Glossary
Here’s a list of phrases you’ll come across regularly in our writings. Links shown here take you to a Substack page for a deeper dive. Bit.ly links in our deep dive pages take you to our research database, hosted on Roam.
We do our best to keep this list updated, but if you find something missing, please comment below.
You can find a list of all posts tagged as Glossary here.
Cocktail of Crises: A phrase that replaces “polycrisis” or “metacrisis.” Just like a cocktail is shaken or stirred by the human hand, this phrase hints at the idea that the multiple crises are a created narrative designed to illicit a particular response.
End of the Familiar: The decade of 2020-30 which commenced with C19 and escalated with the Trump Administration from 2025.
Embodied Evolution: The process by which individuals physically implement and express evolutionary change through their daily practices, relationships, and systems-building activities. Deep dive.
Empire Phases, Cycle of Empire and Cycle of Globalization: The well-established pattern of 7 phases every empire has followed for the past 8,000 years. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/CycleCiv and https://bit.ly/7-Phases-Glo
Evolutionary Agents: An individual or group with the capacity to make goal-directed changes to themselves and their environment in response to shifting circumstances. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/EvAgents
Evolutionary Impulse: The innate drive—an active organizing principle—within all living systems to adapt and evolve into higher expressions of itself. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/Ev-Imp
Interstructure (Class and Values): Builds on the concept of infrastructure that keeps complex societies functioning, and importantly includes their interdependent relationships. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/Int-Struct
Mass Formation: Describes a phenomenon when an entire group, or an entire population, lose their rational faculties, become unable to think for themselves, and begin acting as a herd. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/MadCrowd
Major Evolutionary Transitions: Significant shifts in the way information is stored, transmitted, and processed in biological and social systems, resulting in new levels of complexity and Coordination Fields. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/M-E-T
Mimetic Consciousness: Emerged around 3.5 MYA - The first hominins to be discovered and described from Africa, very basic tool use, used mime to communicate.
Magical Consciousness: Emerged around 1 MYA - Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, and the Neanderthals; advanced tool-making and the use of fire; characterized by animism, emotional engagement, and a magical connection to all living beings.
Mythic Consciousness: Emerged around 60,000 YA - Homo sapiens, a large and complex brain, the capacity for language and the telling of myths to explain and make sense of the human experience.
Material Consciousness: Emerged around 6,000 YA. Characterized by cities with monumental architecture, written language, social hierarchy, poverty and wealth, top-down power structures, organized warfare, empires, Patriarchy, the depletion of Nature leading to Overshoot, objectified reality, scarcity, and separation. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/Mat-Con
Mycelial Consciousness: Started emerging about sixty years ago. Mirrors the sophisticated coordination patterns found in fungal networks. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/MetaCon
Practice: A deliberate, ongoing professional activity built around helping others navigate systemic transitions. Unlike a traditional job (working for someone else) or business (selling products/services), a practice is a structured way of doing work you’re passionate about, with people you love, the way you want, and being paid in a way that creates a healthy value flow from a system that’s ending into a system that’s emerging.