Expansion of our collective consciousness: How our growing awareness as a system requires collective healing
The age of information and communication technology gives us a growing level of awareness about ourselves as a collective and the challenges we face. What does that do to our collective consciousness, the social glue that holds us together as a society? And how does this relate to collective healing and other tools and support systems we need for this unique point in time and the crisis of consciousness many of us feel?
I feel for us as a collective right now.
We’re holding A LOT and not totally sure what to do with it all.
Within my understanding of collective healing, the expansion of our collective consciousness is a key reason why we need to do collective healing work right now (and will need to do so for quite some time).
For I believe we live in a very unique time. Yes, every point in history is unique in its own way. Our ancestors have lived through a myriad of one-of-a-kind challenges. But what I believe is distinctly unique about the time we live in now, is the degree of awareness we have about what we’re experiencing as a world. From climate breakdown to mass shootings to bombings and brutal combat to cyber warfare, a growing population, a rise in authoritarianism, species loss, human rights abuses… the list goes on. Heinous, challenging things have always taken place throughout history, but we’re the first to have such a front row seat to it all.
This new and growing level of awareness results in what I’m seeing as an expansion of our collective consciousness. Never before in history have we had this much information about our collective “self,” spawned by the age of information and communication technology (which has really just begun), as well as advancements in global education (more books), healthcare (more brain capacity), and economic security (more stability). It’s as if our conscious awareness of ourselves as a collective is growing. With this new awareness comes the need for new tools and systems of support.
When I use the word ‘collective consciousness’ here, I’m drawing from French sociologist Emile Durkheim’s term that he coined in the 19th century. He used it to describe the totality of attitudes, ideas, beliefs, and morals that are shared by a group of people and that make up a ‘social glue’ that holds them together. This glue is a body of norms that guides things like: What’s right? What’s wrong? What’s socially appropriate? What do we consider true? How do we relate to one another? How do we make sense of things?
He arrived at this concept while trying to understand the effects of modernity (i.e. the process of cultural change that took place in western Europe for centuries after the Medieval era). A part of his work was seeking to understand how a society maintains its integrity and coherence as a collective when the institutions and cultural practices that make it up vastly change. Sounds kind of familiar, doesn’t it?
As a sociologist, Durkheim looked at the collective consciousness as a social phenomenon. He believed that it is something that permeates all aspects of society (family, religion, education, law, healthcare), and that has a life of its own. As he puts it:
There are in each of us, as we have said, two consciences: one of which is common to our group in its entirety, which, consequently, is not ourself, but society living and acting within us; the other, on the contrary, represents that in us which is personal and distinct, that which makes us an individual (p. 129 Division of Labour 1893).
To illustrate it another way, we as individuals embody and enact the norms that are present within the collective consciousness; but when any one of us passes on, for instance, the collective consciousness doesn't die with us. Instead it lives on as something that’s distinctly separate from us as individuals, and is instead an extension of the larger web of society. It exists beyond us.
It’s pretty fascinating when you think about it. The idea that the collective consciousness has a mind and life of its own (my words, not Durkheim’s). That our ideas, beliefs and morals are not purely our own but are inextricably tied to a collective force that has been in the making since the dawn of time. A collective force that is a product of our decisions as a society, of our history as a people, of the stories we tell, and of the information we have access to.
As I dream into this, I imagine clouds of energy hovering above different pockets of our world. Some overlapping and interconnecting with each other; others a bit more unmovable and static. It’s like this network of dynamic energy that’s undulating in and out of our communities and consciousnesses. I conjure a word like “liberty”and see tendrils of energy light up that connect to history and the social milieu that my consciousness is personally part of. It feels both sci-fi-esque, technological, spiritual, and sociological all at the same time.
This is why when I think about the explosion of information we have at our fingertips today I can’t help but reflect on how it’s affecting us as a world; how it’s affecting all of those clouds of energy. Because this is all new for us as a people, especially at this scale, and we’re not completely sure what to do with it.
On one hand, this greater awareness is inspiring as we learn about scientific advancements and life-saving technologies. We connect with loved ones, share cultures, and make like-minded friends like never before. Every niche and quirk has a way to be seen, and therefore be less alone. And the vast nature of space and the utterly microscopic nature of atoms can be seen and learned about, and almost circle back to each other as one.
But on the other hand, our expanded consciousness also means that we’re no longer asleep to realities that we were previously blind to as a people. It’s nearly impossible to turn a blind eye to the pressing, intractable problems we face. Not only do we have greater awareness of these challenges, but we also have a growing understanding of how they all interconnect with one another; how this creates gridlock and inaction, and feeds into a pressure cooker of converging forces.
No wonder we’re witnessing the amount of division and discord and disarray that we’re seeing these days. It’s as if this expansion of our collective consciousness is cracking us wide open, and, through those cracks, all of this muck and gas and bits and pieces are flying through. A crisis of consciousness is occurring as our once (somewhat) viscous social glue is being dried up and splintered by the sheer force of this expansive process.
It’s a lot for us to handle at a personal level. Many of us are opting out. Squeezing our eyes tight, holding our breath, waiting for all of this to be over. The dysfunction and harshness are too much to handle. Others of us can’t look away. It’s like watching a train wreck! We laugh and munch on popcorn in a dissociated state that makes it bearable to engage with. And then there are others of us who are taking it all on and breaking down. Sleepless nights, knots in our stomachs. We must act now! Wheels are spinning but is progress being made?
I believe much of this is tied to this new need we have as a people to digest and discern such large swaths of information about ourselves and the world, and then make personal and political decisions based on it. I think this is why we are seeing things like:
An upsurge in people reporting disillusionment and despair about the world;
Increased polarization due to being plugged into different echo-chambers of information;
The rise in conspiracy-like thinking, and the challenge of figuring out what are conspiracies and what are actual hidden truths being unveiled;
Greater political violence fed by the idea that the world is in peril and the other side or our system is dangerous and to blame;
A breakdown in communities and families due to not being able to have open conversations about ideas or the things we’re moved by;
And so much more.
This list doesn’t even touch on the role of algorithms and bad actors at play that prey on our human instincts and collective tenderness.
This crisis of consciousness many of us are experiencing can make listening for deeper messages of guidance about what to do or how to be of service hard to hear. There’s real emotional and relational pain that has surfaced amongst us that needs tended to. The prevalence of these emotions, regardless of how any one of us responds, points to a shift taking place–in our social order, understanding of the world, shared values. It points to the expansion of our collective consciousness—and the crisis of consciousness it’s kicking up—facilitating something transformational.
In order for this transformation to be realized in a generative way, it requires that we have new skills and support systems that help us revise our mental maps and construct new moral narratives to make sense of it all, both for ourselves as individuals and collaboratively as a society. It is an undertaking that is steeped in practices of complexity: both intellectual complexity that allows us to mentally move about the greater whole and see from multiple vantage points; as well as emotional complexity that gives us the capacity to hold all of the discomfort and pain that arises within this awakening process, and that gives us the gumption we need to shepherd this transition process in a constructive way.
As a lifelong student of global and cultural systems, the collective consciousness has been a curiosity and teacher of mine since the beginning of my journey. A smoldering question that guides me is: how can we shift things at the collective consciousness level? Yes, there’s the obvious, tried response: we change things at the institutional level (cue my professional career!). We enact anti-discrimation policies and recycling programs, for example. We have more women and minorities in public office. We have greater transparency and build trust in our governance structures. Yes. And, what if there’s more?
What if this moment that we’re living in, and the unimaginable growth we’re experiencing in our collective awareness of ourselves as a whole, is a new entry point we can explore this question through? What if the crisis of consciousness that so many of us feel right now, as we take in the reality of the world as if for the first time with new eyes, is not a sign of our inevitable demise, but is instead a potent key that can unlock our next evolutionary milestone? What if the prevalence of so much social discord and emotional energy is our collective consciousness communicating something to us about the way we need to change and adapt? And that by building our capacity for complexity, including the emotional kind, we can be constructive conduits for this change and help heal and facilitate the movement of this energy towards where we need to go next.
All of these questions are why I keep showing up for collective healing. Because she wants to be known as a crucial member of the Mother Earth squad: the crew of tools and concepts that are here to help us do what we’ve gotta do to be of service to these changing times. Collective healing tells us that we can turn that muck into gold. That we have the tools to do so, we just need to get creative in how we use them and provide access to them. And that all of this is not only possible, but that we’re evolutionarily positioned to do so.
Hi, I’m Liz Moyer Benferhat. Writer, facilitator, coach, and development practitioner dedicated to the subtle interplay between how inner transformation feeds the outer transformation that’s needed in the world. Welcome 🌿