Title: Aspiring Integral Yogi

Gender: Male

Age: 50

Sun Sign: Aquarius

Chinese Sign: Fire Rooster

Location: Melbourne, VIC

Recent events have serves as a catalyst to motivate me to greater self-transformation.  Hence, the material written earlier often now sometimes feels like it doesn't apply.  For sake of continuity I have included it.  However, I distinguish between the “New Me” and the “Old Me”.  This does not mean theer is a sharp demarcation between the two.  Rather it is a process of gradual process, with old samskaras and tendencies constantly reasserting themselves

New Me

Currently moving beyond excessive reliance on rational intellect and associated emotionalism , letting go of longing for the past and fantasising about the future; all that is certain is the present moment.  Nevertheless the past samskaras hold a strong pull.  Being forced to confront the personal self, a necessary prerequiste for self-transformation and beyond.

Intellectually, morally, and spiritually: everything I wrote before (under “old me”) still applies.  I still have the same interests, and still intend to write my books.  But self-transformation is the priority.  More then ever also, I support sentient rights for all beings.

Integral Yoga: For the first time I consider myself an “Integral Yogi” rather than simply a “student”.  As always, consider the Integral Yoga of Sri Aurobindo and thr Mother the most radical, progressive, all-encompassing path of individual and collective transformation ever taught in the history of the planet.  Indeed it is the only path that describes in great detail and clarity what is required to bring about the Divinisation of the Earth.  Because Sri Aurobindo's writing style can be difficult to approach, I recommend the Collected Works of the Mother and the Mother's Agenda .  The latter is edited by Satprem, who (this is my impression from reading the Agenda) seems to be one of the very few disciples able to be receptive to the leap into the future that she described and lived through especially from the late 1950s onwards.

Nonduality: I still acknowledge Ramana Maharshi as the greatest teacher of nonduality of our age.  Nonduality is an essemtial element of Integral Yoga, even if Integral Yoga goes beyond just nonduality alone.


Old Me

I'm an eccentric esotericist, integral philosopher, futurist, armchair paleontologist, animal and nature lover, and vegetarian/vegan.

My interests include (in no particular order except alphabetical), consciousness in general, ecological awareness and environmental consciousness, the evolution and history of life on Earth, esotericism and metaphysics, integral theory,  memetic engineering, personal and global transformation, the sacredness and welfare of all living beings and the Earth as a whole, saving our beautiful Planet, science in general, science fiction, sentient rights (the rights of all sentient beings), spirituality, the supramental transformation, transhumanism and futurism, and vegetarianism/veganism.

I follow the ”Integral Yoga” of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother; for me spirituality has to be about transformation in this world, not a flight to an otherworldly nirvana, which solves none of the Earth's problems.  This individual spiritual transformation has to extend out to the collective consciousness and the Earth as a whole (and ultimately beyond that to the Cosmos as a whole).  More recently I have also connected with Sri Ramana Maharshi (I have a brief page on him here, and am especially inspired by his kindness to all sentient beings).

The Alternative and Integral movements

A practical interest of mine is in networking and establishing a new paradigm.  I have always been symnathetic to and identified with the alternative movement.  In 2004 I was intrigued by comments and the approach in the Wilberian websites about bringing all the different new age and new consciousness type people together, and craeting a  larger worldview as well.  This is what got me interested in the Integral movement.  But while I identify with the type of practical initiative displayed by the Wilberian Integral movement, I find Wilber's abstract mental theories to be pretty boring (sorry!).  This is because they lack true gnosis (spiritual-divine insight).  So my identification with “integral” is from an Aurobindonian, not Wilberian, perspective, and my essays and this book are intended to expand the Integral movement beyond its current boundaries.  In fact there is no such thing as a non-Wilberian  “integral movement” as such, only various streams within the larger Global Mindshift (to use Brian Swimme's wonderful phrase)

I have recently written an essay on “Redefining the Integral”, which has been posted at Integral Praxis

My book projects:

After two years oI interest in the “integral movement” i wrote two long “alternative integral” essays for Frank Visser's Integral World website - Towards a Larger Definition of the Integral (in 4 parts) and an even longer but perhaps rather less uniform (because i got tired of revising it!) new essay called Integral Esotericism : A new Integral paradigm in theory and practice (in 8 parts)    Doing these essays then got me motivated in writing a book. 

My current plan is to write several books.

One will be on the Global Paradigm Shift, and briefly describe the New Age, New Paradigm, Alternative, Eco-spiritual, Integral, and other such movements, and how they all fit together.  I got the idea for this book when I realised that there is no such thing as a generic, non-Wilberian “Integral Movement”; rather there are a  number of different philosophies, beliefs, and practices, although all with a generic theme of consciosuness change.

My more technical book project will be called Integral Metaphysics and Transformation (originally it was just “Integral Metaphysics” but I wanted to add the practical element). 

I am also considering a book will be called The Story of Everything.  It will be a basic, non-technical overview of metaphysics, esotericism, spirituality, and so on, presented as a sequence from tthe emanation of the Supreme, planes of existence, the origin of the cosmos, the history of the Earth, life, and humanity, and the future integral transformation.

I was going to write about five books, but it turned out to be so much work I decided to just make it one book, and hence avoid the repititiveness of having to restate some of your basic ideas in each book.  I was going to write about five books, but it turned out to be so much work I decided to just make it one book, and hence avoid the repititiveness of having to restate some of your basic ideas in each book. 

I had completed the first few chapters of the initial manuscript, but after some provocative feedback by a close friend, agreed with him that the book is too academic and needs to be rewritten.  So I'm currently on the fourth major revision.  It is better than ever now.

So all this feedback is really useful!  :-)  Working on my own, I only see a particular view, and it helps to hear  other perspectives.    I want to get away from that narcisistic old style of doing things, where a single writer creates in isolation from the rest of the world.  So if you have nothing better to do and would be interested in reading my manuscript and giving me your feedback (you would also have your name listed in the acknowledgements page if you want), please contact me.

The subject of these two books will be The Nature of Reality, the divinisation of the world, and bringing about happiness of all sentient beings (not just humans but all other sentient beings as well).  They will incorporate material I've submitted online, as well as stuff from my web site, and original ideas I have had since.  

Both books will use as a guide the teachings of Sri Aurobindo, the Mother, and other esoteric teachings (Neoplatonism, Kashmir Shaivism, Taoist Yoga, Lurianic Kabbalah, Max Theon, Barbara Brennan, etc etc), but will also incorporate ideas from Teilhard de Chardin, Edward Haskell, Erich Jantsch (The Self Organizing Universe), Ken Wilber, and others as well.   I also realised how much animal liberation and sentient rights are ignored or downplayed by these other movements.  A true synthesis has to include an Integral Ethics based on Universal Sentient Rights.  Finally, a univertsal synthesis has to include futurism and transhumanism, but a non-physicalist and eco-friendly transhumanism.

All these themes, and of course the concept of the divinisation of the Earth as whole, as independently described by Sri Aurobindo and Teilhard de Chardin will be integrated in this work.

Integral Morality:

Two subjects I have become very interested in of late are Integral Morality and Ethics, and the abuse of power by false gurus (because a true, enlightened guru never abuses his or her position), as well as the whole psychology of the false guru (they can be understood as being stuck in what Sri Aurobindo calls the Intermediate Zone).

Attending an ecological conference recently caused me to restablish my connection in consciousness with the eco-spiritual/Alternative movement.  I realised there was a huge overlap between the social/ecological reform Alternative movement and the mainstream Integral movement, as well as the New Age movement with both. 

But most important of all is the principle of Universal Sentient Rights - extending love and compassion and e,mpathy to all sentient beings.  In a way sentient rights - such as Animal Liberation - are the last taboo; the ecological conference I attended had lots to say about the environment, and some things to say about people, but apart from a  passing refernce to factory farms, nothing to say about sentient rights in general.

So for me, any true Integral Morality has to include three elements, each of equal importance:

• Human rights and social reform
• The rights of non-human animals (universal sentient rights)
• the rights and care of the environment, for its own sake, not for what benefit it can give us (Deep Ecology)

Healing the Earth is therefore not possible if one ignores the rights of, or selfishly exploits, other beings that share this beautiful world with us.  A revolution is needed, one truely of enormous significance.  Especially abolishing industrialised cruelty to all other sentient beings, all of whom are equal if not superior in feeling and sensitivity to ourselves.

Indeed, the central theme of my book will be happiness for all sentient beings.  This will be based on an “integral morality” and a sense of empathy for all beings, and the coismos as a whole.

Networking:

Those of us who love the Earth are participating in a unique project, linking up and participating in an unprecedented evolutionary networking, the “global brain” or “noosphere” (in popular culture, as oppose dto teh noosphere a la Teilhard or Vernadsky).

In this regard, I have never found an online community I had as positive feeling about as Zaadz!

A few words then about adding me to your friends list (and vice versa).  I'm being rather politically incorrect here, because I know it is a Zaadz habit to just add as many people as possible, in the hope that eventually one will get to know them better.  This is a wonderful ideal - the spirit of universal friendship - but as with all ideals it is hard to put into practice.  In my own case the problem is that I end up with a whole lot of “strangers” I barely know, and/or people who one has nothing in common with apart from that they are also on Zaadz.  btw this used to happen to me on ICQ years ago in my early internet days; I had a great big list and most of the people I didn't even know why they were on there.  I don't want to dis anyone, they may be wonderful very decent sincere and spiritual people, full of enthusiasm for self-development and global transformation.  I'm not criticising anyone.  And I think that Brian Johnson has created an absolute wonderful, beautiful, awesome spiritual networking community here, and for that I will always be greatful.  I'm just saying, a friends network should be - for me at least, others here may feel completely differently - about people I have some connection with, other than that they are simply enthusiastic zaadzters with big friends lists of their own.  But I would rather get to know a person before adding them to my network  So I have decided for now to limit people listed on my friends network to those who i have either corresponded with and gotten to know already, whether here on Zaadz or on other forums (blog comments, email, mail list, wikipedia, whatever), to people who have contacted me and have previouslly followed my work and wish to keep upto date (e.g. by following my blog or whatever), or to those whome we happen to have a lot of interests or things in common.  So please don't feel reluctant to contact me and talk!  I'm a friendly guy :-)  That way if we find we have a lot in common, or have warm feelings for each other, or have friends or aspirations in common, or if i know that you are interested in keeping upto date with developments in my work (progress in writing, essays, whatever), then I am most happy to add you to my friends network!  Also if by some chance I have removed you from my list but you would like to still be on it, please contact me. 

As I've worked on my book my ideas have changed, and also I want to integrate the book with networking and establishing a new paradigm.  In this way, my book will hopefully serves as a focus for new ideas and the emergance of a new and larger worldview.  But not just me; the whole idea is that the emerging spirituality will transcend the old authoritarian power structures of a central leader teaching and a whole lot of devotees passively listening.  In other words, ”the next buddha will be a collective”.  Just as the Internet replaces the old mass media by allowing everyone to choose, and indeed even create, their own media. so the same applies in spirituality, with all of us becoming co-creators of a new world.

However, some commonality is still required, some point of junction or focus.  This may be mental, affective, or most important, spiritual.  This is also what I would like to see with my friends list, not just people with nothing in common with me joining so they can get their faces on the most zaadzster pages as possible, but people with whom there is some sense of common connection or focus.

Other Work I've been involved in

I am the webmaster of The Kheper Website.  Also I am the author of The Integral Transformation Blog.  I am co-author of Palaeos (website and wiki (still very incomplete))  - dedicated to the history of life on Earth, and which I currently only contribute to occasiuonally, due to priorities of writing my books etc; and the co-founder and co-author of Orion's Arm (“hard science” science fiction worldbuilding project).  Also a contributer to Wikipedia and to Integral Wiki

Member Since: Friday, February 24 2006

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