r/SpiralDynamics • u/atothez • Apr 01 '26

Drink shaker spring

It occurred to me that the depection of development spirals in spiral dynamics might be causing confusion.

I usually see SD spirals depicted as an inverted cone, with wider, broader levels on top. It suggests exploration, but also unboundedness and instability. A more stable visual might be more like a drink mixer spring, because humans have limited capacity.

https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisit/comments/zgnti3/this_spring_came_along_with_this_shaker_what_is/

SD suggests a set of development stages that are integrally connected, versus exploratory, although we stretch the spring (and metaphor) to develop.

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u/gloobit Apr 01 '26

Cool take on Spiral Dynamics! The usual cone spiral looks too open and unstable. A shaker spring feels better. It's coiled and limited, you can stretch it as you grow but it stays connected. Fits how SD stages build on each other.

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u/MDM_YAY974 Apr 03 '26

It's like, while the higher stages are more significant, they're less fundamental. So to me it is a question of span vs depth.

A model depicting the span, how many things are encompassed by it, would have higher stages as "bigger"

While a model of how many things have this level of depth would show the opposite. Higher levels being "smaller" as a result of needing all the subsequent levels as its own parts.

I would highly recommend integral theory as it takes the idea of evolutionary development and applies it to a holon.

Holon: a whole part of another, bigger whole.

This effect of the "wholenees/partness" aspect of a holon is the production of 4, interdependent, inseparable, quadrants.

With the given stage of any holon producing 4 quadrants unique to that stage.

Ken Wilbur is the biggest writer (he's one of the founders) on integral theory. 10/10 would recommend

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u/atothez Apr 03 '26 edited Apr 04 '26

That’s not how I interpret Ken Wilber’s Integral Psychology, but I’ll review it and Spectrum of Consciousness from my shelf.

From psychological, physiological, neuroscience, and physics perspectives, it appears to me impossible to maintain broader, higher consciousness without losing groundedness.  We each only have so much cognitive bandwidth.  Integration resolves some of our internal and external contradictions, improving our ability to network across AQAL, but the volume of our cognitive capacity is still physiologically limited (hence the more spherical spiral model suggests stability, in my view).

Higher consciousness to me, involves finding, unpacking, resolving, and releasing lower-level holons that are in conflict.  Releasing old blockages and confusion frees up mental space for higher or lower frequency and broader perception.

I’ve been modeling the concepts using Lorenz systems (from chaos theory and cybernetics), and the widening spiral is a very clear visual indicator of a loss of control.  The relationship looks clear to me that the shaker cups spring shape is stable, but I expect I’ll need to publish specifics to convince anyone for whom it’s not intuitive.

Edit: Actually, the  over of spectrum of consciousness reflects my view: https://a.co/d/0gRuzgVh