The Daily Evolver

One of the blessings of an integral consciousness is the ability to embrace the gifts of earlier stages of development. In this short holiday message, Jeff encourages us to practice being enchanted, once again, by the beauty and goodness of the world.

The popular picture of the midlife crisis is the man in his 40's or 50's who's lost his job, his wife or his health. He's dyed his hair, bought a Porsche and is dating a much younger woman. We feel sorry for him, maybe in the same way we would feel sorry for an active alcoholic, a mentally ill person or anyone who is out of touch with reality.

Losing your job or your partner, having major health issues or just the general feeling of existential ennui can be terrible and even traumatic, but they are not necessarily unique to midlife. The midlife crisis has a flavor all its own. It kicks in with the realization that you’ve crossed the halfway point of your life and are on the downward slope. To make it worse, you may discover that the things most important to you -- your relationships, your career, your purpose in life -- have begun fraying around the edges if you haven’t put in the effort to sustain them.

We negotiate one transformation after another during our lifetimes, beginning with birth and extending into old age. How we learn to handle them is what shapes us as people and fashions our fate. "The difference between a crisis that makes us stronger or one that makes us weaker and diminishes us is how we resolve it," says Dr. Keith.

In the podcast, Jeff and Dr. Keith discuss:

-The history of the midlife crisis, from Freud and Jung to our current integral understanding that takes into account adult development

-The feeling of loneliness and separation that can characterize this time for people, and how healing it will need to be accomplished in relationship

-The resolution of the crisis at a mature age is likely not quantitative (doing more of this or less of that) but instead will require a qualitative shift, a shift in consciousness

-How to get the support you need to cultivate resilience and find out how you can be of better service to the world

Send your questions and comments for the show to [email protected]. Record a voice memo on your smartphone or use the Speakpipe button on DailyEvolver.com.

In a world in which there are no mess-free options, says Jeff, "I'm so happy to have an evolutionary view" when trying to make sense of things like the killings in San Bernardino, the first terror attack on American soil with the fingerprints of ISIS.

While it's objectively true that violent deaths in the U.S. (and the world) are declining steadily, public shootings have become horrifyingly common here (26 mass shootings just during Obama's two terms in office). These create a special kind of anxiety and terror, one that we are evolutionarily programmed to pay outsized attention to.

In this podcast Jeff looks at the range of responses that we've seen in the weeks following this most recent attack--responses that tell us a lot about our country, our candidates and ourselves. A predictable (and evolutionary potent) controversy is underway as to what the U.S. role should be in responding to ISIS, and how we should fight back militarily, culturally, even in cyberspace.

Donald Trump called for a halt to Muslims entering the country, apparently determined to keep anyone from getting to the right of him on issues of national security. He taps a long history of xenophobia when Americans have felt threatened, from the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 to the Japanese internments during WW2, to Operation Wetback in the 1950's. But America was a center-of-gravity traditional (amber altitude) country then; we are a center-of-gravity modern (orange altitude) country now. Those of us in the modern majority look back on these historical acts with regret. But the minority of people who are traditionalists feel little misgiving and believe that tough times call for tough measures. These folks now have an unambiguous, unapologetic, tough-guy champion in Donald Trump, to whom they can hitch their wagon...and ride with him to abject defeat. Which will create more modernists (defeated people usually grow). Isn't cultural evolution wonderful?

Speaking of which, President Obama has taken a lot of criticism for his nuanced, Jeff argues integral approach to dealing with ISIS. Jeff offers his analysis of Obama’s style.

The perennial foreign policy question facing integralists is how to help guide premodern cultures into modernity—a crucially important fulcrum, as violence drops dramatically at this developmental milestone. Jeff advocates an approach similar to that of a parent. "I wish I could think of a better analogy than parenting," he says. "It feels like it's condescending. It makes my green alarms go off that one country could presume to be a parent to another. But from an integral perspective, it's literally true." He explains in the podcast.

Jeff also touches on gun control, the polarity between security and freedom, and how it is we allow ISIS to use the most powerful tool conceived by modernity: the internet.

Plus, a seasonal message of love and renewal.

Have a wonderful holiday and we look forward to seeing you when the Daily Evolver live returns January 5th.

Send your questions and comments for the show to [email protected]. Record a voice memo on your smartphone or use the Speakpipe button on DailyEvolver.com.

The higher divorce rate likely indicates our changing expectations of a primary partnership. We’re living twice as long as we did a hundred years ago, women have more power, and the standard of marriage is a fulfillment standard now more than a stability standard, which is more demanding.

In this conversation on marriage, Dr. Keith shares intimate insights on topics such as what questions to ask as you consider marriage, how to deal with conflict and infidelity, progressive bonding, passion and friendship, and above all, the challenge of supporting each other’s mutual development.

The recent terror attacks in Paris brought to light, once again, the difficulty in reconciling the values of modern, secular societies like France and premodern societies such as those in much of the Arab world. This relationship is complicated by the past sins of the West, from the Crusades all the way up to the wars after 9/11, which, Jeff explains, "took the lid off Iraq, which has put the Muslim world in arrested development and even in a functional regression since".

It may be tricky to claim the moral high ground when you've been alternately toppling and propping up regimes to further your own ends for decades, but between the attacks on Paris and the stream of refugees into Europe, the West cannot ignore what’s happening. Jeff sorts out the cacophony of voices and gives us some perspective.

The practice that's available to us is to put ourselves in the shoes of "the other," the hawks and the doves, the refugees and the terrorists. ISIS is not just a pack of psychopaths that want to see the world burn, (dubious consolation though it may be). They have strict beliefs and the'’re recruiting young people who are actually living nihilistic lives in their host countries, where they’re second-class citizens, says Jeff. "There’s no place for them or their God, the animating principle of their lives." This call to wake up and fight is very alluring, even romantic to young men at this stage of development. Jeff offers some insight into how modern and postmodern societies might offer them a path forward that is meaningful and healthy.

The media is worked up into a frenzy, as usual, ("I wonder how CNN would've covered D-Day" Jeff says). But welcome to modernity, where ever smaller dangers trigger ever greater responses. While it's progress, to be sure, Jeff qualifies his optimism and reveals the one thing that would completely change the game … and not for the better.

Also in the episode, Jeff answers a question from a listener regarding our recent podcast on soul. "If you believe in the unity of everything since the Big Bang, why do you still speak of soul as if it were a separate entity?"

Send your questions and comments for the show to [email protected]. Record a voice memo on your smartphone or use the Speakpipe button on DailyEvolver.com.

How does a nice Jewish girl from Burbank, California become a Buddhist mendicant nun -- with integral proclivities? Listen in as Jeff talks with with Amma Thanasanti, a Buddhist teacher in the Ajahn Chah Forest Tradition, who has been deeply influenced by Ken WIlber and integral theory. Amma was traveling through Boulder a couple weeks ago, and stopped by for a spot of tea and a chat about her unusual life and her beautiful, integrally-informed teachings on love, sex and awakening.

Amma is conducting a virtual retreat (you attend via skype or phone), over Thanksgiving weekend, 11/27 - 11/29. The topic, appropriately, is gratitude. Find out more at awakeningtruth.org.

Some highlights from Amma:

"It's not fashionable right now to live a life of alms mendicancy, or renunciation, or a life of simplicity. But in terms of their potency as a tool for clarity I have not seen anything that comes anywhere close. Once I became a celibate my understanding about sex and sexuality increased logarithmically."

"One of my lifelong journeys has been to understand the energies of love and sex and to use them in the process of awakening. This is not the languaging that comes through the tradition that I ordained into. That languaging is mostly about restraint, so that one can access and cultivate other qualities of mind. But my experience has been a long process of learning how these energies actually can be transformed and utilized for heart opening and mind opening…and how they can take us to states that are really, really peaceful, very blissful, and very useful for practice."

"I teach in a way that speaks to all of the different quadrants, and to making sure that we have lines of intelligence that are developing in many different areas. What I think is imperative is that as many people as possible are in the process of waking up to the highest level of consciousness they have access to."

Is there any part of us that survives this life? Ken offers an argument for the affirmative, and Jeff shares how experimenting with that idea illuminates his own developmental path. Plus, the soul of conservatism.

This week, the sudden animation of Hillary Clinton and the ascendency of Ben Carson, what their presence tells us about the deeper currents flowing under the surface of culture. Also, the poetry of Brooke McNamara, from her new book "Feed Your Vow: Poems for Falling into Fullness".

Jeff takes us on a brief tour of the history of polarization in the US as far back as the Revolutionary War, and describes the silver lining to the conflict and legislative gridlock. Also, Full Spectrum Mindfulness and the practice of evolutionary spirituality with Steve McIntosh.