Navigating the Paradigm Shift of Polyamory

The Power of Releasing Your Grip on Monogamy

More than ever, people are exploring relationship structures that push past the boundaries of the traditional monogamous couple. Some see this as a new paradigm in the area of intimate relationships.

But what is even more paradigm shifting than simply changing your relationship structure itself, is the mindset shift that accompanies such a change. This mindset shift can serve as a potent enhancer of your joy, security, and freedom, and reduce feelings of insecurity, fear, and anxiety related to your relationships. And guess what? You don’t have to have multiple partners to enjoy this mindset shift. The shift of releasing your grip on monogamy can benefit anyone, definitely including those who remain within a pair-bonded couple structure. 

But first, a little background for those who are new to the terrain.

What is CNM?

 

Consensual non-monogamy (CNM), sometimes also referred to as “ethical” non-monogamy, is defined by attachment theory expert and Polysecure author Jessica Fern as the “practice of simultaneously having multiple sexual or romantic partners where everyone involved is aware of and consents to the relationship structure.” Polyamory is the name for one form of consensual non-monogamy that has been popularized in many books, TV shows, and online forums. As distinct from more casual, open-relationship lifestyles like “swinging” (i.e., a couple having sex together or separately with other couples or their members), polyamory is focused on multiple romantic or “love-based” relationships, occurring simultaneously.

The late Deborah Anapol, PhD, a therapist with decades of personal and clinical experience with polyamorous relationships, notes that relationship structure is not the key feature of polyamory; rather, what counts is “allowing love to dictate the form [of one’s relationships] rather than attempting to force love into whatever mold the mind has decided is right.” Dr. Anapol’s perspective underscores how the philosophy underlying the practice of polyamory represents a paradigm shift in how we relate to each other intimately: the idea that people can release their culturally conditioned instincts, social norms, and religious strictures, and embrace “the freedom of surrendering to love.” 

Underscoring that structure is not the fundamental distinction, Dr. Anapol points out that poly relationships can still be “old paradigm” if they exhibit traditionally monogamous characteristics like:

• Impermeable “fidelitous” boundary around a group

• Well-defined set of rules / contract

• Expectation that members will replace individual desires with group agendas

The key is, again, the mindset. “New paradigm” relationships (whether monogamous or polyamorous), emphasize the following:

• Using relationships to further the psychological and spiritual development of the partners

• Responding authentically in the present moment

• Allowing for individual autonomy

• Seeing loved ones as mirrors or reflections of oneself

CNM is thus less a description of what your relationships look like at a particular moment, and more a description of how you think about relationships. 

Even a couple who seems to be classically monogamous, in that neither member of the couple has other intimate partners, may not be “monogamous” at all in terms of how they think about their relationship. 

My Story

In the waning years of my first marriage, I became part of a three-person “V” relationship, in which my wife had an openly dating spouse (me), and a boyfriend at the same time. This exploration was trying to fix a problem: namely a lack of basic chemistry between my wife and me. While at first the adventure provided oxygen to our gasping relationship, as a couple we fell back into our stale groove, and we separated in 2006.

Fifteen years into a “playfully-monogamous” second marriage, my wife Katie opened her heart to a woman. This time, the impetus was not to fix any problem. Instead, this has been a journey of discovery and healing. My marriage is nourished by the expression of Katie’s natural bisexuality. More importantly, all members of our “polycule” have always been strongly committed to personal evolution and a desire to embody the philosophy of “love free from fear.” It has been profoundly expansive, in unique ways for all of us, including my two children. 

At the time of this writing, almost three years into this exploration, our polycule continues to navigate transitions and ongoing questions about what serves each person and each relationship. Katie and her girlfriend have faced numerous challenges, especially around expectations. And while I’ve enjoyed making casual connections, I’m not sure that I currently have room for intimacy with a second partner, given my many commitments as a father, business owner, community leader, and gigging musician. 

The Paradigm Shift

Returning to our initial question: Why might CNM, and polyamory in particular, incur a mindset shift that enhances joy, security, and freedom?

Even though at this particular moment my wife and I might look like a classically monogamous couple, committed to each other within a sacred contract, our mindset is one that doesn’t look to monogamy for security within the relationship. We don’t think of marriage or couplehood as conferring any “right” to love, attention, and intimacy. We create the foundation of those things in our relationship every day.

Our exploration into being a polyamorous family has created a deeper level of security between us, that doesn’t rely on legal or customary bonds of monogamy. And the sense of freedom from within a committed and supportive, loving relationship, is extraordinary. 

Instead of saying “we’re monogamous,” and using that as short-hand for our commitment, we are explicit and focus on the specific commitments we have made together: to love and care for each other, to be there for each other, to support each other’s individual evolution, to parent our kids as an unstoppable team, to inspire the world with our music, etc.   

 

The Practice

Moving beyond the culturally conditioned “safety” of monogamy is not easy for most people (including this author) who have grown up in a world structured around monogamy. There are bumps in the road. (There are bumps in any road.) But this one requires something akin to achieving an advanced degree in authentic relating. It demands that you learn to work with the challenging emotion of jealousy, and to cultivate its opposite: the feeling of joy associated with witnessing your partner have a positive romantic relationship with another.

If you’re just in the inquiry phase around what it might look like to push beyond the boundaries of monogamy, ask yourself the following questions.

• Are you prepared to give up the false sense of security that monogamy provides? Monogamy makes it seem like you are secure from being abandoned, for example. You are probably no more likely to be abandoned in an open relationship than in a closed one, but that fear can feel very strong. You will be forced to trust your partner and his or her love for you, without that false sense of a safety net. You will be likely faced with the challenge of honoring your commitments, even if you are posed with a momentary desire to dishonor them in the throes of excitement with something new.

• Are you looking to express your own wholeness through relationships, or are you looking to your relationships primarily to fulfill your needs? Some people hope that a new relationship might fulfill unmet needs in a current relationship, which might happen, but as experienced polyamorous practioners know, people are not “need-fulfillment machines.” Looking for someone to fill a need is not the most inspired reason to start a relationship. In addition, while most people have generic relationships, an essential quality of consensual non-monogamy is that people build UNIQUE relationships with each person. We can’t all scratch each other’s issues, and that’s okay. What can we provide each other? What can’t we provide? Relationships and marriage sometimes have a finite goal that is only clear in hindsight: e.g., adventure, protection, kids, family, etc. Others are meant to go the distance (if they evolve).

• Are you ready to view your relationship entirely as privilege, and not as a right? When you leave monogamy at the gate, you no longer have a “claim” on someone—another false idea, anyway—and you are forced to enjoy the privilege of the company of a partner who is completely free to continue to want to be in relationship with you, or not. In a long term relationship, you have to commit to CREATING the relationship, every day. And you can’t focus on ensuring against loss (because you can’t guarantee that), and you can’t rely on monogamy to protect you from loss. 

• Are you ready to acquire advanced degrees in communication, radical honesty, and introspection? There is no place to hide, and no reason to hide. And you will need to increase your skills to expand in love. Relationships require skills that don’t transfer from other competencies. For example, in addition to becoming a master at the art of communication, you will need to learn to allow for the paradoxical co-existence of things like independence and dependence.

• Are you ready to become a master of time management and to negotiate underlying needs of your partners? Or to support your partners to do so? Love is not a zero-sum game; the birth of a second child doesn’t mean you love your first child less. However, some degree of intimacy is sacrificed with one partner as you gain other partners with whom you will seek to share intimate moments, dreams, and fears.

• Are you ready to invite jealousy into your life with open arms? You were probably taught at least a little about how to deal with challenging emotions like anger and sadness. In a monogamous culture, we are not taught at all how to handle jealousy, because if jealousy ever arises, it means something is wrong. In the context of polyamory, you are often better served understanding and dealing with your jealousy as opposed to looking for that phantom Thing That Must Be Wrong.

• Are you approaching open relationships to fix a problem, or is it a creative act? Like having a baby, polyamory is not likely not fix your relationship issues. It is more likely to accelerate what is already in motion (like a breakup). But if you take the stance that everything provides either the results you want or the education you need, then you are well-positioned to be educated and transformed in ways that positively alter the foundations of all your relationships. It’s important to bear in mind that while relationships reveal all issues, they don’t necessarily handle all the issues. You may need to work some things out elsewhere, like with a poly-informed coach or therapist. My own journey revealed an addiction to fantasy (a fixation on things that will never become true) and an adolescent relationship to physical intimacy. With the help of my coach, I was able to work these things out and grow massively.

Most people don’t have models of successful non-monogamous relationships around them. Read books and join online forums. Consider investing in expert guidance to expand your capacities, self-understanding, and skills. If you are part of a couple, consider finding support to get clear on the mutual vision and commitments that are required to sustain the primary partnership when adding additional humans into the mix. A poly-informed relationship coach can help you lay the foundations to build and maintain extraordinary relationships, and avoid or clean up messes. 

John Hoelle is a Colorado-licensed family law attorney and mediator, and co-founder of Conscious Family Law & Mediation. He brings an earnest yet playful approach to his work as a relationship coach. He leads a weekly coaching group for those exploring or navigating Consensual Non-Monogamy.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the author only and do not represent an endorsement or recommendation of any particular relationship practices by Conscious Family Law & Mediation or any of its employees or partners.

____________________________

Further Reading:

Polysecure by Jessica Fern

More Than Two: A Practical Guide to Ethical Polyamory by Franklin Veaux and Eve Rickert

Polyamory in the 21st Century by Deborah Anapol

Watch a short webinar given by the author about his personal story:

I AM THE PRODUCT OF...

I AM THE PRODUCT OF...

Here are things I am profoundly grateful for in my life:

• I am the co-founder of a successful law firm in Boulder, Colorado, which fully supports a comfortable lifestyle for my family.
• I have a nourishing and vibrant marriage currently in its 12th year.
• I have two healthy and vital children.
• I have a wonderful "life/work balance." I enjoy my law and mediation practice, and have ample time for outside activities, including performing music regularly as a serious pursuit.
• My relationship with my kids is strong, and I am constantly opening up to new ways to parent them, treating them with respect and dignity while modeling a self-actualized life.
• At age 44 I am radiantly healthy, feeling better than I have ever felt. I eat clean and delicious foods. I exercise daily with a variety of running, hiking, biking, and yoga.
• I have a strong spiritual practice, meditating twice per day.

Now the important part: I think all of the above blessings are a product in some small way of my own genetic makeup and how I’ve chosen to use my natural talents and intellect, BUT I believe it is powerful for me to name and acknowledge that the above blessings are predominantly the product of the following circumstances of my life:

• My parents are white and were both born in the United States, where there is relative freedom of thought and action, where tremendous resources are located or have been gathered from around the world (perhaps often through economic/debt coercion or military coercion), and where many societal resources and avenues to wealth are available (especially to white citizens).
• I was born (and have lived almost all of my life) in the United States.
• On the foundation of the above circumstances, I grew up in a relatively safe suburban area.
• On the foundation of the above circumstances, my parents had sufficient resources and commitment to feed me the most healthful foods they knew about and had access to.
• On the foundation of the above circumstances, my parents had sufficient resources and commitment to push me to excel academically and to help me attend college and law school.
• I am white, which means I have had less barriers to entry to almost everything in the United States.
• I am what is referred to as a cis-gendered (non-trans) straight male, which means in part that many societal resources and avenues to wealth have been more easily available to me relative to females or other gender minorities.
• I am of average size, which means many things have been constructed for use by males like me.
• On the foundation of the above circumstances, I have always had sufficient resources (or access to credit) to invest in personal development, relationship development, spiritual development, and therapeutic programs supporting body, mind and spirit, and have lived in areas where such programs are easily available.
• On the foundation of the above circumstances, I have enjoyed the privilege of extensive world travel, including unique cultural experiences such as Burning Man.
• I had the ability to pursue a non-punitive avenue to correct for unfortunate or ill-advised financial choices and circumstances, via the bankruptcy laws of the United States.

I have tried to be thoughtful about what exactly to thank for my abundance in life, but please comment if you notice one or more missing elements.

The main reason behind this post is to model a thorough acceptance of the sometimes hidden factors of our station in life, and also to identify some of the fundamental things humans need to live abundantly, so that we can begin to work together to create a culture where everyone has access to these things.

Upon review of my list above, I flag these important ingredients for human abundance:

• Relative freedom of thought, action, and travel
• Sufficient monetary and non-monetary resources to build and exchange things and ideas, and to nourish the body (e.g., universal basic income)
• Communities free of coercive debt or forceful extraction of their local resources
• Communities free of unregulated criminal activity
• Tools that have been constructed for use by all kinds of different people
• Access to, and no unjustifiable barriers of entry to, good quality services, education, employment, clean and healthful food, etc.
• Laws and systems that allow for non-punitive correction of past mistakes or misfortune

There are surely more ingredients as well.

If this post resonates with you, I invite you to re-post and re-write using your own life as the basis for this exploration of what is required to produce abundance in life.

Thanks for reading.

Seeking Models for Sacred *and* Grounded Partnerships

My first wife and I had already been in couples counseling for about a year leading up to the proposal. Twenty years later, I have gotten divorced and remarried, and I’m now in an evolving, nourishing, beautiful life partnership with the mother of my kids. Along the way I co-founded a law firm focused exclusively on helping couples mediate their conflict, or divorce efficiently and with the least harm possible.

I have been a serious student of life partnerships for more than two decades.

I found some of my teachers by random chance, and others through books. Much of my Love learning has been through raw experience. But if I were now seeking out mentors and role models, where would I look for guidance to navigate the key relationships in my life? Who could provide a truly useful model for forging an extraordinary partnership with my significant other, where I am expressed fully, and she is too? Who could show me a path in which I can maintain my own ground, while continuing to grow and push my personal boundaries (as well as the joint boundaries I share with my intimate partner)? Who can show me all the ways Love hasn’t blossomed fully in my life, and the path to opening to all the joy, exuberance, richness, stability, and fun that is possible through my long-term relationship?

Most people have no decent (forget about great) relationship role models or mentors anywhere in sight. Rarely do we find such guiding figures among our parents, relatives, friends, clergy, gurus, fictional heroes, or academic mentors. Even the poets seem to be lost.

How is that possible?

Perhaps because Love is nothing less than a spiritual quest. God is Love, Love is God. And if the quest of Love is “spiritual,” the mastery required must be of a spiritual nature. (And thus requiring mastery of what Ken Wilber calls the “psychotechnology” required for discovery of your highest Self, as he defines spirituality.)

But Love, while sacred, is also tethered to the sexy and the profane. (There are biochemicals and other fluids involved.) Navigating human love requires being grounded in the root chakra of human beingness.

By my calculus, then, a master of Love must be versatile in both the spirit and the earthly domains. A teacher or role model incorporating only one or the other should be considered cautiously, if at all. He or she should be part of a grounded and ascendent partnership. Further, a teacher who is not also a role model, who is not on the court and navigating serious partnership (I'm thinking about you David Deida), should be considered cautiously, if at all.

If you are in an extraordinary, sacred yet grounded partnership, you probably get comments about it from people. Don't keep to yourself. If a person is the average of the five people he or she spends the most time with, then couples are the average of the couples they spend time with. Your mission is to share yourselves, and help lift others in this time.

If you are not in such a partnership, but want to be, look hard for these couples and spend time with them.

I am humbled at the way participants of all backgrounds have expressed how the blending of sacred and grounded practices have helped shift stuck energy, create new conversations, and unlock more of what’s possible in their intimate partnerships. My beloved and I call our workshops “Bhakti + Beloved,” because Love is about the heart’s devotion, and the most powerful practices to open the heart and expand it’s capacity for devotion are found in the Indian traditions of bhakti yoga. Calling in Divine energy to help harness the power of devotional practice, alongside the practical work (supported by coaching and mediation) of clearing up toxic issues and improving communication, is a special and powerful combination.

If you are interested in learning more about our workshops for both couples and singles, or our sacred and sexy couples retreats, visit us here. (Hint: we laugh, sing, connect, and cultivate your ability to open up fully into a devotional relationship, with practices including cacao ceremony, kirtan, partner yoga, improv games, embodiment exercises, creative projects, communication games, and the giving and receiving of blessings and missions.)

Will you seek out relationship mentors who are developing themselves equally on the spirit and earthly level, and become a light for other partnerships in this new era?

Partnership with the Feminine Yang

The Yang energy of the feminine is rising.

Women are stepping into a power like nothing we've ever seen on earth. This power looks nothing like the masculine Yang energy. It's not about dominance or strength. The feminine Yang energy is rising to birth a cultural and planetary transformation. Deep down, the masculine wants this, yet it is also disconcerting, unknown terrain. Men are confused.

What does this have to do with your relationship at home, with your wife?

What is happening on a macro level is mirrored at a micro level. As above, so below.

If you are reading this, it is likely that you are feeling your woman's Yang energy intensifying. Perhaps right now your wife is training to become a yoga teacher. Or she is getting political. Or she is making art. Starting a business. Perhaps she is simply asserting new ideas in the bedroom. Finding her passions.

As I've discussed elsewhere, those who think deeply about these dynamics identify that a masculine Yin energy is rising to complement the feminine Yang. If you desire to be in (or to improve your) relationship with a strongly Yang woman, consider cultivating your Yin nature. Yin is not effeminate—it can be as deeply masculine as feminine. As deeply masculine as the testicles. Like the testicles, the masculine Yin nature is ever generative, resourceful, and steadfast. These qualities are supportive of and desired by Yang femininity.

The Yin man is not dominant; he is in partnership with the woman.

Yang feminity is unpredictable. There is no set way to partner with a Yang oriented woman. Yin and Yang exist as in a dance. Dance with your woman, and trade leads. Sometimes you will need to follow her lead; other times you will be looked to for leadership. Be flexible and creative.

The Yin man is playful. He laughs that he cannot control or predict the Yang woman.

The Yin man is patient. He knows that wonderful things await him if he allows space and doesn't demand immediate gratification.

The biggest shift for a man is probably not relinquishing the outdated role of Boss, but rather stepping into a supportive role without hierarchy. The feminine Yang is changing the world, but not through an organized, linear, structured approach. (That would be masculine.) It makes sense to a man to “ line up” behind a cause, or an organization, that he can make sense of and support. Men of this age are being asked to support what they don't necessarily understand. We are being asked to follow our hearts and keep our hearts open. To bring our masculine gifts, to provide, to organize where needed. But all in service of something that is inherently mysterious.

We are done setting lofty goals and making plans for Towers of Babel. The world is changing because we've taken Man’s mastery over his environment as far as we could, and now this is a deficient way of operating.

Her yoga or her art may not make sense to you. Her passions or way of doing business may seem perplexing. Listen to your heart, not your head.

Let her know you are behind her, and that you believe in what she is doing. This will transform your relationship, and the world.

As always, I welcome honest thoughts informed by your journey. If you disagree with my perspective or have a different one, I’d appreciate if you say so simply and through respectful dialogue. 

To your health and evolution!

The Deep Sexuality of the Masculine Yin

Traditional masculinity, fashioned in and by millenia of "patriarchal" culture, has had a tendency to expect sexual gratification from a mate. Often instant gratification. Because femininity of the new era is not always available for this... enter internet porn.

The masculine of the dawning new era still tends to have a desire for immediate sexual gratification (or “sexual nourishment,” as I’ll frame it). However, he has a rising, and perhaps now even stronger, desire for his mate to WANT him.

I call this a yearning for Deep Sexuality.

I believe the shift away from a desire for instant and surface sexuality to deep sexuality, with a nod to author Genia Haddon, is evidence that the masculine yin energy is increasing in relevance relative to the once-dominant masculine yang energy. One aspect of masculine yin energy is that it gets more energized and nourished by supporting and nourishing the feminine, than by exerting power over the feminine.

(Read this article by Charles Eisenstein, or my interview on this podcast, for more on how yin/yang dimensions can radically expand our conception of sexual polarity.)

The masculine sexual desires of nourishment and being wanted are not mutually exclusive, because the feminine yang energy rising in women everywhere will, when the moment is right, absolutely want the masculine sexually in that moment. And she will bring a creative, surprising, feminine sexuality to the dance. (By contrast, the feminine yin surrenders to the masculine yang, but does not necessarily want it and therefore does not tap into her deepest sexual fire.)

How does a man get nourished when he wants and needs nourishment, by a woman who deeply desires to nourish him and brings a potent feminine creativity to the affair?

If you view the above question as the holy grail of masculine sexuality, then join me, brother, in our quest.

Here are a few suggestions from the front lines, where I have had but mere glimpses of the Deep Sexuality grail.

1. Get to know and become enamored with the feminine yang 

If you are reading this, it’s likely that you are a man with a mate who exhibits primarily feminine yang energy. Feminine yang energy is powerful and dynamic, not meek and receptive. She will react or pounce at the right time and in the right context, and the dance is ecstatic. You must be aware and sensitive to this. You are a fisherman.

2. Breathe into the security and confidence of your masculine yin nature 

Cultivate an inner sense of sexual security and confidence that does not rely on your ability to exercise dominance over the feminine, but on the ability to inspire lust in the feminine. The opposite of security and confidence is a whining, expectation of sexual nourishment. This is a childish expression, not a mature one. I am very familiar with this expression. I have often heard myself expressing in this tone, and neither myself or my mate is sexually ignited by it.

3. Step into the solidity and steadfastness of your masculine yin nature

The feminine yang energy is aroused and excited by, among other things, the solidity and steadfastness of the masculine. The mystery is that masculine solidity and steadfastness does not equal passivity. I like to think of being steadfast in my flirtation with my mate, ready to amplify with her the sexual energy when it is present. But at the same time I work to stay solid in my own skin, meaning I don’t need my mate to perform some sexual act, in this moment, to satisfy me and keep me from flipping out. Patience is not passive. Breathe. Take care of yourself. and have faith


All men have a yin and yang expression, but some are more naturally expressing of one over the other. Trust me, even as a man who naturally expresses yin energy, cultivating a mature sexuality that embodies security, confidence, solidity, and steadfastness is a practice, and practices are not always easy, especially at first. Maturity develops over time. I am writing this because it’s my own medicine, right now.

As always, my friend, I welcome your honest thoughts informed by your own journey. If you disagree with my perspective or have a different one, I’d appreciate if you say so simply and through respectful dialogue.

To your health and evolution!

Architecting the Great Web

The nation-state is too big. It’s a behemoth. Even our large cities have ballooned to a size many times too big for a healthy, dynamic community at a human scale. These social monsters are just that: monstrosities. What’s more, they’re dinosaurs. The evolution of natural systems (such as unfortunate dinosaurs) gives us a clue of patterns of organization that are effective to a point, but beyond that become cumbersome. Clunky. Inefficient. And soon, extinct.

An evolving system has no other scheme but to test the stress limits of itself and its own boundaries. We’ve tested those boundaries with our nation-sized communities, and I posit that these entities are not proving to be optimal. We’re starting to become aware of problems in a nation 300 million strong; the huge bureaucracy of the United States is unable to attend to the basics of human welfare or the infrastructural basics we need from our government. More than a few thinkers are realizing that the U.S. Constitution is already cracking under the size of this country. While the American tradition of federalism (shared political/legal power between states and the national government) is one approach to localized governance within a larger whole, I believe even American states are too big to serve as a human-scaled governments.

While things are arguably too big already, political science is currently grappling with how our organizational institutions can “scale up” even larger to cope with apparently inevitable globalization. Despite the seeming paradox, I am actually optimistic that some form of global government is possible that can protect normatively good things such as localized diversity of thought, while establishing a baseline of order and standards of human decency worldwide. The question I am interested in is how natural systems theory can help us predict, or even help us architect a new global order in harmony with human-scale communities.

With the disclaimer of my somewhat broad, but certainly limited awareness of the various factors at play, let me describe what I predict will happen. It is impossible to guess when or how exactly the transformation will occur, but I think we will soon begin to forge new forms of local governance within a larger system that I’ll generically call the “web.” I believe local communities will reflect a shrinking back down to human size, and will possess the following characteristics:

-- less than 100,000 people
-- relative self-sufficiency
-- interconnectedness/interdependence with nearby communities (forming the overall web)

Like a scalable network, the interconnected communities will form a web eventually encompassing the entire face of the earth, and still retain a coherence or unity. The local communities/cities will self-govern, but will also be governed by the powerful, normative practices or customs of the web/multitude/network. These cities will be sovereign and autonomous, but the web will serve as the foundation, embodying and enforcing principles that sustain itself. Longevity and continuance will be bellwether, and the social organization that sustains over time will simply prevail. This living web of cities will display amazing diversity within a larger unified framework. McLuhan’s “global village” will manifest as a collective sphere of media and communication (underpinning the global political norms), but no singular culture will dominate as a hegemony. Some form of representative democracy will likely be central to both local and global levels of governance, but I believe the operative foundation will reflect some kind of peer-to-peer autopoietic organization as opposed to a top-down enforcement of “voting rights.” I realize this sketch is too vague at present to be of much use, but there are many thinkers who are expounding on these ideas right now, and I have faith that innovative models will soon be testable and employable, if they aren’t already being tested right now.

Like any natural system, this web will surely be attacked and challenged. But the web itself will respond naturally and effectively. Like cancerous tissue may grow and threaten to harm the body, cancerous agents may poison parts of the web. But, cut off from surrounding cities, the “cancerous” regions will not represent an extreme threat. Like a lone individual cut off from food and water, rogue cities will not long survive without the sustaining network around them. This stands in opposition to the current situation where large nations have enough resources to sustain destructive activity for a frightening long duration. Inter-community conflict resolution mechanisms will probably surface and ebb as needed, along with some form of intermittent Congress to help give form to the evolution of the basic “sustaining” principles of the web.

Compared to the current structure, the web of cities will respond better to nearly all stresses. Climate disasters, for example—a catastrophe for nations with closed borders—should be easily tolerated by a distributed network of communities that can absorb populations easily, dispersed across a region. Populations will be stabilized through the creation of planned sister-communities, seeded as necessary to prevent overcrowding.

Certainly a topic of such scope as I have addressed here entails consideration of many factors. This text represents merely my preliminary thoughts and predictions about our collective future, about a global social body that has yet to be born. I for one believe the birth is near at hand. To the extent that active midwifery may assist in this birthing, I welcome any comments and reactions as to how, beyond working to purify and enlighten ourselves as individuals, we may facilitate this evolutionary process.

February, 2010
Boulder, Colorado

Image from http://www.flickr.com/photos/kelloggphotography/, used under a creative commons license.

Diversity In Unity

According to Chris Bache's description of Robert Monroe's "interlife rings," the bardo region between life and death is a place where our souls can choose to associate only with others like ourselves, or with others at a similar level of development. Bache indicates that this stands in counterpoint to the physical plane where we live, where we are forced to interact with myriad, different beings. Thus, the diversity of physical life encourages faster development at the soul-level. In this way, would such an "interlife" be a kind of heaven with a dark side, akin to gated communities where people choose to be insulated among others just like themselves? This model indicates a back and forth between resting (in unity) and growth (through diversity). But is such a one-at-a-time model the only way of thinking about how diversity and unity interact?

Perhaps a more useful conception, especially as manifested in a conscious organism, is consciousness as unity and community. The diversity of unique thoughts, the diversity of experiences and emotions -- these can be conceived of as analogous to a society. The single neurons in a human brain that can never experience what it feels like to act as a coherent body nevertheless comprise an overall system which "transcends and includes" them. Aren't these neurons a form of community? Moving beyond the concrete biochemistry of the brain, Genpo Merzel builds on the "Psychology of Selves" theory as he seeks the communal intelligence of our different conscious "Voices" to help us integrate Dual and Non-Dual reality. And even from the point of view of the unified ego-consciousness of a single individual, the diversity of experience as we age reflects the shifting of emphasis of different voices or perspectives of our minds.

However you want to conceive of our discrete inner-selves or voices, one can imagine our inner landscape to function like the shifting currents of cultural views (and vice versa). Like a peaceful transition of political power, perhaps each coherent individual repeatedly transitions as different inner voices align and become prominent, thus transforming our "singular" identity. "I" and "We" at the same time. Diversity and Unity, together.

In the outside world as we typically think of it, diversity is something that must be actively sought out, and embraced as the vehicle for growth that it is. But coherence must also be sought. Homogeneity, or hegemony, is not an evil, unless it is blind. If we are to evolve into a loving, unified culture, certain coherence of principles must be attained. Homogeneity with openness is a strong, evolving coherence. I believe this to be our destiny: Diverse but Unified.