Exploring the Transrational: A Journey into the Realms of Consciousness with Vivian Dittmar

In their second dialogue on "Voices with Vervaeke," John Vervaeke and Vivian Dittmar explore transrational thought, emotions, and transformative practices, embarking on a profound journey into human experience. Vivian introduces a map of five distinct sensations, illuminating the practice of conscious release for personal growth, emotional maturity, and integrating higher consciousness with shadow aspects. Their discussion delves into pre-rational, rational, and transrational modes of thought, emphasizing the importance of integrating various forms of thinking to navigate modern cognitive landscapes effectively. This intellectual and experiential exploration offers valuable perspectives on human consciousness, emotional work, and the potential of transrational thought to enrich our self-understanding and worldview.

Vivian Dittmar, a globally influenced author, speaker, and wisdom teacher, has dedicated two decades to enhancing holistic development. Her diverse upbringing inspired her to explore beyond conventional education, delving into various cultures' wisdom. Through her books and the Be the Change Foundation, Dittmar seeks to redefine prosperity, focusing on emotional intelligence, ecological sustainability, social justice, and spiritual fulfillment, aiming to address the crises facing modern society.

Glossary of Terms
Transrational: Going beyond or surpassing human reason or the rational; nonverbal; nonlinear; abstract.
Pre-rational: Preceding the development of intelligence.
Rational: A state of consciousness characterized by logical, linear, and verbal thinking.
Conscious Release: A practice developed by Vivian Dittmar that fosters the integration of higher states of consciousness with shadow aspects.

John Vervaeke

Vivian Dittmar

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Quotes

"One of the things that became really clear to me is that the transrational by nature has a very difficult stance in today's world because it speaks to us in a way that is nonverbal, nonlinear, abstract." - Vivian Dittmar [00:16:00]

“The ancient world had a whole faculty and term for nous and noesis, and that was all lost with the loss of our Neoplatonic heritage." - John Vervaeke [00:16:18]

"We have a transrational faculty that is also proactive, that is not receptive, and that's intention. It’s really challenging for people to understand in our cultural framework because we very quickly confuse intention with a goal." - Vivian Dittmar [00:57:43]

Chapters
[00:00:00] - Introduction and Overview of the Poly Crisis and Emotional Intelligence
[00:04:00] - Differentiating Sensations, Emotions, and Consciousness
[00:11:13] - Pre-rational, Rational, and Transrational Distinctions
[00:25:00] - Intuition, Inspiration, and Transrational Wisdom
[00:38:45] - Heart Intelligence
[00:47:50] - Reevaluating Rationality and Embracing Intuitive Integration for Decision-Making
[00:56:17] - Intention and Shaping Agency in Transrational Knowing
[01:03:40] - Bridging Phenomenology, Transrational, and Transpersonal Dialogues

[rebekkahaascetin]

Vivian is a trail blazer! I love her thought so much, it was missing badly in the landscape of personal growth, psychology, therapy etc! She got my attention since i ran into her years ago and these interviews bring forth her treasures.
Spiritual bypassing, wrong “therapy” and coaching to so called improved behaviour is a huge failiure and here she brings the solution through a fantastic dialogue and brings out the best in JV as well. I didn’t mind the sharp questions at all, the opposite, much needed to clear up with the mistaken practices and paradigms. This IS the right approach for todays heavily hurt people that your synergy brings forth, i am in awe!!

[MiPo]

Thanks for bringing Vivian to us! Can't wait for the third episode. A bit less interrupting would be great - I understand the intent of emphasising the important points and John's enthusiasm. But it's taken away a bit of what Vivian was saying - on the narrative side only though, Vivian still could perfectly bring across all of her thoughts and insights, I feel. And I also would love these two to co-write a book one day 👍

[amaryllisbulbfarm]

I was brought up to see intuition, inspiration and conscience as our connection with God. When thought resonated in a certain way with the body it was described as feeling the spirit of God, which was an indicator of truth. These teachings were packed together with a lot of myths that are easy to shoot down with modern criticism. It took a lot of listening to people like John Vervaeke and Jordan Peterson to understand that something can be true on a deeply psychological level even though it isn't historically accurate, objective, or scientific. This helped spirituality and religion to come alive for me again. I love how you unpack the different ways of knowing and thinking/feeling with your body.

[thomasf.webber]

My wife has been using the emotional backpack analogy, which has helped me tremendously as a visual. I love the formulas! (Intensity of life exp x sensitivity / support to process). To share a little and expand this; I used to ignore the tools I put into my backpack, but now I have more mindfulness for what I've gathered so far. I loved the words of size and heaviness, but I think it extends to how well it's organized/accessed too.
Models of thought - Intuition (emotion (gut)) (receptive), Inspiration (receptive), heart intelligence (receptive), Rationality, Intention (Goal)
I'm excited to hear the expansion of this conversation and exploration into how to manage the interaction and conversation between these.

[oliverjamito]

Thank you, our beautiful Vivian for attending unto our OWN. Love you too! Gratitude and Honor. Thank you!

[sogolesmaili-ph]

John thank you so much for bringing these people and make us know that these type of scholar and literature exist
you know for people like me it may take hundred of years of study and reading to find these but you intelligently pick up the most " relevant " stuff and share with us ❤❤

[montanaskurka]

Thank you for this beautiful and illuminating conversation!

This understanding and the distinctions made will become more vital to disseminate as we enter this psychedelic renaissance and folks are searching for ways to make sense of their increasingly intangible experiences.

As someone who experienced "patient-hood" much of my childhood / young adulthood, I faced these existential issues and a sense of terrified confusion and alienation from an early age. I saw doctors seeing me from a pure "rational" lens, as a set of fragmented pieces to "fix". The journey home to myself has meant a descent deep into the felt sense of same body I had turned away from for decades - as broken, inefficient, disempowered.

As a somatic practitioner working with these same populations now, I find the chakra system a wonderful way for me to conceptualize these different dimensions of feeling, knowing and being. It also seems that these energetic centres relate to the endocrine system.

This integration - of mysticism and science, of the feminine and masculine - this is what heals - brings us as individuals and a collective into a greater sense of wholeness. Thank you!

Also - the emotional backpack concept as explained by Vivian here was both mind-blowing and greatly helpful in my personal journey as well as my work! Thanks again!

[annajohansson]

Wow! This impacted me deeply! The last sentence was very profound for me since I feel like I fif listen with my body, but I had self doubt about if I really learn anything. This also goes for a lot of the other content John puts out. I love listening to it and I feel like it has transformed my way of thinking and being in the world, but there are not a lot of facts from the content that I accurately could retell to other people. I absorb it deeper on other levels than the intellectual, and it was big for me to understand the value of that. Thankyou both. Looking forward to more episodes with you two!

[mikegarrigan]

I believe I share John’s enthusiasm with this episode, it was amazing. Can’t wait for the next installment.
Intuition, reminds me of the Latin word "praesentire, " which means "to feel beforehand."

[oliverjamito]

Keep the sincere conversations going our beautiful Vivian! Sincere answers will be given.

[mills]

This was an incredible conversation! I really appreciated the distinctions between prerational and transrational as well as the unpacking of intuition. I think the "small, still voice" aspect is very important and is reflected in Taoism with it's emphasis on not perceiving through the lens of valence. I really look forward to what you produce on your sabbatical, John! Thank you both for this discussion which I think makes a lot of progress towards deepening the overall discourse around intuition. 🙏

[tobiassicken]

That was awesome and deeply inspiring. My mind went to Internal Family Systems. Especially considering the internal dia logos between the five elements of the transrational. I am seeing parallels there considering different parts in us communicating while we might be busy doing other things. So much fun!

[movewithseth]

Fantastic. Looking forward to reading The Emotional Backpack and also looking forward to Inner GPS once translation is available. Feel great appreciation for the work of bringing the wordless wisdom of our inner experience into the realm of reason where we can develop intelligent practices that increase our agency.

People who enjoyed this video should also check out The Power of Feelings which is already available in English.

[Michlin-rpiv]

Hi John and Vivian, hoping for #3 to come soon. The matrix almost demands it, since the first episode was 6 months ago, the second 3 months .... .

[Root]

Wow! So elegant and simple yet I can sense that this is on the far side of much complexity and even suffering to come to.

[janthonycologero]

I can't wait to see where this goes from here. Reality "feeling" it! Embody yourself, your Self, your SELF.

[chrismurphy]

I was almost as excited as John during parts of this

[fabricmedia]

Fascinating conversation with amazing clarity. I feel fed and can't wait for the next episode.
I'm just about to do a master's project and want to find something plausible that might help us better understand some of these facilities at play. Although the project might be crude in its scope, I want to better understand aspiration and how one might overcome self-deception and offer suggestions for practically enhancing our tuning, although as I heard in this talk, it might be that a scientific project to reach some of these suggestions might be off the mark or too ambitious. Any ideas are welcome; I am all ears.

[iscottke]

Fantastic interaction! 'Summoning intent' (from C. Castaneda) has a dual implication. Whereas the personal can be termed, 'decision'.

[colorfulbookmark]

The wisdom is human capacity with trust. The positive mind can grow from this ^^ The rational thoughts and wisdom are what we can trust to.