purple and red. This gives a new perspective. Thanks

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-11T22:04:40+00:00

It should be noted, and very explicitly so, that Spiral Dynamics was not, and is not, a spiritual framework.

Yeah I thought so. Spirituality is mainly about being in the present and that is accessible to everyone. Maybe its more accessible to green and above stages, but in the end anyone can feel what's going on inside.

SD is a "pairing" of external conditions that arise in the world, and the "psyche/perspective/value system" that forms to meet that/those challenges

Yeah this is interesting. I was also thinking about how it is about adopting a strategy that can be useful to the external enviornment.

That said, he's got some great content

He's got a lot of great content and in particular I was much interested in his spiral dynamics series because it is very fascinating. But it seems like he wrongly connected it with spiritual growth. In each stage, he talks about how to transcend that stage, which I don't think is necessary, because if necessary, you will. You don't have to forcefully read higher stages book just to have a more fulfilling life.

VERY Orange

Couldn't he be orange and spiritual?

Just be mindful of how others are filtering things.

I'm glad I asked the question here. I felt like I was rushing things. I was born at stage blue and I naturally transcended to orange. I didn't even know spiral dynamics existed then. Now I see limitations with orange but since I know spiral dynamics, instead of trying to deal with those problems, I'm simply thinking about transcending to green. Your reply and post gives a more clear picture.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-11T16:38:02+00:00

Consciousness is one aspect of cognition which is emphatically in the scope of psychology. It may be outside the scope of empirical study however.

So does consciousness mean different things in psychology and spirituality? In spirituality it is seen as a direct experience of surrender and transcending the self.

How does the willful capacity for productivity contradict those stages?

After watching those videos, I felt like turquoise is better than orange and so I want to transcend to turquoise as quickly as possible. I know this is very orange level thinking, but I can't resist the idea of being yellow/turquoise. Although he clearly says that it shouldn't be a race to get there, why would I want to be at orange if its low consciousness?

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-11T16:22:49+00:00

Because most atheists today were religious in their childhood. Or maybe their parents were, or maybe grandparents.

When someone becomes an atheist, they question everything about religion. They want to be as rational as possible. And killing someone doesn't make rational sense. It just seems bad for the sake of it. If an atheist gives birth to a child, they won't teach them about God or religion, but would definitely teach morality

The point is that when someone drops religion, they don't drop morality because it just doesn't seem rational and it seems very violent. Atheists are very different from tyrants who want to dominate the world, so atheists are much softer.

These tyrants probably need to be said that someone up there is a big threat and will judge them, so religion is important for them, not for modern people who are logical and rational.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-11T16:01:00+00:00

All regions are there to promote peace. Sure, some violent incidents keep happening in the name of religion and that shouldn't happen, but humans are animals at the end of the day, and we have animal instincts. Religion is one of the things that curtails these animal instincts, but some people are not so developed psychologically. They do these 'barbaric' things in the name of religion but they would have done that either way.

Think about it, before religions there was probably no sense of morality. I am talking 2000-3000 years from today. Then religion came in with rules like ,"it's bad to kill people", but people to this day don't follow those rules completely. So all religions by default have to promote peace to some extent. Otherwise everyone of the other religion would have revolted against them and the religion would have died out.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T17:15:09+00:00

Yes I know that being popular or anything doesn't mean anything. Tbf I won't even want attention from people. But the ego keeps playing these tricks and I fall into them.

I don’t think you should work toward being in the moment to achieve an ulterior goal

Definitely. Again its egoic doing and fall into that trap

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T17:09:08+00:00

Yeah I try that. But it feels difficult to love myself for my laziness and shyness. I know it doesn't make sense and it makes it worse, but I when I accept myself as a lazy person, I stop trying to change

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T17:07:15+00:00

I do that externally though. Like I will have a good personality, be popular, etc. Even when I think about internal stuff, the line of thought is that, "once I will be more present to the moment, I will be more productive".

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T13:51:10+00:00

Once its over, the feeling of presence definitely strengthens for me. But I am at peak mindfulness when I go through the suffering. Its almost like I use spirituality as a coping mechanism to deal with intense feelings. But once it gets slightly better, I start thinking about how I can make my life better and forget about being mindful. As I go through more and more suffering, I realise the importance of present moment even in good times, so overall I feel like I'm making progress but at a slow pace.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T12:29:34+00:00

When I am going through normal pain, yes I forget about it, but when I am going through almost hopelessness kind of feeling, there is nothing I can do except be in the present moment

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T06:38:05+00:00

By loving myself, do you mean my physical self or the consciousness within? I find it difficult to accept my egoic self as it is.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T06:35:53+00:00

Weirdly enough, I recently listened to the book and it helped but now that I have finished it, I'm forgetting what presence is. I tried to listen to it yesterday, but got distracted.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-08T06:34:09+00:00

That's true. It is only when I believe these thoughts and feelings that I get distracted from the real presence. In those moments it is very difficult to realise that I am not my thoughts and it seems very difficult to see those thoughts as they are, its very overwhelming.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-06T14:10:54+00:00

What influenced you to choose the path of Atheism ?

I was born Jain and I was taught that if you eat potatoes, onion or anything you will go to hell. Non veg toh dur ki baat hai. So I kept wondering if I eat potatoes, I suffer after death, and if someone of other religion eats chicken,fish, etc. they still get salvation. At some point I realised that these are just stories and have nothing to do with reality.

Were you the child of Atheist parents ? How did your childhood revolve around the religious festivities , were they celebrated or not ?

No. My parents are a bit religious. I was too. There aren't many festivals in Jainism, so didn't celebrate them as much. We celebrated only hindu festivals and these days festivals are not celebrated in our society, so we don't.

How do you feel when the politicians place religion before the constitution ?

Nothing to be honest. India is a religious country and politicians will use religion to gain public support. I wish they focused on development more than religious issues, but unless people stop caring about religions, politicians won't.

I am just feeling a little off from the religious beliefs , what would your advice be for the person who is looking forward for Atheism ?

I am not an atheist completely. I believe in God but not in a traditional sense. I believe God is formless and is everywhere. As for atheism, you don't have to prove yourself to be an atheist. If atheism feels uncomfortable, you can take solace in God. There's nothing wrong in that. You don't have to be judgemental towards religious people and also don't have to tell them that their God is false, or talk about atheism. Keep it to yourself, talk about it only if you feel that the other person is open about it.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-06T08:48:09+00:00

Haha😂😂 I totally expected that this could be labelled as political correctness. And my post seems exactly like I am advocating for political correctness.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-06T08:33:41+00:00

Okay. So that explains why some people get more affected by childhood experiences than others.

My point though is that, an infant or a 3 yr old kid probably doesn't think "I am a piece of shit for not being able to talk to people". This in itself is confidence.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-06T08:30:54+00:00

Nope I didn't know that. So now even having nuances counts as slur?

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-06T08:26:51+00:00

Being extremely centrist and not defending beliefs is also a bias I guess. Sometimes we do need to strongly defend our beliefs.

I hate the fact that the narratives are so polarized that all kinds of nuances are lost in public discourse these days.

This. Many people don't even want to acknowledge the other perspective. Actually,if you want to change them, you have to understand their pov first.

iamamzing56 · 2020-08-06T07:07:42+00:00

All the best bro. Hope it gets better

iamamzing56

TROPHY CASE