SPIRAL DYNAMICS IN ACTION
SDi Level Two Personal Emergence

Dr. Don Beck and The Spiral Dynamics Group are proud to present this 10th Annual SDi Level Two experience in beautiful Boulder – a 4-day program of dynamic SDi certification training, interactive learning, and meshWORKING with some of the finest veteran minds and groups in the global SDi constellation.

2009 THEME
Personal Emergence and The Challenge of the Self

Selves of the World, Arise!

While many speak of ways to suppress the "self" or even "ego" as if these expressions of individuality are toxic to the whole, we take the opposite view; namely, that it is within the genius of "self" – call it ego if you wish – that critical aspects of emergence are triggered.

Everybody is fond of quoting the famous Margaret Mead expression of the power of groups: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever does”.  We support that strategy. But we advocate meshing individual brilliance with collective wisdom. If our individual moments of creativity are lost in the communal, in "group think," then we will have a bleak future indeed.

It is time that we re-discovered "self" in its many positive manifestations. 

That is precisely what we intend to do at this year’s Boulder event. We warmly invite you to join us with an open mind and an open heart to explore this very challenging, even controversial topic of celebrating the positive Self in its appropriate equilibrium with the communal.

Each year during our annual “evolution” of the SDi Personal Emergence experience in Boulder we add more and go deeper into the application of Spiral Dynamics.  This year’s theme brings to the forefront the crucial characteristics and trajectory of the emerging self, and both the differentiation and the integration of the impact of individual and group/cultural emergence.

As in previous years, the overall intent will be to both explore and experience ways to develop, nurture and enhance the eight senses of self and 'personal' displays: survival Beige (SurvivalSense), magical Purple (KinSpirits), egocentric Red (PowerGods), saintly Blue (TruthForce), achiever Orange (StriveDrive), sensitive Green (HumanBond), Integral Yellow (FlexFlow) and holonic Turquoise (WholeView).

However, this year we add to our curriculum a focused exploration of the interface between self and society.

We will look at the challenge of the self through many lenses, most notably the biological, and what that entails for personal emergence.

And we will probe deeply into questions such as:  What are the codes, the logarithms, for individuals to emerge in healthy ways within, between, and across group and cultural boundaries?

Design

Spiral Dynamics, in both the warm and cool colors, embraces the whole. It does not force a mindless conformity around group norms or political correctness, but shows how the genius of human creativity must arise at a time of trouble, when the old wine skins can no longer contain the new wine.

The four days in Boulder are designed to engage participants fully in a focus on the individual’s personal life journey, and the characteristics to which individuals respond as differentiated from a group, community, or nation.

This will remind many of us of the way we used to speak of creativity, the liberation of the fuller potential of people as they cope with life's challenges, especially the odd balls among us who are often punished or simply do not play group or collective games very well. (For example, “punishing” behavior, by means of “equalizing” behavior, which often results in the demise of honor societies in high schools or legitimate merit prizes, or the imposition of rigid norms on thought and behavior at a time when we desperately need the full spectrum of human creativity and emergence. Don't forget that Green is often plagued by high levels of conformity and intolerance of real human differences.)

Approaches and Perspectives

Our aim will be to come up with a comprehensive individual perspective uncovering patterns, equations, logarithms, codes that appear to influence and choreograph personal emergence as differentiated from a cultural grouping’s.

We must be prepared to examine carefully the new genetic research regarding behavioral patterns, as well as what Prof. Clare Graves used to refer to as "temperament or disposition.” Spiral Dynamics is based on the bio-psycho-social dimensions – and only now are we beginning to explore more fully the "bio-" aspects of the self, and how our genetic tendencies and even more primal animal-like instincts continue to shape our behavior, even those who are "enlightened."

In short, it is time to restore balance to our understanding of humanity to avoid making claims that anybody can be anything; that we are pieces of clay to be molded by society. Rather, the evidence is we are like gardens already planted and the vast individual differences among us – even in the children in our families – have deeper causality than many of our current egalitarian models acknowledge.

Come prepared to walk the talk and move beyond the simplistic and the surface levels – so often addressed by assemblages of people, conferences, meetings, conventions shaped by habits and patterns of the past which simply exchange emotive satisfaction in the present and false senses of equality, peace and harmony – as we explore the deepest codes shaping our realities. Realities which are at present perhaps still beyond our understanding, or off our radar screens, and largely ignored by large cadres of “experts” and a whole generation of well-meaning people who still do not grasp the essence of the human drama and the cultural factors along with the genetics that are either propelling us into despair or lifting us towards the broad sunlit uplands of a possible and obtainable future.

It is time now that we not only collect, accumulate and synthesize the wisdom from the past but also seek after the not yet clearly understood wisdom for the future – new realities and life conditions demand it – with clear minds, hearts full of passion, and invincible courage.

So come prepared for a mind-challenging look at human destiny, and at the choices we can make to resolve a host of pressing problems and clear out the impasses and dangers that confront us all.

Available only in SDi training courses!

While this body of knowledge will be informed by the work of Graves and the Spiral Dynamics Integral conceptual system, it will also reflect a great deal of new insights from our studies of large-scale systems that are going through major shifts.

Nowhere else in the world can one find this level and quality of Spiral thinking, nor the hands-on demonstration of real-world, practical application of Spiral Dynamics in Action.

In fact, what you can access in our training only and nowhere else is that specific ingredient other imitative courses miss: knowledge of the actual dynamics of change. Rarely discussed elsewhere in the Integral worlds, let alone taught, is the deceptively simple exploration of what different people mean by “change.”
Without understanding how complex systems, including levels of ego involvement, actually “change” – and in which change variation – means people are simply not realistic about real-world conditions.

Delivery and Faculty

Delivered by Dr. Don Beck, and assisted and enriched by live presentations by veteran SDi practitioners and “Live Wire” tele-interviews and -presentations from experts in the fields of brain research, biology, genetics, education, child-rearing, and spirituality.
An opportunity not to be missed!

What else will be important at Boulder 2009?

It is time for Integral to become more fully integral. Join with us in the exploration and emersion into new thinking about human nature. Otherwise, we will allow ourselves to be trapped in limiting models of human potentials. If we are afraid of all of this new research into a biological nature, then we are no better than those who have embraced materialism, flatlander frameworks, or naïve understanding of interiority that is the product of a single value system band.

This is especially the case as we begin to focus more specifically on the 8th Code - Turquoise. Too many simply advance their Green beliefs and mistakenly claim that they are, well … you know the problem.

To register now, click here.