Showing posts with label Ken Wilber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ken Wilber. Show all posts

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Ask Dr. Julianne

Dr. Julianne Hanson
Transpersonal Psychologist-Chaplain-Intuitive
Maui Spiritual Counseling

Aloha from Maui, Hawaii!


Aloha Dear Ones,

First, for those asking to subscribe and receive my posts (thank you very much, I love you, too:), giving you a heads up that it’s going to be another week or so until my Word Press update makes that and other new things available from the blog link on MauiSpiritualCounseling.com’s menu. I so appreciate your interest and enthusiasm!

You have send me many wonderful, warm, inspiring comments of support. I am deeply grateful for your openness of mind and heart. Of all the comments I’ve received thus far, only one has expressed disappointment.

That reader found nothing original in my posts, rather, much whining about things that could be fixed, if we weren’t so busy looking for awareness. I was surprised when first reading the comment–nothing about the evolutionary perspective on relationship, my readers’ questions, or my answers, seems whinny to me. But there is great value in focusing a practical lens on any spiritually-oriented discussion. For this opportunity to clarify my intention, I am thankful to the reader.

The only real evidence we have of deeper understanding is how we are living in our relationships. Our relationships are a sacred laboratory, where we explore the reality of what we believe, what we think we know, how we feel, and what we are willing to do about it. Embarking on a journey of spiritual discovery is a good and noble thing. For some, it has become the necessary thing, the response to a deep longing, to a lifetime of urging from the Holy Spirit, the evolutionary impulse.

Being on a journey of spiritual discovery, and taking it seriously, is not an excuse to withdraw from the practical needs of our relationships. Indeed, each and every nuance, any glimpse we have of greater truth, makes us more responsible for bringing that awareness directly into our relationships. How else are we to know if we know anything new? If we are unable to change in the ways we say we want to, if we are not choosing differently, have we really learned anything?

It’s true that there is some confusion around the evolving paradigm of enlightenment. We are all familiar with the iconic guru on the mountain top, meditating away all awareness of life in form. Sometimes, individuals that awaken in relative isolation can become inadvertent teachers for many, and we are all beneficiaries. This model of illumination, an internal attainment of the individual, perhaps within a small religious community, has existed throughout history. Those with calls on their hearts to experience a devotional life often go off to various forms of monasteries and convents. These souls earnestly seek divine revelation, surrendered to a life of celibacy and service. How purely inspirational–if that is truly one’s path.

In reality, only a very small number of us flourish within that austere setting. Most of us are meant to live in the larger world, to have a mate, to bond deeply with a number of people in different types of relationships. Most of us are meant to love, and share love, in every way possible for humans.

An emerging model of enlightenment suggests that our consciousness has now evolved to the point where we are capable of waking up, together.  It is possible for us to experience a shared awareness of a higher, deeper, sacred oneness between us, a loving, non-dual reality. This is a potential shift in our awareness from me, to we. Small groups exploring this process are calling this shared consciousness the, “We space” (see Andrew Cohen’s, “Evolutionary Enlightenment,” 2011). For those familiar with integral terminology, the “We space,” is the fourth quadrant, the group internal consciousness (see Ken Wilber’s, “Integral Spirituality,” 2006).

This shared experience of inter-relatedness, this awareness between us of deep care, of a sacred impulse to show up as that care in the world, is real, and available. In the two years I’ve been part of Craig Hamilton’s, Evolutionary Life Transformation Program (IntegralEnlightenment.com), I have experienced the, “We space,” in practice circles and evolutionary partnerships. I’ve facilitated small groups that were able to enter that field of unified, expanded consciousness. It is beyond wonderful. I’ll tell you more about my experience in future posts.

One of the most wonderful things about the We, is the shift in motivation that occurs. Our motivation moves from a focus on our individual preferences, to a deep desire to act on behalf of the greatest good–not in a way that devalues our individual gifts, indeed, as more authentic beings free of the conditioning that can suppress our unique talents.

The cutting edge of human consciousness leads us right back to deep responsibility for the quality of our relationships. Want to be more spiritual? Got enlightenment (who said that?:)?  No need to, “get thee to a nunnery,” (and who said that?) anymore. Go on retreats, yes. But those of us with a strong urge to wake up can now choose to do it together, in marriages, in friendships, with partners at work or play. It takes commitment, it takes practice, and, in this evolutionary paradigm, becoming more conscious also requires deep commitment to our intimate relationships and friendships.

We have a sacred responsibility to show up for each other. As we become more awake, we grow an awareness of being responsible to all of humanity.

So, after taking longer to make my point than intended, here is the bottom line. My intention in inviting you to explore a deeper dimension of relationship, is not to cast you adrift on an amorphous metaphysical sea of individual seeking until you attain some certainty enabling you to swim to relational shores. My intention is to encourage you to explore deeper truths in your real life relationships, and find practical, inspirational ways of moving forward, together.

Love and blessings,

Dr. Julianne


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Thursday, January 12, 2012

Ask Dr. Julianne

Dr. Julianne Hanson
Transpersonal Psychologist-Chaplain-Intuitive
Maui Spiritual Counseling

Aloha from Maui, Hawaii!


Aloha Dear Ones,

Found myself wondering–did the last post seem a little harsh?  In asking us all to become more awake in our relationships, am I asking too much?

So many of us have gone through long periods of feeling defeated by relationship–by a relationship within which we feel emotional pain, by a relationship left by our partner, by our longing for relationship.  Many of us are in that place of experiencing some kind of despair around relationship, right now.

What more understandable source of despair could there be than our knowing something is missing from the way our heart connects with another’s?  Whatever our theology might be about our origins, whether we believe we are individual expressions of a single divine mystery, inexorably linked, or not–it’s clear we need each other.  Whatever the cosmic truth may be, on this earth, we need each other deeply.

We long for the real thing–for relationships wherein we are seen and accepted and appreciated for our true selves. We want to be known, to be valued for our gifts, to share our dreams and have them encouraged. Most of us want to experience this profound connection with a mate, to have a special bond with a life partner.  This desire is so deep, so natural, we think we know what the real thing, true love, must be like, look like, feel like. We have millennia of expectations built up about our relationships, and are programmed with ample fantasies to keep us on automatic pilot.

When our expectations are not met, what are we supposed to think? So many past associations pop up to fill our heads, it’s hard for us to know what we actually think, or feel. Our defenses quickly blame the other, blame circumstances, blame some story about our own limitations. There may be some truth in any or all of these–but there is a bigger truth.

The bigger truth, the saving grace, is about who we are, really.  If we are steeped in a cultural identity of a separate self, at the mercy of past conditioning (not only ours and our family’s, but of all our ancestors), how can we be free to even know our true selves, much less another? The path to personal freedom, and the path to true love, are the same. Begin to consider an identity, a self, that is not now, and has never been, separate from its source. Allow yourself to imagine being an essential part of a divine blueprint, becoming more awake to its true nature with each moment, a nature that is inter-related to all others, to its creator, to the sacred mystery, to God.

If we can begin to wake up to this larger identity, limitations of the past begin to drop away. We begin to see with fresh eyes, to hear with the ear of a grander heart. We listen, and hear a call to serve a higher, deeper power, a sacred evolutionary impulse, that animates all that exists. Hearing that call is the beginning of our journey on the path of true love, a love that is ever unfolding, a love that needs us to help it evolve to a vibrantly awake, holy consciousness shared by all humanity.

Our freedom to experience that greater love begins with a new awareness of our ability to choose. We can only be more responsible, to ourselves, in our relationships, if we believe that we are able to choose, to make different choices than the ones that have led to heartbreak and isolation. We can choose to begin walking this path of evolving love now, together.

I’ll continue to give you the resources that are the most powerfully revelatory and inspiring for me.  I’ve been blessed to study evolutionary spirituality with Craig Hamilton for the last two years.  Craig’s site, IntegralEnlightenment.com, gives many resources for beginning on the evolutionary path, along with opportunities for deeper study and ongoing practice with an online community.  Craig Hamilton was the Senior Editor of, “What Is Enlightenment? (WIE),” magazine, founded by Andrew Cohen.  WIE is now, EnlightenNext.org, an online magazine and evolutionary network.  In addition to publishing, “EnlightenNext,” Andrew Cohen has just written, “Evolutionary Enlightenment,” (available on Amazon), an essential primer on evolutionary spirituality.

An integral perspective on life, meaning, relationship, culture, spirituality, can be widely explored on IntegralLife.com, Ken Wilber’s, “online town square,” for integral/evolutionary thought and practice.  Ken Wilber’s book, “Integral Spirituality,” addresses the deep queries of seekers and intellectuals, alike.

I’m becoming acquainted with a new site, evolutionarycollective.com, with Patricia Albere, who hosts interviews with leaders in evolutionary thought. I’m studying a course on evolutionary relationship that Patricia has begun offering, and will happily share some of the insights with you.

If you feel drawn towards any of these resources, please do take the time to check them out. It’s almost impossible for us to get underneath our conditioning on our own–we need interaction with and feedback from others on the path of true love, the path of evolving relationship. Together, we can move forward from, “me,” to the possibility of, “We.”

Love and blessings,

Dr. Julianne

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Tags: Andrew Cohen, chaplain, consciousness, counseling, Craig Hamilton, enlightenment, EnlightenNext, evolutionary community, evolutionary enlightenment, evolutionary impulse, evolutionary relationship, evolutionary spirituality, evolutionarycollective, God, Hawaii, integral, integral spirituality, IntegralEnlightenment, IntegralLife, intuitive, Julianne Hanson, Ken Wilber, love, Maui, Patricia Albere, phone counseling, Prayer, Psychology, psychotherapy, Relationship Advice, relationship counseling, Skype counseling, Spiritual Counseling, spiritual psychologist, spiritual psychotherapy, spirituality, transpersonal psychologist, Unity, We space