I have one major rule: Everybody is right. More specifically, everybody — including me — has some important pieces of truth, and all of those pieces need to be honored, cherished, and included in a more gracious, spacious, and compassionate embrace (Introduction, Collected Works of Ken Wilber, vol. 8, 2000, p. 48).
Some views are "more right" than others (Ken Wilber: The Kosmos Trilogy, Volume II, Excerpt B: The many ways we touch)
Some critics are just worthless (Ken Wilber: What We Are, That We See. Part I: Response to Some Recent Criticism in a Wild West Fashion, June 8, 2006: www.kenwilber.com/blog/show/46).
“What's my philosophy? In a word, integral. And what on earth — or in heaven — do I mean by "integral"? The dictionary meaning is fairly simple: "comprehensive, balanced, inclusive, essential for completeness." Short definition, tall order (Ken Wilber: "An Integral Spirituality." Beliefnet Essay).
an integral approach acknowledges that all views have a degree of truth, but some views are more true than others, more evolved, more developed, more adequate (Ken Wilber: "Integral Spirituality in Real Life." Beliefnet Essay).
In Integral Life Practice, we use the AQAL View or Framework, simply because it is the only genuinely integral view that we are aware of at this time (Ken Wilber:The Integral Vision, 2007, p.179).
The Integral [AQAL] Map is just a map, but it is the most complete and accurate map we have at this time
Ken Wilber: The Integral Vision, 2007, p. 18).
A truly Integral or AQAL Framework is not an inert map, it’s a psychoactive map. It is a psychoactive system that goes through your entire bodymind and begins to activate any potentials that are not presently being used (Ken Wilber: Integral Spirituality, 2006, p.299).
AQAL is a map of samsara, a map of the prison...(Ken Wilber: The Integral Operating System, Version 1.0, Sounds True, 2005, "Going Further" with Ken Wilber. Disc 2).
In other words, all of my books are lies. They are simply maps of a territory, shadows of a reality, gray symbols dragging their bellies across the dead page, suffocated signs full of muffled sound and faded glory, signifying absolutely nothing. And it is the nothing, the Mystery, the Emptiness alone that needs to be realized: not known but felt, not thought but breathed, not an object but an atmosphere, not a lesson but a life (“Foreword" to Ken Wilber: Thought as Passion (2000) by Frank Visser).
Reality is composed neither of things nor processes, neither wholes nor parts, but whole/parts, or holons ( Ken Wilber: A Brief History of Everything, 2000).
[E]ach thing is a perspective before it is anything else. And this means that in the manifest world, there are no perceptions, only perspectives…As far as we know or can know, the manifest world is made of sentient beings with perspectives, not things with properties, nor subjects with perceptions, nor vacuum potentials, nor dharmas, nor strings, nor holograms, nor biofields, etc. Those are all perspectives relative to some sentient being” (Ken Wilber: Integral Spirituality, 2006, 255).
But with the nondual state, suddenly,...there is nothing outside of you to smash into you, bruise you, torment you. Suddenly, you do not have an experience, you are every experience that arises, and so you are instantly released into all space: you and the entire Kosmos are one hand, one experience, one display, one gesture of great perfection. There is nothing outside of you that you can want, or desire, or seek, or grasp – your soul expands to the corners of the universe and embraces all with infinite delight. You are utterly Full, utterly Saturated, so full and saturated that the boundaries to the Kosmos completely explode and leave you without date or duration, time or location, awash in an ocean of infinite care. You are released into the All, as the All – you are the self-seen radiant Kosmos, you are the universe of One Taste, and the taste is utterly infinite....
...See the sunlight on the mountains? Feel the cool breeze? What is not utterly obvious? Who is not already enlightened? As a Zen Master put it, "When I heard the sound of the bell ringing, there was no I, and no bell, just the ringing." There is no twiceness, no twoness, in immediate experience! No inside and no outside, no subject and no object–just immediate awareness itself, the sound of one hand clapping....
…This state is not something you can bring about. This nondual state, this state of One Taste, is the very nature of every experience before you slice it up. This One Taste is not some experience you bring about through effort; rather it is the actual condition of all experience before you do anything to it. This uncontrived state is prior to effort, prior to grasping, prior to avoiding. It is the real world before you do anything to it, including the effort to 'see it nondually’ (Ken Wilber: A Brief History of Everything,2007, pp. 345-347).
So the call of all Nondual traditions is: Abide as Emptiness, embrace all Form. The liberation is in the Emptiness, never in the Form, but Emptiness embraces all forms as a mirror all its objects...You and the universe are One Taste (Ken Wilber: A Brief History of Everything, 2007, p. 361).
In fact, all things, we might surmise, intuit to one degree or another that their very Ground is Spirit itself. All things are driven, urged, pushed and pulled to manifest this realization. And yet, prior to that divine awakening, all things seek Spirit in a way that actually prevents the realization: or else we would be realized right now! We seek Spirit in ways that prevent it (Ken Wilber:The Eye of Spirit, 2001).
Ultimate reality is not an idea, philosophy, experience, proposition, technique, or perspective. It is rather a profound realization, in the deepest seat of consciousness, that opens one to a direct identity with that ultimate nondual Estate, a Reality that in itself can therefore never be seen as an object and hence remains purest Mystery shining in the Cloud of Unknowing (Childhood Spirituality).
It's not just Genpo [Roshi] as a human being and as an enlightened human being. He's a deeply, deeply decent human being, which is much harder than being enlightened, incidentally (Ken Wilber on Anchoring I AMness videosu)
For more quotes see my book Wilber's AQAL Map and Beyond and Healing Thinking and Being (Chapter 7)
Some views are "more right" than others (Ken Wilber: The Kosmos Trilogy, Volume II, Excerpt B: The many ways we touch)
Some critics are just worthless (Ken Wilber: What We Are, That We See. Part I: Response to Some Recent Criticism in a Wild West Fashion, June 8, 2006: www.kenwilber.com/blog/show/46).
“What's my philosophy? In a word, integral. And what on earth — or in heaven — do I mean by "integral"? The dictionary meaning is fairly simple: "comprehensive, balanced, inclusive, essential for completeness." Short definition, tall order (Ken Wilber: "An Integral Spirituality." Beliefnet Essay).
an integral approach acknowledges that all views have a degree of truth, but some views are more true than others, more evolved, more developed, more adequate (Ken Wilber: "Integral Spirituality in Real Life." Beliefnet Essay).
In Integral Life Practice, we use the AQAL View or Framework, simply because it is the only genuinely integral view that we are aware of at this time (Ken Wilber:The Integral Vision, 2007, p.179).
The Integral [AQAL] Map is just a map, but it is the most complete and accurate map we have at this time
Ken Wilber: The Integral Vision, 2007, p. 18).
A truly Integral or AQAL Framework is not an inert map, it’s a psychoactive map. It is a psychoactive system that goes through your entire bodymind and begins to activate any potentials that are not presently being used (Ken Wilber: Integral Spirituality, 2006, p.299).
AQAL is a map of samsara, a map of the prison...(Ken Wilber: The Integral Operating System, Version 1.0, Sounds True, 2005, "Going Further" with Ken Wilber. Disc 2).
In other words, all of my books are lies. They are simply maps of a territory, shadows of a reality, gray symbols dragging their bellies across the dead page, suffocated signs full of muffled sound and faded glory, signifying absolutely nothing. And it is the nothing, the Mystery, the Emptiness alone that needs to be realized: not known but felt, not thought but breathed, not an object but an atmosphere, not a lesson but a life (“Foreword" to Ken Wilber: Thought as Passion (2000) by Frank Visser).
Reality is composed neither of things nor processes, neither wholes nor parts, but whole/parts, or holons ( Ken Wilber: A Brief History of Everything, 2000).
[E]ach thing is a perspective before it is anything else. And this means that in the manifest world, there are no perceptions, only perspectives…As far as we know or can know, the manifest world is made of sentient beings with perspectives, not things with properties, nor subjects with perceptions, nor vacuum potentials, nor dharmas, nor strings, nor holograms, nor biofields, etc. Those are all perspectives relative to some sentient being” (Ken Wilber: Integral Spirituality, 2006, 255).
But with the nondual state, suddenly,...there is nothing outside of you to smash into you, bruise you, torment you. Suddenly, you do not have an experience, you are every experience that arises, and so you are instantly released into all space: you and the entire Kosmos are one hand, one experience, one display, one gesture of great perfection. There is nothing outside of you that you can want, or desire, or seek, or grasp – your soul expands to the corners of the universe and embraces all with infinite delight. You are utterly Full, utterly Saturated, so full and saturated that the boundaries to the Kosmos completely explode and leave you without date or duration, time or location, awash in an ocean of infinite care. You are released into the All, as the All – you are the self-seen radiant Kosmos, you are the universe of One Taste, and the taste is utterly infinite....
...See the sunlight on the mountains? Feel the cool breeze? What is not utterly obvious? Who is not already enlightened? As a Zen Master put it, "When I heard the sound of the bell ringing, there was no I, and no bell, just the ringing." There is no twiceness, no twoness, in immediate experience! No inside and no outside, no subject and no object–just immediate awareness itself, the sound of one hand clapping....
…This state is not something you can bring about. This nondual state, this state of One Taste, is the very nature of every experience before you slice it up. This One Taste is not some experience you bring about through effort; rather it is the actual condition of all experience before you do anything to it. This uncontrived state is prior to effort, prior to grasping, prior to avoiding. It is the real world before you do anything to it, including the effort to 'see it nondually’ (Ken Wilber: A Brief History of Everything,2007, pp. 345-347).
So the call of all Nondual traditions is: Abide as Emptiness, embrace all Form. The liberation is in the Emptiness, never in the Form, but Emptiness embraces all forms as a mirror all its objects...You and the universe are One Taste (Ken Wilber: A Brief History of Everything, 2007, p. 361).
In fact, all things, we might surmise, intuit to one degree or another that their very Ground is Spirit itself. All things are driven, urged, pushed and pulled to manifest this realization. And yet, prior to that divine awakening, all things seek Spirit in a way that actually prevents the realization: or else we would be realized right now! We seek Spirit in ways that prevent it (Ken Wilber:The Eye of Spirit, 2001).
Ultimate reality is not an idea, philosophy, experience, proposition, technique, or perspective. It is rather a profound realization, in the deepest seat of consciousness, that opens one to a direct identity with that ultimate nondual Estate, a Reality that in itself can therefore never be seen as an object and hence remains purest Mystery shining in the Cloud of Unknowing (Childhood Spirituality).
It's not just Genpo [Roshi] as a human being and as an enlightened human being. He's a deeply, deeply decent human being, which is much harder than being enlightened, incidentally (Ken Wilber on Anchoring I AMness videosu)
For more quotes see my book Wilber's AQAL Map and Beyond and Healing Thinking and Being (Chapter 7)
