The Purpose of The Model of Personal Development and Global Change
by James Blacker

This article relates to The Papillon Human Potential Model of Personal Development and Global Change, a teaching presentation that we present from the homepage of our multi-website Integral Wisdom Movement, Whole Life Whole World (.com). For information, Papillon Human Potential morphed into, and became a subset of, Whole Life Whole World, as we broadened to work with a few more colleagues.

The Aims of The Model

Perhaps the prime aim of the Model (there are perhaps two main aims, I’ll come on to the other one later) is to deal with a gap that I am certain exists between a large element of the populations—of many countries—who might actually want to do some good in the world, for themselves, in society, when they see bad things on the local news, for example…and those same people believing, or even knowing that there can be any idea of how to actually go about that. Are they empowered enough in themselves to even realise that they can make a difference? And do they know how that difference may be made, particularly in terms of positively supporting global dynamics by helping our cultures to reach more integral levels of consciousness?

In most cases, they are almost certainly not even aware that there are people; scholars, teachers, philosophers, leaders, around the world, who essentially know the theoretical answers to the “How?” but are all too blissfully aware that the rub is that getting sufficient numbers of people to take deeper perspectives, to be aware, to heal, is the real essence of the task. As to quote Wilber; “A global map is one thing—a mapmaker capable of living up to it, quite another”.

If the person in the street—or, as we say in Britain, “The man on the Clapham bus”, can have it explained to them—almost certainly for the first time—that, for example, The Line of Care moves up from Egocentric and Ethnocentric levels, and on to Worldcentric levels and beyond, and that individuals make up a culture’s psychological ‘centre of gravity’, and that the degree to which people evolve themselves and their potential can indirectly (or even directly in some instances!) influence—however slightly—almost every nook and cranny of every culture and continent, then they are, at least, informed enough to decide whether they want to make their ‘vote’, the caring that they already have, and their potential, count. And even if they only seek to evolve for themselves and for their own sake, then that in itself is also a benefit to the collective, for a strong world will only ever be made up of strong people. And as someone who might not like or agree with all of the people in the world, but who certainly loves them all in any case, it would also be very welcome news to me, for its own value to them, in and of itself.

This brings us on to another, even more important question, then: Can they even take control of their own lives?

The second aim of The Model is about giving people a very nice, clear, user-friendly understanding of the various dimensions of their own selves, so that just maybe they can see the best and most appropriate place for them to work on themselves in any given moment—the point of power for them in that situation, rather than seeing all of personal development as one big, random, confusing—and therefore uninviting—soup. This, I believe, can make any effort that the individual may make in order to take control of their lives much more successful, effective and informed. And, back of that, our whole movement is designed to help them in that.

Are they shackled and overwhelmed by their Shadow or their negative beliefs and self-talk? Have they learned yet to use their own Spiritual awareness, by which I simply mean awareness of their own ever-present sense of self, as a grounding for taming the Ego and thus achieving emotional mastery? Has anyone even ever explained to them that all supposed ‘negative’ emotions carry positive gifts?

Has the importance and practice of listening to the body been informed and taught, and then followed up with the suggestion to integrate the mind with the body, which is something that is not—yet—focused on culturally, and so is a very natural capacity of beautifully flowing with the luminous health of one’s body that only a few people have as yet achieved, but which makes achieving lifelong health so much easier? If you can see your own mind and its wondrous intricacies as an object and a tool that is yours to shape and nurture and define, then you can manage it in order to integrate it with the body! This conclusion has led me to define ‘The 1-2-3 of Health’, whereby step one is listening to the body, step two is distinguishing the difference between the needs of the mind and the needs of the body, and step three is actually having—or developing—the capacity of self-mastery to actually make that awareness count, and take the right action. Outside the much smaller percentage of unavoidable ill health causes, that is where the solution to Western health lies in the Degenerative Disease age.

“The needs of the mind are not the needs of the body. If the need for food is in the mind, if the need for sex is in the mind, you cannot satisfy the need.”—Don Miguel Ruiz

A Description of The Model

So what is The Model? Well really it’s something for people to read from our website, in just a few minutes, plus some brief basic imagery to help them get a sense of themselves, and the world, and how the two can move forward in a common aim. It’s linked to our ‘Wisdom Welcome’ messages, and to our other pages, events and written, audio, video, and interactive resources, and so is a starting point as much as anything.

It starts with the individual, and then moves on to the influence and relevance of the individual for the collective. We start with the explanation of the individual, and really this is based around the four aspects of any person as explained by Integral Theory, or Integral Life Practice, of Mind, Body, Spirit and Shadow.

The first principle is about freedom and self-acceptance of where and how one is in the moment, which simply amounts to not fighting against oneself and one’s true nature. From this, then other principles are engaged in, the next main two being healing, and (vertical) growth, and, of course, addressing the practicalities of the current situation. By pointing out that any suppressed or ‘Shadow’ elements in our subconscious are also stored in the physical body’s nervous system, we give people an insight into the relationship between mind and body.

All this can help to cultivate a stronger and more informed basis for approaching the task of developing both life skills and vocational skills, and for also better understanding one’s scope for contribution in all of its potential facets.

Then we look at the collective. This is very much in support of Andrew Cohen’s observation that nothing is as important as the evolution of the individual, as with the evolution of the individual, consciousness (and the collective) itself evolves. As Peter Ragnar also explains, “If I leave this place as one improved human unit, I’ve improved The Whole.”

To improve The Whole is also a natural by-product of improving oneself and fulfilling one’s potential for happiness by embracing one’s human potential, physically, mentally, socially…and is therefore totally in harmony with the individual’s authentic and truest goals. To embrace one’s potential is to be oneself truly, in full—and constant—bloom.

The second half of The Model on the collective discusses such things as the value of Integral Theory, Empowerment, and other concepts and principles, showing, amongst other things, how Interior Depth can alleviate famine, and the concept of ‘The Cost of Separation’ as a name for social and global resource inefficiency. Put simply, the growth and development of Interior Depth reduces The Cost of Separation.

We use the term, ‘The Cost of Separation’, and it’s opposite, ‘The Prosperity of Unity’, co-operation (or the T.E.A.M. Principle—Together Everyone Achieves More), to give that same layman on the Clapham omnibus an insight into the world’s resource inefficiency. This uses the invitation to think of a family that does not co-operate with itself as a metaphor for the inefficiency of the global (human) family.

“In a healthy family environment, all available resources are maximised because everyone is working together as a unit. Specifically, though, the reason why everyone in a family pulls together is that they each have each other’s well being at heart.”—Taken from The Model

Then what?

The Model of Personal Development and Global Change is just the starting point or the centre piece really, though. What happens when people have read it, and so want to “jolly well get on with it”? Well, the piece is surrounded by a growing collection of websites that support all of these various areas of life.

Because so much of this revolves around personal transformation and healing—Everything revolves around personal transformation and healing—from dieting and weight management, to global change (as individuals make up societies), my most compelling drive was to provide some kind of resource back of this which would support people in those efforts, and have the best people possible present to the most people possible, for the maximum benefit for the whole.

Gracefully, I am now working with my good friend and colleague, Gary Hawke, a prominent Integral Practitioner here in the UK, who runs The London Integral Life Practice Group, and is now helping us to shape our online encouragement areas for the primary practice aspects; Mind, Body, Spirit and Shadow, plus we are including an area for Ethics. Transformation or healing comes with practice, and so people will know that they can go to www.wholelifewholeworld.com/practice to get ongoing information, inspiration and support from us on this to help them keep it going. Feed the mind. Daily. In conventional environments, how else are people to give themselves a consistent mental diet of personal growth and practice support?! Whenever people leave live motivational weekends, the energy drops, dissipates and disappears almost as soon as they get home. That is the big issue for an individual’s personal development; a supportive environment of daily practice, wisdom and application to keep it going.

Then we have other support resources for the other areas; Health, World. We have begun to develop a presentation area for our Body Wisdom Campaign and Culture—to encourage people to the profound and very simple approach of simply listening to their bodies. The ‘Wisdom Diet’ presents a psychologically healthy, informed approach to integrated weight management. My concept of ‘Wisdom Coaching’ is to reach those people who otherwise would have nothing to do with words like ‘spirituality’ and enlightenment’, but who’s faces light up at the mention of the notion that they might be “giving their power away” to something (an attachment to a finite—and therefore Egoic—identity), such as their lover, their bank balance, or their parking space at the office. And I have designed ‘Wisdom: The Course’ to explain all of this also, and to teach just about everything I have to give—a combination of wisdom, worldcentric vision and life coaching. And as well as myself and Gary, we are joined by the spiritual teacher and life skills trainer, John Christian, the UK’s top sleep expert, Dr Neil Stanley, who is also supporting our Body Wisdom Campaign…David Heard, who provides our health and ‘Strength for Life’ coaching, and many others, in a growing community of thinkers, experts and practitioners.

On the ‘World’ front, we are currently working with a couple of other organisations whose material is relevant to manifesting a global outlook, to see if their reach can be expanded and shared through our ‘World’ homepage, so that those 30% or so of the population who visit our website, who care beyond just themselves and their families, have something to spur them on in that interest, too. This already includes ‘Moor the Boat’, the short story about the future of humankind, which was written by the late enlightened master, Tamo-san, a friend and former teacher of John’s, which we have now arranged and made available for people to read for free through the site.

Oh, and was I about to forget to mention that we are just now teaming up in support of Gary Hawke in his vision to launch an Integral UK Symposium?! This is the latest pinnacle of where we are at now in terms of driving consciousness and integral wisdom forward, particularly here in the UK.

Best wishes and kind regards,

James Blacker

About the Author

James Blacker is the founder of first Papillon Human Potential, and, later, Whole Life Whole World. James is involved in pioneering virtually all of the Whole Life Whole World websites and projects. As an Integral Philosopher, Body Wisdom pioneer and Wisdom Coach, his work aims to strengthen human consciousness by illuminating human potentials in all their glorious dimensions. He is the author of the epic coaching programme, Wisdom The Course: The Way of True Success, and The Wisdom Diet, and is co-founder of The Body Wisdom Campaign and Culture, which aims to promote and encourage a culture of listening to the body for the benefit of all our health. James has also recorded audio products and interviews with some of the country’s top health experts, including Good Sleep with UK Sleep Expert, Dr Neil Stanley, Nutrition and Healthy Cells with the Human Nutritionist, Dr Laurent Bannock, and Strength for Life with founder of The National Rehabilitation Centre for The Paralysed, David Heard. http://wholelifewholeworld.com/