Welcome, to the Whole Spectrum of Shadows online self-paced course, Level 1.  

In this series of webinars, we lay out this whole spectrum of shadows as a wholistic context. Anything less seems to lead to misunderstanding and confusion. 

We begin with the karma that we inherit when we’re born as a human being. Then, we can move on to something that's a little closer to home, our family karma. When I'm working with a group, I always ask how many of you come from a family that has some seriously messed up family karma? Almost everyone raises their hand. 

After karma we move into preverbal, developmental and shock trauma, as well as the early childhood issues that are illuminated by attachment theory and parental bonding patterns. Then we begin to explore the subpersonalities that are split off and disowned in light of the capacities that are trying to emerge and stabilize at each specific level of ego development. We must also include Instincts, archetypes, and all karmic habitual patterns. The whole spectrum of shadows must also include demons, angels, benevolent and wrathful deities, collective shadows and state shadows.

An Online Five Level Webinar

• Level 01 – An Essential Integral Zen Framework - 6 sessions
• Level 02 – The Scent of Wu – A Taste of Nothingness - 6 sessions 
• Level 03 – The Problems of State Shadows - 6 sessions
• Level 04 – What Color are Your Individual Shadows - 6 sessions
• Level 05 – The Karma of Collective Shadows - 6 sessions

This series consists of edited live videos of the original class, along with slides, notes, and homework.  We have done our best to adapt the live class to a self-paced course, but some creativity will be needed to follow along with the exercises and homework review.  

Kosmic Address

The Kosmic address is a unique point that describes everything according to the various dimensions in Integral Theory.  It is made up of a person or thing's location on the progression of Ego consciousness scale (Level), the state perception scale (state), the quadrants (I, We, It, Its), the line of development ( Emotional, Cognitive, Worldviews, Self-Identity, etc), and the type (Myers-Briggs, Enneagram, Introvert/Extrovert, etc)

The Quadrants

The Quadrants arose from the progression of ego consciousness throughout history.  As the ego progresses from 1st person, to 2nd person, etc, each new level provides a new way of seeing the world and a new definition of what exists in it....a definition that is more expansive as we move forward.  After we reach a fourth person perspective, we have access to I, We, It, and Its, the four quadrants.

Levels (Progression of Ego consciousness)

Sometimes referred to as "stages".  The levels represent the progression of ego consciousness and its ability to comprehend the complexity of the world.  In various systems, these stages are labeled differently.  In Integral Theory we use colors as shorthand:  Infrared, Magenta, Red, Amber, Orange, Green, Teal, etc.  Each one of these colors represents a level that transcends and includes all previous level.  

These levels are also associated with the eastern concept of "chakras" and they appear in an individual throughout childhood and adult development.  

We review the idea of Kosmic Address and go deeper into the Quadrants using an example. Any attempt to change things that is not conscious of all four quadrants will fail. Using the issue of recycling, we talk about each quadrant individually and what needs to be present for recycling to be a successful initiative.

Deeper into the four quadrants

In the first quadrant, individual ego consciousness has a progression of stages: instinctual, magic, egocentric, mythic, achiever, sensitive, etc.

In the second quadrant, we see a corresponding outward manifestation of the first quadrant interior consciousness. We call those organic states, limbic system states, brain activity, etc.

In the third quadrant, lots of people at a certain level get together and culture emerges spontaneously. We can label these levels of culture as archaic, animistic, power, mythic order, scientific-rational, pluralistic, etc.

And finally, in the fourth quadrant, all of the interactions of all of the other quadrants have an outward manifestation on what society and the systems that make up society look like. Here the progression looks like forager, horticultural, agrarian, industrial, informational, etc.

Levels and Quadrants Review

Doshin reviews the same slides of how the levels and quadrants progressed throughout history, going into 5th and 6th person perspectives.

States

We introduce the idea of "States" and how they interact with levels in the "Wilber-Combs Lattice". These states we are pointing out are gross, subtle, causal, and non-dual, and Doshin goes through a description of these states from a Zen perspective.

Finally, we examine how these states interact with the four quadrants we learned about, which give us states, realms, bodies, and systems.

This week, we examine another part of the five-part integral framework: Lines of development.

Human evolution does not happen all at once in all areas.  Instead, we have different levels of consciousness in different "Lines".  For example, we may be more advanced in cognitive functioning, and less advanced at moral development or emotional development.  There are many, if not infinite, lines of development, and any progress happens mostly independently to other lines (We say "most" because as Ken Wilber says, "The cognitive line leads").

After laying out the most important lines of development, we dive into specific researchers who have worked on one line or another and examine their models.

Finally, we took a look at lines of development through the prism of the levels we learned about earlier.  Each line looks different at each level (red, amber, orange, green, etc).  

We continue our exploration of lines of development, looking at three very important lines:  the cognitive line, the moral line, the emotional line, and the spiritual line. 

When discussing the cognitive line, we will introduce the idea of the cognitive matrix, based on Jung's theory of types: thinking, feeling, intuitive, and sensing. 

For the moral line, the emotional line, and the spiritual line, we will look at each line from the vantage point of levels and also from the vantage point of quadrants.

Continuing our look at the Kosmic Address, we will cover "types" and also a few things we missed along the way.

Types are an important part of the Integral framework, and are the style with which someone interprets their developmental level.

Some examples of different types are male/female, the Enneagram, Jung's theory of types, and we can also use quadrants as types.

On our final session on the Kosmic Address, we start by looking at the cognitive, emotional, moral etc lines of development through the four quadrants.

We introduce the idea of the "pre-trans fallacy", where we mistake a level of higher evolution as instead a level lower.  And we also introduce the "level-line fallacy", where a line of intelligence gets stuck and we mistake that for the center of gravity.

Next, a short introduction to Integral Semiotics, what the components are, and how it would help.

Finally, we wrap up Level 1 with an in depth look at a real world problem and how we apply all of these ideas.

Thank you for the hard work and discipline needed to make your way through these last six sessions.  This is not easy material, and remember to leave yourself alone:  you will get what you need and let the rest of it go.

Here are some things you might look at next:

• The only person at Integral Zen who is paid is Doshin.  He has put many hours into creating this course, and if you feel it was of value please consider a donation to support our efforts.  
• We welcome feedback on the course at [email protected].
• Our series continues with Level 2.  Take a look at the "Retreats and Courses" page to see if registration is still open.
• Also, don't forget we have live Dharma talks every Sunday, morning meditation sessions, saturday Chi-gong, and priests available for 1 on 1 meetings to help with your meditation practice.

Deep gratitude to you all.