Phase Six: Life Surges Upward
Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community is a book by social researcher and political commentator Robert Putnam.
Putnam was Trevor Noah’s guest on his podcast, “What Now?” (January 22, 2025)
“Bowling alone” says so much in two words and Putnam’s decades of research officially confirms what we know we do - or rather, don’t do:
We stopped joining. We don’t bowl in teams anymore. Membership in groups and associations has steadily declined and is still declining.
Robert Putnam’s data associates the decline of clubs, picnics, and local socializing with the decline of trust in our society.
“Join or Die” is a 2023 Netflix documentary about Bob Putnam’s lifelong dedication to reviving the community spirit in America, for America’s sake.
When did we - myself included - start saying “I’m not a joiner”? Putnam showed that, statistically, we have more free time but we spend it on our own - in front of a screen.
Trevor’s free-ranging conversational style in his podcast creates the kind of “bridging” mechanism Bob Putnam advocates. In allowing ideas and opinions to coalesce on their own, the unplanned synergy dissolves barriers of age, gender, race, and even political differences.
The Natural Forces
I study the kind of forces in human society that are unintentional and historically significant. In that perspective, we can see that human development moves upward.
Culture, innovation, the arts - creativity in general - are not orchestrated by a collective intent as much as they rise from the inspiration and drive of individuals.
To that end, there is far too little understanding of your and my natural motivation and direction.
No one teaches a plant to flower or a tree to produce fruit. It is the product of the organism’s DNA that tells it how to develop.
Intuition is a fumble in the dark, not seeing any order but knowing the way, unconsciously.
Intuition comes by way of your nervous system and you feel it. The struggle - even in the pain of growth - produces new strength and permanent personal growth..
We suffered during the pandemic but pushed through - interestingly - in isolation. You worked out your recovery in a unique, personal, and intuitive way. Each individual strength comes together in a stronger society. It is Nature’s way.
In this year 6 of the pandemic years (2020 was the impact, year 1; see previous blog) the unconscious response to the natural assimilation of the covid years, so far, will be to break through to a new level of personal strength through surviving the challenges of 2025.
Your life is sustained in the fact that you survive.
The human organism - yours, mine, and others’ - has individualized, often undiscovered, needs for which Nature provides.
Imagine the unexpected result of billions of individuals bringing their individual value into a collective global breakthrough.
You feel it more than realize it - body, brain, mind, and emotions working together without your intent or control.
Each of us will bring forth something new this year - I believe that, based on the natural phenomenon of human development…
For you, none but your own development will matter. You have an unfailing navigator in the process that sustains your life. Make room in your perspective for what happens without your effort.
Life consists in the convergence of the cycles of time and all human effort. This is a system beyond any one person’s control, of natural forces working in an orderly way beyond the intention of any single or few persons.
The pandemic gave us a rare opportunity to see all of us at the mercy of those forces. AND it gives us an opportunity to recognize how humanity naturally recovers and persists.
It’s a good thing. The 12 Phases™ brings language to this system so that the power of survival is actual “good",’ defined from the human perspective.
It is good to survive and thrive. It is good to have moments of peace in a world where so much is out of our hands as individuals. It is good to recognize your own special way of surviving by your DNA - the .1% difference each of us has.
I make new discoveries all the time as I watch this internal individualized phenomenon work its way to the surface, individually and collectively.
The phases of growth do its work in me - and so it does in our 99.9% common DNA. I recognize the vital energy of constant adaptation in myself and others, especially in lives where I am a participant.
Your circle of influence may intersect with mine; you may be an influencer in my life without knowing it.
Effectiveness is good to the degree that it honors and reflects Nature. As system developer, I know how to copy natural growth processes and customize them for you.
In Phase Six of the 12 Phases™, I leave you with the keywords:
“Strength” is the keyword for the principle operation of the Phase:
It will be an unconscious experience like a “pumping iron” workout that develops strength with each progressive phase.
“Breakthrough” is the keyword for a feeling - the unconscious physiological response as you break through to a new level of personal strength. It is bound to show up in some way, globally.
A word for individual growth that may appear as untamed new growth because it is unconscious and organismic - my word for that root of personal initiative is “autonomous motivation.”
Autonomous motivation is the unconscious mechanism of self-interest that I believe is contained in your DNA, the 0.1% of you that is different from every other human being.
As you establish a base of identity, you join the stream of life with your unique inborn traits. This provides the variety you crave and the meaning of life that you need to survive..
To accept, honor, and learn your unique life assignment will give you great satisfaction.
Can you believe it?
You may have trouble believing that, by December 2025, a new level of personal strength will have been accomplished - not only in each of us, individually, but in the global society.
This is not a prediction!
It is the natural phenomenon of the twelve phases of human development at work. It is everything in you that is not conscious and not intentional, but is the effectiveness of another of Nature’s living systems.
We are in a century where creativity is the demand of the day. Massive historic shifts that the pandemic brought to our hearts, and the way we work will mark the difference of the 21st century, just as the industrial and technological revolutions did in previous centuries..
On a personal note…
It has been a disheartening fact of aging that the particular challenge I face is sensitive eyes that limit computer time.
But in the way I’ve learned to recognize life’s true and good purpose in aging, what felt devastating to me in a real way, also gave me a new imperative:
I must come out of my writing closet and get more face time with people. I have neglected that part of life in my zeal for my life assignment.
So, I will write fewer or shorter blogs and depend on more responses from real people by having real, collaborative conversations.
Regardless of the restrictions on my screen time, I cannot abandon my initial assignment:
From a simple and recognizable point of beginning, I am tasked with word smithing the proofs of the phenomenon I witnessed.
I have given many arguments already, but in pieces. It is necessary to go back to the beginning and show what I know now, having studied, proven, and applied Nature’s process to how to find meaning hidden in the Heart’s Mind™.
It is a living system worthy of a scientist’s scrutiny, and it was given to me, someone who ‘merely’ followed my mind’s eye until the whole thing could be seen.
Stay tuned for more.
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Referenced in this blog:
Trevor Noah’s podcast episode “Join or Die” with Robert Putnam on January 22, 2025. Find on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts.
My go-to reference (sometimes subliminally): Antonio Damasio’s history of work that culminates in a comprehensive description of the integration of body and mind, especially in his book The Strange Order of Things: Life, Feeling, and the Making of Culture available on Amazon.com.
Books by Elizabeth Diane on the Theory of Unconscious Response™ and the twelve phases phenomenon:
The Heart’s Mind: How Unconscious Responses in Life and Work Naturally Improve Our Lives While We Make Other Plans, (2018) available on Amazon.com.
Time & Life Cycles: the spirit’s journey through time (2012 and updated 2019), available on Amazon.com.
“Qualitative Study of the Theory of Unconscious Response™” (2020) free download available on ResearchGate.net.
Note: If you don’t know New York Times bestselling author Sally Hogshead’s work, I can say that it is transformative in the area of natural motivation and personal direction. Based on research about what fascinates us, Sally’s profiling system has made brilliant use of the information. I highly recommend her book, How the World Sees You: Discover Your Highest Value Through the Science of Fascination” available online and at libraries. Just Google her; she’s a well-known speaker and pioneer of human capital in the business world. SallyHogshead.com