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At critical times in individual lives and for collective mankind there come transcendent transformation eras into a new stage of the Human Psyche System that did not previously exist on Earth.

First, the Transcendence comes to a relatively small number of leading-edge human individuals. Their numbers gradually accelerate until they emerge as the new Genre of world leaders living and working in the newly emerging stage of individual human psyche - A new individual Paradigm. Second, these transcendent individuals catalyze and then develop the newly emerging stage of collective human psyche - A new collective Paradigm.

This two-fold process of Transcendence - Individual and then Collective - is the root cause for each great Transformation Era of human history when the previous dominant stage of human leadership is replaced by the newly emergent stage. The results of this process are the major turning points in human life, organization and affairs on earth.

The first diagram above shows the rise and decline of the various Human Psyche System stages in world leadership and the resulting great collective transformation eras of human history. The earliest transition era - From Stage A to Stage B - took at least 10,000 years. The second transition era - From Stage B to Stage C - took 2,000 to 3,000 years. Since then, the transition eras have been significantly shorter. The shaded areas on the diagram designate the periods when the world was undergoing traumatic upheaval to a whole new concept and practice of human life and affairs.

The peak of the curve for each stage represents the period of history when the world leadership Paradigm of that stage was dominant in human affairs. A complete curve for Stage A is not shown because it would require the diagram's time scale to extend backward several hundreds of thousand to maybe a million years. There is little historical knowledge about Stage A.

The second diagram below uses an expanded time scale to better show the more recent transformation eras. The Stage D Era in the West is best known as the Middle Ages. Its peak of power came about 1000 A.D. when the Stage E began its transcendence into world leadership. The Stage D to Stage E transformation era is best known in the West as The Renaissance - that I prefer to name the 1st Renaissance. Near 1800 A.D., Stage F began its transcendence into world leadership. Western events directly related to the emergence of Stage F are the French Revolution and the rapid growth of socialism throughout Europe in the early 1800's. The rapid rise of Stage F marked the peaking of Stage E power. Since then, up until today, Stage E and Stage F have been in a shared, but combative, dominant power relationship in human affairs.

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Then, about 1900 A.D. the Stage A' - Living System humans began their transcendent appearance in human affairs. I name the period since the early 1900's as the coming of the 2nd Renaissance. It promises to be the most tumultuous and beneficial transformation era in history since humans first emerged out of the pre-human animals more than a million years ago. This time leading edge humans are emerging into Living System Life and Work. Their leadership influence is already far greater than their still relatively small numbers. Like all previous stages I believe Stage A' will grow to dominant influence in human affairs and faster than any previous stage.

Since the early 1800's, the world has been in continuous transformation upheaval. Since the early 1900's there is a unique situation in human history. Previously, transformation eras involved one rising and one declining stage. Now there are two declining stages - Stage E and Stage F - and one rising stage - Stage A' -that is much more than just a new stage because it also brings a whole new phase of human life not known to any of the earlier six stages of mankind.

As you learn more about Living System Psychology and the Human Psyche System you will become more profoundly impressed that the period ahead of us is truly a 2nd Renaissance, even though the challenges to move beyond today's transition trauma will be substantial.

John Clayton Caris

Links to previous Posts in this series:
Human Psyche System Definitions - Part 1 - Terminology
Human Psyche System Definitions - Part 2 - Individual Psyche Structure
Human Psyche System Definitions - Part 3 - Psyche System Stages Diagram
Human Psyche System Definitions - Part 4 - Terminology Table