Who:  Sally Kempton, also known as Swami Durgananda, is among the most dynamic, insightful, and sought-after teachers of Siddha Yoga, and is author of the celebrated guide to spiritual practice, The Heart of Meditation: Pathways to a Deeper Experience.

Summary:  Sally Kempton is one of the most extraordinary pioneers in more integral, comprehensive forms of spiritual teaching—but my oh my, she’ll be the first to tell you it isn’t always easy, for her or her students!

For anyone walking around the modern spiritual marketplace, one of the largest challenges is simply not knowing what the “right” thing to do is anymore.  With unprecedented access to all the great Wisdom Traditions from across the world, one is left with several very difficult questions.  For students, which tradition should I pick—or should I pick more than one?  For teachers, should I continue to pass on my spiritual knowledge in the way it was passed on to me—or should I add in some complimentary techniques from other traditions? 

This is an exploration requiring equal parts courage and humility, and it’s about this journey of exploration that Sally and Ken discuss, in nuance, with passion, and always with humor.  Who will be the next generation of teachers of explicitly Integral spirituality, in each tradition, or as a tradition in itself?  Who is going to train those teachers in the first place?  Will the teachers of tomorrow help personalize spiritual practice to each person, a kind of “designer spirituality,” or will they forget entirely the importance of discipline, and simply have a bunch of “designer egos” walking around instead?  Can teachers of today and tomorrow hold both “unique fit” and discipline in their minds simultaneously? 

As Sally and Ken discuss, studies have shown that the twenty-somethings of today are even more narcissistic than their boomer parents (a rather frightening achievement), and yet within that generation is an eerily high number of young people who seem to have shot right to the top of the evolutionary wave, and are ready to keep riding higher!  So what on earth does that mean for the future of spirituality?  A bunch of “be-here-now,” don’t worry about practice, you’re already enlightened so just go play video-games teachers?  Or a crop of teachers looking to synthesize and integrate the best that the traditions have to offer, within a framework that understands developmental structures, ever-present spiritual states, but also understands that those higher states won’t stick without diligent practice?

At the leading-edge of consciousness, where these questions are being pondered from an Integral view by both teachers and students, we are the ones who have to answer our own deepest questions, through trial and error, with support from others on the same path of discovery, and with the courage to let the exhilarating birthing pains of a more Integral form of spirituality come into the world through you.  Why would anyone embark upon such a path?  Because their own Highest Self is telling them “walk this way.”  It is the call of Eros and evolution itself, which is precisely and only the gesture of Spirit-in-Action—your own I AMness asking you, personally, to help divine truth shine brighter, and embrace more, than what has come before.

Sound like a commitment to egoic self-aggrandizement?  A Messiah complex perhaps?  Not at all.  Because if you truly realize what you have just devoted yourself to, humility will knock you flat.  In a post-metaphysical Integral spirituality, where it is understood that consciousness evolves, those at the leading edge of consciousness evolution are literally co-creating the structure of consciousness, the world-space, into which untold numbers of others will eventually follow.  So, um, don’t screw it up… and don’t let the fear of screwing up paralyze you either.  Breathe, smile, and go find some friends—and teacher(s)—to help create this path together…. 

(For Part 1 of this dialogue, “Why Liberals Can’t See Beyond the Mythic God,” click here, for Part 2 of this dialogue, “From Bohemian Rebel to Integral Swami,” click here.)