The 10 Steps Of Consciousness: Wake Up Stages Part 1

Most of us know the words at the top of the ladder: love, bliss, letting go of the self. Very few of us live there.
In this talk I walk up all ten steps of consciousness, from the basic drive to survive to awakening. For each step you will hear where it shows up in an ordinary life, the kind of person who lives there, and what moves us on to the next one.
The map builds on Clare Graves, Spiral Dynamics, and Tara Springett's The Stairway to Heaven. This is the first of three talks on the stages of awakening.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to this presentation on the awakening map. I'm so excited that you have come to join us and to explore what I believe is a fascinating journey through the states of consciousness we go through as we go towards awakening. So welcome to the Awakening Map presentation, 10 stages of consciousness that we work through right from the very beginning stages of consciousness through to awakening. My name is Peter Adcliffe. I've been working in this area for years, Decades in coaching, Teaching meditation, Teaching practices of awakening, And anything that will help people achieve greater levels of happiness and peace and you know, Serenity. I've come up with this map, Which I believe is probably the most practical, Succinct and powerful way to clearly understand how to grow your consciousness. And so I'm excited to share it with you. Okay, So let's go to stage one now. We will work up through all 10 stages first, Then we will sort of look at them at a bigger level, And then we'll work down and back up again through various, You know, Chapters as we work forward. But before we begin, I just want to acknowledge where a lot of this work comes from, Because as everyone before me often says, None of this work really is meant mine per se. I've drawn it from various sources and then sort of put it together, Put my own little spin on it to present to you. But the main sources I've brought this from is work done by Claire Graves, Who put together this evolution of values to begin with. That was then further worked on by people like Don Beck and Christopher Cohen, Who created this area called Spiral Dynamics. So you're welcome to search for that in the Their idea, Our staircase is more like a spiral going up, Which I'll talk about a little bit later why that's so. And then finally, They came up with about seven or possibly eight levels. And then recent work by Tara Springett has added, You know, A couple more levels on to show where we go into awakening. And I've drawn heavily on that as well. So then I've sort of put it into my own system. And that's what we have here. So, You know, Obviously, I acknowledge all of those great people before me to help me bring this together to present to you. Now, The journey ahead, As I said, Is 10 levels. Just very quickly, Before we jump into level one, It goes through some rough stages. Level one and two is sort of pre-egoic, Where we are more connected with the universe in a way. And then as we go into stage three, We start developing the ego and then optimizing the ego up to about stage five. And then we take a turn and we realize that that's not fulfilling in itself. And we are interested in more connection, Both connection with people and connection to the universe. And then we deepen that in stages eight to 10. So I'll get back to why that's important, But it probably helps first of all, To actually outline each of the stages. So let's go into that journey now. So we start off with step one, Which is really just survival. Now, I'm also going to try to give you an idea of where this happens in both everyone's life from an age perspective, As well as examples of people who might be stuck at these stages. Now, Survival, Of course, It begins when we're born. And as a baby, All we're really interested in is getting food, Getting sleep, You know, Going to the toilet or whatever it takes just to survive. We're not interested in character, It's just the bare necessities of life. So that's sort of the age, Up until about, I don't know, One and a half, Something like that, We're in this survival stage. Very, Very connected to the universe, No development of ego, No problems. We don't have hatred towards people, We're not jealous of people, None of that even exists yet. As terms of people who stay like that, It's very uncommon. So you won't very much see people in the level of survival. One possible exception I came up with might be, Or a couple actually, When you're very sick, You might regress back to that. Because when you're so sick and feeling so in pain and nauseous, You can't think about broader things. All you're interested in is that moment, Getting exactly what you need in that moment to survive. So that's one example. On an ongoing basis, I've thought that sometimes people with a strong hoarder concept, Trying to just bring everything to themselves, This kind of existential fear that they feel more safe when they sort of accumulate everything. It can even be people have this attitude and can accumulate calories by either overeating or the body will put on weight irrespective of how much you eat. Just because of sort of this mental concept. But in practice, It's very rare to see someone at survival. Of course, Animals are in that state as well. They live in the present moment, And this is not necessarily a negative state. You know, Animals, For the most part, Are very happy sleeping away, And yet their mind is in that state of when they need something, They'll just go and get it, And they won't think too much of it. So yeah, So that's step one or stage one. So going on to stage two is the level of belonging. Again, This is fairly pre-egoic in the sense that we don't have a big identity of self. It's more that we are merged with, In the first case, Our family group. So at the age of maybe one and a half to two, We see ourselves instinctively as part of this family group, And we don't really think about our boundaries that much. We just naturally do uh. . . What the tribe or the family does. And generally, In this area, There is a certain amount of peace because there's no instinct to create violence for any state of egoic state, Which will come in the next stage. So there is a certain amount of harmony here. Again, This in terms of age tends to be maybe when we're very, Very young. Again, Maybe two or three before we start getting into the tantrum stage. And It is possible to see people in the world that do have strong traits of belonging. They tend to be very much either attached to their family or attached to their tribe. So this is very much a sort of a tribal thing. If you worship the ancestors and you believe very much in this connection with your kin and your ancestors, Would be a trait of this showing up. So you can imagine sort of ancient tribal cultures that might still have this kind of thinking. You can also imagine, You know, Gangs. So a lot of these gang behaviours in jails or in slums exhibit some of this sort of tribal culture. But also you might come across people in life which are very, Very and tend to stay close to their family. They're often connected with their mum all the way up, You know, Through middle age, You know, Through their whole life basically, Never straying too far from home. Often quite innocent people. We have to be a little bit careful that they're not taken advantage of because they don't really have this strong sense of boundaries around themselves, Which comes later. So these are examples of people and stages of the belonging stage. However, If we do end up being. . . Are used a little bit, Taken advantage of, Then we need to find our own power, And that comes in stage three. So stage three is a state of awakening of the ego, Where we learn to stand on our own two feet and stand up for our own rights, And this is called the power stage. So it's where we draw boundaries and it can come come in often in the form of a sort of a violent behavior or shouting. So in child's development, You know, The first few temper tantrums and just not giving your toys to your friends or standing up for yourself. This is all the child learning about this power stage. Again, This very much can go through into adulthood where people just care about themselves. You know, I want it, Therefore I'm just going to take it. And everything becomes a power game. And it's just who can dominate who. They believe the world is a dog-eat-dog world. It's everyone out for themselves. And the name of the game is to get power over your over your enemy, Because this world is a place of people who are also your enemy, Who are wanting to get power over you, So you have to fight that. So this is very much where the ego comes and can be one of the places where violence is the most extreme. Now eventually we get sick of having to live in a violent culture where the most aggressive person seems to dominate and we look for a solution and that solution comes in the form of order. So if we cannot dominate those people around us, We look for things and people that can. And it can come in the way of a law and order system. So you can have a law which is above the common people. And if everyone obeys that, Then we're at least out of that very chaotic, Violent stage of level three. This can be taken fairly far or another big source of order is a religious order. So in this case we're not able to tame these violent, Power-hungry people, But God can do it, Or our religious order can keep them in mind by realizing there's something even higher than them that even they have to abide by. Another extreme example of this is sort of in communism, Where everyone has to stay at the same pecking order, At least in the idea of ideal communism, And we all have to abide by a set of rules which covers everybody. Now, This, As you can imagine, Can be quite stifling. And when people have had enough of this, They look to grow further by asking the question, Is order the only way or is there another way? And that leads us into the next stage, Which is achievement. Now, People who have understood the benefits of order, They don't necessarily disregard them entirely. They realize that, For example, The rule of law is important for society to function properly. But within those rules, I'm going to try to bend every law to my gain and even break laws if I think I can get away with it to achieve my own personal games. So this is a level of achievement where people are not interested in just keeping the status quo. And as Gordon Gekko said in the movie Wall Street, I think it was, That greed is good. You know, There's nothing wrong with someone striving to achieve and make the best of themselves. Because the drawback of places like communism is it tends to drag everybody back into the past. Whereas entrepreneurship can propel not only you, But also the people around you into greater levels of of success, For example. So achievement is very much for people who are potentially in their teens looking, As we try to encourage people, You can be the best person that you can be. And they're very interested in making themselves better, So they'll go to courses where they can improve their communication, Their various skills, Sporting achievements. It's all about trying to manage your body and mind into success because that's where you believe happiness lies is in your personal success. However, Achievement can eventually become hollow when you realize that no matter how much money you earn, You still really want to earn more. And no matter how much success you have in sport, There's always somebody who's better than you or nipping at your heels to be better than you. And there's generally a sense of emptiness in people who are serial achievers, Which then causes us to look around to see if there's a better way and leads us into step six, Which is what we call community. Now community, A big idea dawns on people that when I look back on my life, The times when I've been happiest have been when I've been sharing with people. When I've been helping people and other people have been helping me, When I've been working as a team. And that's when I don't feel this sense of void in me, This sense of hollowness. And so maybe that is what life is all about. And there's no real age where this comes upon people. It could be, You know, Young 20s or 30s, Or maybe not until you're 60 or so. When you start to look at alternative ways of life. So this is the tree changers, The hippies, People going into a spiritual community, Sometimes a sort of Eastern spiritual community, Is they're looking for something more in life to fulfill that hollowness in them. And they will start looking at spirituality with renewed interest. Now, Just a brief interesting difference, At level five people are not interested in spirituality. They are interested in making themselves the best they can be and the more pleasure the better, The more fame the better, And spirituality just seems to be a bit woo-woo, A bit out there, A bit crazy. Who would give to other people unless it somehow benefited yourself? So this is where kind of people start searching again and in my workshops it's no coincidence that a large percentage of the people who would be watching a presentation like this are Predominantly at stage 6 and starting to search for something a little bit deeper. So this is a stage we go through but it's by no means the end because there are some drawbacks in that we search and search and search out there to try to find the right belief system, The right community, The right places we can help and we seem to always still feel I'm adulterated, With people problems in organizations, That sort of thing. And so we start searching around for something better. And the step into number seven is more internal transformation. Well, All of these are really. But when we realize that there's no system out there that is going to change us, They are just ways or doors we can walk through for us to help change ourselves. And the big shift from a sharing community level 6 stage to a level 7 stage, Which is responsibility, Is we take responsibility for our own happiness. We make this decision that Annoying people are out there and there's never going to be, You know, Any lack of annoying people. But what makes them annoying is our buttons. If they press our buttons, It's our responsibility to get rid of buttons and not be annoying. So we can't change the things that happen to us, But we can change our reaction to those things and not become annoyed and instead start to feel happy, Start to accept what's out there. And the big responsibility that we take is if we're suffering, Then there's only one person who can do something about it. And that's us. It's no good trying to fix the person that is causing our suffering. There's no harm in doing that either. But ultimately, The real goal is to change the state we think about our situation so that we feel much happier about it. And with some success, We do start to feel empowered. By the fact that we can change our own destiny. We're still at stage six. There's a sense that it depends on finding the right teacher or the right system to change us. Now we realize the answer lies inside of us. So this is a really big period in someone's growth, But it's still very much a sort of a change. We've almost changed direction. From finding the answer out there to finding the answer within. However, There is a certain sense of. . . Calculated change which doesn't seem to work. And there's definitely a sort of a disconnection. Because we believe it's our responsibility, There's a sort of a withdrawing from groups. They can't help me. He can't help me. I've just got to do this work myself. And by the way, You have to do your work yourself. So I'm not going to try and help you anymore. And this withdrawal makes one a little bit isolated. Until we start to look for an answer and in the first instance the answer seems to be love. And that's why the next stage, Stage eight, Is the stage of a deeper connection with people and things and trying to fall in love with everyone around you, Knowing that that connection is what brings that sense of spiritual fulfillment. Because that love is starting to create a deeper connection between us and our universe, I. E. The universe. The people in it, But also the things in it, Which is the connection between us and the universe is where that contentment will eventually lie. But at this level, The answer seems to be generosity. Forgiveness. Trying to help people, Loving kindness, What they call appreciative joy, Being joyful for other people's happiness, And very much not worrying too much yourself because things are starting to be less and less appealing. It's more about this feeling of the warm fuzzies when I actually are able to help that and help other people and get that appreciation. So we tend to launch ourselves into helping others but again we can start to lose ourselves in that love and we again become a little bit more too dependent on. The love that we give to other people. And of course, If that, Those people don't return appreciation, That really hurts, We find, You know, Something is going wrong. And, You know, Mother Teresa, I think, Had these issues that It was give, Give, Give, Give, Give. And although she got a lot out of that, There was still something missing. There's still some sort of connection to the universe or to the divine in her case, Which seemed to be missing. And this is what happens with a state of love. And so we look around for an answer and we see that just abiding calmly. And instead of going and projecting our love onto people, If we just have this aura where when people step into our aura we can help them and we can direct positive energy to them there's a much more sense of relaxation which turns into a state of bliss and this total acceptance of helping people when they need help but not necessarily pushing ourselves onto people creates a sense of contentment, And with that contentment comes this, What people talk about, This internal state of joy or bliss that arises internally, Instead of having to chase pleasure externally. And when you get this state of bliss that arises internally, It is so good, It trumps anything that you could possibly get from the outside world, And therefore you stop chasing things. More and more stop chasing things, You feel more and more internal bliss. And this connection to the universe. And there's only one final shadow, Which is as you settle into this deep sense of connection to the universe, There can be a subtle type of escaping. So people go and test themselves by, You know, Sitting in caves for years at a time, For example. But we could do this ourselves at this stage. We feel completely content. And whilst the world is still harsh, It's much easier for us to withdraw from the world and stay in that state of bliss. And it's fragile in the sense that The bliss comes and goes when you're in a good position, It's there, But if you're having to deal with terrible neighbors or you still have to go to work, Then the bliss sort of disappears. And whilst your loving is still there as well, This sense of connection to the universe then disappears, Therefore it's not stable. And the job here to get rid of this shadow is to learn to stabilize that in all situations. And that is really the end of suffering, Which is what we call awakening. And there are certain insight practices, Which I won't go into here, That are involved with that. But that leads us to the final step, Which is the awakening step. So that's a brief overview of the 10 stages. What I'm going to go to next is, Again, To zoom out and look at these stages as a whole.