Spirit
What we refer to as "spirit" and "spirituality" are much better referred to using other terms, such as the "transpersonal," the "non-dual," "life compass," or "authentic presence." The reasons for this are based on both experience and communicative clarity.
What we are attempting to convey by all such terms is life itself, as including and transcending all meanings and experiences in a awe-inspiring embrace of oneness, goodness, wisdom, peace, and lucidity. We are both awakened and transformed in the presence of life itself.
So while any and all terms that disclose such ultimate and all-encompassing experiences of life are helpful and useful, some are more helpful and useful than others, for a variety of reasons.
Regarding experience, IDL finds that when we suspend whatever assumptions we may hold about the nature of ourselves, others, the world, and reality, and instead practice deep listening in an integral and phenomenological way, what we find is that we encounter endless perspectives that are more awake and aware than we are which do not use these terms, nor do they think or organize reality in terms of "spirit" or "spirituality." This implies that these terms are our projections onto reality and are unnecessary filters that actually box it in and limit life rather than allowing life to disclose itself in its fullness.
The second reason to be cautious regarding our use of "spirit" and "spirituality" involves communicative clarity. It is indeed strange to consider that a word synonymous with enlightenment would itself not necessarily be conducive to it. The problem with the word “spirit” is that its meaning is over-determined. It means so many different things to so many different people that you can use it to mean whatever you want. You can switch from one meaning to another depending on what point you want to make or what you think your listener will best respond to. All this may be useful for signaling agreement where it may not in fact exist, but it is not useful when clarity and agreement are important. Let’s take a look at some of the different meanings of spirit as described by Ken Wilber in Integral Spirituality, p.121-3:
“If you analyze the way that people use the world “spiritual”—both scholars and laypeople alike—you will find at least 4 major meanings given to that word. Although individuals themselves do not use these technical terms, it is apparent that “spiritual” is being used to mean: (1) the highest levels in any of the lines; (2) a separate line itself; (3) an extraordinary peak experience or state; (4) a particular attitude. My point is all of those are legitimate uses (and I think all of them point to actual realities), but we absolutely MUST identify which of those we mean, or the conversation goes nowhere fast, with the added burden that one thinks ground has actually been covered. In my entire life, I personally have never heard more people utter more words with less meaning.”
“1. If you take any developmental line—cognitive to affective/emotional to needs to values—people do not usually think of the lower or middle levels in those lines as spiritual, but they do describe the higher and highest levels as spiritual… The word “transpersonal,” for example, was adopted with that usage in mind: spiritual is not usually thought of as pre-rational or pre-personal, and it is not usually thought of as personal or rational, it is thought of profoundly trans-rational and transpersonal—it is the highest levels in any of the lines.”
“2. Sometimes people speak of something like “spiritual intelligence,” which is available not only at the highest levels in any of the lines, but is its own developmental line, going all the way down to the earliest of years. James Fowler is one example of this. Put similarly, this spiritual line has its own prepersonal, personal, and transpersonal levels/stages. This is one of the reasons you have to follow usage extremely closely, because juxtaposing usage #2 and #1, we would say that only the highest levels of the spiritual line are spiritual. This, needless to say, has caused enormous confusion. (The AQAL position is that both usages—actually, all 4 usages—are correct, you just have to specify which or you get endlessly lost.)”
“3. Sometimes people speak of spirituality in the sense of a religious or spiritual experience, meditative experience, or peak experience (which may, or may not, involve stages). Virtually the entire corpus of shamanic traditions fit in this category. William James, Daniel P. Brown, Evelyn Underhill, and Daniel Goleman are also examples of spirituality as a state experience (often trained). State experience is another important usage…”
“4. Sometimes people simply speak of “spiritual” as involving a special attitude that can be present at any stage or state: perhaps love, or compassion, or wisdom (i.e., it is a type). This is a very common usage, but in fine detail, it usually reverts to one of the first three usages, because there are actually stages of love, compassion, and wisdom.”
In addition, the word “spirit” in most of these usages does not differentiate between prepersonal spirit and transpersonal spirit, and it implies that the intermediate, personal levels of development are relatively “non-spiritual.” The failure to differentiate between prepersonal and transpersonal spirit is what Wilber refers to as the “pre-trans fallacy.” It confuses consciousness that is unaware of itself and exists in a state of unaware oneness, with consciousness that is aware of itself and exists in a state of conscious oneness. The implication that personal levels of development are less spiritual or non-spiritual separates reason from spirit, setting up an intrinsic duality that moves happiness, integration, and completion farther and farther into the future.
Wilber continues to use “spirit” throughout his writings without saying which one of these uses that he is referring to, which assumes that the reader knows which meaning he is referring to. Of course, most people are not familiar with these four different meanings, nor with the pre-trans fallacy, and so thinks they know what Wilber is talking about when they do not have the same meanings for the same words. IDL thinks a better solution is to avoid using the word spirit unless it is clearly defined and there is a good reason to do so. IDL finds that in most cases “life” can be effectively substituted for “spirit,” with the result being both clarity, simplicity, and de-mystification.
The following interview challenges many of our traditional assumptions about spirituality.
Interviewing a Chronic Cough
Have you ever had a cough so bad it wouldn’t stop for weeks? Linda had one for FIVE weeks when we did this interview. The cough wasn’t constant, but it was persistant and woke her up at night. What to do? Integral Deep Listening treats physical symptoms as if they are wake-up calls. What will they have to say if we listen to them?
Cough, would you please tell me about yourself and what you are doing?
Cough:”I’m a strong cough with a deep voice. I’m mostly dry. I start at the neck and spread all over the lungs. I’m very noisy. Everybody has to listen to me. Linda can’t ignore me. If she tries, I make her throw up. I did that twice.”
What is it that you are trying to say to her?
Cough: ”Stay in bed! Calm down! Do nothing! Because she’s doing too much! She’s working all the time! She’s working too hard. No days off. Always a bad conscience about not working if she doesn’t work for half an hour! She’s becoming addicted to work! She thinks she has to do many things before going to the dog school on the 8th of July for three months. She has a very bad conscience about that! It’s always the same old story: not working is not allowed; having fun is not allowed.”