What is an Integral Love Relationship?

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Many scientific studies proof that being in a healthy lifelong love relationship, raising conscious children, and living on purpose are fundamental both for our own long-term well-being as well as for that of future generations so that we and they can flourish in all respects—materially, physically, sexually, mentally, psychologically, and spiritually.

Yet in today’s modern and postmodern societies, an increasing number of people are not in such relationships, don’t have children, and pursue an individualistic hedonistic lifestyle. Sadly, this individualism has been contributing to the ongoing socioeconomic and environmental problems that humanity is creating, rather than being part of their solution.

The sexual selection process has gone completely out of whack; more people live alone; most couples procreate way below sustainable rates. As a consequence, we may become the next endangered species if we don’t change our way of relating with each other and the world. What happened? Many people moved from “we” to “me”, or loving themselves more than others, lost touch with what their life’s purpose is beyond “enjoying life to the fullest,” and didn’t acquire the relationship skills to master the complexities of love in the twenty-first century.

While our personal relationships and global challenges are constantly increasing in complexity, more people are looking for easy answers to address these problems. This simplistic approach is obviously not working.

On the other hand, most of the complex meta-models that are offered to solve the wicked problems that humanity is facing are rarely effective either, as they require a Ph.D.-level grasp of philosophical and scientific subtleties just to be understood.

Ironically, these complex perspectives routinely overlook the basic fact that integrating the fundamental human dimensions of sex, purpose, love, and sustainable procreation is an essential prerequisite for creating the eudaimonic world that the creators of these models envision.

The Integral Relationship approach remedies these two problems by, on the one hand, providing a practical road map or model (the Integral Love Relationship model) that is simple enough to be fully grasped and put into action by singles and couples of all walks of life and educational levels, and on the other, by presenting a vision that is comprehensive enough to effectively address the relational and global challenges that humanity is facing in the twenty-first century.

Without such a model, we cannot even see what kind of love relationships are possible and necessary for our own well-being, and for the creation of a peaceful and sustainable world in which current and future generations can flourish.

The intention of the Integral Relationship approach is to inspire singles and couples to realize their full learning, healing, growing, and awakening potentials to co-create the kind of love relationships that are not only personally satisfying, but also make the world a better place.

Learn how to apply Ken Wilber’s acclaimed Integral theory of human growth and potentials to (1) co-creating a fulfilling sexual relationship, (2) sharing your deepest purpose with your partner, (3) deeply loving your partner and what is uniquely co-created between the two of you at all levels of your being, and (4) understanding why co-creation and procreation in Integral love relationships matter in the grand scheme of things.

In an Integral Love Relationship, (1) equal and opposite partners with a (2) shared Biological and Transcendental Purpose and the (3) same rights and responsibilities in the domestic and public sphere love each other, and even more so that which is uniquely co-created between them, in (4) all four quadrants at (5) the level of all seven chakras by (6) balancing and harmonizing their healthy feminine and masculine polarities. This allows them to move from (7) asymmetrical transactional love relationships, to (8) symmetrical transcendental Integral Love Relationships (more below).

Let’s unpack this complex sentence:

1. Equal and opposite partners:

By equal we mean that the partners are at the same level of consciousness, spiritual, sexual and anima/animus complex development. This is illustrated by the personality matrix below.
Note that you can have an Integral Love Relationship at any level of consciousness development, not only at an Integral or higher level.

On the left side, you see eight stages of consciousness development from Archaic to Transpersonal.

Next to the stages of consciousness, you see two meandering vertical lines, showing the most common tendencies of the feminine and masculine polarities for males and females as they evolve in consciousness (more below).

Located to the right of the two vertical lines of the feminine and masculine polarities on the Personality Matrix are three rows with the five state/stages of spiritual and sexual development and the five stages of anima/animus complex development that we explored above. They are arranged separately on a horizontal axis for each of the vertical stages of consciousness development for three reasons: (1) they can develop independently at each level of consciousness and are then interpreted from that altitude; (2) spiritual and sexual development can be experienced as temporary states that may or may not be developed into a state-stages; and (3) their development can be interrelated.

On the very right, you see the various personality types such as Ennegram, Meyers Briggs, Love Languages etc.

With opposite, we mean that the partners complement each other in their opposite (or different) strengths (personality types, natural talents, feminine masculine polarities) to create synergy (as in opposites attract).

2. Shared Transcendental Purpose:

Before we can share our purpose in a love relationship that makes the world a better place, we need a deeper understanding of what our individual purpose is.

Humans have two purposes:
1. Our Biological Purpose or “biological imperative” (which we share with most animals) is to perpetuate our existence through self-sustaining processes such as metabolizing, pair-bonding, procreation, territorialism, competition, cooperation, quality-of-life seeking, group forming, and agency.

2. Our Transcendental Purpose is to create more goodness, truth, beauty, and functionality that are in service of our Biological Purpose and the well-being of others (beyond sexual selection), and is unique to humans.

These four dimensions of our Transcendental Purpose began to become genetically encoded when early humans became self-conscious through exclusive pair bonds and females began to select males who were not only good providers and protectors, but also empathetic towards their partner, intelligent, creative, and practical. The offspring of females who selected for one or more of these additional fitness indicators in males had higher survival rates than those who selected “duller” partners, and the genes of the former where passed down in greater numbers to future generations.

These additional fitness indicators were later recognized by philosophers as the transcendentals of science (truth), the arts (beauty) and religion (goodness) and the corresponding philosophical disciplines of logic, aesthetics and ethics. Ken Wilber then added the fourth dimension of functionality in his four-quadrant model.
As a consequence of these additional criteria for sexual selection, every human is born with different “levels” of genetically predisposed natural talents or capacities for Empathy, (cognitive) Intelligence, (artistic) Creativity, and Kinesthetic abilities. The combination of natural talents, nurture and skill development then lead to a multitude (literally thousands) of expressions as shown in the tree metaphor below.

The majority of people awaken to their Transcendental Purpose and use it as an additional sexual attractor for the formation of love relationships between equal and opposite partners who share the same rights and responsibilities in the domestic and public sphere to live their shared Biological and Transcendental Purpose to make the world a better place.

Read why shared purpose is the future of love here, about four methods to discover your Transcendental Purpose here, and how to identify a compatible partner for sharing your Transcendental Purpose here. Watch the related webinars at www.youtube.com/channel/UCsZbcLqZXmhqjKA1Rf-vqyg

3. Same rights and responsibilities in the domestic and public sphere:

Traditionally, women had responsibilities and some rights in the domestic sphere, with the associated feminine qualities of care, compassion, feelings and relationships, and men had responsibilities and various rights in the public sphere, with the associated masculine qualities of rights, justice, rationality, and autonomy.

With the rise of modernity and the female liberation movement, women gained the same rights as men in the public sphere, with the option to choose how many responsibilities (and masculine qualities) they would want to assume. Men on the other hand retained their rights and responsibilities in the public sphere, and sometimes assumed more responsibilities in the domestic sphere while losing their rights. Furthermore, most singles and single parents (men and women) had to assume responsibilities in both, the domestic and public sphere.

Sharing our Transcendental Purpose opens the door to sharing the same rights and responsibilities in the domestic and public sphere.

4. All four quadrants:

The key point to an Integral Love Relationship is that it is healthy in all four dimensions (or quadrants) of our being.

1. The individual interior “I” maturity, psychological health, spiritual awareness, and worldviews.
2. The individual exterior “It” individual physical body (nutrition, exercise, sexuality, rest, etc.)
3. The collective (shared) interior “we” values, intimacy, ability to communicate, shared vision, etc.
4. The collective (shared) exterior “Its” social environment such as money, home, lifestyle, transportation, etc.

If one or both partners are (or become) unhealthy in one or more of these four dimensions, or if certain quadrants get elevated over others (called quadrant absolutism) or ignored, the relationship will suffer.

5. The seven chakras:

The seven chakras represent “energy centers” that you can experience right now.
At the Root is your energy to survive, such as food and safety.
At the Sacral is your sexual energy.
At the Solar Plexus is your energy for protection and self-determination (power).
At the Heart is your energy for empathy and care.
At the Throat is your energy for self-expression and creativity.
At the Third Eye is your energy for intuition, deep insight and wisdom.
At the Crown is your energy for oneness or unity (with all existence or the ground of all being).

In an Integral Love relationship, partners co-create at the level of all seven chakras in all four quadrants.

6. Balancing and harmonizing healthy feminine and masculine polarities:

This co-creation takes place by balancing and harmonizing healthy feminine and masculine polarities (at the level of all seven chakras):

The Integral Relationship model equates ascending and agency with masculine qualities and descending and communion with feminine qualities. Males and females have equal potentials to develop each of the four polarities in healthy or unhealthy ways. As you can see in the image below, one can either be agentic or communal, or ascending or descending, but not communal and agentic or ascending and descending at the same time.

Healthy ascending is characterized by a desire to improve, to go beyond, to grow, to transcend, to create, and to think big.
Unhealthy ascending ignores, represses, controls, and dominates the lower instead of embracing and caring for it. It denies feelings, the body, sexuality, and nature.
Pathological ascenders fear getting dragged down, engulfed, absorbed, and lost.

Healthy descending means being connected with and sensitive to the richness and fullness of the world and being down-to-earth and in touch with one’s body, feelings, emotions, and sexuality.
Unhealthy descending means being overwhelmed, fused with, and run by the many details of life and its manifestations, feelings, earthly desires, and needs.
Pathological descenders fear losing touch, to get lost, and being dissociated from the fullness of life and its forces.

Healthy agency supports the autonomous functioning of the individual, group, organization or society.
Unhealthy agency leads to alienation and dissociation from others.
Agentic people fear losing the freedom to make independent choices and becoming dependent on others for their well-being.

Healthy communion is expressed through the peaceful, responsible (response-able), considerate, and caring connection between people.
Unhealthy communion leads to fusion, dependency, neediness, and clinging—with the loss of one’s own will, individuality, and autonomy—which eventually leads to resentment.
Communion-oriented (communal) people fear that they will be abandoned, unsupported, and alone.

This brings us to the image below, in which equal and opposite partners with a shared Transcendental Purpose and the same rights and responsibilities in the domestic and public sphere co-created between them in all four quadrants at the level of all seven chakras by balancing and harmonizing healthy feminine and masculine polarities.

How this Integral Love Relationship manifests at each level of the seven chakras depends on the level of consciousness of the couple as show in the matrix below.

As mentioned above, this co-creation at the level of the seven chakras takes place at each level of consciousness in all four quadrants as shown below:

8. Symmetrical transcendental Integral Love Relationships.

In which both partners co-create at the level of all seven chakras.

The entire Integral Love Relationship model is shown below with Intimacy, Passion and Commitment between couples with shared Biological and Transcendental purposes.