The Daily Evolver

In this episode I share some thoughts on the evolutionary power of Greta Thunberg, the young Swedish climate activist, and her visit (via sailboat!) to the UN Climate Summit.

This week I examine the roster of Democratic contenders vying to unseat Donald Trump. It’s fascinating to watch them trying to create a larger public identity and harness the cultural forces they need to stand out. For my jumping-off point I consider two articles in last week’s Sunday Review in the New York Times: “Donald Trump Is Not A Sinister Genius”, by Ross Douthat, which makes the case that Trump is beatable, and “Tinder the Vote”, by Eve Peyser, a comic take on each of the Democratic candidates in the form of a quick dating profile. If article #1 is correct then one of the people profiled in article #2 will be the next President of the United States. In this episode I share which of them is – and isn’t – getting my heart fluttering. Let me know what you think at jeff@dailyevolver.com!

This summer marks the finales of two multi-chapter fantasy epics that have both reflected and shaped our evolving culture. HBO’s Game of Thrones presented its eighth season, earning a record-breaking 32 Emmy nominations (it has 161 overall). Over at the movies, the Marvel franchise based on The Avengers comic books released its eighteenth and final installment, Avengers: Endgame, which has already become the world’s highest-grossing movie of all time. What are the cultural forces behind these entertainment juggernauts? Today I bring an integral lens to that query with my guest, Los Angeles-based filmmaker and evolutionary guide Jason Lange. Jason wrote and directed the award-winning sci-fi short film SHARE, and is currently crowdfunding a new webseries, Stuck in Development. (See if you can find the integral easter egg in the background of the kickstarter video!)

“We have to accept the reality that to one extent or another everyone has chronically amped-up distress, and a persistent negativity that generates confusing, distorted stories and emotional pain.” This statement kicks off another fascinating conversation with my pal, integral psychotherapist Dr. Keith Witt. What makes our distress difficult to accept, Keith says, is that we live in a culture that preaches zero tolerance for emotional pain. We have convinced ourselves that when we feel it we should be able to fix it — with therapy, pills, spiritual practice or one of the thousands of products that promise to make us happy. And if/when we can’t fix it we are a failure. It’s a double-bind that contributes to psychological conditions such as anxiety and depression, now at record levels. In this episode of our ongoing series, The Shrink and the Pundit, Dr. Keith and I talk about evolving a more mature relationship with our own – and other peoples’ – emotional discomfort and pain.

Today’s guest, Sebastian Siegel, is the screenwriter and director of the upcoming movie, Grace and Grit. The film tells the true love story of iconic, Integral philosopher Ken Wilber and his wife Treya. Based on the acclaimed book that chronicles Treya’s journals, they fall madly in love in 1980’s California and are immediately faced with illness and challenges that tear them apart. They overcome by finding a connection beyond this world, and love beyond life. The film stars Mena Suvari and Stuart Townsend as Treya and Ken, and features supporting performances by Frances Fisher, Rebekah Graf, Nick Stahl, and Mariel Hemmingway, In our conversation, Sebastian, who is an integral practitioner, friend, and long-time fan of Ken’s work, talks in depth about many elements of making the film from writing, development, and casting, to directing, storytelling, and production, and his overriding mission to serve not just this epic love story, but also the emergence of Integral consciousness itself. Sebastian Siegel is a

My vision of a peaceful Colorado summer of slowed-down punditry and ramped-up gardening has been disturbed by a specter of menace entering the scene. While never reaching a crisis level, it has nevertheless presented a real-life dilemma that has taxed whatever integral capacities I have, and has proven to be potent grist for my daily evolving. In this podcast I share the story of my bully and me.

Every first-tier worldview wants to dominate the world, and given a chance they will run roughshod over all who dissent. But as humanity grows (and we individual humans grow) each worldview has to contend with opposing worldviews, a process that constrains the totalitarian impulses of each. In this way, worldviews, even as they stay true to their essence, become less dangerous as they arise in an ever more complex, multi-stage world or person. But they’re still there, or rather here, living and breathing in our developmental stack, and we just have to click on a news site to see that the worst of humanity can break out at any time. In this episode I explore this phenomenon of horizontal development as it applies to red “warrior” consciousness and culture, using examples from General Butt Naked, an infamous Liberian warlord turned evangelical Christian minister, to current popular art such as Game of Thrones, to the President of the United States, a master of red energy. I also discuss the integral practice of

My guest, Fleet Maull, is a criminal justice activist and integralist who shares the story of his time in prison and the work it has inspired. In the 1980s Fleet was a contemplative psychology graduate and student of Buddhist teacher Chogyam Trungpa. But a double life caught up with him as he was convicted of drug trafficking, and he ended up serving 14 years in prison. While behind bars, Fleet sought to put his Buddhist training to work and began teaching meditation in the prison chapel, eventually founding the Prison Mindfulness Institute and The Prison Hospice Association. Today Fleet continues his work in what he calls mindfulness-based emotional intelligence training, which has proved to be remarkably successful in sparking transformation for people inside and outside of prison. In this conversation Fleet shares wisdom gained from decades of work with countless prisoners, virtually all of whom, he discovered, had been victimized themselves, the realization of which was central to their healing. Fleet ref

In this episode, I talk with Dr. Keith Witt about what he calls “the seductive power of quadrant absolutism,” riffing on the quadrant model (part of the AQAL Model) developed by integral philosopher Ken Wilber. Quadrant absolutism denotes the propensity each us of has to see the world through the lens of a preferred dimension of reality – the inner world vs. grounded reality, for instance, or through relationships rather than tasks (see illustration). These preferences, innate and learned, help us create internal models of everything – the world, ourselves, other people – and rely on these models to function. We project our models onto events to better understand and put them in context. We resist input that contradicts our models and struggle with people who see the world differently. As a result we may miss out on the fruits of entire dimensions of reality. The good news is that seeing our native perspective is a powerful way to expand beyond it and to grow into integral stages of consciou

By Jeff Salzman The Democratic field for US president is taking shape fast. Today I have a freewheeling conversation with Corey DeVos of Integral Life about our impressions of the emerging landscape, with a special focus on Marianne Williamson, Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg.

By Jeff Salzman From the earliest clans to today’s multicultural societies, we can see the circle of moral consideration that human beings and cultures have granted to others has increased, stage by stage. Traditional societies (amber altitude) are built on racial and religious identity and enforce overt and often brutal hierarchies. Modern societies (orange altitude) in turn seek to grant legal rights to all, as we have seen with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, laws against discrimination against women, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the legalization of gay marriage. The postmodern project (green altitude), is to correct less overt biases embedded in the structures of society, and in the hearts and minds of each of us. In this episode, I talk with Diane Musho Hamilton about how the process of authentic inclusion continues to emerge, and what she’s learned from her work in diversity training and mediation. Diane Musho Hamilton is a Zen teacher, mediator and meditator. She is the author of The Zen of Yo

In his classic book, Adventures of Ideas, Alfred North Whitehead describes the eros of the beautiful, the true, and the good. And to this list of intrinsic values he adds the idea of adventure, without which, he observes, “civilization is in full decay.” In this episode, Jeff Salzman’s guest Steve McIntosh explores Whitehead’s theme of adventure as it relates to the realm of spiritual experience. Steve focuses specifically on the spiritual experience of wilderness, and the spiritual experience associated with entheogens (psychedelic drugs). He compares the locations of these “inner and outer adventures,” using his powerful personal experiences to illustrate. We conclude with Steve considering the theological and political implications of psychedelic spiritual experience. Steve McIntosh is the author of several books on Integral theory, including The Presence of the Infinite. You can find out more about Steve at stevemcintosh.com, and at the Institute for Cultural Evolution.

In less than three months, Pete Buttigieg, the 37-year-old mayor of South Bend Indiana, (population 102,000), has gone from political anonymity to the top tier of candidates in the Democratic race for president of the United States. What accounts for Mayor Pete’s blast out of the political gate? His resume certainly ticks the boxes: Harvard graduate, Rhodes scholar, McKinsey consultant, and Afghanistan war veteran. And his performance as mayor of South Bend is by all accounts successful; he won 80% of the vote in his reelection campaign – months after coming out as gay. As the first prominent millennial candidate for president, Mayor Pete embodies his slogan, “It’s time for a new generation of American leadership.” And with his nerdy, earnest, shirt-sleeve persona he is the polar opposite of Donald Trump. But I would argue that Mayor Pete has an X-factor that is greater than the sum of those parts: an Integral sensibility. Evident in his campaign biography, Shortest Way Home, as well as his recent media

First of all, let me say that “intellectual dark web“ is the worst name I can imagine for a movement that seeks to illuminate our cultural moment. But, okay, nobody asked me and it appears they’re doing quite well anyway: the intellectual dark web (IDW) has coalesced into a vibrant group of intellectuals, most prominently Jordan Peterson, who are sparking a new international counter-culture known mostly for goring the sacred cows of far left postmodernism (Green altitude). Today’s guest, David Fuller, is at the center of the intellectual Dark Web (IDW) having founded Rebel Wisdom, a YouTube station that has attracted over 60,000 subscribers in less than two years. A veteran producer from BBC News, David made the first documentary on Jordan Peterson, “Truth in the Time of Chaos”, which helped launch Peterson into intellectual stardom. David is also interested in integral theory, and last November he traveled to Denver to interview Ken Wilber for Rebel Wisdom, from which he has recently released the following t

Nature is, as poet Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote, “red in tooth and claw.” Human nature is too, so far at least, but a counter-trend is emerging: as evolution progresses, conflict overall becomes less violent and more complex. Complexity arises out of the evolutionary process of differentiating (conflictual) and integrating (fun!). In this episode of The Shrink and the Pundit, integral psychotherapist Keith Witt and I discuss the evolution of human conflict, how it is manifesting in today’s world and what might be next as emerges into integral (second tier) consciousness. The integral awakening is bringing a deeper awareness of interiors, natural hierarchies and flex/flow power dynamics to all human functioning. The result, as Dr Keith says, is that conflict resolution at the cutting edge doesn’t even look like conflict: Second-tier conflicts keep pumping compassion, love, and play into the fractal interface between order and chaos, until it transforms into warmth and intimacy, the gold standards of interpersona

This week I take a look at a recent issue of New York Times’ Sunday Review (2/24), where seven of eighteen articles focus on the real-time evolution of sex and gender relations. The Sunday Review is a quality barometer of the cultural weather in America and is must reading for me each week. In this podcast I endeavor to bring some integral perspective to the following selection of articles: Stop Counting Women: Quotas and tallies won’t bring real progress on gender parity Not the Fun Kind of Feminist: How Trump helped make Andrea Dworkin relevant again What Formula Does for Dads. A young father finds bliss in bottle feeding It’s Not That Men Don’t Know What Consent Is Why the Priesthood Needs Women Why Celibacy Matters. How the critique of Catholicism changes and yet remains the same Just another week in the Culture War. Enjoy! Please forgive the three short sections of defective video

Today my guest is Vince Horn, integrally-informed Dharma teacher and co-founder of the popular podcast, Buddhist Geeks, who discusses how the Buddhist Dharma (teaching) and Sangha (community) are being reimagined for contemporary life. How does a lineage founded on traditional concepts of renunciation, surrender and obedience to a teacher get transmitted into a modern and postmodern culture — without losing its potency? Can awakening itself be practiced in a way that recognizes the integral distinction between waking up (horizontal state development) and growing up (vertical stage development)? These are messy propositions, as is evolution in general, and Vince shares his thinking on how they are emerging. He also explains how his own practice community, Pragmatic Dharma, is experimenting with new forms of Sangha such as virtual networking, transparency and naturally flowing hierarchy. As Vince says “When everyone in a community is more empowered to learn and share it creates an incredible positive feed

Every stage of human development creates radical new ways to organize work. The holy grail for today’s companies is to function so that everybody has a real chance to contribute their gifts. Instead of operating top-down, more power must be distributed throughout the organization, giving individuals and teams freedom to self-manage, while staying aligned to the organization’s purpose. Achieving this is the promise of Holacracy, a self-management practice for organizations, developed by my guest Brian Robertson using explicitly integral principles. Over 1000 companies utilize Holacracy today – in healthcare, insurance, banking, retail, technology, nonprofit and government sectors; and in places as diverse as Dubai, Shanghai, Amsterdam, London, Berlin, New York, Bangalore, Las Vegas and rural Africa. Holacracy enables employees to act more like entrepreneurs and self-direct their work instead of reporting to a manager who tells them what to do.”</em– Tony Hsieh CEO, Zappos It so happens that I and a g

I invited Brooke McNamara to the Daily Evolver to talk about a project she is launching that I think represents a new way of building creative we-spaces. It’s a 6-week virtual course that provides inspiration, community and an opportunity for creative self-expression to a select group of people who are living in a unique crucible: mothers. Brooke developed the course, Write to the Heart of Motherhood* because, as a poet, she knows writing to be a flexible and potent way for mothers to “connect to our true voice in the middle of our messy lives.” She explains: “The practice of writing is not something I do, but somewhere I go. When I give myself fully to whole-bodied listening for poems, I am never disappointed. Even if nothing comes, the tuning itself creates a presence and vitality in my being that support me profoundly in living and mothering. Poetry, for me, is language that carries both meaning, imagery and story, AND, more importantly, life force itself.” Brooke McNamara is the author of “Feed Your Vow,

Is there intelligent life beyond Earth? Have alien beings contacted us? What do we make of the thousands of testimonials of human-alien contact, including from scientists, diplomats and astronauts? Yet … where’s the proof? And if there is proof, why is alien contact not the biggest story of the millennia? “It is arguably the most intellectually credible topic on the planet with the most cultural taboo surrounding it.” So says my guest, Sean Esbjorn-Hargens. Many of you know Sean as a leader in the integral community, as producer of three hugely successful Integral Theory Conferences, a respected consultant (founder of MetaIntegral) and author (Metatheory for the 21st Century). Well, it turns out there is another side to Sean. Here’s how he describes it: “For over a decade I’ve been a closeted UFO/ET geek – reading 100s of books and watching 1000s of hours of videos (interviews, documentaries, movies) – all in an attempt to make sense of my own experiences and intuitions around this fascinating and confusing t