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May 25 - December 12, 2016
Most do not jump stages, anymore than an acorn does, each stage laying the foundation for the next one up. This realization helps us to be patient with ourselves
The Lord loves His children at each stage, even as He works with us in each stage to keep us developing toward a fullness. And, as we said, it’s not that one stage is more important than another or that a person at a higher stage is more valuable than one at a lower, or is more acceptable to God; rather, the higher the stage, if it is balanced development, the greater one’s personal sense of fulfillment and the more enhanced one’s ability to contribute to others.
Spiritual development is, in the adult years, a team effort: Man provides the appropriate practice, and God provides the power by which development goes forward. It is something like this: “For we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do” (2 Nephi 25:23). We can’t do it without Him, nor can He do it all for us without our desire, intention, and practice.
Mindsight: The New Science of Personal Transformation. Siegel is clinical professor of psychiatry at UCLA School of Medicine. His premise is that we are not hardwired to behave in unproductive ways but instead have the ability to harness the power of our minds to resculpt the neural pathways of our brains in ways that will be life-transforming. “Mindsight is a learnable skill. It is the basic skill that underlies what we mean when we speak of having emotional and social intelligence. When we develop the skill of mindsight, we actually change the physical structure of the brain. This revelation
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CHAPTER 6 STAGES OF GODLY DEVELOPMENT
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. (1 Corinthians 13:11)
Spiritual progress occurs in stages: in the beginning, one learns of spiritual realities and studies them. Then comes the practice and application of the teachings in every aspect of life…. Through devotion, commitment, and practice, spiritual concepts become experiential realities. (David R. Hawkins)1
Developmental models themselves have been seen to be what might be called “psychoactive,” because when people get a new vision of where they might go, they often begin spontaneously to move toward or even operate at a higher level. Such is the power within us.
large percentages of adults seem to stall at lower levels of development. This slower progress likely happens for several reasons: 1) most adults do not know that there are higher levels of development available to them; 2) nor are they aware of the benefits of aspiring to them; 3) nor do they have in their surroundings or culture sufficient models or attractors enticing them to higher development; 4) nor do they know where to begin.
designed to lose the sense of personal limitation, even limited ideas of our own identity, and expand into the divine.
movement from one stage of development to another creates moral, philosophical, and behavioral changes. Developmental progression is spiritual progression.
The Stages of Development I. The “Concrete” Stage Characteristic of this stage is the perception that the world is all about “me” and “mine”—
drives. As his divine nature unfolds, the ability to love gradually expands from perceiving only his own needs to including those of his family or group. Social groups become very important, as we see in adolescent cliques
His ability to care continues to expand beyond his immediate circle to a wider group—to those of his culture, his religious group, his nationality, etc. But a person at this stage is not yet able to be very empathetic with those outside his own group or culture and is often not able to put himself in another person’s shoes, especially outside his particular group. Empathy is one example of a spiritual ability he is not yet capable of.
25% of adults in developed societies remain in the higher levels of this stage; about 10% of adults remain in the lower levels.
II. The “Abstract Operations” Stage In this next stage the growing person develops the ability to think more abstractly
begins to appreciate other points of view and to understand others different from himself;
self-worth as he matures in this stage is equated with his achievements:
subject to anxiety and suffering, to guilt and shame,
energy in trying to meet others’ expectations, at the same time then, be...
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He identifies with his own thoughts and believes that the thoughts that come into his mind must be so. To him, his thoughts reflect reality—which is often not the case because of his still limited perception and be...
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50% of adults in developed countries arrive...
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III. The “Context Aware” Stage In this next stage a person becomes more aware of the unreliable natur...
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question his own thinking and his own perception of reality; he no longer fe...
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things are not necessarily what they seemed at earlier stages because the interpretation of reality always depends on the position of the observer….
begin to receive knowledge through more avenues than just his rational mind, thus becoming more sensitive and perceptive. He is now able to take into account others’ individual uniqueness and circumstances. His ability to feel empathy and concern includes more people, also animals, and even global ecologies. His reverence for life expands. With a growing sense of his interconnectedness to others, his comprehension increases.
For some Latter-day saints, the Context Aware stage is a transitional point where, as their consciousness develops, they become aware that some of the “old forms” that used to serve them in the Gospel now seem insufficient spiritually. They are moving into subtler stages and toward a growing sense of oneness with God and with His word.
In my first year of college (Duke), I chanced to pick up a very small book… [Lao Tzu,’s Tao te Ching, a book of ancient Chinese wisdom]. I had never been exposed to such ideas before…. My life up to that point had been largely involved with science (physics, chemistry, biology, and mathematics).… And so, as I stood reading the first chapter of the Tao te Ching, it was as if I were being exposed, for the first time, to an entirely new and drastically different world—a world beyond the sensical, a world outside of science, and therefore a world quite beyond myself…. My entire world outlook began
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begins to move away from what Father Keating describes as the “Western Model of Spirituality,” a model at variance with the Savior’s teachings. This traditional model is a perspective where external acts of obedience (like rituals or things on a spiritual to-do list) seem more important than internal ways of being. The problem, he points out, with preferring the external over the internal is that though the obedience to external religious acts can look pious and spiritual, the acts can arise, not out of a pure heart of love for God and others, but out of pride and self-centeredness and a
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aspect of the Western Model which shifts with greater maturity. He describes the mental image of being engaged in a battle “to placate God for one’s sins or to win God’s favor, while God sits passively in the bleachers watching the contest. If we do well, it is thumbs up; if we fail, it is thumbs down.9 The gospel, on the contrary, teaches that God initiates all good deeds through the inspiration of the Spirit abiding within us, while we listen attentively and put into action what the Spirit suggests.”10
rather than God being “out there,” He is “in here,” offering a very close relationship. A maturing person develops the sense of working within a sense of God’s presence in the perfecting process, rather than outside it, fearing His displeasure.
15 % of adults in developed countries experie...
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IV. The “Construct Aware” Stage This person begins to realize that his own perceptions and worldview are only partial views of things as they really are, and indeed, that his view of reality is self-constructed thr...
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This tendency to construct a personal, subjective reality rather than respond to an objective reality is one reason two people who find themselves in identical circumstances can have such different experiences of those circumstances….
He values intuitions and spiritual promptings more. He depends less on intellectual ways of knowing and more on direct experience.
He can more fully empathize with and value each person, whatever his or her worldview or level of development might be, with a deep concern for the entire spectrum of humanity. His will becomes increasingly aligned with the greater will of God.
Divinity is so mixed in with the world that one increasingly senses that everything needed is provided in anticipation (as in 1 Nephi 17:5,13).
V. The “Unitive” Stage
The person who develops to this stage experiences profoundly the unity and interconnectedness of all things, as opposed to the sense of separation and alienation that accompanies the lower stages.
“Your understanding doth begin to be enlightened, and your mind doth begin to expand” (Alma 32:34); and, “they were loosed, and their souls did expand, and they did sing redeeming love” (Alma 5:9).
his emotions become deeper and more sensitive to the simple feeling of being, to beauty, and also to suffering. He feels the preciousness of life. He also becomes deeply accepting of “what is” in the moment, having lost the need to try to control other people and events. His way of being includes, “Thy will, not mine, be done.” He radiates a calm and unassuming presence, approaching life’s challenges with spiritual wisdom and compassion. He has a humble attitude of continual repentance and openness to growth. That is, he is not defensive because he has less and less attachment to promoting or
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Meditation and contemplation are his practice.
But not to the exclusion of active engagement in the world.
He comes to experience an ineffable feeling of limitless compassion, a deep wisdom, as well as an awareness of a powerful Presence. That is, he has learned how to commune nearly continually with the Lord.
the present moment is so dominant that it seems to swallow up everything; it seems to be forever. It is so intensely personal that I get flooded with emotions, and end up crying several times a day.”
in these upper stages one is still subject to the trials of life, though the perception of trials has changed. There is a tendency to idealize late-stage development, but each stage presents new challenges: perhaps greater pain but also deeper joy;
start to make full use of the spectrum of human emotion, behavior, expression, etc. In other words, they may show up in a given situation with a surprising amount of fierceness, in part because the ego is no longer in the driver seat, carefully managing how others perceive it. When Christ chastised the Pharisees, for example, I don’t believe he was considering how others would perceive him so much as [he was] manifesting Divine Justice and Mercy in that very moment….
Each level presents new tasks, new challenges to transcend. Researchers report that a yet smaller fraction of adults has developed to this point.
Love is misunderstood to be an emotion; actually, it is a state of awareness, a way of being in the world, a way of seeing oneself and others. Love for God or nature or even one’s pets opens the door to spiritual inspiration. The desire to make others happy overrides selfishness. The more we give love, the greater our capacity to do so becomes. It is a good beginning practice to merely mentally wish others well throughout the course of the day. Love blossoms into lovingness, which becomes progressively more intense, nonselective, and joyful.6
The natural mind is described as a part of Man that exists in opposition to God (Mosiah 3:19) and sets itself up in opposition to one’s true self, enthroning itself as God.