A study-guide for the Modern Tribe
The evolution of most natural organisms takes place through entropy as the organism breaks down, diversifies and then integrates and re-organises itself with a higher level of complexity. We can feel our current systems stretching and under pressure, no longer are the functions they provide the most effective for our time. Many human civilizations have collapsed in the past and as Daniel Quinn explores in ‘Beyond Civilization,’ how will we re-organise with a new level of complexity as a collective ‘organism’ to survive this transition?
For some, their train of thought shoots straight to technology and as a human civilization living in a virtual experience where the constraints of a physical world will ‘hopefully’ no longer be such a burden. For others, returning to the land, living off-grid and reconnecting with our primal way of being makes most sense.
“The world must live. We are only one species among billions. The gods don’t love us any more than they love spiders or bears or whales or water lilies.”
― Daniel Quinn
What if it was both? What if we didn’t neglect but rather listen to and embody the wisdom of our ancestors and those who lived with the land, whilst we built for the future in a modern world and modern context?
As I wrap up writing Modern Tribe, to be released in a few months time, I wanted to share some of the material that has influenced my journey through this question. I will update this as I am moved by different sources. Hopefully you can make your way through this material also if you are pulled to truly consider how we can consciously navigate these next few decades as a species.
The Modern Tribe philosophy around this question is underpinned by a few things:
1. Cultural-technologies: how we organise ourselves culturally as a collective. Informed by our ancestors, what has worked in the past and our natural environment.
2. Material-technologies: systems-innovation and the built environment . What physical systems, technologies and built-environments do we need to be considering for this emerging future. Again, informed by our ancestors, what has worked in the past and our natural environment.
3. Personal-technologies: what are the ways in which our personal mental frameworks, beliefs and behaviours have been programmed to maintain our current state? What might a revised inner-world need to look like to bring about a new outer-world?
Books to read:
The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World by Wade Davis
Check it out here.
TRIBE: On Homecoming and Belonging by Sebastian Junger
Check it out here.
Unlearn, Rewild by Likes Olson
Check it out here.
Original Wisdom by Robert Wolff
Check it out here.
Beyond Civilisation by Daniel Quinn
Check it out here.
Sacred Economics by Charles Eisenstein
Check it out here.
New Self, New World by Philip Shepherd
Check it out here.
A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander, Sara Ishikawa and Murray Silverstein
Check it out here.
The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
Check it out here.
Articles:
Like most startups, intentional communities fail — why?https://aeon.co/essays/like-start-ups-most-intentional-communities-fail-why
Videos and material to watch:
The Collaborative Living Experience — Coliving and Collaborative Ownership
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwPm1z_fi0k
Holocracy: A Radical New Approach to Management
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJxfJGo-vkI
The Future of Cities
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOOWk5yCMMs
If you have any recommendations or other resources you have found powerful on this topic, I’d love to hear from you so I can explore them and then put them up here also. Feel free to email me at al@realiseflow.com
Enjoy the study and enjoy the senses!
Al
