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Ken Wilber

Ken Wilber Quotes

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Famous Ken Wilber Quotes

“The point of the overall meditative path is to have Wakefulness (or Consciousness as Such) transcend and include all state-realms, so it ceases to "black out" or "forget" various changes of state (such as dreaming and deep sleep), and instead recognizes a "constant Consciousness" or ever-present nondual Awareness, the union (and transcendence) of individual finite self and infinite Spirit.”

SelfStatesDreamSpiritIndividualBlackSleepForgetConsciousnessPathAwarenessInfiniteConstantUnionsVariousCeaseRealmsFiniteTranscendenceDeep SleepAll State
Book:The Fourth Turning: Imagining the Evolution of an Integral Buddhism
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“If humanity doesn't destroy the planet first, which is always a possibility because as Spirit threw itself out there, that included free will. So, if we don't blow ourselves up first, soul will become as common of a mature development in adults as mind currently is and, eventually, Spirit will become the common experience for humanity.”

IfsMindFirstsSoulSpiritHumanityCommonPossibilityPlanetsDevelopmentAdultsBlowFree WillMatureCommon Experience
Author:Ken Wilber
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“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.”

NeedsImportantTruthPiecesMajorsEmbraceIncludingCompassionateHonoredGracious
Book:The Simple Feeling of Being: Visionary, Spiritual, and Poetic Writings
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“That all opposites—such as mass and energy, subject and object, life and death—are so much each other that they are perfectly inseparable, still strikes most of us as hard to believe. But this is only because we accept as real the boundary line between the opposites. It is, recall, the boundaries themselves which create the seeming existence of separate opposites. To put it plainly, to say that "ultimate reality is a unity of opposites" is actually to say that in ultimate reality there are no boundaries. Anywhere.”

BelieveStillsRealHardRealityEnergyLinesExistenceAcceptingSubjectsObjectsMassOppositesUltimateUnityStrikesBoundariesLife And DeathRecallsInseparableSeemingHard To BelieveNo BoundariesUltimate Reality
Book:No Boundary, Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth
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“Each band or level, being a particular manifestation of the spectrum, is what it is only by virtue of the other bands. The color blue is no less beautiful because it exists along side the other colors of a rainbow, and "blueness" itself depends upon the existence of the other colors, for if there were no color but blue, we would never be able to see it.”

IfsAbleBeautifulSidesLevelsExistenceVisionVirtueSeeingParticularColorDependsBandBlueManifestationAweRainbowSpectrumExitColor Blue
Author:Ken Wilber
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“Conscious business.. business that is conscious of inner and outer worlds.. would therefore be business that takes into account body, mind, and spirit in self, culture, and nature. Put differently, conscious business would be mindful of the way that the spectrum of consciousness operates in the Big Three worlds of self and culture and nature.”

WorldWayMindSelfGodBodyBigsWould BeSpiritCultureSpiritualityThreeBusinessConsciousnessSelf HelpConsciousAccountsSpectrumOuter Worlds
Author:Ken Wilber
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“In fact, at this point in history, the most radical, pervasive, and earth-shaking transformation would occur simply if everybody truly evolved to a mature, rational, and responsible ego, capable of freely participating in the open exchange of mutual self-esteem. There is the 'edge of history.' There would be a real New Age.”

IfsRealSelfFactsWould BeAgeEarthSelf EsteemSelf HelpEgoCapableTransformationResponsibleEdgesRationalEsteemRadicalMutualMatureNew AgeShakingParticipating
Book:The Simple Feeling of Being: Visionary, Spiritual, and Poetic Writings
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“Bad Gardens copy, good gardens create, great gardens transcend. What all great gardens have in common are their ability to pull the sensitive viewer out of him or herself and into the garden, so completely that the separate self-sense disappears entirely, and at least for a brief moment one is ushered into a nondual and timeless awareness. A great garden, in other words, is mystical no matter what its actual content.”

SelfMatterMomentsSpiritReligionSpiritualityAbilityCommonAwarenessGardenNo Matter WhatDisappearSeparationSensitiveCopiesGardeningTimelessMysticalViewersBrief MomentsGreat Garden
Author:Ken Wilber
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“Evolution goes beyond what went before, but because it must embrace what went before, then its very nature is to transcend and include and thus it has an inherent directionality, a secret impulse, toward increasing depth, increasing intrinsic value, increasing consciousness. In order for evolution to move at all, it must move in those directions-there's no place else for it to go!”

MovingValuesOrderSecretConsciousnessEvolutionEmbraceDepthImpulseInherentIntrinsic Value
Author:Ken Wilber
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“Perhaps the best place to begin with an integral approach to business is with.. oneself. In the Big Three of self, culture, and world, integral mastery starts with self. How do body and mind and spirit operate in me? How does that necessarily impact my role in the world of business? And how can I become more conscious of these already operating realities in myself and in others?”

WorldMindDoeSelfBodyBigsRealitySpiritCultureThreeBusinessRolesSelf HelpApproachConsciousImpactOneselfMasteryMind And BodyBest Place
Author:Ken Wilber
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“All the things and events we usually consider as irreconcilable, such as cause and effect, past and future, subject and object, are actually just like the crest and trough of a single wave, a single vibration. For a wave, although itself a single event, only expresses itself through the opposites of crest and trough, high point and low point. For that very reason, the reality is not found in the crest nor the trough alone, but in their unity.”

ReasonRealityPastFoundCausesSubjectsEffectsEventsObjectsLowsOppositesUnityWaveVibrationsCause And EffectHigh PointsTroughLow Points
Book:No Boundary: Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth
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“Were you somebody different a thousand years ago? Will you be somebody different a thousand years from now? What is this One Self that is forever your own deepest being? Must you believe the lies of time? Must you swallow the insanity that One Spirit does not exist? Can you show me your Original Face, of which there is One and Only One in all the entire World?”

WorldYearsBelieveDoeDifferentSelfShowsFacesSpiritLyingForeverThousandYears AgoOriginalsUnityInsanityThousand YearsShow Me
Book:One Taste
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“Great art suspends the reverted eye, the lamented past, the anticipated future: we enter with it into the timeless present; we are with God today, perfect in our manner and mode, open to the riches and the glories of a realm that time forgot, but that great art reminds us of: not by its content, but by what it does in us: suspends the desire to be elsewhere. And thus it undoes the agitated grasping in the heart of the suffering self, and releases us - maybe for a second, maybe for a minute, maybe for all eternity - releases us from the coil of ourselves.”

HeartDoeArtSelfEyeTodayPastDesireSufferingPerfectMinutesGloryEternityUnityRichesReleaseRealmsElsewhereTimelessGreat ArtGrasping
Author:Ken Wilber
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“What would it mean if there were a theory that explained everything? And just what does "everything" actually mean, anyway? Would this new theory in physics explain, say the meaning of human poetry? Or how economics work? Or the stages of psychosexual development? Can this new physics explain the currents of ecosystems, or the dynamics of history, or why human wars are so terribly common?”

IfsHumansMeanDoeWarCommonStageTheoryDevelopmentEconomicsHistoricalCurrentsPhysicsEcosystemsDynamics
Book:A Theory of Everything: An Integral Vision for Business, Politics, Science and Spirituality
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“Start as a human being in this culture, toss in madness, toss in mystical states, toss in being gay, toss in being HIV-positive, toss in religion that assures you God hates you for all of that - and then look me in the eye and tell me you can feel ok about yourself. I dare you. I just dare you.”

FeelsHumansLooksStatesEyeHateCultureSpiritualityHuman BeingsGayMadnessDareAbout YourselfMysticalHate YouHivTossBeing GayHiv PositiveLook Me In The Eye
Author:Ken Wilber
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“If the majority of the "spiritual market" is drawn to prerational magic and myth, how do you reach the small group who are involved in genuine, laborious, demanding, transrational spiritual practice? This is very difficult, because both markets are referred to as "spiritual," but these two camps really don't get along very well-one is mostly translative, the other is mostly transformative, and they generally disapprove of each other-so how do you put them into one magazine without alienating them both?”

IfsWellsTwoSpiritualSpiritualityDifficultPracticeMagicGroupsInvolvedMajorityMythGenuineMagazinesCampsSpiritual PracticeSmall Groups
Book:One Taste
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“In the stillness of the night, the Goddess whispers. In the brightness of the day, dear God roars. Life pulses, mind imagines, emotions wave, thoughts wander. What are all these but the endless movements of One Taste, forever at play with its own gestures, whispering quietly to all who would listen: is this not yourself? When the thunder roars, do you not hear your Self? When the lightning cracks, do you not see your Self? When clouds float quietly across the sky, is this not your own limitless Being, waving back at you?”

MindSelfPlayNightEmotionForeverImagineSkyMovementTasteDearCloudsWaveEndlessWanderCracksStillnessGesturesGoddessLightningThunderFloatsLimitlessPulseWhisperingBrightnessDear God
Book:The Essential Ken Wilber
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