Ken Wilber Stops His Brain Waves

[Anders Lindman]

Here is a pretty cool video with Ken Wilber controlling his mind:

Ken Wilber Stops His Brain Waves - YouTube

:D

[deca]

any Ideas where I good get one of them machines it would help me a lot?

[tru3]

Anders,

THANK YOU for posting this. you know, it's so cool what's happening on this forum. i causally mention wilber, you have an interest, and find this video. a picture really is worth a thousand words, isn't it?

in "one taste", wilber writes that he originally did this kind of as a goof, or a "parlor trick". but what he found was people really got fascinated watching the video, and got them attracted to the whole idea of Integral Consciousness.

kudos! :)

[hagbard_celine]

Ken Wilber is brilliant. Have you read any of his books? They're heavy on the brain, but well worth the effort.

[tru3]

Ken Wilber is brilliant. Have you read any of his books? They're heavy on the brain, but well worth the effort.

yes. about 4 or 5. i actually read "sex, ecology and spirit"; wading thought that one became, about 2/3 of the way through, a grim challenge, but i'm glad i finished it! "a brief history of everything is a good summary of it, actually.

one reviewer said (i paraphrase) in the 21st century, you have 3 choices for a philosopher: plato, nietchze, or wilber. pretty heavy company lol

my favorite is "one taste". it's a journal he kept for a year, after his wife died of luekemia. "eye of spirit" is excellent too. the chapter on art is terrific. there are pages and pages of footnoted citations and academic theory, and then, all of a sudden, he slips in a passage about nonduality that would just give me goose flesh.

[tru3]

any Ideas where I good get one of them machines it would help me a lot?


um, not to overstate the obvious, but i'm pretty sure it's the other way around. wilber is hooked up to the machine, not the machine to him. it's a recording device, not a generator.

wilber kind of casually mentioned it, but when the dots go to zero, he called it sahaj. i understand that to be sahaj samadhi:

Samadhi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Samadhi (Sanskrit: समाधि, lit. "establish, make firm") is a Hindu and Buddhist term that describes a non-dualistic state of consciousness in which the consciousness of the experiencing subject becomes one with the experienced object,[1] and in which the mind becomes still (one-pointed or concentrated)[2] though the person remains conscious.

no brain activity whatsoever, and he's sitting there, in an extremely high state of consciousness. he's not in a trance, no incense, no mudras or mantras, just sitting there, breathing and blinking, ready at any second to re-engage in what he was doing before the experiment.

so, if there's no brain activity, where's ken wilber?

wilber specifically states time and again in his writings that we already are that nondual consciousness. imv, the implications are staggering. all that is required is the willingness to let go of all that is extraneous and impermanent. it is available to anyone, anywhere, right now.

all we have to do is, literally, live out of our minds! :)

[jimijams]

I just watched some of those Ken Wilber videos on youtube and something didn't quite sit right with me, so I did a further search and found this passage from his book "A theory of everything".

"But now global systems and integral meshworks are evolving out of corporate states and value communities. These interdependent systems require governance capable of integrating (not dominating) nations and communities over the entire spiral of interior and exterior development. What the world needs now is the first genuinely second-tier [ie, integral, holistic] form of political philosophy and governance. I believe, of course, that it will be an all-quadrant, all-level political theory and practice, deeply integral in its structures and patterns. This will in no way replace the US Constitution (or that of any other nation), but will simply situate it in global meshworks that facilitate mutual unfolding and enhancement - an integral and holonic politics.

The question remains: exactly how will this be conceived, understood, embraced and practiced? What precise details, what actual specifics, where and how and when? This is the great and exhilirating call of global politics at the millenium. We are awaiting the new global founding Fathers and Mothers who will frame an integral system of governance that will call us to our more encompassing future, that will act as a gentle pacer of transformation for the entire spiral of human development, honoring each and every wave as it unfolds, yet kindly inviting each and all to even greater depth."

Sounds like spirituality UN style to me, but this is also my first impression of Wilber and I'm happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, just following intuition.

[Anders Lindman]

any Ideas where I good get one of them machines it would help me a lot?

I would also like to get one. I wonder how much it costs.

[Anders Lindman]

a picture really is worth a thousand words, isn't it?


When subjective states (left quadrants) can be measured and verified in objective reality (right quadrants) then that is a kind of confirmation. I'm very impressed by Wilber's ability to still his mind. He now only has to practice a bit more with moving his awareness into his emotions and physical body. I read that he recently had a heart problem. That indicates an imbalance in body and emotions.

[Anders Lindman]

"This is the great and exhilirating call of global politics at the millenium."

Sounds like spirituality UN style to me, but this is also my first impression of Wilber and I'm happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, just following intuition.

To have global politics without people having matured ourselves, then that could be very dangerous I think, leading to more and more Orwellian control. Perhaps Wilber is too much stuck in external change when it comes to politics and such.

[tru3]

Sounds like spirituality UN style to me, but this is also my first impression of Wilber and I'm happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, just following intuition.

i agree with you, jimi, it is troubling. rather than letting things unfold in an organic way, he has taken the concept of spiral dynamics and set up a series of standards, sort of like the "big test" in europe where they decide the rest of your life from one sheaf of papers. the distorted application here would be you can't get your "green card" until you go to "orange school". soon, everyone is once again following some kind of "career path" set up by someone else instead of listening to the Heart's Truth.

it's unfortunate wilber has taken this turn, imv. spiral dynamics is a fascinating concept, for sure, but like ken always says, "the map is not the territory."

thanks for the perspective.

[Anders Lindman]

Ken Wilber is brilliant. Have you read any of his books? They're heavy on the brain, but well worth the effort.

I have read A Brief History of Everything, which was fairly easy to digest after having read some of his ideas on the Web. One Taste was also easy to read. Integral Spirituality was a mix of easy and difficult reading for me. For example his description of perspectives and what he calls integral math looked simple at first but I have still not understood the ideas behind that.

[hagbard_celine]

yes. about 4 or 5. i actually read "sex, ecology and spirit"; wading thought that one became, about 2/3 of the way through, a grim challenge, but i'm glad i finished it! "a brief history of everything is a good summary of it, actually.

one reviewer said (i paraphrase) in the 21st century, you have 3 choices for a philosopher: plato, nietchze, or wilber. pretty heavy company lol

my favorite is "one taste". it's a journal he kept for a year, after his wife died of luekemia. "eye of spirit" is excellent too. the chapter on art is terrific. there are pages and pages of footnoted citations and academic theory, and then, all of a sudden, he slips in a passage about nonduality that would just give me goose flesh.

"Sex, Ecology and Spirituality" was too much for me, but then I read "Brief History" and it all made sense. It was wise of Wilber to condence "SE+S"

I've also read "The Atman Project", but my favorite is "Grace and Grit". It's an incredible book because it combines his philosophizing with the true story of his marrriage, ending in the death of his wife from cancer. It's an incedibly, DEEPLY moving tale, and despite everything, it's a story of hope and comfort. I can't recomend it to you more heartily. If you read it you won't regret it.

I've got a book called "Ken Wilber in Dialoge" which relates a correspondance debate between Wilber and many other metaphysical cosmologists. they include Stanislav Grof, of whom I'm a big fan.

[hagbard_celine]

I have read A Brief History of Everything, which was fairly easy to digest after having read some of his ideas on the Web. One Taste was also easy to read. Integral Spirituality was a mix of easy and difficult reading for me. For example his description of perspectives and what he calls integral math looked simple at first but I have still not understood the ideas behind that.

Some of his ideas are togh going, but one of the bst things about his style is that if you don't understand something, he doesn't make you feel left behind or cast out.

Like I said to Tru3, do get a copy of "Grace and Grit"; it's such a fantastic read.

[Anders Lindman]

Some of his ideas are togh going, but one of the bst things about his style is that if you don't understand something, he doesn't make you feel left behind or cast out.

Like I said to Tru3, do get a copy of "Grace and Grit"; it's such a fantastic read.

Grace and Grit sounds to be a bit too sorrowful for me (at the moment). I think Bruce Lipton is correct in saying that cancer and such are caused by deep subconscious beliefs. I don't want to feed those beliefs with more energy. Much more interesting for me would be a book about people who have had spontaneous remission of cancer, and what made them capable of such self healing.

[tru3]

I've also read "The Atman Project", but my favorite is "Grace and Grit". It's an incredible book because it combines his philosophizing with the true story of his marrriage, ending in the death of his wife from cancer. It's an incedibly, DEEPLY moving tale, and despite everything, it's a story of hope and comfort. I can't recomend it to you more heartily. If you read it you won't regret it.

I've got a book called "Ken Wilber in Dialoge" which relates a correspondance debate between Wilber and many other metaphysical cosmologists. they include Stanislav Grof, of whom I'm a big fan.

thanks hc! i appreciate the referral.

i'm curious: have you done any holotropic breathwork? i have done some rebirthing, including cold water (i'm talking alpine lake cold :eek: i actually met leonard orr once. quite a character lol). and it was an extremely powerful experience i would recommend.

[emma royds]

I would also like to get one. I wonder how much it costs.


I think they sell them in argos, but I can't remember how much they cost.

[seanx]

I agree with hagbread, "Grace and Grit"; is an extraordinary book
about his wife's battle with cancer.

But you get the sense that Wilber and his wife never really, really
believed that she would be cured.

Maybe, at some level, they didn't want to - they wanted to
experience this 'experience'.

Another great writer is Stephen Levine and his wife. And the strange
thing is she too developed cancer - but their attitude towards it
seemed totally different - and she was happily cured of it. ( I have
no-up-date news and I hope it's still the same)

The strange thing also in the book 'Grace and Grit"; he kind of
attacks the idea of belief work and visualization has having any proven effect - again the opposite of Levine.

I am not fully read up on all Wilder's ideas on this.

Maybe I'm taking him up wrong, or maybe he has changed his ideas
- can anybody who is a real fan help me help me out?

Becuase the rest of his ideas, especially his ability to explain the
Self and how we are all one Self expressed as many is absolutely
masterful.

[tru3]

Maybe I'm taking him up wrong, or maybe he has changed his ideas
- can anybody who is a real fan help me help me out?

Becuase the rest of his ideas, especially his ability to explain the
Self and how we are all one Self expressed as many is absolutely
masterful.

please read jimijam's post:

http://www.davidicke.com/forum/showpost.php?p=13075&postcount=7

i basically agreed that some of his most recent ideas sound "u.n.-ish". i didn't watch the video, but i kind of got the idea from some of ken's writing on integralnaked (i'm not a member there, btw, i just like to keep up where he's at.) and in "what is enlightenment"? magazine (don't even get me started!!! :mad: ) basically, about 5 years ago he became fascinated with a model called spiral dynamics (you can google it), kind of like a kitten with a ball of catnip lol.

so, before writing him off completely, here are a couple of things i ponder:

1) what's fascinating about ken is that he's always "morphing" lol. he admittedly calls most of his early writing "obsolete" or outmoded, based on his latest research. he is one of the few writer's who is willing to say, "i was wrong; i wrote that based on the most recent research i had available. well, now here's what we know. he calls his own models "wilber I, wilber II, wilber III". i think the newest is wilber iv, i'm not sure.

personally, i think that is so refreshing. i think bill o'reilly might try that approach sometime; it might make him more endearing! lol


2) wilber calls himself a pundit, NOT a guru. he has absolutely no interest in starting a spiritual community, and shields himself from media attention (which is "interesting", considering all the videos; i never even thought to search youtube for him! that's something new to watch: his message and behaviour as more videos are released. in his audios, he's always had this "gee-willikers" tone in his voice, like a kid who just found a frog down by the pond lol. i'll be particularly interested to see if his emotional demeanor changes. )

3) i am still not willing to throw the baby out with the bathwater, to borrow one of ken's own fave phrases. the brainwave video has all kinds of implications to me. if wilber's sitting there, clear-eyed, alert, movements crisp, and the dial's on zero, whose manning the ship?? you know what i mean? what exactly is the brain for, anyway? is it a thinking machine, or an illusion machine?? :confused:

admittedly, he spent over 20 years doing hard-core zen and dzogchen meditation which, as i understand, is some pretty heavy shit. dzogchen was for a different place and a different time, when the pace of life was slower and there was a support structure for monks and such folk.

personally, with the time frame the planet seems to be on, i'm not sure any of us have 20 years to sit around meditating. :o contemplation seems to be a better choice, these days, imv.

and, as i'm hoping mr. icke peaks in every now and then, he might pick up a copy of "the atman project" and give it a once over <hint, hint!> :)

[hagbard_celine]

thanks hc! i appreciate the referral.

i'm curious: have you done any holotropic breathwork? i have done some rebirthing, including cold water (i'm talking alpine lake cold :eek: i actually met leonard orr once. quite a character lol). and it was an extremely powerful experience i would recommend.


Thanks, tru3, I'll try that. In 2005 I went to the Findhorn Community in Scotland for a week and had a great time. I was given reiki and kinesthetic therapy which did me a lot of good. I met a bloke at a conference lasty year selling CD's of the sounds of Rosslyn Chapel and listening to them made me feel a bit strange.

[tru3]

Thanks, tru3, I'll try that. In 2005 I went to the Findhorn Community in Scotland for a week and had a great time. I was given reiki and kinesthetic therapy which did me a lot of good. I met a bloke at a conference lasty year selling CD's of the sounds of Rosslyn Chapel and listening to them made me feel a bit strange.

cool! isn't amazing when we open ourselves up to possibities we see how deep the threads run? there is a oneness in diversity, Consciousness shining forth. the attempt to stamp out diversity, in thought and action, is the attempt to stamp out life. the discord becomes ever more transparent, more obvious, more laughable, to me.

anyway, to get back to your trip, that's wonderful! i've done reiki shares with up to 10 people. it's quite moving to be a part of that many people just willing to be of service, unconditionally. it really is shamanic, in a way, because it's a language that's completly non-verbal. anyone can learn to develop a dialogue with their own body: simply get the conscious mind bored first! :D