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In Sedona, we needed a simple, one page overview of what integral was that average folks could get their heads around. Here's what we came up with. You are welcome to use this for your own purposes.

What Is Integral?

Since our work is greatly assisted by the fantastic materials and resources produced by Integral Institute, we encourage our members to support Integral Institute by becoming monthly contributors. Monthly contributions range from $10.00 a month to $500.00 a month, with each level of support providing an ever-expanding list of services to donors. A mere $10.00 a month provides full access to the growing collection of audio, video, and other materials offered by Integral Naked. Larger monthly donations, allows supporters to receive the IN Sampler CD/DVD set, the Holons Newsletter, AQAL Journal, Integral seminar discounts, invitations to special events, and more.

We can also support Integral Institute (and our own development) by purchasing integrally-oriented books and materials. Here is a quick list of the books and resources we recommend the most:

• Integral Vision by Ken Wilber
• Integral Life Practice Starter Kit
• A Brief History of Everything by Ken Wilber
• Introducing Ken Wilber by Lew Howard
• Grace & Grit by Ken Wilber
• One Taste by Ken Wilber
• Big Mind - Big Heart by Genpo Roshi
• Soulfully Gay by Joe Perez

Quote Worth Pondering:
"The AQAL Code is the result of what started as The Human Consciousness Project. Similar to the Human Genome Project, the Consciousness Project was created to map every state of consciousness, personality type, meme, neurotransmitter from dopamine to serotonin, every synapse, PET distribution scan, meditation state, altered state, peak experience, neuropeptide, stage of consciousness, neuronal display, twitch, twinge, and tingle of the human mind, or psyche, or bodymind, or brain-mind, or whatever you want to call our being. The idea was to get a complete map of the human brain-mind -- a composite map created by looking at every known culture and its psychological, spiritual, and scientific maps of the human psyche -- going back thousands of years, and then using all of those partial maps to create a composite map of the full potentials of the total known territory of the human psyche to date."

--- Excerpt from Ken Wilber's new novel, "The Many Faces Of Terrorism"

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AQAL Integral Map

View/Download AQAL Integral Map
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The Four Quadrants

According to Integral Theory, there are at least 4 primary dimensions or perspectives through which we can experience the world: subjective, intersubjective, objective, and interobjective. These 4 perspectives, represented graphically, are the upper-left, lower-left, upper-right, and lower-right quadrants.What’s the point of looking at the world through a 4-quadrant lens? Simple answer: Anything less is narrow, partial and fragmented! Integral Theory maintains that all 4 quadrants are real -- and all are important. So, for example, to the question of what is more real, the brain (with its neural pathways and structures) or the mind (with its thoughts and perceptions), Integral Theory answers: BOTH. Click here for more information.

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Altitude

The concept of Altitude is a radically new approach to development created by Ken Wilber and presented in his book Integral Spirituality. In Holons, we use Altitude as a measure of development in both culture and consciousness. A simple way to explain it is to say that Altitude indicates the degree of developmental unfolding of items such as complexity, consciousness, and the number of perspectives one can take. For example, in consciousness development as indicated below, one goes from the capacity to take only a 1st-person perspective, to also being able to take a 2nd-person perspective, to also being able to take a 3rd-person perspective, and so on. Thus, in this example, you can see that the capacity for love increases (from being able to love only me, to being able to love us, to being able to love all of us, to being able to love all sentient beings....). For convenience, Altitude follows the natural colors of the rainbow, so you'll often hear us refer to degree of development or degree of consciousness or degree of capacity to love, etc. by a particular color of the rainbow. Click here for more information.

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Integral Life Practice
From Ken Wilber's Website:

"Integral Life Practice (ILP) is no-nonsense, practical application of the Integral model that helps you to authentically exercise all aspects or dimensions of your own being-in-the-world. ILP teaches 4 core modules – body, mind, spirit and shadow – as well as 5 or so auxiliary modules – ethics, yoga of relationships, karma yoga, transforming emotions, and sexual yoga – and dozens of potential electives. Grounded in hundreds of transformative practices, East and West, ILP allows you to take anything you're already doing and place it within a comprehensive framework that finally makes sense of it.

"In addition, ILP is modular, scalable and customizable. Not only can you make it fit your schedule, you also choose the practices that are right for you in an effort to create a program that is flexible and effective. By cross-training practices in the core modules you accelerate growth in all areas, increase the your chance of healthy development and deepen your capacity for transformational living. In short, Integral Life Practice is the simplest practice you can do to wake up!"

The Integral Life Practice Matrix

View Larger Chart On The Web

Download A .pdf Copy
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Genpo Roshi's "Big Mind Process"
Excerpted from Ken Wilber's Forward to Genpo Roshi's Book,

"Big Mind / Big Heart":

"Let me state this as strongly as I can: the Big Mind Process (founded by Dennis Genpo Merzel Roshi) is arguably the most important and original discovery in the last two centuries of Buddhism. It is an astonishingly original, profound, and effective path for waking up, or seeing one's True Nature. It is such a simple and universal practice it can be used in any spiritual path you wish, or even just alone, by itself, as a practice for realizing your True Nature -- which you can call God, Allah, Jahweh, Brahman, Tao, Ein Sof -- it doesn't really matter, because the core of the Big Mind Process is Emptiness itself, which, having no specific content at all, can and does embrace anything that arises, integrating it all. What Dennis Genpo Roshi has done is not only the most original discovery in Buddhism in the last two centuries, it is unbelievably simple, quick, and effective. In Zen, this realization of one's True Nature, or Ultimate Reality, is called kensho or satori ('seeing into one's True Nature,' or discovering Big Mind and Big Heart). It often takes five years or more of extremely difficult practice (I know, I've done it) in order for a profound satori to occur. With the Big Mind Process, a genuine kensho can occur in about an hour -- seriously. Once you get it, you can do it virtually any time you wish, and almost instantaneously. It is nothing less than the discovery of your True and Unique Self, Ultimately Reality, the Ground of All Being -- again, call it what you like, for 'they call it Many which is really One.' "

An Integral Perspective On Barack Obama
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Photo of Integral Life Staff from their 2007 Christmas Card. Click here for names and more information.