DESIGNER STATES — III

Given the last two posts on Designer States, when you meta-state yourself and one of your states, you not only are able to give it the texture and qualify that you want, but you simultaneously do a lot of other things. You set a meaning frame, you classify it, you transcend it and include it in a higher experience, and you establish a self-organizing attractor. That’s a lot for a single action — applying one state to another state. Yet there is more.

Here’s another thing. Your states are holons. That is, you experience your states as a whole within itself and simultaneously as a part of another whole. Research scientist Arthur Koestler introduced the term “holons” many years ago to describe reality as composed of “whole/parts.” This concept rescues us from unhelpful dichotomizing and enables us to understand something in a more holistic way. And whole/parts is the way it is with every meta-state.

These whole/parts holons refer to any “entity” that is itself a whole and yet simultaneously a part of some other whole. When it comes to states such as confidence, courage, commitment, playfulness, joy, flow, etc., they are also a part of a larger whole. While you experience them as a whole and can deal with them as a whole unit or experience, they are also inside of higher level wholes— meta-levels of beliefs, decisions, permissions, memories, anticipations, etc.

If a mind-body state operates as a holon in that it is within many higher mental-emotional frames (beliefs, values, expectations, etc.) which support it, then when you detect a meta-state, you have a part of a greater whole. Like a hologram—if you know how to read it, you have a lot more than what is immediately obvious. And that can give you a heads up on the structure of the experience.

Ken Wilber also speaks about holons. He uses such terms as agency and communion and then transcendence and dissolution. He says that a holon has identity and autonomy—it has its own agency (activity, energy) and identity as a whole. Yet as a holon within a larger whole, it also communicates and has communion with other wholes.

In joyful learning, learning has transcended itself and gone beyond to become more than mere learning—to become joyful. The transcending-and-including process adds novel components to the original state. Or, on the other hand, it can dissolve qualities and change the nature of the state. That happens in calm anger and in respectful anger.

When a state, as a holon, moves up to transcend itself, something new emerges.

This happens when you are in a state of fear— facing something potentially dangerous — and you transcend your fear as you go into commitment and responsibility so that courage emerges. Now the person goes into the burning building to rescue a child. Courage—the ability to face a fear in spite of the danger. Here the lower is transcended and included in

the higher to produce something new.

In systems, a gestalt is “more than and different from the sum of the parts.” So a gestalt state is more than just a meta-state, it is a meta-state that has transcended its components and formed a new configuration. Merely adding the parts together (the primary states) does not, and cannot, explain the new emergent state. The leap upward invites a higher structure of an experience.

Wilber offers another description: “holons emerge holarchically” (p. 27). Originally Koestler also created the term holoarchy to replace “hierarchy.” This means that the meta-levels (logical levels) that you and I experience do not comprise a hierarchy. They are not hierarchal. They are holarchical. That’s why we cannot say that one logical level is higher than another. Values are not higher than beliefs. You can believe in a value. You can believe in an identity or a vision.

Holarchies describe an order of increasing wholeness. Particles to atoms to cells to organisms. Or letters to words to sentences to paragraphs. The whole of one level becomes a part of the whole of the next. Each higher level embraces and engulfs the lower. That’s why when we take a primary state like anger and set frames about it (respect, calmness) to create new emergent properties as a larger holon.

Imagine embracing your anger with acceptance, appreciation, and then wonder. Imagine engulfing it in love, respect, and honor. Imagine applying mindfulness, values, and patience to it. Imagine bringing ecology concerns, moral uprightness, and honor to it. Mix well. Put into the oven of your mind, let it bake for awhile... Imagine embracing your power to take action in the world with acceptance and appreciation. Imagine engulfing it with ownership, excitement, and joy. Imagine applying hope, desired outcomes, willingness to take intelligent risks, love, and concern for others, to it. Mix all of these well in a state of contemplative relaxation. Let it bake as you learn and explore and develop...

How’s your holographical set of states? Are they structured so that you have the most optimal qualities to your states?

For more reading: Hall, L. Michael (1995/ 2012). Meta-States: Reflexivity in Human States of Consciousness. Clifton, CO: Neuro-Semantic Publications. Wilber, Ken. (1996). A Brief History of Everything. Boston MA: Shambhal.