I’m currently in school to become a psychotherapist, but I want to integrate philosophy into my practice because I love both philosophy and psychology equally.
With that being said, my knowledge about philosophy is more limited than it should be. I’ve listened to a few Great Courses on Western philosophy, I’ve read Plato’s Republic, read several of Ken Wilber’s books, and listen to podcasts on philosophy. However, I haven’t really gotten deep into the great modern or postmodern works that lead to the Integral/Metamodern philosophies of today and the future.
My current reading list is as follows:
Ken Wilber - Integral Psychology
Ken Wilber - Integral Spirituality
Lawrence Cahoone - From Modernism to Postmodernism
Steven Best - Postmodern Theory
Gary Gutting - French Philosophy in the Twentieth Century
Jean-Francois Lyotard - The Postmodern Condition
Critical Realism: An Introduction to Roy Bhaskar’s Philosophy (recommended as a pre-metamodern philosopher)
Whitehead - Process and Reality
Heidegger - Being and Time
Bertrand Russel - History of Western Philosophy
What other books would you recommend I read to really understand philosophy, especially as it pertains to the Integral and Metamodern spaces?
If I was to look at my own philosophy going forward to an integral life and community, here are my “pillars” Postmaterialism (growing up)
The failure of materialism as a life goal is epic for individuals, nations and the planet. After enough communities are functioning with postmaterialist ethics and motivations, only then can they come together to create a post capitalist economy. Hyperreality (often termed transrationalism in these forums) (waking up)
Religion and Theology has to be transformed to assist people in understanding they are both physical and nonphysical. When enough communities share this understanding they can begin to transform scientific materialist understandings based on only 5 senses into a more actual understanding of the physical and spiritual as a integrated science that accepts both objective and subjective observations. Sexuality (growing up)
This area is Waaaayyyy behind al other areas. I’d say while the world was quickly turning “green / postmodern” in the past 20 years, our cultural sexuality is still stuck far behind. Culturally the concept of living more than one person quickly goes off the rails and even in highly postmodern intentional communities constant open communication skills are required. People very often have a very visceral negative reaction to the word “polyamory” and the vast majority of people still look to one person that will bring them self actualization. Shadow Work (cleaning up)
Jung’s work is often see as an area of psychology, but the implications are much more especially when you look at the idea of a collective unconscious. I see many problems of the last 10 years as a culmination of a collective crisis on national and global levels that has its roots in shadows shared by very large groups of people.
I would add Jeremy Johnson’s 'Seeing Through the World: Jean Gebser and Integral Philosophy"
Mark Foreman’s “The Monster’s Journey” and Mark’s other books, and Nora Bateson’s "Small Arcs of Larger Circles ", Gregory Bateson’s “Towards An Ecology of Mind”, Tyson Yunkaporta’s “Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World”, the works of Sri Aurobindo, and Any and All writing of Sophie Strand ( book forthcoming but her writing can be seen on Facebook and Instagram). Otherwise, imho, your reading will be quite… well, skewed… (-; Ken’s work is fantastic, but it is only a Partial view of Integral…