The great and rare mystics of the past . . . were, in fact, ahead of their time, and are still ahead of ours. In other words, they most definitely are not figures of the past. They are figures of the future.
Ken WilberRead
Evolution does not isolate us from the rest of the Kosmos, it unites us with the rest of the Kosmos: the same currents that produced birds from dust and poetry from rocks produce egos from ids and sages from egos.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the interconnectedness of evolution and existence within the cosmos.
Ken Wilber's quote reflects on the profound unity between all forms of life and existence, suggesting that evolution is not a process that alienates us from the universe but rather one that connects us deeply with it. It highlights how all elements of the cosmos, from the physical to the abstract, are intertwined, producing both biological beings and thoughtful individuals, thereby illustrating the shared origins and destinies of all entities within the universe.
Themes
EvolutionKosmosInterconnectednessUnityExistence
In practice
Example use cases
This quote would be perfect for a lecture on philosophy and the interconnected nature of life.
More from Ken Wilber
All quotes →The understanding of "evolutionary consciousness" is perhaps the most important thing lacking in spiritual practices today. Evolution means growth and development. This means that there are aspects of reality that have not yet arisen in our consciousness. But they will arise if we grow.
Ken WilberRead
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?
Ken WilberRead
As you you deeply into your own awareness, and relax the self-contraction, and dissolve into the empty ground of your own primordial experience, the simply feeling of Being-right now, right here-is it not obvious at once?
Ken WilberRead
So it is a good idea to start simple, I think, and be very careful. There is a spiritual opening in the Kosmos. Let us be careful of how we fill it. The simplest is: Spirit or Emptiness is unqualifiable, but it is not inert and unyielding, for it gives rise to manifestation itself: new forms emerge, and that creativity is ultimate. Emptiness, creativity, holons.
Ken WilberRead
It is flat-out strange that something-that anything-is happening at all. There was nothing then a Big Bang, then here we all are. This is extremely weird.
Ken WilberRead
Similar quotes
In Reformed theology, if God is not sovereign over the entire created order, then he is not sovereign at all. The term sovereignty too easily becomes a chimera. If God is not sovereign, then he is not God.
R. C. SproulRead
Imagination, on the contrary, which is ever wandering beyond the bounds of truth, joined to self-love and that self-confidence we are so apt to indulge, prompt us to draw conclusions which are not immediately derived from facts.
Antoine LavoisierRead
Nature is what we know. We do not know the gods of religions. And nature is not kind, or merciful, or loving. If God made me - the fabled God of the three qualities of which I spoke: mercy, kindness, love - He also made the fish I catch and eat. And where do His mercy, kindness, and love for that fish come in? No; nature made us - nature did it all - not the gods of the religions.
Thomas A. EdisonRead
Once you open up the Pandora's box of race and gender... you're never done.
Kara WalkerRead
But what if God himself can be simulated, that is to say can be reduced to signs that constitute faith? Then the whole system becomes weightless, it is no longer anything but a gigantic simulacrum - not unreal, but simulacrum, that is to say never exchanged for the real, but exchanged for itself, in an uninterrupted circuit without reference or circumference.
Jean BaudrillardRead
A superfluity of wealth, and a train of domestic slaves, naturally banish a sense of general liberty, and nourish the seeds of that kind of independence that usually terminates in aristocracy.
Mercy Otis WarrenRead