Abstract: There is an explosive, revolutionary, deconstructive theme in the 20th century that has enacted an existential crisis in Western culture’s sense of identity and reality. Drawing on the spiritual emergence model, it can be shown that coming to the edge of destruction, as we have, calls forth the deepest possible potential for spiritual and psychological renewal at an individual, community and cultural level. We now live within a consumerist global community that is struggling with issues of social justice, economic equality and the survival of indigenous culture, driving the planetary ecosystem into an apocalyptic crisis, perpetuated by the 'enemy making' dualities of linear, reductionist, power driven, rational empiricist Western culture. Archetypal activism presents a possibility for political action that draws on the archetypal and existential depth models, highlighting egalitarian, reciprocal cooperation and reflective intentionality. If we look forward in our cosmology toward renewal and reconnection, we have to look beyond the core principle of a regulatory, transcendental divine that saves and protects to an existential and ecological divine that mediates participation. This involves a need to come to terms with complex diversity and the dark, mysterious intensity of our own unknown depths. Richard Tarnas speaks of kairos and dynamical systems theory of deep sensitivity to subtle input at a systemic bifurcation point, where the system is about to go to a new level of existential organization. It would seem that we are in just such an intense period of change in Western culture, and also globally. "We live in a networked world" says the Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. The theme of the networked periphery influencing the centre is in the process of being enacted. The network of global interconnections in the archetypal, humanistic, existential, transpersonal and related depth traditions that emerged from the 1960's is a complex, systemic manifestation calling for, and enacting, transformational cultural change.
Now is the time. This is the place. We are the people. Let’s do it.
Jim McNamara, ND Programs Director, Living Institute; President, Human Horizons Foundation. He has been practicing since 1973 doing individual, couples, group and intensive retreat work. He is currently working as a practitioner providing holistic life coaching and existential-integrative spiritual counselling. His background includes psychodynamic psychotherapy, gestalt, primal and bioenergetics, as well as Jungian, archetypal, existential and transpersonal psychology, holistic healing and naturopathy, Vajrayana (Tantric) Buddhism, shamanistic work and Western mysticism. He is the founder of the Holistic Experiential Process Method (HEP), having trained and certified 12 practitioners since the 1990’s. He was Academic Dean of the Ontario (now Canadian) College of Naturopathic Medicine in the beginning of its 4 year full time program in the early 80’s, designing the first two versions of the curriculum. He is the founder and editor of the Archetypal Review of Culture, an on line magazine and journal.
There is an explosive, revolutionary, deconstructive theme in the 20th century that has enacted an existential crisis in Western culture's sense of identity and reality. Drawing on the existential and spiritual emergence models, it can be shown that coming to the edge of destruction, as we have, calls forth the deepest possible potential for spiritual and psychological renewal at an individual, community and cultural level. We are now entering an archetypally situated, and cosmically framed, period of revolutionary evolution comparable to the 1960's and to the early Romantic period of the late 18th/early 19th centuries. Western culture is struggling with having emerged from the twentieth century, the century that exploded, with a relativized, fragemented, self-critical identity. We now live within a global community that is struggling with issues of social justice, economic equality and the survival of indigenous, local culture. Western culture's 20th century industrial capitalism began, and, now, 21st century consumer capitalism continues, the process of driving the planetary ecosystem into an apocalyptic crisis. Themes of egalitarian, reciprocal cooperation emerge from the humanistic, psychodynamic, existential, archetypal and transpersonal traditions that offer possibilities for facilitating a successful transition through this explosive, evolutionary crisis in the culture.
The 2002 Pacifica Graduate Institute "The World Behind the World – Reflection, Reconciliations and Renewal" conference asked "What, at this juncture in time and place is life asking of us? Who, from our deepest sources calls us to respond? How do we embody the wisdom of our individual psyches, our collective imagination, our cultural mythologies, our living planet?...Where is our lifeline, our myth, the larger meaning for our time?" At the conference the theme of 'archetypal activism' emerged – how to be politically and culturally active in this time from an archetypal point of view. Archetypal activism presents a possibility for political action that draws on the archetypal, existential and psychodynamic models of human nature, individuality and culture.
If we look forward in our culture toward renewal and reconnection, we have to look beyond the core principle of a regulatory, transcendental divine that saves and protects to an existential divine that mediates participation. Rather than saving by lifting us above and protecting us through transcendental regulation, the existential divine invites us into a self-arising, self-organizing, self-regenerating world, where relationship is the basis of protection and authenticity is the saving grace. The existential divine implies an emergent relationship with our own nature, including coming to terms with 'otherness' rather than trying to control or eliminate otherness, whether as unconscious adversity or simply as the 'alien' other. This involves a need to come to terms with complex diversity and the dark, mysterious intensity of our own unknown depths. It also means eschewing the enemy making dualities of the psychopathic, linear, reductionist, power driven, outcome oriented ego ideal of our rational empiricist culture. The existential divine could also be attributed as the ecological divine. This implies an emergent relationship with (rather than control over) nature, both as the wild ground from which we arise, and in which we have our life. The form of social organization for the existential-ecological tradition is an egalitarian confederacy of locally focused, communally organized network of small groups, rather than a religious, legalistic, hierarchical, authoritarian, centralized, bureaucratic mode.
Richard Tarnas speaks of kairos, Malcolm Gladwell of the 'tipping point', and dynamical systems theory of deep sensitivity to subtle input at a systemic bifurcation point, where the system is about to go to a new level of existential organization. It would seem, from many perspectives and on many levels, that we are in just such an intense period of change in Western culture, and, through various translations, also globally. "We live in a networked world" says the Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in the Jan/Feb, 2009 issue of Foreign Affairs. This publication of the prestigious Council on Foreign Relations speaks from the knowledge base of the US power elite, the centre. President Barack Obama, the community organizer who speaks with psychological reflection and approaches problem solving from a relational perspective, is a highly visible, centrally situated manifestation of this. The theme of the networked periphery influencing the centre is also in the process of being enacted. The network of global interconnections in the archetypal, humanistic, existential, transpersonal and related depth traditions that emerged from the 1960's is a complex, systemic manifestation calling for, and enacting, transformational cultural change. What used to be peripheral and counterculture is becoming an influential network of interconnected points of awareness and action. The Canadian Humanistic and Transpersonal Association (CHTA) has begun the creation of a directory of these and related programs, currently listing 150. Visit www.chata.ca and follow the 'Web Resources' link to 'Collegial Contacts in the Humanistic, Existential, Somatic, Transpersonal and Related Fields' to explore these extensive, networked global connections.
Now is the time. This is the place. We are the people. Let's do it.
From April 12 – 14, 2002, Pacifica Graduate Institute presented a conference entitled "The World Behind the World – Reflection, Reconciliation and Renewal" as a response to 9/11 and subsequent events, including the War on Terrorism. The conference presented an archetypal/mythological and psychodynamic perspective on the situation. The brochure for the conference presented the theme in this way. "The events of our recent past, still unfolding, have brought us all-individually and collectively-to a solemn turning point. What, at this juncture in time and place is life asking of us? Who, from our deepest sources calls us to respond? How do we embody the wisdom of our individual psyches, our collective imagination, our cultural mythologies, our living planet? From the wells of our soul's deepest desires we yearn to heal our Selves, each Other, and the world. Where is our lifeline, our myth, the larger meaning for our time?"
At the conference the theme of "archetypal activism" emerged – how to be politically and culturally active in this time from an archetypal point of view. Archetypal activism presents a possibility for political action that draws on the archetypal, existential and psychodynamic models of human nature, individuality and culture. The following is an elaboration of material from the conference.
At the conference, Robert Romanyshyn pointed out a basic contradiction between the archetypal and activist themes. Archetypal implies metaphoric attunement, resonance, reverie, receptivity, reflection, understanding, depth, non-linearity, holism, dialectic complexity, tentativeness, a play of dark and light. Activism is a term used in the field of politics, such as 'political activism'. Politics tends to be strongly solution oriented, definitive, linear, reductionist, forward looking, somewhat unreflective, leader oriented, authority based, legalistic. It idealizes bright, well lit places. It is sound bytes and slogans. The KISS directive (Keep It Simple Stupid) rules. James Carville's "It's the Economy Stupid" got Clinton elected. Politics sees the world in black and white, good guy/bad guy terms. In "The War on Terrorism", fighting "the Axis of Evil", "we will hunt them down and burn them out". What is precisely missing is that complex archetypal reflective quality. Even in the counterculture, which is critical of mainstream politics, activist politics are still political, focalizing around polarization, protest, incidents, causes, idealism, bite size chunks. This linear action orientation is apparently antithetical to the archetypal reflective way of being. How we could make this polarity dialectic is a fundamental theme we must explore.
The archetypal/political polarity extends through a number of different cultural parameters. In terms of ways of understanding, archetypal prefers seeing symbolic connection through pattern and metaphor, drawing on history as depth illumination. Politics prefers factual reasons that provide cause and effect information, through which blame can be attributed, guilt determined, punishment meted out and solutions found. In the archetypal model, taking responsibility means showing understanding – it is self affirming and evolutionary. In politics taking responsibility means either self aggrandizing and glorifying or resignation in disgrace. In politics, emotions are stereotyped as position statements justifying action whereas, in an archetypal context, emotions are subjectively compelling. Politics clings to hope, while archetypalists live with doubt and faith. Politics values definitive action based on reasons, carried out with will power and determination, in which the actors original (usually simplistic) position does not change, but is tenaciously maintained until "he" (sic) prevails. Archetypalists value tentative action arising from non linear metaphoric thinking, feeling, intuition and complex, changing motivation holding the tension of opposites through dialectic attunment. Politics values achievement, success, triumph, attainment based on an idealistic platform. Archetypalists struggle with principles that are characteristic, rather than simplistic direct bases for action – principles of beauty, destiny, participation and connection, respect for failure and loss, holism, surrender, emergent self definition, context driven action. Politics is a legalistic mode of operation whereas archetypalists prefer justice as a principle. While politics promotes legalistic factual finding of guilt and consequent punishment, archetypalists prefer truth and reconciliation that encourages forgiveness.
Archetypalists understand and accept mistaken repetition rather than strive for decisive victory, so that the full details of unrecognized, forgotten identity emerge. Archetypalists understand how repetitious mistakes fully unfold and elaborate depth so that what is not mistaken can be seen, the gifts in the wound realized and the more robust health in the disease manifest. Politicians who wish to remember the past as the basis for creating a perfect future may be creating other problems – such as iatrogenic diseases (from medicine's fascistic desire to control and eliminate disease and to protect against death) and the ecological crisis (from the culture's desire to have an easy, secure world full of cheap fast food and consumerist recreational entertainment, with a nature that is contained and controlled). Archetypalist remembrance of the past takes us into the depths of understanding failure with forgiveness and provides a tendency to include the weak, the diseased, the malformed, the complainant – the alien other as the basis of an evolved, integrated, emergent, more complete sense of self.
These distinctions, of course, are not absolute. They provide an analytic and descriptive way to look at polarities. As archetypal activists we are called to be synthetic (i.e. dialectical) in order to facilitate bringing together the fragmented polarities of the culture in such a way that the existential tension of opposites is maintained while the opposites interact mutually, engaging without definitive dominance. In this way polarities may reflectively energize and activate each other, reflecting through distinction.
What then is an archetypal activity in the world? We must first recognize that the archetype itself is phenomenal – it is in the world, even as it points beyond itself to the world behind the world. What action might we say constellates around archetypal presence in the world?
Deep action, complex action, dialectic action, receptive action, action that affirms polarity and brings polarities into relationship, metaphoric action (action whose genesis is based in metaphoric understanding and whose activity reveals the metaphoric nature of life). In Michael Meade's words archetypal action would speak the unspeakable and mourn openly – not simply as a means of returning to where we were before or as a genesis of vengeful retaliation. Archetypal activism would encourage the acceptance of the breaking in of tragedy, of the collapse into terror at the conflict within the culture, rather than simply enacting a War on Terrorism, out there, as a means of managing this inner conflict. Lionel Corbett focuses also on this deep ambivalence within American culture. Meade goes so far as to suggest America must look for evil within, and in its own actions, as also does Corbett.
Archetypal activism would find ways to bring acceptance of the profoundly changing identity of American (really Western) culture and recognize that "the centre cannot hold" and that to hysterically and rigidly attempt to shore it up by acting out will constellate only more extreme and unmanageable fragmentation and hinder a necessary evolution. Corbett suggests something is dying in North American culture even as the new struggles to be born. Grof's perinatal images echoed this. It seems that the archetypal experience of birth/rebirth is inherently attended by experiences of dying, violence, brutal penetration, crushing, torture, imprisonment, poison and that, to accomplish emergence into a new world, we must accept this.
Meade and Corbett both speak of loss of innocence, specifically of the necessary and inevitable loss of innocence in a young, idealistic and self idealizing culture. Meade points out that the word noxious is the etymological core of innocent i.e. innocence is dialectically noxious.
A central motif of 9/11 is the collapse of the twin towers. Meade points out that the falling towers are a terrible, tragic lifting of the veil between the worlds, profoundly revealing the world behind the world. The fact that this revelation constellates as a terrifying 'end of the world' event, rather than an inner experience of evolutionary terror, reflects the hard core rigidity of military industrial consumerist globalization and the cultural imperialism of the good guy world saviour Logos. Because of the loss of the mediating institutions of the mesocosm in this revelation, we stand raw against the macrocosm. Surely the second coming is at hand.
As Jung and Edinger point out, in Western culture (specifically, perhaps, North American culture), a humanization of God is taking place (has been especially so since the Renaissance, according to Tarnas) with an accompanying reification of the human capacity to create (e.g. the self created human and genetic engineering) and destroy (e.g. the atomic bomb and planetary ecological crisis). This is portentous, but dangerous and explosive. We have expected the end of the world momentarily since World War II – the slow apocalypse is upon us, in Meade's words.
Chris Downing spoke of the uncanny – the unfamiliar in its frightening aspect of the return of something terrible that has been forgotten. This alien other is the very axis of evil, almost by definition. The uncanny is therefore threatening. But also promising, in that, in Lacan's terms, it brings a return of the Real – the radically excluded original ground of being that we have forgotten in order to become who and what we are, in our world of everyday being and action. A coming home. A homecoming, however, that is also a death threat. In fact, a terrible attack on our accomplished, successful sense of self. This is of course precisely the homecoming that Homeland Defense is supposed to defend against, psychologically.
We may reflect on the possibility that as activists, archetypalists are terrorists – not in the manner of blowing up people and buildings but in the manner of radically and terribly undermining and deconstructing the cultural ego. Returning us, in Meade's words, to ground zero as a grounding in zero, with the concomitant grief, sadness, despair, shame, guilt and terror. According to Corbett the archetypal evolutionary task is to contain these emotions and not act out in narcissistic, infantile, fragmented and fragmenting rage. To contain the borderline tendency to moralistic vengeance and, instead, take the hit and collapse inward rather than acting outward.
Downing suggests that instead of asking "Why me?" we might ask, "Why not me?" This might enable us to reclaim the most profoundly unfamiliarly familiar, that which we are able to repress most of the time in order to be able to go on – the awareness of death, the precariousness of life, the mystery of being and non being.
Henrieka de Vries quotes her World War II Resistance mother who explained why she risked her family's safety to hide a Jewish woman in Holland. "Either we are all safe or not one of us is safe". She also quoted Margaret Meade: "You can no longer save your family, you tribe, your nation. You can only save the world ".
She suggests a way to understand the events of 9/11 is through a critique of the patriarchal social structure in which terrorism would seem to be inevitable in a world based on male sibling rivalry and treachery (Cain/Abel, Jacob/Esau), and father dominance (of sons, of women and of the other). She suggests however, that fundamentalists everywhere, East and West, want to reinstall the absolute dominance of the military industrial clerical father. In a world at war, in the midst of profound explosive economic and cultural change, the military industrial clerical father and his heroic sons "save the day". Archetypally then, could we say that this father/son team are actually content to be in charge again? They, of course, are saddened and outraged at the tragic loss of life, the "unprovoked" attack. But now they have a mission and it is clear – at least to them. It is the age old war between "good" and "evil", and they are the good guys – on both sides.
I would like to suggest that it is precisely the war between good and evil that is the issue, not evil per se. What alternative is there to war on evil? A psychological perspective can suggest a self questioning that deliteralizes the view of evil and questions the location of evil in "the other", in the enemy.
For now the enemy is no longer the enemy. The enemy now is enmity – non-relational, absolute, annihilating conflict on a global scale. The enemy now is the war itself. As the twentieth century has so brutally demonstrated we can no longer afford this dualistic Titanic global battle between "good" and "evil". In what John Ralston Saul calls the Second Hundred Years War around 100 million people have died in the twentieth century (Voltaire's Bastards – The Tyranny of Reason in the West). This war between good and evil threatens to destroy the biosphere – life as we know it on this planet. A new approach of reconciliation and integration, while maintaining dialectic differentiation, is called for.
This means moving from a dynamic of mechanistic, linear, controlling, idealistic duality to one of complex, emergent, pragmatic, dialectic aliveness. This means moving from a formalized, politicized, legalistic model of social relations to one of personal responsibility, freedom, negotiation and mediation. This means moving from politics and religion to psychology and spirituality. This means moving from ruthless competitiveness to cooperative competitiveness, from a politics of divide and conquer to a politics of differentiated inclusion and empowerment and from a model of striving for victory at all costs to one of accepting failure and mistakes as part of an evolution in which we share the gold. This means moving from a culture of moralistic conformity and oppression to one of liberation and freedom, from a culture of reductionist mechanism to one of holistic aliveness and from a culture of idealism and excellence to one of pragmatism and muddling through. This means moving from a military industrial, skill oriented educational model to a more individualistic, humanistic one oriented toward consciousness and creativity. This means moving from "living lives of quiet desperation", adaptation and "getting by" to lives of existential intensity on the cutting edge, where creativity, resourcefulness, innovation and the Bodhisattva motif of "doing what needs to be done" prevail.
Another fertile area for the application of archetypal activism is in the field of organizational development. Since the early '90's in this field there has been the beginning of a fundamental change in values. Various traditions, disciplines, ideas and practices come together in what has been called 'integral culture'(by Paul H. Ray and others). In general, this involves the traditions of: chaos theory; dialectic polarity management; paradoxical thinking; trans competition; holism; dynamic web models; quantum uncertainty models; non-linearity, co-dependent arising and emergent self organization models; change convergence and "hyperchange" models; authenticity, responsibility, connectivity and the search for meaning; "servant leaders". These are all elements of an emerging step toward new forms of organization in business and government particularly, but also culture in general. Integral culture could also be termed archetypal culture. There are many individuals and organizations already working in this field with books, journals and magazine articles being published.
Western culture is struggling with having emerged from the twentieth century, the century that exploded, with a relativized, fragemented, self-critical identity. This is an identity crisis which the psychopathic, unreflective part of the mainstream culture has responded to with materialistic consumerism and a militaristic neoconservative power drive (both fuelling a global ecological crisis in sustainability), moralistic political correctness and an apocalyptic fundamentalist religious zeal. We now live within a global community that is struggling with issues of social justice, economic equality and the survival of indigenous, local culture. Yet, in the emergent post imperialist model for the regulation of order in the global community, peaceful, self-interested cooperation is becoming a theme, as exemplified, for example, in the European Union. The election of US President Barack Obama also enacts a psychological, relational, egalitarian, multicultural theme. Respect for the multiple meanings of individual human life is becoming integrated into the multicultural model of social relations. These themes of egalitarian, reciprocal cooperation are related to the humanistic, psychodynamic, existential and transpersonal traditions that offer possibilities for facilitating a successful transition through this explosive, evolutionary crisis in the culture.
These themes have undergone a parallel emergence in the corporate world, where business negotiations in a progressive, pragmatic environment include not just a competitive striving for dominance, but also the recognition that the inclusion of mutuality and co-operation, as well as acknowledgement of unconscious psychodynamic factors, brings more effectiveness and productivity. In the general area of conflict resolution this psychodynamic theme also shows itself. Not just striving to defeat 'the enemy' in a militaristic drive for victory over the other, but recognition of mutual self interest and egalitarian co-operation as being fundamentally more realistic and productive. In this way, resources can be directly allocated to problem solving rather than the more immediate and limited goal of achieving dominance, and only then being able to 'fix' things because you are now in charge. The psychodynamic model also highlights the need for addressing contradictory tensions between positivistic social and organizational intentions and the more obstructionist, defensive, emotional unconscious factors that come into play when people try to cooperate.
If we look forward in our own culture toward renewal and reconnection, we have to look beyond the core principle of a transcendental divine that saves and protects to an existential divine that mediates participation. Rather than saving by lifting us above and protecting us through transcendental regulation, the existential divine invites us into a self-arising, self-organizing, self-regenerating world, where relationship is the basis of protection and authenticity is the saving grace. Dogmatic religion as a social institution and a militaristic drive for security does not serve this model. Psychology does, in its psychodynamic, existential, humanistic, transpersonal and archetypal forms. I will refer to this theme as the existential-humanistic tradition.
The fragmentary remnant of the transcendental divine model is consumerism - everyone a little king or queen, the centre of their own universe, ostensibly able to have whatever they want, whenever they want and however they want. This is driving our culture into a mad frenzy, where the watchwords are 'more' and 'faster', fuelling a fatalistic and nihilistic culture of shallow, narcissistic self satisfaction and self aggrandizement. In an idealistic, success driven culture, hypocrisy is inevitable - lip service must be paid to ideals while secret pragmaticist do 'whatever is necessary', spinning the tawdry possibilities of greed and power as the grand achievement of high ideals.
We may look at the existential-humanistic tradition in Western culture and see it as an evolutionary tendency that relativizes dogmatic, monotheistic religion and undermines the prevailing dualism of neo-Victorian moralism and rampant consumerism in liberal, democratic capitalism. Dogmatic religion as a social institution has become inadequate as a way of understanding human nature and as an inspirational vehicle for how to live. The existential-humanistic alternative involves a move away from idealized goals that one works towards with resolute commitment through skill and means, toward a model of surrender into what is being called forth at the level of individual humanness, in a cultural and natural context. This surrender facilitates the evolutionary drive to manifest our full potential, what Jung calls the process of individuation. While this involves stepping beyond the limitations of received enculturation, it also calls for a return to altruistic cultural involvement and contribution. What Paul H. Ray calls 'integral culture'.
Dogmatic religion, for many, has become inadequate also as a container for aspirations towards wholeness, participation, genuine community, and a meaningful cosmology that isn't simplistic. The mechanistic cosmology of classical science, with its linear cause and effect phenomenology, provides certainty and predictability, to some extent. This is the basis of its technological success. But it doesn't meet the richness of actual human experience, which it reduces to biology and behaviour. Although quantum physics and dynamical systems theory provide more complex and co-creative models, the scientific tradition remains a limited, albeit magnificent, achievement in human understanding of humanity, nature and cosmos.
The existential divine implies an emergent relationship with our own nature, including coming to terms with 'otherness' rather than trying to control or eliminate otherness, whether as unconscious adversity or simply as the 'alien' other. This involves a need to come to terms with complex diversity and the dark, mysterious intensity of our own unknown depths. This move has been marked politically and socially by the change from the militaristic, monotheistic, imperialistic, divine right of kings model of social-organization to the current neo-liberal, capitalist democracy. There has not, however, been a concomitant evolution in the religious cosmological model of human nature. We have begun to pass over, instead, into the existential, psychodynamic and transpersonal psychological and spiritual model, although this has not yet received a wide spread integration and socio-political formulation. There are many institutions engaged in this endeavour – to bring these psychological and spiritual perspectives to bear on the cultural evolution that is taking place in an unnecessarily dangerous and unconscious manner in Western culture.
The existential divine could also be attributed as the ecological divine. This implies an emergent relationship with (rather than control over) nature, both as the wild ground from which we arise, and in which we have our life. The Living Institute teaches an archetypal phenomenology of a re-enchanted postmodern cosmos that is, simultaneously, radically deconstructed and tentatively re-constructed, revealing the world as a co-creative, personified, existential project of inner/outer reconciliation. This includes a focus on Thomas Berry's geocentric ecotheology, Emerson's 'community of subjects' and an experiential, process oriented psychological and philosophical approach to a study of cosmology. In this, the cosmos is seen as a sacred Great Work of unfolding self organization, in which humans carry a particular role as co-creative, self conscious earth stewards. James Lovelock, in his book, The Gaia Hypothesis, proposes a scientific formulation of the earth as a self regulating sentient entity, which this program takes up. This tradition also draws on the teleological purposefulness implications of the biocosmic, creation theology model, without subscribing to literalistic creationist fundamentalism.
The form of social organization for the existential-ecological tradition is an egalitarian confederacy of locally focused, communally organized network of small groups, rather than a religious, legalistic, hierarchical, authoritarian, centralized, bureaucratic mode. The Obama campaign's self organizing, egalitarian nature provides an example of this at the macropolitical level of social organization that is dramatically illustrative, given its widely publicized contribution to the sweeping success of the campaign, and including its impact on the perceived style of governing in the Obama presidency. In the existential-ecological tradition, 'truth and reconciliation' is a psychological model for justice that promises to complexify the powerful, yet fundamentality dualistic, model of 'determination of guilt and consequent punishment' characteristic of the militaristic secularization of monotheistic morality in the legal system. There is a significant focus on embodied experience in the existential-ecological tradition rather than a prohibitive, regulatory fear of the body with the concomitant priorizing of spiritual and mental phenomenon at the expense of the body that is characteristic of the transcendental divine. There is no 'sin' or 'evil' in the existential-ecological tradition. Rather there is a concern for holism and reconciliation to otherness, and an appreciation of the evolutionary function of adversity and alterity. The model is one of education and healing – providing complex care for restoring the wholeness of the subject, both individually and communally.
There is an explosive, revolutionary, deconstructive theme in the 20th century that has enacted an existential crisis in Western culture's sense of identity and reality. Drawing on the existential and spiritual emergence models, it can be shown that coming to the edge of destruction, as we have, calls forth the deepest possible potential for spiritual and psychological renewal at an individual, community and cultural level. As Rick Tarnas spoke of at the Living Institute's Transforming the Modern World conference (April 18 – 20, 2008), and writes about in Cosmos and Psyche, we are now entering an archetypally situated, and cosmically framed, period of revolutionary evolution comparable to the 1960's and to the early Romantic period of the late 18th/early 19th centuries. There is a need to educate people in how to harmonically amplify and constructively engage these explosive change energies, so that it isn't just deconstructive, but, in a complex, dialectic sense, reconstructive. A re-enchantment of the alienated, post-Enlightenment world, as Morris Berman has spoken of in The Re-enchantment of the World, and Charlene Spretnak has echoed in The Resurgence of the Real: Body, Nature, and Place in a Hypermodern World, which develops 'ecological postmodernism' as a re-grounding of the human project in the dynamic processes of the Earth community.
Aftab Omer, founder and president of the Institute of Imaginal Studies (a San Francisco graduate school and research centre that draws on the archetypal psychology tradition, now Meridian University, where he remains as a core faculty), focuses his work in this area on "assisting organizations and learning communities in tapping the creative potential of diversity, conflict, chaos". He has this to say about our current situation in his "The Spacious Center: Leadership and the Creative Transformation of Culture" paper. (www.meridianuniversity.edu)
The center and periphery of a culture interact differently during steady-state periods and periods of change. During steady-state periods, the center of a culture is conventional—dense with rules, norms, taboos, and consensual notions of the 'truth'—while the periphery is marginalized and remains disenfranchised, disempowered, and often scapegoated. In contrast, during periods of instability and conflict, the periphery is in dynamic interaction with a culture's center. During such times, the center is more responsive to the different and the unknown. By engaging and recognizing differences that were previously denied, suppressed, and trivialized, a culture's web of habits transforms as it responds to the perspectives and practices found at the periphery. The dynamic interaction between a culture's center and its periphery keeps the culture vital and adaptive, providing cultural leaders with opportunities for creative cultural transformation. Cultural leaders choreograph this interaction in ways that are creative and transformative. In this way, cultural leadership is distinct from political and administrative leadership. While political leaders primarily make rules and administrative leaders primarily enforce rules, cultural leaders like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and Mother Teresa, find principled and imaginative ways to transgress those rules that inhibit the emergence of cultural sovereignty and creativity. Their actions engender new and unexpected meanings. The recognition and creative transgression of rules and norms is at the heart of cultural leadership. Cultural leadership entails an ability to surrender through creative action to the necessities, meanings, and possibilities inherent in the present moment. Cultural leaders are able to transmute how they are personally affected by the culture into creative action that midwives the future.
In the 20th century, revolutionary, romantic counterculture became a pervasive, defining theme in cultural evolution, focused through areas such as the arts, philosophy, psychology, spirituality. Drawing on culture studies, postmodernism, existential depth psychology, and the archetypal tradition, it can be shown that these initially peripheral, revolutionary countercultures, enacted in a timely, community activist manner, have challenged and rejuvenated the main stream culture of the centre on many levels, including attitudes and social mores (concerning, for example, body, sex, emotion, spirituality, nature, work, civil society), ideology, practical politics and related themes.
Some of these traditions that started as small, underground, elitist, radical, fringe movements evolved into traditions of significant, centralized, cultural influence and leadership.
Specific traditions include:
These leadership and change themes have been, and continue to be, brought into many programs in graduate schools, growth centres and diverse organizations around the world that derive from or relate to the archetypal, humanistic, existential, somatic, transpersonal and related traditions that emerged from the 1960's. What used to be peripheral and counterculture is becoming an influential network of interconnected points of awareness and action. "We live in a networked world" says the Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in the Jan/Feb, 2009 issue of Foreign Affairs. This publication of the prestigious Council on Foreign Relations speaks from the knowledge base of the US power elite, the centre. The theme of the networked periphery influencing the centre is also in the process of being enacted. The California Institute of Integral Studies (where Rick Tarnas teaches), Naropa University, Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center and JFK University are examples of grad schools in the humanistic, transpersonal, existential and somatic depth traditions that have transformative leadership degree programs focusing on cultural evolution, through areas such as politics, community, social justice, environmentalism, sustainability, organizational development, business, administration, education, clinical issues. Hollyhock Leadership Institute, a successful, non-grad school, Canadian version, is a part of this work, having graduated 3000 trainees and served 200 organizations since 1997, as is Parker Palmer's Center for Courage and Renewal, having trained 160 facilitators in 35 states and 50 cities. Esalen Institute continues to offer programs in this tradition. The Institute for Imaginal Studies (with Aftab Olmer) is also part of this, as is the newly formed Meridian University's Center for Social Healing, based in the archetypal 'imaginal' psychology tradition, "dedicated to research, education, and consultation that engages the schisms and enemy making dynamics of our time". Toronto's Centre for Social Innovation is a "social enterprise, catalyzing social innovation … for social entrepreneurs, in the social mission field", with 100 social mission groups sharing desk space for the purpose of creating "original action in a participatory culture" through "diversity, interconnections, discovery, serendipity". The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, part of the University of Toronto, also has a focus on personal and social transformation, with a holistic creativity theme, in their Transformative Learning Centre, as well as their Adult Education and Community Development Program, and the Department of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning.
There are many others. The Canadian Humanistic and Transpersonal Association (CHTA) has begun the creation of a directory of these and related programs, currently listing 150. Many in turn list others, such as Paul Hawken's WiserEarth website (www.wiserearth.org), which serves people who are concerned with transforming the world as a community directory and networking forum that maps and connects global non-governmental organizations, businesses, governments and individuals addressing the "central issues of our day (climate change, poverty, the environment, peace, water, hunger, social justice, conservation, human rights and more)". This is connected to Hawken's, Blessed Unrest, which chronicles and lists in book form the tens of thousands of individuals and organizations around the world addressing these issues. The websites of the Association for Humanistic Psychology (www.ahpweb.org), Association for Transpersonal Psychology (www.atpweb.org) and International Transpersonal Association (www.transpersonalassociation.org) provide similar global linkups. Visit www.chata.ca and follow the 'Web Resources' link to 'Collegial Contacts in the Humanistic, Existential, Somatic, Transpersonal and Related Fields' to explore these extensive networked global connections.
The Living Institute Leadership Program's (LILP) cultural activism focus is on transforming our "culture's web of habits", in Aftab Omer's terms, much in the same way that psychotherapy transforms an individual's complex web of habits. The LILP educates cultural leaders who can function, in a sense, as cultural therapists, focused through particular fields of cultural concern (such as sustainability, multiculturalism, social justice, organizational change), and also, in an archetypal, depth manner, complexly interacting with the cultural ground and zeitgeist. Richard Tarnas speaks of kairos, Malcolm Gladwell of the 'tipping point', and dynamical systems theory of deep sensitivity to subtle input at a systemic bifurcation point, where the system is about to go to a new level of existential organization. It would seem, from many perspectives and on many levels, that we are in just such an intense period of change in Western culture, and, through various translations, also globally. President Barack Obama, the community organizer who speaks with psychological reflection and approaches problem solving from a relational perspective, is a highly visible, centrally situated manifestation of this. The network of global interconnections in the archetypal, humanistic, existential, transpersonal and related depth traditions is a complex, systemic manifestation of the same thing, calling for, and enacting, transformational cultural change.
Now is the time. This is the place. We are the people. Let's do it.
Abstract: The Mayan Calendar’s prediction of an apocalyptic change in the year 2012 points to a deep transformation in human consciousness. While popular belief is that this indicates the physical destruction of the earth, the Basic Perinatal Matrix model shows that the Mayan’s instead were indicating a psychological death and rebirth within cosmic consciousness, not an apocalyptic end of the world. There are many correspondences between Mayan cosmology, mythology, spiritual practices, and modern day perinatal experiences evoked through holotropic breathwork. The Mayan mythology of the Hero Twins illustrates the evolutionary journey of going into the mythic underworld and reformulating a new cosmology as the Sun and Moon. Holotropic breathwork evokes similar experiences. The holotropic model shows the creative destruction and reintegration happening in modern cosmological consciousness. In the past this type of transformation has been externalized in violent physical events, but is now being integrated into a deep change in cultural consciousness, part of a radical psychological change that is happening in modern Western culture, mediated through traditions such as holotropic breathwork, shamanistic, meditative and spiritual practices, and other "technologies of the sacred".
Stanislav Grof, M.D., (www.stanislavgrof.com) is a psychiatrist with more than fifty years experience in research on non-ordinary states of consciousness induced by psychedelic substances and various non-pharmacological methods. He is Professor of Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, conducts professional training programs in holotropic breathwork and transpersonal psychology, and gives lectures and seminars worldwide. He is one of the founders and chief theoreticians of transpersonal psychology and the founding president of the International Transpersonal Association. In October 2007, he received the prestigious Vision 97 Award from the Dagmar and Vaclav Havel Foundation in Prague. Among his publications are over 140 papers in professional journals and the books Realms of the Human Unconscious; LSD Psychotherapy; The Adventure of Self-Discovery; Beyond the Brain; The Cosmic Game; Psychology of the Future; When the Impossible Happens; The Ultimate Journey; Spiritual Emergency;The Stormy Search for the Self (the last two with Christina Grof). His books have been translated into 20 languages.
Since the publication of Jose Arguelles' book The Mayan Factor: Path Beyond Technology (Arguelles 1987) brought to the attention of lay audiences the ancient prophecy concerning the end of the Maya Long Count calendar, which started on August 11, 3114 BC, and will end on December 21, 2012 AD, this date has become the focus of many articles, books, and conferences and of a forthcoming movie entitled 2012. Similar prophecies about the end of the Great Cycle can be found in many other cultural and religious groups – the Hopi, Navajo, Cherokee, Apache, Iroquois confederacy, ancient Egyptians, the Kabbalists, Essenes, Qero elders of Peru, the Subsaharan Dogon tribe, and the Australian Aborigines.
With a few exceptions, the Mayan prophecy about the end of the cosmic cycle, the Fifth World, has been interpreted in terms of actual physical destruction of humanity and of the material world, in a way similar to the interpretation (or better misinterpretation) of the term apocalypse by Christian fundamentalists, particularly the millions of American Christians who believe that at the time of this global destruction they will experience "rapture" and be united with Jesus. People who see it this way are not aware of the fact that the original and literal meaning of the term apocalypse (Greek Ἀποκάλυψις Apokálypsis) is not destruction but "lifting of the veil" or "revelation." It referred to the disclosure of some secrets hidden from the majority of humanity to certain privileged persons. The source of the misinterpretation of this word is probably the phrase "apokálypsis eschaton" which literally means "revelation at the end of the æon, or age."
The purpose of this conference is to explore a radically different, more optimistic interpretation of the Mayan prophecy – as referring to the end of the world as we have known it: a world dominated by unbridled violence and insatiable greed, egotistic hierarchy of values, corrupted institutions and corporations, and irreconcilable conflicts between organized religions. Instead of predicting a physical destruction of the material world, the Mayan prophecy might refer to death and rebirth and a mass inner transformation of humanity. In order to explore this idea, we have to answer two important questions, First, how could ancient Mayans two thousand years ago predict what situation humanity would be facing in the twenty-first century? And second, are there any indications that modern society, more specifically the industrial civilization, is currently on the verge of a major psychospiritual transformation? I will try to address these questions in the course of my presentation.
The Mayan prophecy concerning the 2012 winter solstice has an important astronomical dimension. Over 2,000 years ago the early Maya formulated a profound galactic cosmology. Being excellent observers of the sky, they noticed that the position of the winter solstice sun was slowly shifting toward an alignment with the galactic axis. This movement is caused by so called precession - the wobble of the rotational axis of the earth. The Mayans concluded that major changes of cosmic proportions would occur at the time of this auspicious solar/galactic alignment. This is an event that happens only every 25,920 years, which is the period required for the equinox to move through all twelve zodiacal signs. C. G. Jung used in his book Aion and in his other writings the term "Platonic Month" for the period that it takes the vernal equinox point to pass through one constellation of the sidereal zodiac (approximately 2160 years) and the term "Platonic Year" for the completion of the entire zodiacal cycle.
Astronomers of the pre-classic Maya culture called the Izapa Culture devised the Long Count calendar consisting of thirteen baktuns to target the time when the cosmic alignment would maximize - December 2012 AD. The cultural legacy of ancient Mayans includes stone monuments conveying in carved glyphs and images the prophecy concerning this auspicious alignment. The above facts make it clear why the list of presenters to this conference should include people like John Major Jenkins, who has spent two decades studying Mayan archeological records trying to understand their original meaning (Jenkins 1998, 2002) or Robert Sitler, who has spent extensive time with contemporary Mayans and can offer deep insights into their culture (2006). It is also obvious that an accomplished astrologer and historian like Richard Tarnas would be able to make a vital contribution to the main theme of the conference (Tarnas 2006).
My own area of interest in the last fifty years has been research of non-ordinary states of consciousness or, more specifically, an important subcategory of these states for which I coined the term holotropic. This composite word means literally "oriented toward wholeness" or "moving in the direction of wholeness" (from the Greek holos = whole and trepein = moving toward or in the direction of something). These are states that novice shamans experience during their initiatory crises and later induce in their clients. Ancient and native cultures have used these states in rites of passage and in their healing ceremonies. They were described by mystics of all ages and initiates in the ancient mysteries of death and rebirth. Procedures inducing these states were also developed in the context of the great religions of the world – Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Judaism, and Christianity (Grof 2000, 2006).
It is less immediately evident and requires some explanation why and how experiences and observations from the study of holotropic states can throw new light on the problem of the Mayan prophecy. The key consideration in this regard is that powerful consciousness-expanding procedures ("technologies of the sacred") played an integral and essential role in the Mayan culture. We have ample pictorial evidence on Mayan stone stelae, sculptures, and ceramics that they used for this purpose the Mexican cactus peyote (Lophophora williamsii), magic mushrooms (Psilocybe mexicana or coerulescens known to the Indians as Xibalba okox or teonanacatl), and skin secretions of the toad Bufo marinus. Additional plant materials used in pre-Hispanic Mesoamerica were the morning glory seeds (Ipomoea violacea) called by the natives ololiuqui, Salvia divinatorum, also known as diviner's sage, wild tobacco (Nicotiana rustica), and balche (a fermented drink made from the tree Lonchocarpus longistylus and honey).
A powerful and specifically Mayan mind-altering technique was massive bloodletting induced by using lancets made of stingray spines, flint, or obsidian to wound the tongue, earlobes, and genitals (Schele and Miller 1986, Grof 1994). Ritual bloodletting opened up an experiential realm that was not ordinarily accessible before the time of biological death. The Mayans used the symbol of the Vision Serpent for the experiences induced by blood loss and shock. This symbol represented the contact between the everyday world of human beings and the world of gods and sacred ancestors, who were expected to appear in their visions in the supernatural realms. The lancet was perceived as a sacred object with enormous power; it was personified in the form of the Perforator God.
Because of the extraordinary importance that these "technologies of the sacred" had in the Mayan culture, it is reasonable to assume that visionary experiences induced by them might have provided inspiration for the prophecy concerning 2012 and played a major role in its articulation. It is thus fully justified to look at this prophecy through the prism of the discoveries of modern consciousness research.
In holotropic states of consciousness, it is possible to obtain profound revelations concerning the master blueprint of the universe designed by cosmic intelligence of such astonishing proportions that it is far beyond the limits of our everyday imagination. Individuals experiencing psychedelic states, including myself, occasionally reported that they had profound illuminating insights into the creative dynamics of the Kosmos. More specifically, psychedelic pioneer Terrence McKenna described in his preface to John Major Jenkins' book "Maya Cosmogenesis 2012" that he received his insights concerning 2012 in his mushroom sessions.
Individuals who had such illuminating cosmic visions suddenly understood that what is happening in the material world is formed and informed by archetypal principles, beings, and events existing in dimensions of reality that are inaccessible for our everyday consciousness. They also saw that the dynamics of the archetypal world is systematically correlated with the movements of the planets, their angular relationships, and their relative positions to the fixed stars. This led to a completely new understanding of astrology, its origins, and paramount importance. It became clear to them that the source of astrology were global encompassing visions of the workings of the Kosmos and not tedious accumulation of individual observations of correlations between events in the world and celestial bodies.
Richard Tarnas, amassed over a period of more than thirty years impressive and convincing evidence for systematic correlations existing between the archetypal world, celestial dynamics, and psychological and historical processes and presented it in his ground-breaking and paradigm-breaking book Cosmos and Psyche (Tarnas 2006). Rick's astrological research has focused primarily on correlations with the movements of the planets, but there exist astrological systems, which pay great attention to fixed stars; experiences in holotropic states can provide equally revealing insights in this regard.
An important aspect of experiences in holotropic states is that they transcend narrow linear time and make it possible to see events in the universe on a cosmic astronomical scale. In all their grandeur, time scales like the Mayan Long Count Calendar or the Great or Platonic Year are very modest as compared to others inspired by visionary experiences, such as those found in Tantric science, in which the age of the universe amounts to billions of years (a number similar to the assessment of modern cosmologists), or to those discussed in Hindu religion and mythology, such as the kalpas or the Day of Brahman that also amounts to billions of years. The visions of ancient Mayan seers could thus with the help of "technologies of the sacred" easily reach many centuries into the future.
The Mayan prophecy concerning the galactic alignment is not limited to astronomical observations and astrological predictions; it is intimately interconnected with mythology, with what C. G. Jung called the archetypal domain of the collective unconscious. For example, the Mayan seers referred to the December solstice sun as "Cosmic Father" and to the Milky Way as "Cosmic Mother. They envisioned the center of the galaxy, where modern astronomy places a giant black hole, as her creative and destructive womb. The time of the galactic alignment was thus the time of a cosmic hieros gamos, sacred marriage between the Feminine and the Masculine.
In the year 2012, the sun will have traveled to the edge of a cosmic dust cloud known as the Great Dark Rift that lies along the Milky Way and seems to divide its light into two paths. The Mayans called this dark rift Xibalba Be (Road to the Underworld) and saw it as a place of birth and death and of death/rebirth. It was for them the birth canal of the Cosmic Mother Creatrix, where the December solstice sun gets reborn in 2012. It was also a death place, because it is the doorway into the underworld, the land of the dead and the unborn. These associations clearly were not products of everyday fantasy and imagination of the Mayans projected on the night sky, but results of profound direct apprehensions of the connection between the archetypal world and the celestial bodies and processes.
The Mayan prophecy has also an important mythological connection to the story about the Hero Twins, Hunahpu and Xbalanque, who were invited by the death gods to visit the underworld Xibalba and play ballgame with them. The Xibalba Lords put them through many ordeals and the brothers overcame them all and, finally, they died and were reborn as the Sun and the Moon (or according to some interpretations as the Sun and Venus). The part of the story that seems particularly relevant in this regard is the battle of the twins with the bird demon Vucub-Caquix ("Seven-Macaw"); he is a vain, selfish, and impulsive ruler, who pretends to be the sun and the moon of the twilight world inbetween the former creation and the present one. He seems to represents the ego archetype that is dominant at the end of the cycle. Seven Macaw seems to have an archetypal parallel in the New Testament -– the Endtime Ruler or the "Beast," also known as Antichrist.
Hunahpu and Xbalanque defeat Seven Macaw and strip him of his teeth (the instrument of violence), of his riches, and his power. By doing this, they facilitate the resurrection of their father, One Hunahpu, a just ruler who represents selfless divine consciousness that is holistic; it shows concern for all beings, and makes political decisions based upon future generations or - as Native Americans say – with regard to how they will affect seven generations down the road.
Research into holotropic states – psychedelic therapy, holotropic breathwork, and work with individuals in "spiritual emergencies" – made major contributions to the understanding of mythology. Myths are commonly considered to be products of human fantasy and imagination not unlike stories of modern fiction writers and playwrights. However, the work of C. G. Jung and Joseph Campbell brought about a radically new understanding of mythology. According to these two seminal thinkers, myths are not fictitious stories about adventures of imaginary characters in nonexistent countries and thus arbitrary products of individual human fantasy. Rather, myths originate in the collective unconscious of humanity and are manifestations of primordial organizing principles of the psyche and of the cosmos which Jung called archetypes (Jung 1976).
Archetypes express themselves through the individual psyche and its deeper processes, but they do not originate in the human brain and are not its products. They are superordinate to the individual psyche and function as its governing principles. In holotropic states the archetypal world can be directly experienced in a way that is as convincing and authentic as the material world appears to be, or more so. To distinguish transpersonal experiences involving archetypal figures and domains from imaginary products of individual fantasy, Jungians refer to this domain as imaginal.
French scholar, philosopher, and mystic, Henri Corbin, who first used the term mundus imaginalis, was inspired in this regard by his study of Islamic mystical literature (Corbin 2000). ). Islamic theosophers call the imaginal world, where everything existing in the sensory world has its analogue, ‘alam a mithal,' or the "eighth climate," to distinguish it from the "seven climates," regions of traditional Islamic geography. The imaginal world possesses extension and dimensions, forms and colors, but these are not perceptible to our senses as they would be if they were properties of physical objects. However, this realm is in every respect as fully ontologically real and susceptible to consensual validation by other people as the material world perceived by our sensory organs.
Archetypes are timeless essences, cosmic ordering principles, which can also manifest as mythic personifications, or specific deities of various cultures. The figures of Maya mythology – Hunahpu, Xbalanque, their father One Hunahpu, Seven Macaw, Quetzalcoatl (Kukulcan), and others - like those of any other culture are thus ontologically real and can be directly apprehended by individuals experiencing holotropic states. As John Major Jenkins pointed out, Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend contributed to the understanding of archetypes another important dimension that is relevant for the problem of the Mayan prophecy. They described in their book Hamlet's Mill the deep connection that exists between myth and astronomical processes (de Santillana and Dechend 1969).
In 1948, after many years of systematically studying mythologies of various cultures of the world, Joseph Campbell published his ground-breaking book The Hero with a Thousand Faces, which in the following decades profoundly influenced research and understanding in the field (Campbell 1968). Analyzing a broad spectrum of myths from various parts of the world, Campbell realized that they all contained variations of one universal archetypal formula, which he called the monomyth. This was the story of the hero, either male or female, who leaves his or her home ground or is forcefully separated from it by external circumstances and, after fantastic adventures and ordeals culminating in psychospiritual death and rebirth, returns to his original society radically transformed - as an enlightened or deified being, a healer, seer, or great spiritual teacher.
In Campbell's own words, the basic formula for the hero's journey can be summarized as follows: "A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder; fabulous forces are encountered and a decisive victory is won; the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow men." Campbell's inquisitive and incisive intellect went beyond simply recognizing the universality of this myth over time and space. His curiosity drove him to ask what makes this myth universal. Why does the theme of the hero's journey appeal to cultures of all times and countries, even if they differ in every other respect?
Campbell's answer has the simplicity and unrelenting logic of all brilliant insights: the monomyth of the hero's journey is a blueprint for the transformative crisis, which all human beings can experience when the deep contents of the unconscious psyche emerge into consciousness. The hero's journey describes nothing less than the experiential territory that an individual must traverse during times of profound transformation. The story of the Mayan Hero Twins is a classical example of Campbell's Hero's Journey. It belongs to a vast array of archetypal motifs that we can experience in holotropic states.
I hope that the above discussion adequately addressed the first question that I asked earlier in my presentation: "How could ancient Mayans two thousand years ago discover anything that would be relevant for humanity in the twenty-first century?" The theme of Joseph Campell's Hero's Journey brings us to the second question: "If the Mayan prophecy does not refer to the end of the world and to physical destruction of humanity, but to profound collective psychospiritual death and rebirth comparable to what Campbell described on the individual scale, are there any indications that such inner transformation is possible or that it actually is already underway.
My approach to this question is based not only on observations of the experiences of thousands of individuals in holotropic states of consciousness – psychedelic therapy, holotropic breathwork sessions, and spontaneous psychospiritual crises ("spiritual emergencies") - but also on extensive personal experience of these states. I would like to begin this discussion with an account of an experiential sequence from one of my own psychedelic sessions. It provided for me deep insights into the archetype of the Apocalypse, a motif that occurs relatively rarely in holotropic states, but is particularly relevant for the topic of our conference.
About fifty minutes into the session, I started experiencing strong activation in the lower part of my body. My pelvis was vibrating as enormous amounts of energy were being released in ecstatic jolts. At one point, this streaming energy swept me along in an intoxicating frenzy into a whirling cosmic vortex of creation and destruction.
In the center of this monstrous hurricane of primordial forces were four giant herculean figures performing what seemed to be the ultimate cosmic saber dance. They had strong Mongolian features with protruding cheekbones, oblique eyes, and clean-shaven heads decorated by large braided ponytails. Whirling around in a frantic dance craze, they were swinging large weapons that looked like scythes or L-shaped scimitars; all four of these combined formed a rapidly rotating swastika.
I intuitively understood that this monumental archetypal scene was related to the beginning of the process of creation and simultaneously to the final stage of the spiritual journey. In the cosmogenetic process (in the movement from the primordial unity to the worlds of plurality) the blades of the scimitars represented the force that is splitting and fragmenting the unified field of cosmic consciousness and creative energy into countless individual units. In relation to spiritual journey, they represented the stage when the seeker's consciousness transcends separation and polarity and reaches the state of original undifferentiated unity. The direction of this process seemed to be related to the clockwise and counterclockwise rotation of the blades. Projected into the material world, this archetypal motif seemed to be related to growth and development (the fertilized egg or seed becoming an organism) or destruction of forms (wars, natural catastrophes, decay).
Then the experience opened up into an unimaginable panorama of scenes of destruction. In these visions, natural disasters, such as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, crashing meteors, forest fires, floods and tidal waves, were combined with images of burning cities, entire blocks of collapsing high-rise buildings, mass death, and horror of wars. Heading this wave of total annihilation were four archetypal images of macabre riders symbolizing the end of the world. I realized that these were the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. (pestilence, war, famine, and death). The continuing vibrations and jolts of my pelvis now became synchronized with the movements of this ominous horseback riding and I became I joined the dance, becoming one of them, or possibly all four of them at once, leaving my own identity behind.
Suddenly, there was a rapid change of scenery and I had a vision of the cave from Plato's Republic. In this work, Plato describes a group of people who live chained all of their lives in a cave, facing a blank wall. They watch shadows projected on the wall by things passing in front of the cave entrance. According to Plato, the shadows are as close as the prisoners get to seeing reality. The enlightened philosopher is like a prisoner who is freed from this illusion and comes to understand that the shadows on the wall are illusory, as he can perceive the true form of reality rather than the mere shadows seen by the prisoners. This was followed by profound and convincing realization that the material world of our everyday life is not made of «stuff» but created by cosmic consciousness by infinitely complex and sophisticated orchestration of experiences. It is a divine play that the Hindus call lila, created by cosmic illusion maya.
The final major scene of the session was a magnificent ornate theater stage featuring a parade of personified universal principles, archetypes - cosmic actors, who through a complex interplay create the illusion of the phenomenal world. They were protean personages with many facets, levels, and dimensions of meaning that kept changing their forms in extremely intricate holographic interpenetration as I was observing them. Each of them seemed to represent simultaneously the essence of his or her function and all the concrete manifestations of this element in the world of matter. There was Maya, the mysterious ethereal principle symbolizing the world illusion; Anima, embodying the eternal Female; a Mars-like personification of war and aggression; the Lovers, representing all the sexual dramas and romances throughout ages; the royal figure of the Ruler; the withdrawn Hermit; the elusive Trickster; and many others. As they were passing across the stage, they bowed in my direction, as if expecting appreciation for the stellar performance in the divine play of the universe.
This experience brought me a deep understanding of the meaning of the archetypal motif of the Apocalypse. It suddenly seemed profoundly wrong to see it as related exclusively to physical destruction of the world. It is certainly possible that the Apocalypse will in the future be actually manifested on a planetary scale as a historical event, which is a potential of all archetypes. There are many examples of situations in which archetypal motifs and energies broke through the boundary that usually separates the archetypal realm from the material world and shaped history. The giant asteroid that 65 million years ago killed the dinosaurs, wars of all ages, the crucifixion of Jesus, the medieval Witches' Sabbath and Dance of Death, the Nazi concentration camps, and Hiroshima are just a few salient examples. But the primary importance of the archetype of the Apocalypse is that it functions as an important landmark on the spiritual journey. It emerges into the consciousness of the seeker at a time when he or she recognizes the illusory nature of the material world. As the universe reveals its true essence as virtual reality, as a cosmic play of consciousness, the world of matter is destroyed in the psyche of the individual. This might also be the meaning of the "end of the world" referred to in the Mayan prophecy.
The observations from modern consciousness research that are most relevant for a positive interpretation of the Mayan prophecy are related to a phenomenon that is much more common in holotropic states than the experience of the Apocalypse; it is the experience of psychospiritual death and rebirth. This experience has played a crucial role in the ritual and spiritual history of humanity – in shamanism, rites of passage, the ancient death/rebirth mysteries, and in the great religions of the world (see the Christian concept of being "born again" and the Hindu "dvija"). The process of death and rebirth is a multivalent archetype that manifests on many different levels and in various areas and ways, but in self-exploration and therapy it is closely related to the reliving and conscious integration of the memory of biological birth.
Psychospiritual death and rebirth is one of the most prominent themes in therapeutic work using holotropic states. When the age regression in the process of deep experiential self-exploration moves beyond the level of memories from childhood and infancy and reaches the level of the unconscious that contains the memory of birth, we start encountering emotions and physical sensations of extreme intensity, often surpassing anything we previously considered humanly possible. At this point, the experiences become a strange mixture of the themes of birth and death. They involve a sense of a severe, life-threatening confinement and a desperate and determined struggle to free ourselves and survive.
Because of the close connection between this domain of the unconscious and biological birth, I have chosen for it the name perinatal. It is a Greek-Latin composite word where the prefix peri-, means "near" or "around," and the root natalis signifies "pertaining to childbirth." This word is commonly used in medicine to describe various biological processes occurring shortly before, during, and immediately after birth. The obstetricians talk, for example, about perinatal hemorrhage, infection, or brain damage. However, since traditional medicine denies that the child can consciously experience birth and claims that this event is not recorded in memory, one never hears about perinatal experiences. The use of the term perinatal in connection with consciousness reflects my own findings and is entirely new (Grof 1975).
The perinatal region of the unconscious contains the memories of what the fetus experienced in the consecutive stages of the birth process, including all the emotions and physical sensations involved. These memories form four distinct experiential clusters, each of which is related to one of the stages of the birth process. I have coined for them the term Basic Perinatal Matrices (BPM I-IV). BPM I consists of memories of the advanced prenatal state just before the onset of the delivery. BPM II is related to the onset of the delivery when the uterus contracts, but the cervix is not yet open. BPM III reflects the struggle to be born after the uterine cervix dilates. And finally, BPM IV holds the memory of the emerging into the world, the birth itself.
The content of these matrices is not limited to fetal memories; each of them also provides selective opening into a vast domain in the unconscious psyche that we now call transpersonal. This involves experiential identification with other people and other life forms, ancestral, racial, collective, phylogenetic and karmic memories, and material from the historical and archetypal collective unconscious, which contains motifs of similar experiential quality. Emergence of this material into consciousness constitutes the process of psychospiritual death and rebirth and results in deep inner transformation.
Some of the insights of people experiencing holotropic states of consciousness are directly related to the current global crisis and its relationship with consciousness evolution. They show that we have exteriorized in the modern world many of the essential themes of the death rebirth process that a person involved in deep personal transformation has to face and come to terms with internally. The same elements that we would encounter in the process of psychological death and rebirth in our visionary experiences make today our evening news. This is particularly true in regard to the phenomena that characterize what I refer to as the third Basic Perinatal Matrix (BPM III)(Grof 2000).
As I mentioned earlier, this matrix is related to the stage of birth when the cervix is open and the fetus experiences the tedious propulsion through the birth canal. This stage is associated with the emergence of the shadow side of human personality – murderous violence and excessive or deviant sexual drives, scatological elements, and even satanic imagery. It is easy to see manifestations of these aspects of the death rebirth process in today's troubled world.
We certainly see the enormous unleashing of the aggressive impulse in the many wars and revolutionary upheavals in the world, in the rising criminality, terrorism, and racial riots. Equally dramatic and striking is the lifting of sexual repression and freeing of the sexual impulse in both healthy and problematic ways. Sexual experiences and behaviors are taking unprecedented forms, as manifested in the sexual freedom of adolescents, premarital sex, gay liberation, general promiscuity, common and open marriages, high divorce rate, overtly sexual books, plays and movies, sadomasochistic experimentation, and many others.
The demonic element is also becoming increasingly manifest in the modern world. Renaissance of satanic cults and witchcraft, popularity of books and horror movies with occult themes, and crimes with satanic motivations attest to that fact. Terrorism of the fundamentalist fanatics and groups is also reaching satanic proportions. The scatological dimension is evident in the progressive industrial pollution, accumulation of waste products on a global scale, and rapidly deteriorating hygienic conditions in large cities. A more abstract form of the same trend is the escalating corruption and degradation of political, military, economic, and religious institutions, including the American presidency.
Ancient Mayans showed profound interest in death and in the process of death and rebirth. They saw it happening on an astronomical level every day watching the sunset and sunrise and every year during December solstice when the sun got "reborn" and its light started returning into the world. The highest octave of this solar return was then the alignment of the December solstice sun with the galactic center, which the Mayans saw as hieros gamos –Sacred Marriage between the Cosmic Mother and the Cosmic Father. This phenomenal event occurring only every 26.000 years heralded for them a major rebirth of cosmic proportions, beginning of a new world cycle (Jenkins 1989).
Much of the Mayan ritual and art was dedicated to the process of death, from the soul's entrance into the underworld called Xibalba to a final rebirth and apotheosis. Mayan mythology and funereal art described death as a journey whose challenges were known and its important stages were depicted on coffins, wall paintings, pottery, jades, and other objects that accompanied the deceased during the great transition. Mayan funeral vases of the Classic period were decorated with paintings depicting rebirth of young lords from a cracked skull or turtle carapace and many sculptures showed similar figures in the process of being reborn from water lilies.
Unfortunately, no specific eschatological texts comparable to the Egyptian or Tibetan Book of the Dead have survived from the Mayan Classical Period, since much of the Maya literary legacy has been lost for posterity. Only a few codices, accordion-like bark paper screenfolds with rich and colorful illustrations, survived the hot and moist climate of Central America and escaped the ravaging of the Spanish invaders." However, in the 1970s, mayologists Lin Crocker and Michael Coe were able to distinguish a group of funeral vessels painted in the style of the Maya codices, probably by the same artists. Cardiosurgeon and archeologist Francis Robicsek was able to assemble substantial evidence for his theory that certain sequences of the vases of the 'ceramic codex,' placed in proper sequence, actually represented a Maya Book of the Dead" (Robicsek 1981).
Observations from the research of holotropic states of consciousness have thrown new light on human propensity to unbridled violence and insatiable greed – two forces that have driven human history since time immemorial and are currently threatening survival of life on this planet. This research has revealed that these "poisons," as they are called in Tibetan Vajrayana, have much deeper roots than current biological and psychological theories assume – biology with concepts like the naked ape, the triune brain, and the selfish gene and psychoanalysis and related schools with their emphasis on base instincts as the governing principles of the psyche.
Deep motivating forces underlying these dangerous traits of human nature have their origin on the perinatal and transpersonal levels of the psyche, domains that mainstream psychology does not yet recognize (Grof 2000). The finding that the roots of human violence and insatiable greed reach far deeper than mainstream academic science ever suspected and that their reservoirs in the psyche are truly enormous could in and of itself be very discouraging. However, it is balanced by the exciting discovery of new therapeutic mechanisms and transformative potentials that become available in holotropic states on the perinatal and transpersonal levels of the psyche.
We have seen over the years profound emotional and psychosomatic healing, as well as radical personality transformation, in many people who were involved in serious and systematic experiential self-exploration and inner quest. Some of them had supervised psychedelic sessions, others participated in holotropic breathwork workshops and training or various other forms of experiential psychotherapy and self-exploration. Similar changes occur often in individuals who are involved in shamanic practice or are meditators and have regular spiritual practice. We have also witnessed profound positive changes in many people who received adequate support during episodes of spontaneous psychospiritual crises ("spiritual emergencies"). Thanatologist Ken Ring referred to this group of transformative experiences as "Omega experiences" and included in it near-death experiences and alien abduction experiences (Ring 1984).
As the content of the perinatal level of the unconscious emerges into consciousness and is integrated, the individuals involved undergo radical personality changes. They experience considerable decrease of aggression and become more peaceful, comfortable with themselves, and tolerant of others. The experience of psychospiritual death and rebirth and conscious connection with positive postnatal or prenatal memories reduces irrational drives and ambitions. It causes a shift of focus from the past and future to the present moment and enhances zest, élan vital, and joi de vivre - ability to enjoy and draw satisfaction from simple circumstances of life, such as everyday activities, food, lovemaking, nature, and music. Another important result of this process is emergence of spirituality of a universal and mystical nature that, unlike the dogmas of mainstream religions, is very authentic and convincing, because it is based on deep personal experience.
The process of spiritual opening and transformation typically deepens further as a result of transpersonal experiences, such as identification with other people, entire human groups, animals, plants, and even inorganic materials and processes in nature. Other experiences provide conscious access to events occurring in other countries, cultures, and historical periods and even to the mythological realms and archetypal beings of the collective unconscious. Experiences of cosmic unity and one's own divinity result in increasing identification with all of creation and bring the sense of wonder, love, compassion, and inner peace.
What began as a process of psychological probing of the unconscious psyche conducted for therapeutic purposes or personal growth automatically becomes a philosophical quest for the meaning of life and a journey of spiritual discovery. People, who connect to the transpersonal domain of their psyche, tend to develop a new appreciation for existence and reverence for all life. One of the most striking consequences of various forms of transpersonal experiences is spontaneous emergence and development of deep humanitarian and ecological concerns.
Differences among people appear to be interesting and enriching rather than threatening, whether they are related to gender, race, color, language, political conviction, or religious belief. Following this transformation, these individuals develop a deep sense of being planetary citizens rather than citizens of a particular country or members of a particular racial, social, ideological, political, or religious group. and they feel the need to get involved in service for some common purpose. These changes resemble those that have occurred in many of the American astronauts who were able to see the earth from outer space (see Mickey Lemle's documentary The Other Side of the Moon).
It becomes obvious that our highest priorities as biological creatures have to be clean air, water, and soil. No other concerns, such as economic profit, military pursuits, scientific and technological progress, or ideological and religious beliefs, should be allowed to take priority over this vital imperative. We cannot violate our natural environment and destroy other species without simultaneously damaging ourselves. This awareness is based on an almost cellular knowledge that the boundaries in the universe are arbitrary and that each of us is ultimately identical with the entire web of existence.
In view of the fact that everything in nature runs in cycles and is based on the principles of optimum values, homeostasis, and sustainability, the technological civilization's frantic pursuit of unlimited economic growth, exploitation of non-renewable resources, and exponential increase of industrial pollution hostile to life appears to be dangerous insanity. In the world of biology excess of calcium, vitamins, or even water is not better than lack of these substances and unlimited growth is the main characteristic of cancer.
It is clear that a transformation associated with the experience of psychospiritual death and rebirth would increase our chances for survival if it could occur on a sufficiently large scale. The great German writer and philosopher Johann Wolfgang Goethe was aware of the importance of the experience of psychospiritual death and rebirth for the quality of our life and sense of belonging when he wrote in his poem Selige Sehnsucht: "Und so lang du das nicht hast, dieses: ‘Stirb und werde!' Bist du nur ein trüber Gast auf der dunklen Erde." ("And as long as you do not experience this: ‘Die and become!' you will be only a shadow guest on the dark earth").
Holotropic states of consciousness experienced in a supportive environment and under responsible guidance offer thus an opportunity for profound psychospiritual transformation of two different kinds or degrees. An individual who experiences death and rebirth – usually in the context of reliving and integrating the trauma of biological birth – discovers his or her own divinity, sacredness of all creation and oneness with other people, nature, and the cosmos. Deeper exploration of the transpersonal realms and particularly the experience of the archetype of the Apocalypse then radically changes the perception of the world we live in. We begin to understand that what we experience as material reality might be what the Hindu teachings refer to as lila – divine play created by cosmic consciousness. Both of these two forms of spiritual transformation have profound positive effects on the individual's hierarchy of values and life strategy described above.
Various methods of inducing holotropic states – "technologies of the sacred" – have been an integral part of ancient and native cultures for millennia (Grof 2000). Modern humanity has been rediscovering the healing and transformative power of these states in many different contexts. Meditative practices of the great Eastern spiritual traditions and various shamanic techniques are becoming increasingly popular, particularly among the young generation. Translation and publication of spiritual literature of many cultures, recording of their sacred music, and availability of competent teachers have greatly contributed to this process.
The isolation and chemical identification of the active principles of many psychedelic plants, development of new synthetic psychedelic compounds, and increasing knowledge about these substances have been instrumental in inner transformation of many individuals who have used these powerful tools wisely and responsibly. The use of psychedelics – the most powerful means for inducing holotropic states of consciousness - is seriously hindered by legal restrictions, bad and misleading publicity, and difficulties in obtaining pure materials. However, there exist very effective forms of experiential psychotherapy, such as various neo-Reichian approaches, primal therapy, rebirthing, and holotropic breathwork, which can induce these states without the use of chemical agents. Their increasing popularity thus represents a very promising trend.
Advances of modern medicine have made it possible to save the lives of individuals involved in life-threatening accidents and diseases and have increased the incidence of near-death experiences (NDEs) The development of thanatology, a discipline studying death and dying, has amassed and spread information about these states and made it possible for survivors to use them for positive inner transformation (Ring 1982, Ring and Valarino 1998).. As the economic, ecological, and political global crisis escalates, it instills fear and diminishes hope for fulfilling and satisfying life in the minds of hundreds of millions of people all over the world. The resulting emotional turmoil seems to engender spontaneous psychospiritual crises, also known as "spiritual emergencies"(Grof and Grof 1989, Grof and Grof 1990). Once mainstream psychiatrists recognize that these states have an extraordinary healing and transformative potential - if they are properly understood - and provide support and guidance for this process rather than suppress it by tranquilizers, it could greatly contribute to inner transformation of many people.
As Gregg Braden pointed out, the potential significance of 2012 can be supported by scientific observations (Braden 2007). Astrophysicists have shown that we are at the beginning of a new cycle of magnetic storms (sunspots) that will peak in 2012 with an intensity 30-50% greater than previous cycles. Although the solar magnetic storms are cyclical, they have never occurred during the last 26.000 years at the time of galactic alignment and with the population and the technology we have today; it is therefore uncertain what effects this phenomenon will have on our future.
Scientists also agree that the magnetic field of the earth has been rapidly weakening and there are indications that we are in the early stage of reversal of the magnetic poles, which could occur in 2012. Historical analysis shows that periods and areas of weak magnetic fields are conducive to greater acceptance of new ideas and change. Magnetic reversals are rare in the history of civilizations, but common in the history of the earth; at least 14 of them happened in the last 4.5 million years (one of them coinciding with the sudden extinction of the mammoths). However, none of them happened at a time when the planet had over 6 billion inhabitants with significant number of them depending on modern communication technology – television, radio, computers, and satellites.
We can now return to the subject of our conference and of this paper – the Mayan prophecy concerning 2012. Whether or not this was predicted by ancient Mayan seers, we are clearly involved in a dramatic race for time that has no precedent in the entire history of humanity. What is at stake is nothing less than the future of humanity and of life on this planet. Many of the people with whom we have worked saw humanity at a critical crossroad facing either collective annihilation or an evolutionary jump in consciousness of unprecedented nature and dimension. Terence McKenna put it very succinctly: "The history of the silly monkey is over, one way or another" (McKenna 1992). We either undergo a radical transformation of our species or we might not survive.
The final outcome of the crisis we are facing is ambiguous and uncertain; it lends itself to pessimistic or optimistic interpretation and each of them can be supported by existing data. If we continue the old strategies, which in their consequences are clearly extremely destructive and self-destructive, it is unlikely that modern civilization will survive. However, if a sufficient number of people undergoes a process of deep inner transformation described above, we might reach a stage and level of consciousness evolution at which we will deserve the proud name we have given to our species: homo sapiens sapiens and live in a new world that will have little resemblance to the old one.
Abstract: Modern educational institutions need to consider the radical shifts that are taking place in global consciousness if they are to contribute to the evolutionary changes in our world. Western modernist thought that focuses through Newtonian certainties and an obsession with linear and segregated knowledge needs to expand to encompass the chaotic uncertainty that has become a subject of current natural and humanistic sciences and quantum physics. In the complex confluence of information in our global culture, there are now many different truths for many different subjects, revealing the possibility of dimensions of reality not apprehensible through rationality and objectivity. The Western world is facing an existential crisis, lost in a turbulent, complex sea of information overload and global uncertainty, in which we are called to adapt and synchronize a multiplicity of knowledge systems into a paradoxical integrated whole. Outdated modes of being will disintegrate under the impact of the limiting perceptions of warring ideologies. Personal psychological development, including the ability to holistically foster the creative and relational aspects of the self, needs to be incorporated as a means to facilitate integration in our evolving social order. Humanity is in a cataclysmic change period, and our educational institutions can be at the forefront of developing a new planetary consciousness. We need an evolutionary expansion in our model of consciousness, with new content, pedagogies and modes of enquiry in our educational tradition. We are living in the age of innovation where we must learn our way into the future.
Dr. Maureen O'Hara, PhD (www.maureen.ohara.net) is Chair of the Psychology Department at National University, La Jolla, CA and President Emerita of Saybrook Graduate School, San Francisco. Working with American psychologist Dr. Carl R. Rogers, she helped develop the Person-Centered Approach to psychotherapy and large group process. More recently, her writings have examined the relationship between the 'big picture' changes underway and internal psychological adaptation. Combining her background as psychotherapist, organizational consultant and futurist, she is a frequent keynote speaker nationally and internationally on the evolution of new ways of being in a changing world. As a specialist in higher education assessment and governance she has served on evaluation teams for the accreditation agencies WASC and DETC. Maureen serves as Immediate Past President of APA Division 32, the Society for Humanistic Psychology. She is a Distinguished Clinical Member of the California Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, Fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science, Fellow of the American Psychological Association, Fellow of the Meridian Institute on Governance, Leadership Learning and the Future and member of the International Futures Forum in St. Andrews, Scotland.
"Maybe the time has come in our civilization for a period of creative suspension. True creativity appears when we stay within the tension of a question or an issue and do not rush to assuage our insecurity with easy solutions. We are all essential parts of this modern world and must exercise our collective creativity to discover orders beyond, new forms of action and exercise our ability to hold a variety of viewpoints in creative tension and mutual respect." David Peat.
"The sign of an educated man is one who can hold two contradictory ideas in mind at the same time and continue to function." F. Scott Fitzgerald.
"I believe we ... need a revolution. We need a mindset change if we are to attain a just and sustainable future. And the revolution must be in our thinking. As Einstein has said, "We cannot solve the problems of today at the level of thinking at which they were first created." Another way of saying it is what one of my psychologist friends said, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result." Jean-Lou Chameau, Dean of Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology has said, "We need to change the mindsets not just the problem sets". Anthony D. Cortese
"An educated person has the ability to appreciate, learn from, and embrace contradiction, even when we might prefer closure." Peter Salovey.
We are living in a period when foundational givens of thought are on the move and when the cosmology that has framed experience in Western societies is unravelling. This is creating a shift in our understanding of reality so fundamental that it undermines many of the bedrock assumptions on which Western consciousness is based.
After an almost 500 year march from medievalism to modernism, during which time we in the West have addressed our desires for knowledge and eased our existential anxieties through a variously titrated mixture of metaphysics, superstition, natural science, alchemy, theory, and practical knowledge, the world is changing so fast around us that our minds cannot keep up.
It is hard to overemphasize the implications for knowledge in the conceptual revolution that is underway. In the sciences and technology, this shift from a world of Newtonian certainty and predictability to one of quantum uncertainty and chaotic unpredictability comes largely as the logical consequence of discoveries in theoretical physics at the opening of the 20th century and to the development of the mathematics of non-linear systems in 1950s. Taken together, these intellectual developments represent a fundamental shift in our way of understanding the world, and as, Peat says, "puts an end to that Enlightenment dream of conquering the world through pure reason."(Peat, 2005.p.5) It also reopens the possibility of dimensions of realities not apprehensible through rationality and objectivity.
There are many ways to think about this great unravelling, with significant implications for scientific research, ethics and philosophy of science, for instance. I would like to explore it as a psychological event—and discuss the simultaneous danger of mental distress and opportunity for consciousness breakthrough or growth. Further, I would like to propose some steps that those of us in the knowledge business—whether inside the academy or outside— might take to avoid possible cultural and psychological meltdown, and instead to enhance the likelihood that humanity will find ways to embrace the learning opportunity offered by its collective existential predicament and cultivate the necessary capacities of mind to live well in an unavoidably uncertain world.
In the familiar Sufi tale of the blind people groping to try to understand what they have in hand, the point of the story is that the blind seekers can transcend their own partial knowledge and understand the totality of the elephant—the mysterious whole—only if they recognize the partiality of their view point, and can pool their various local knowledge of the parts towards an understanding of the whole. The story presupposes, however, that there is a position—that of the story teller—from where it is possible to know the whole. Furthermore it presupposes that there is already a whole to be known. For reasons much more situational than ontological, we now face a world where as Donald N. Michael once observed, the elephant is missing (Michael 1999) . Or more accurately, there are an infinite number of elephants, chickens, spirits, rainbows, concepts, music--potential patterns to be recognized or produced, each an emergent phenomenon of particular participant-subject relationships. And furthermore, the cosmos may well be more vast than we can ever really know.
No matter the issue—global warming, terrorism, famine, avian flu, the nature of love, the location of a housing development, the existence of being after death or care of aged, once you begin to include into your thinking all the information that could potentially illuminate your subject, you find you must look at technology, science, sociology, folk lore, religion, psychology, anthropology, media, personalities, politics, big picture, up close, history, current events, future predictions and so on out into an ever expanding universe of relevance. Before you know it, you are awash in a sea of information where the more you learn the less you understand. And despite the availability of sophisticated data- mining techniques and ever more intelligent search engines, the sheer volume of information—good, bad and ugly—coming at us from everywhere, at accelerating speed, in different languages, epistemologies, assumptive frames --sometimes contradictory, sometimes complementary—means that even if we had the most super-duper pattern-recognizing-mega-computers and data-mining techniques with which to process it, we could no longer hope to separate signal from noise to make the kind of sense we used to refer to as truth.
We experience information overload, yet at the same time there is a widening realization of how much we don't know. We need information to understand our information, we don't agree on priorities, discipline, epistemology, metaphysics, metaphors, values. Is global warming a technical problem, moral problem, or a social psychological problem—or no problem at all—and who decides? How much of the context do we include—too much and the signal disappears, too little and we can't join up the dots—in either case, we miss 9/11, and so on. Just a few years ago, the favorite metaphor for life in the age of hyper-rapid information flow was "white water rafting." Increasingly it is "lost at sea."
Such a world is a fundamentally uncertain world. Gone forever is the security that for every question there is a single simple answer—even one, as Mencken quipped, that is wrong. Our relentless search for new answers is itself a source of new ignorance, undermining old certainties at the same time as it creates new ones, only to have them disintegrate in turn in the face of new knowledge. Our irrepressible curiosity has brought us finally to a place where we can no longer hope to comprehend our world as a whole and to where we no longer have a basis to trust what we once trusted. Should we trust science for instance? Our doctor? Priest? Tarot reader? Fox News? Al Jazeera? Dreams? Intuition? Logic? Wikipedia? Me? And if so, why?
Cultural psychologist Richard Shweder has observed that stable communities derive their stability in part from a shared "cosmology", (or "grand narrative") which coherently and convincingly explains to their inhabitants why things are the way they are (Shweder and Bourne 1982) . This cosmology includes the interpenetrated and culturally embedded stories, symbols, language, metaphors, beliefs, epistemologies, morality, view of reality, cognitive and emotional routines that make any particular culture. It defines what is sane and what is crazy, what is mature, smart, foolish, good, evil, beautiful, worth striving for, worth living for, worth dying for, is the right way to think, perceive, feel and act. It is the role of the socializing institutions—schools, families, churches, governments, media—to inculcate these ideas and values into the population. When the cultural consensus breaks down, societies and the individuals in them come unglued.
A shift in cosmology on a scale implied by the end of the Enlightenment dream, taken together with an awareness brought to us by ever present global media, that our cosmology is actually just one of any number of reasonable stories to live by, is highly destabilizing. In the emerging global context, where previously trusted authorities and sources of knowledge, must compete in the information marketplace with literally countless others, we are left with radical uncertainty not only as a theoretical reality, or as a technological limitation, but as an existential reality. For a great many of us, this presents us with a serious psychological challenge. As any psychotherapist can attest, an existential challenge can be both threat and opportunity; a source of anxiety and defeat or a spur to transformational learning.
Peat (2005) argues that the fundamental complexity and uncertainty of our times requires us to understand that, "we are all essential parts of this modern world and must exercise our collective creativity to discover orders beyond, new forms of action and exercise our ability to hold a variety of viewpoints in creative tension and mutual respect." If he is right, and I think he is, we must ask if we are psychologically prepared for such a task and if we are not, what can and must we do to become so.
As a clinical psychologist and educator, my look at the evidence suggests that while some small percentage of us may have achieved the level of psychological development implied in Peat's statement—which is actually pretty sophisticated—most of us have not and by a long way. We are mostly over our heads, where many of the challenges we face every day require levels of consciousness, habits of mind, and ways of being that are beyond the level of psychological development at which most people are operating. (Kegan 1994) .
And I think the evidence suggests that a great many of us are not all coping well with being out of our depth. It is generally accepted in world health circles, for instance, that we are experiencing a global mental health pandemic. The World Health Organisation reports of 2001 and 2002 reveal mounting evidence of the global burden of psychological distress and violence. WHO suggests that by 2020, depression will be second only to heart disease as a source of illness in the world (2001; Organization 2001; 2002) . This shows up in individuals in symptoms of anxiety and depression, self-destructive and violent behavior and it shows up in communities as marginalization, alienation, hopelessness and extremism. Though much of this is due to such factors as war, poverty and other problems, even in advanced and economically privileged societies, mental illness is on the rise. At the level of nations the unravelling shows up as failing states, civil war and repressive regimes (Hannah, 2005).
The Nuffield Trust: UK review of policy futures for health examined the deterioration in "the social context for healthy living", pointing out how stretched people feel when there is "no time for life, no partner for life, no job for life." (1999) In the U.S. the 9/11 Commission Report, sees people turning to fundamentalism as a source of stability in a world in which many have lost their bearings (National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Against the United States, 2004). The report notes Osama Bin Ladin's appeal to "people disoriented by cyclonic change as they confront modernity and globalisation". Palestinian psychiatrist and human rights activist Eyad Sarraj, describes the evolution of what he calls "a paranoid culture" in the Middle East, where older cultural coherence was destroyed by colonial actions in the region and nothing coherent replaces it (Interview with Tikkun Magazine, February, 2005). In its Readiness for the Future Index of 2001 the World Economic Forum states that "social harmony" in a nation is necessary for sustainable competitiveness, but notes that this is deteriorating in many countries (World Economic Forum, 2001).
Perhaps, we should not be surprised about how unprepared we are for the new context of complexity and uncertainty in which we find ourselves. After all, in the West, socializing institutions, especially our educational institutions are still mostly designed with the Enlightenment dream in mind. For all the usual reasons—entrenched interests, bureaucratic inertia, established hierarchies, revered tradition, ideology, and so on, the educational establishment has been highly resistant to fundamental change in its basic commitment to the Western scientific canon and over the last decades science and engineering rule the roost. This is especially true of the universities and colleges that are often "prisoners of their own legacies...trapped in long-established procedures and norms" and where legitimate concerns for quality and accountability approached through the frames of the Enlightenment dream, has lead to an exaggerated focus on metrics, the unintended consequences of which is to freeze innovation and to overload teachers. (Kelley 2005, p.212).
Increasingly, higher education as a socializing institution is seen to be failing its students and the societies that support them. Smith (Smith 2004) has suggested that in large measure this is because the curriculum increasingly misses concerns of a generation already living in a post-Enlightenment world, that our schools are organized for failure and that our "industrial model" does not work for the 21 st century. In the US, less than 50% of young people actually enter college and only 50% of those leave with a completed degree. The figures for blacks and Latinos are even more distressing. Even those who do graduate do not develop the needed competencies for success in today's work force or for life. In particular, according to employers, they lack the higher order mental capacities such as critical thinking, imagination, analysis of ideas, creativity, expressive skills, and social skills that are now required for success in the most jobs. This misalignment between the curriculum within the academy and the world outside it, will become all the more salient in the not so distant future in which China and India—exposed to European thought relatively recently, and after millennia of seeing the world through radically different frames—become the dominant economies. Inadequate capacity to deal with the inevitable uncertainties of life in a world where Eastern modes of thought have equal standing alongside Western, for instance, will leave the West vulnerable, yet in the West, we continue to construct educational programs as if no other forms of thought even exist, let alone have epistemic legitimacy. If a student brings up questions from outside the Western canon such as questions about talking to ancestral spirits or other non-material beings, for instance, they are still likely to be ridiculed. Singapore, in contrast, has already realized that to be successful in the emerging future, a new commitment to mental formation of its young is required where a far more expanded conception of consciousness guides learning programs. In 1997, the Prime Minister launched the Thinking Schools, Learning Nation initiative where emphasis is placed on the ability to function in ambiguous situations, problem –solving skills, creativity, flexibility, new literacies, and self-motivation (1997, Ministry of Education, Singapore) (retrieved at http://www.moe.gov.sg/corporate/mission_statement.htm) .
From these and many similar indicators, it seems obvious that we have come to a place in our development where the inherited ways of thinking and knowing are inadequate to the task at hand.
In a recent presentation, Walter Anderson, quoted Stewart Brand, who suggested that since we now possess the power to destroy worlds or to transform them, "We are Gods, and we might as well get used to it." (Anderson 2005) If this is true—and I assume he means by this that we now have the kind of responsibility for the future of the planet that was once thought to belong to beings of a higher order-- then it seems to me urgent that we consider what kind of education this unprecedented level of responsibility requires.
Questions arise. What would ensure that enough of us across the various world cultures develop the capacity to hold not just two opposing ideas at the same but many; and to resist the desire for easy certainty and premature closure? What kind of socializing experiences can we invent so we learn to see the world through new eyes and to take in its complexity without becoming overwhelmed by it? What will help us stay "within the tension of a question or an issue" and live in the messiness for longer than is comfortable in order that creative new forms can emerge? What do we need to learn to live in peace and with respect for those we have been taught to see as the "other". In a rapidly moving technology landscape what do we need to teach so that we develop "just in time" technical and content experts who are willing to let go of obsolete information and to continuously learn? What kinds of experiences would help people steward our natural resources, protect the ecosystem that we are part of while at the same time we feed the next few billions of additional people? Can we reclaim lost capacities such as "dream time", communication with animals, and connect to the spirits of a place?
The mental capacities aimed at in the Western canon reflect those which generations of academicians believe are necessary for success in the industrialized world--objectivity, reason and rationality, linear logic, critical thinking, radical skepticism, secularism, a focus and clarity, either/or dichotomies, sensitivity to difference, preference for fixed categories and sharp boundaries, empiricism, analysis, quantification, self-mastery, enough certainty for confident agency. Obviously, these capacities remain highly relevant in the emerging new world, and need to remain a focus of socialization attention—in schools and outside. In the new world of uncertainty the Enlightenment culture does not evaporate, but rather becomes subsumed within the new world view. The modern, science dominated world will be with us for the foreseeable future, and we can safely assume that as the developing nations enter the industrialized world they will ensure that some part of the acculturation will involve learning to think in these ways. (Schofer and Meyer 2005).
But the new context of complexity and uncertainty calls for the cultivation of levels of consciousness and habits mind that go far beyond this and success will require new modes of consciousness. Let me briefly, and with some trepidation describe what some of these dimensions of consciousness beyond the modern might be.
We must learn, or rather relearn, to view ourselves subjects in a world of other subjects. Though as part of the methodology of science and technology subject-object thought has been immensely productive, it has arguably also brought us to the edge of destruction. With its arms-length relationship to the world, it has severed the deep empathic links our ancestors had with the earth, and with their kin and with other beings. We must reconnect. We need to cultivate intuition and appreciation of the non-rational; not as substitutes for reason and scepticism, but as a complement to them. We need to cultivate both/and thinking, enhance our capacity for holistic perception, gestalt awareness, network logic and pattern recognition. Along with a capacity to focus, we need to be at home with fuzziness and a wide-angle view. We will need to balance a fear that we have not enough information with the problems of having too much. People will need to become comfortable in a world of fluid boundaries, understanding the world as a continuous web of relationally connected integrities. We will need to be able to work at the places where knowledge domains and interests overlap and interact. To make all this work, and to actually be at home in the creative tensions posed by a world in transformation, we will need to make explicit the importance of psychological self-care, emotional maturity and the nourishment of the soul. This means we must recognize and honor the important place in most people's lives of what is called religion or spirituality.
If these are the ends to which we strive, what might be some of the approaches to learning and knowing that could provide the means?
There are four holistically interrelated dimensions which educational institutions must rethink—a new mission, new curriculum content, new pedagogy, new modes of inquiry,
Firstly, education at all levels needs to rethink its mission in light of the emerging connected world. This mission must go beyond simply providing workers for the global economy. We also need to make it a high priority to cultivate the kinds of people—individuals and collectives—with the necessary scope of awareness and level of mental development to create sustainable systems in which human beings thrive and can co-exist on a fragile planet. We must aim at an expansion of, or evolution of, the modal consciousness of our species. Anything less, is whistling past the cemetery.
Unless we evolve our ways of thinking to embrace a wider sense of responsibility not only for self, or tribe, but for entire planetary system including its people and other creatures, nature may well decide that its experiment with homo sapiens sapiens should be abandoned.
Not only what we learn but how we learn will need to adapt to the new agendas.
My colleague Eamonn Kelly has said that the world may be entering a "Cambrian explosion" of innovation and experimentation in education and learning (Kelley 2005) . We are gaining knowledge of the brain and cognitive and emotional functions at an astonishing rate and this knowledge is already being used in instructional design to enhance learning and performance. We will see "transhuman" mind enhancement through drugs and various implanted technological mental add-ons very soon (Hughes 2005) .
Announcements about innovations in educational delivery models arrive every day. Reports on new ventures--distance learning bringing classes to remote Indian villages by satellite, new business-academy partnerships, Barefoot academies, service learning that takes the academy into the world, apprenticeships and corporate training that tack back and forth between academy and workplace. The boundaries between the research universities and commerce have all but disappeared, prestige institutions band together to create joint programs to satisfy the massive appetite for learning in societies like China and sub-Saharan Africa.
At lower grade levels, educational innovation abounds. Even though hobbled by gargantuan bureaucracies and political wrangling , innovative teachers are gradually introducing systems thinking, group techniques such as "sharing circles" and creativity labs, classes in eco-literacy, digital media production, contemplation (though you cannot call it meditation!) and are increasingly employing the latest research from cognitive science in their instructional design. Adventurous youngsters too, are also part of the innovation--they are blogging, creating their own multimedia of high quality, doing simulations, participating in online role playing games with thousands of players worldwide. Many of these games expand the imagination, requiring intense participation, long attention spans, and the development of sophisticated mental strategies.
Humanity—or at least large parts of it—has faced such inflection points before, where new forms of consciousness have been called for—the shift from the medieval to the modern world for instance, and then later as a result of the industrial revolution. Some societies have thrived, and others have disappeared. The response to the present conceptual crisis must be to embrace the adventure and harness the potential for transformative learning that is implicit in such uncertain times. The stakes are high: If we fail to learn fast enough the world could, as it was in the 13 th century, be cast into a Mad Max world of violence, craziness and despair. But on the other hand, and it is here that we must aim our efforts, the potential exists that we might use the challenge of these times to learn our way into the future.
If we can provide the supporting structures in education and other socializing institutions to permit us to live in the creative tension of unanswered questions and emergent possibilities, and if new or reclaimed capacities become integrated into our existing forms of knowledge, we may as Peat suggests, " discover orders beyond." This could conceivably result in a new stage of human evolution. It seems to me that this should be the goal of education for the global 21 st century.
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I use the word "cosmology" to refer to the totality of world view, narrative frames, symbolic landscape, meaning frames, language, logical forms, cognitive schemas, and epistemologies that provide the taken-for-granted assumptions of life in that society.