Hey—read your piece. It’s clearly thoughtful and intentional, but I’ve gotta be honest: it reads like someone solidly in what Robert Kegan calls the “self-authoring” stage of adult development (Stage 4), trying to speak from Stage 5 without actually being there yet.
If you haven’t read Kegan’s work, I strongly recommend starting with The Evolving Self and In Over Our Heads. He outlines how adults construct meaning through increasingly complex frameworks. Stage 4 is where people build their own systems to break from old ones. Stage 5 is where they begin to see through all systems, even their own, and stop needing to fix, save, or transcend anything.
The reason I bring this up is because your essay still feels reactive. You’re trying to move beyond spiritual narcissism and traditionalism—but you’re still defining your position in opposition to both. That’s classic Stage 4. You’ve authored a new lens, but haven’t yet let go of needing it to be the better lens.
That distinction matters. Without it, it’s easy to conflate personal conviction with universal insight—and to slip into subtle performance under the banner of humility.
If you’re genuinely aiming for metamodern, post-ego, or integrative perspectives, I’d suggest sitting with Kegan’s fifth stage. It might clarify whether you're truly operating beyond the previous structures, or still writing in reaction to them.
But for real, I’d love to learn more about the resistance you’re naming and the stage 5 you’re referring to. I don’t personally ascribe to stage models anymore but I’m always interested in how different lenses can produce new insights or syntheses.
I totally respect your openness to different lenses. That said, your entire piece is a developmental journey—inner trauma to sovereignty, codependence to interbeing, spiritual bypass to relational integrity.
Saying “I don’t ascribe to stage models” while mapping an entire evolutionary arc is like building a staircase and saying, “Oh, I don’t believe in steps.”
Since you asked about Stage 5, here’s the distinction as clearly as I can put it:
In Kegan’s framework, the difference between stages matters not because of status or hierarchy, but because it reveals something deeper:
What your current way of making meaning can and can’t see.
So when someone is operating from Stage 4 and reacting to Stage 3—without realizing they’re doing that from within Stage 4 logic—they’re still subject to their own constructed worldview (their values, framework, narrative). They haven’t yet objectified that lens enough to see it as one of many tools.
And that’s the core developmental move in Kegan’s model:
Shifting what was subject (unconscious, embedded, unquestioned) to object (seen, held, worked with).
It’s not just about gaining insight—it’s about seeing where perceived insight is still operating as an illusion. That’s the classic Stage 4 trap:
“I’ve seen it, I’ve transcended it,” when in fact the lens is still invisible—because it’s the thing doing the seeing.
That’s why the critique matters—it’s not just about terminology or whether you name “stages.” It’s about your ability to reflect on your own meaning-making structure.
In your piece, you critique other relational systems (which map to Stage 3), then build a new system in response (Stage 4), and frame it as beyond systems entirely (implying Stage 5). But the structure is still reactive—it’s defining itself in opposition. That still reflects a Stage 4 pattern, at least in Kegan’s framing.
From Stage 5, the view would be more like:
“This framework I’ve authored is one container for meaning, not the truth. And maybe the drive to fix or transcend something is itself a form of shadow.”
That’s why this distinction matters:
It shows where your developmental edge might actually be
It explains why the essay feels clear and sincere, but not yet integrative
And it reflects what Kegan’s work is all about: growth doesn’t come from constructing better truths—it comes from holding your truths lightly.
Sharing this not as a correction, but as a lens that’s helped me recognize where I was still reacting from within the systems I thought I’d transcended. Hope that’s helpful.
Absolutely beautiful reflection. Thank you! What I mean by not viewing things via Stage Theories is not, as you’ve rightly pointed out, a rejection of developmental processes. I’ve just started seeing it less like a ladder and more like a fitness landscape in which different developmental capacities and lenses are more or less fitted to more or less specific or abstract contexts.
Much of the piece is my own process which, I agree, could be framed more personally and less systemically.
I’ll sit with your feedback for a bit and see how it shifts things. Again, thank you!
Ahh okay yes I got you. Thank you for being open to me sharing - you're like the first person who has welcomed my comments like these without defensiveness, attack, or shutdown. I truly appreciate that and it shows how self-transforming you actually are.
Hey—read your piece. It’s clearly thoughtful and intentional, but I’ve gotta be honest: it reads like someone solidly in what Robert Kegan calls the “self-authoring” stage of adult development (Stage 4), trying to speak from Stage 5 without actually being there yet.
If you haven’t read Kegan’s work, I strongly recommend starting with The Evolving Self and In Over Our Heads. He outlines how adults construct meaning through increasingly complex frameworks. Stage 4 is where people build their own systems to break from old ones. Stage 5 is where they begin to see through all systems, even their own, and stop needing to fix, save, or transcend anything.
The reason I bring this up is because your essay still feels reactive. You’re trying to move beyond spiritual narcissism and traditionalism—but you’re still defining your position in opposition to both. That’s classic Stage 4. You’ve authored a new lens, but haven’t yet let go of needing it to be the better lens.
That distinction matters. Without it, it’s easy to conflate personal conviction with universal insight—and to slip into subtle performance under the banner of humility.
If you’re genuinely aiming for metamodern, post-ego, or integrative perspectives, I’d suggest sitting with Kegan’s fifth stage. It might clarify whether you're truly operating beyond the previous structures, or still writing in reaction to them.
hell yeah
But for real, I’d love to learn more about the resistance you’re naming and the stage 5 you’re referring to. I don’t personally ascribe to stage models anymore but I’m always interested in how different lenses can produce new insights or syntheses.
I totally respect your openness to different lenses. That said, your entire piece is a developmental journey—inner trauma to sovereignty, codependence to interbeing, spiritual bypass to relational integrity.
Saying “I don’t ascribe to stage models” while mapping an entire evolutionary arc is like building a staircase and saying, “Oh, I don’t believe in steps.”
Since you asked about Stage 5, here’s the distinction as clearly as I can put it:
In Kegan’s framework, the difference between stages matters not because of status or hierarchy, but because it reveals something deeper:
What your current way of making meaning can and can’t see.
So when someone is operating from Stage 4 and reacting to Stage 3—without realizing they’re doing that from within Stage 4 logic—they’re still subject to their own constructed worldview (their values, framework, narrative). They haven’t yet objectified that lens enough to see it as one of many tools.
And that’s the core developmental move in Kegan’s model:
Shifting what was subject (unconscious, embedded, unquestioned) to object (seen, held, worked with).
It’s not just about gaining insight—it’s about seeing where perceived insight is still operating as an illusion. That’s the classic Stage 4 trap:
“I’ve seen it, I’ve transcended it,” when in fact the lens is still invisible—because it’s the thing doing the seeing.
That’s why the critique matters—it’s not just about terminology or whether you name “stages.” It’s about your ability to reflect on your own meaning-making structure.
In your piece, you critique other relational systems (which map to Stage 3), then build a new system in response (Stage 4), and frame it as beyond systems entirely (implying Stage 5). But the structure is still reactive—it’s defining itself in opposition. That still reflects a Stage 4 pattern, at least in Kegan’s framing.
From Stage 5, the view would be more like:
“This framework I’ve authored is one container for meaning, not the truth. And maybe the drive to fix or transcend something is itself a form of shadow.”
That’s why this distinction matters:
It shows where your developmental edge might actually be
It explains why the essay feels clear and sincere, but not yet integrative
And it reflects what Kegan’s work is all about: growth doesn’t come from constructing better truths—it comes from holding your truths lightly.
Sharing this not as a correction, but as a lens that’s helped me recognize where I was still reacting from within the systems I thought I’d transcended. Hope that’s helpful.
Absolutely beautiful reflection. Thank you! What I mean by not viewing things via Stage Theories is not, as you’ve rightly pointed out, a rejection of developmental processes. I’ve just started seeing it less like a ladder and more like a fitness landscape in which different developmental capacities and lenses are more or less fitted to more or less specific or abstract contexts.
Much of the piece is my own process which, I agree, could be framed more personally and less systemically.
I’ll sit with your feedback for a bit and see how it shifts things. Again, thank you!
Ahh okay yes I got you. Thank you for being open to me sharing - you're like the first person who has welcomed my comments like these without defensiveness, attack, or shutdown. I truly appreciate that and it shows how self-transforming you actually are.
Oneness in diversity. Thank you ~ ♡