This is what I have been trying to explain to a friend for quite some time.
Ironically, he is the one who sent me this article.
What resonated is not the idea of collapse or drama, but the framing of this moment as an evolutionary transition rather than random chaos. That is exactly where my thinking has been landing over the past year, largely triggered by the cognitive dissonance of watching political, cultural, and psychological systems behave in ways that no longer make sense using old assumptions.
In conversations, I kept coming back to the same point. Complex systems break down before they reorganize. Fear rises because fear is fast and efficient. People narrow their thinking not because they are stupid, but because the environment is pushing them into older, more energy efficient cognitive modes. That looks like polarization, spectacle, and regression on the surface, but underneath it is a system under strain trying to find a new equilibrium.
What has been especially striking to me is how this lens suddenly makes ancient wisdom feel less mystical and more practical. The teachings of early seers, religious traditions, Stoicism, and contemplative practices were not just moral guidance. They were early maps of the human nervous system. Now neuroscience and psychology are independently confirming the benefits of meditation, reflection, emotional regulation, and restraint in exactly the kinds of high stress, high complexity environments we are entering.
That convergence is what convinced me I was not just overthinking things. When ancient practices and modern brain science start pointing in the same direction, it suggests we are rediscovering tools that help humans adapt during periods of instability, not escape from them.
This article put language to something I have been circling intuitively. Not apocalypse. Not business as usual. A transition phase where old operating systems no longer scale, and the real work is learning how to think, regulate, and relate differently before something more coherent can emerge.
Yip, through a wide enough lens and with sufficient distance from each random event, the chaos we see reported on mainstream and alternative sources is actually beautifully elegant.
I remain stunned by the sheer majesty and artistry of the progression from single-celled creatures to the complex life forms we have today. 😲
Mmm I honestly loved reading all of this, it's beautiful to come across another threshold guide/walker and see so much of your own thoughts in someone else's words.
I have some space over the next few days to sit with these very powerful and important questions.
So glad it resonated, Florence. As I'm sure you know, it can be challenging putting thoughts like this out there, because one never knows how they will land. Your comment means the world. 🙏🙇♂️
I was a typical prepped a few years ago, but it felt more like hoarding. Then I watched Alone and Ray Mears wild food and realised you need knowledge and other people more than you need stuff. The saddest part is Ray talked about traditional foods like shellfish and how those habitats are now destroyed. There's no going back.
I’m in awe. Your article feels like pure synchronicity, arriving at the exact moment I’m moving through something similar. I can’t fully believe it and I completely believe it at the same time. This paradox is where I’m living right now. What you describe resonates so strongly with the shift I’m in the movement away from the old, survival-based structures and into something more mycelial, more interconnected, more intelligent in the unseen layers.
This disruption doesn’t feel like destruction to me, it feels like consciousness unraveling just enough so that what wants to emerge can reorganize beyond the old frame. That’s exactly how my cocooning feels as an internal dissolution shaping new form.
Real preparation, for me, is attuning. Learning to move inside the web of unseen support. Treating uncertainty as invitation. Aligning with the decade that is coming.
I feel grateful for your words. They mirror something I’m already sensing and encourage me to continue this unfolding—cocooning, rooting, aligning, listening and it’s not personal event, but as participation in a collective one.
A great delve into the dark impregnable recesses of mind. What you pay attention to, becomes reality. A needed shift from the usual expectations to a higher and wider view. Seeing the whole forest instead of just an individual plot. An intertwining of roots and sustenence of the whole organism, not just a limited view. Thank you for these insights.
All this is absolutely what I believe to be happening, but I feel so intimidated by all of you. I used to know a lot more than I know now, I had a significant life experience from 2004 to 2013 and I seemingly lost a lot of knowledge. Now I’m trying to catch up. Plus, I’ve always been so focused on taking care of my family that I’ve never done that deep study into astrology and tarot that I wanted to do. The other thing is that I am almost completely dissociated from my body. Part of that is due to sexual abuse issues for years, but most of that is due to the level of chronic pain that I live with every day, so I’ve pretty much destroyed the connection between mind and body in my mind. And I don’t know how to get it back, and so much of what I need for what is coming, requires that connection between your mind and your body, that ability to feel things in your body. And I would really love any suggestions anyone has as to how to fix that without making my pain more of a problem than it already is. You guys are all amazing and I hope that someday I can be as erudite and educated as you all seem to be
The wayfinders this world needs aren't those who have read all the books and can recite them in detail.
They're the ones who've walked through fire and came out still willing to love.
You've been caring for your family through chronic pain and trauma recovery. Do you know how much adaptive capacity that requires? Do you understand what a teacher of resilience you already are?
I hope the questions in this protocol didn't make you feel inadequate. They're meant to help you see what's already true beneath the conditioning.
If they feel too insensitive, try these instead:
- What small thing brings you relief? (Not healing, just relief—even for a moment)
- Who in your life needs you exactly as you are right now? (Not who you should become—who needs THIS you)
- What would you tell someone you love who felt as intimidated as you do? (Then say it to yourself)
- What's one thing you know from lived experience that no book could ever teach?
- If your body could speak without judgment, what would it say it needs? (Not "to be fixed"—just... needs)
Thank you for this. I moved through the process, but left the evening prompts for the next morning so that I could integrate while I slept. This worked well for me.
Michael, I am hoping you can clarify what a mycelial integration practice might look like.
Prior to encountering your post, I had begun to reach out to people for conversations simply for connection. This is not something that I would have done in the past. I have been shocked at how open and willing people are to engage with a stranger about their lived experience, and how “fed” the conversations make me feel. Would we call this mycelial integration? Perhaps you can help me expand on it.
What a delightful question: "What might a mycelial integration practice look like?"
I can feel the stirrings of a full-length essay to unpack this further, but for now a few quick thoughts:
By reaching out the way you describe, you're weaving a living network.
As I'm sure you know, mycelium doesn't plan its connections. It extends tendrils toward nourishment and discovers what's there. You've begun doing exactly this: reaching out without any agenda but with a genuine openness to connection. The "shock" you describe at people's willingness to engage is the discovery that the network was always there, waiting — we simply forget to extend ourselves into it.
Some of your engagements won't be as rich as others, but what you're doing is building 'an external memory' (refer to the video at about 0:45), which reminds you that certain corridors are dead ends, so that you can grow along the shortest path towards mycelial wisdom.
My response has been a little metaphysical, but if you watch the 2min video and apply it to what you're doing, I think you'll get it immediately. 💚
Imagine my surprise and delight when I opened the video to discover I was about to learn about slime molds! Thank you for this thoughtful response and for brightening my day with some (very applicable) mycelial trivia :)
I'm just going to plant a few more 'spores' - there's a whole field unfolding which I'm going to call Mycelial Science. This is a body of work that directly challenges Conventional Science. It's a predictable outcome when the existing paradigm fails to adequately address anomalies or challenges that arise during the practice of Conventional Science (Thomas Kuhn in 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.')
It includes topics like:
- Expanded Consciousness (Out of Body) Experiences
- Near Death Experiences
- Reincarnation (especially with kids under the age of 7)
- Terminal Lucidity (surprising clarity about a day before a person passes)
What this science is pointing towards is a whole field of consciousness that can be accessed as part of a mycelial practice (your original question). This is what I'll be unpacking in an upcoming essay.
Added Kuhn to my reading list. I am here for this and will be following your posts. This work is timely as the conversation is becoming more mainstream and, while I enjoyed the telepathy tapes as much as the next podcast listener, I'm ready to go deeper. My sense is much of the work of Mycelial Science, as you call it, is more internal, intuitive, and spiritual than Conventional Science would ever allow.
To save you the time of reading Kuhn's book, 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions' (although I recommend it if you can), here's a quick summary. Bear in mind that it was written in 1962, sixty years ago! Essentially, Conventional Science doesn't (yet) embrace emergent ideas, but the field is growing rapidly...
Kuhn made a distinction between Normal Science and Revolutionary Science (which I'm now calling Mycelial Science just to follow the alliteration of Mimetic, Magical, Mythical, Material). By his definition, Revolutionary Science refers to the phase of scientific development that occurs when the existing paradigm fails to adequately address anomalies or problems that arise during the practice of Normal Science. This phase is characterized by several key features:
- Crisis and Anomalies: Revolutionary science begins when persistent anomalies accumulate, leading to a crisis in the existing paradigm. These anomalies are observations or experimental results that cannot be explained or addressed by the current scientific framework. (This is one of the reasons for the Metacrisis - we are reaching the limits of Material Science)
- Paradigm Shift: In response to the crisis, a new paradigm emerges that offers a different perspective, fundamentally altering the scientific community's approach to understanding and investigating phenomena. This shift is often marked by a reorganization of concepts and methods. The current equivalent is the Regenerate Life Paradigm, which I'm tracking in my research database here: https://bit.ly/RegenLife
- Radical Change: Unlike Normal Science, which focuses on puzzle-solving within the accepted framework, Revolutionary Science involves a radical rethinking of theories and assumptions. This can lead to the rejection of old theories and the adoption of new ones that better account for the observed anomalies.
- Social Dynamics: Revolutionary science is not just a cognitive process but also involves social dynamics within the scientific community. The acceptance of a new paradigm often requires a shift in the consensus among scientists, which can be contentious and involve significant debate. Expect to see suppression and censorship of new ideas by those invested in the status quo.
- Incommensurability: Kuhn posited that competing paradigms are often incommensurable, meaning they cannot be directly compared or evaluated using the same criteria. This reflects the profound changes in perspective that accompany a scientific revolution.
Thank you Michael for this pretty complete and concisely written analysis and way forward. As Austin mentioned already, now I am finally able to explain my guesswork! 🙏🏼
So pleased to hear it was helpful, Martin, AND I can't tell you how gratifying it is to know there are others feeling the same way about this stuff. 🙇♂️
There are others too. About a month ago Richard Rudd was interviewed by Amrit Sandhu on YouTube and described why 2026–2027 marks the end of an era for humanity (Rare prophecy happening now).
While I'm a big fan of The Gene Keys, I really don't enjoy woo-woo discussions like this one. It's just a personal preference, and I know that many place their trust in astrology and astronomy. I just seldom see sufficient science to back up the claims made.
That said, I found the mentions of 2026/7 interesting. 🙏
I resonate very much with this… it’s helped me to feel less like an outsider as I believe we have the world we have the consciousness for, and a new one is indeed being born.
AND... there's no guarantee that the birth will be painless, or even that it will happen. But my spidey-sense tells me that there are enough who are ready for the transformation. 🐛⇢🦋
This essay resonates strongly with the trajectory of my own research and creative practice. Your framing of threshold guides aligns with my work in phenomenology and imagination as modes of lived and practiced inquiry rather than abstract theory.
I’m particularly interested in how - as you describe - mimetic, magical, mythic, material, and emerging mycelial forms of collective consciousness coexist and are mobilised contextually. Much of my work sits at these thresholds, translating between systems and stories, building and being, without collapsing them into a single explanatory register.
The reframing of disruption as an evolutionary crossing, rather than collapse, offers a grounded and necessary sense of hope, one that preserves attention, relationality, and presence as meaningful forms of agency.
Great to meet you, Malcolm, and thanks for your email which gives further context to your wonderfully rich question.
Briefly, and I'll unpack this further in an upcoming essay, each of the forms of consciousness transcend and include the former. For example,
1. Mimetic consciousness is still very much alive in the form of mime artists;
2. Magical includes superstitions - lucky charms, not stepping on cracks, athletes' pre-game rituals;
3. Mythic includes national origin stories like the American Dream, Australian "mateship," founding myths;
4. Material is pretty much everything we see around us, starting with the idea of property ownership - land commodification, housing as investment rather than shelter, etc.
5. Mycelial includes things like biomimicry in design - learning from fungal networks, regenerative agriculture.
I could unpack 100 more examples for each, but the point is that none are right or wrong - they all exist simultaneously. Mycelial is the one we are still learning to work with. The skill is being able to identify which form exists at each activity and being able to question what consciousness is best suited to a particular desired outcome.
I hope I understood your question correctly and that this gives enough of a taste to explore further.
That’s a very helpful clarification, especially the idea of transcend and include, rather than replace.
Where my own work tends to sit is more in the doing: trying to facilitate ways of living and dwelling that allow different modes of consciousness to coexist, without one dominating the others.
pavilionHOUSE, for example, is my attempt to manifest a degree of worldview coherence physically and intersubjectively, housing conceived less as commodity and more as shared shelter and regenerative relationships between people and place. This ethos, for me, naturally embraces mime, magic, myth, (definitely the) material, and the mycelial; I’ve just never had these words to articulate that evolution so clearly.
I’ve been writing about this on Substack alongside broader reflections on imagination, presence, and dwelling. Your framing helps articulate the larger field within which that work sits. Much appreciated.
Glad you've found it useful, Malcolm, and I look forward to exploring pavilionHOUSE.
A book that greatly influenced my thinking (after reading hundreds of books on consciousness) was 'Emerging World: The Evolution of Consciousness and the Future of Humanity' by Roger Briggs (2021). You can find a PDF version (with the author's permission) in my research portal: https://bit.ly/Em-World.
It was this book that helped me get to the Mime, Magic, Myth, Material, Mycelial alliteration. (Roger uses the word 'Planetary' instead of 'Mycelial' which felt like a missed opportunity, so I jumped on it 😁. He and I have since become good friends and sparring partners.)
(Just be patient with the link - can take up to 20 seconds to load).
I have to say...as someone who fully defends organized religion...I was taught nothing less than what you said by any Saint, Church father, or writer. Thanks for coming home...
Oooh, as someone who walked away from organized religion in my early twenties, I can point to *many* teachings and writings that entirely undermine the Evolutionary Impulse, which I describe as the innate drive or active organizing principle within all living systems to adapt and evolve into higher expressions of itself.
Just one example is The Doctrine of Discovery invoked by Pope Alexander VI in 1452 & 1493, which established a spiritual, political, and legal justification for colonization and seizure of land not inhabited by Christians: https://bit.ly/DocDisc
That said, I do believe there are eternal truths recorded in religious texts like the Bible. They just need to be read outside of the perversions of state-sanctioned religion.
Those aren't "teachings" though. Those are largely administrative rules in a time when the Church was the only organization left standing.
My kids follow hundreds of rules. Bush your teeth. No jumping on beds. Turn off lights. It would seem silly if, after having written all these, someone was against "organized families" or said that my family had no love or dynamic spirit because "look at all the rules." Participation theology, theois, earth as the first communion, sacramental world view, mysticism, that's what my "organized religion" has brought me. I am a priestly Adam, who's forgotten his home, slowly remembering. A human organization that has a list to "take my shoes off" is just governance.
In that case, I made a dangerous (and erroneous) assumption when you used the words 'defends organized religion.'
My understanding (and experience) of 'organized religion' does not include 'Participation theology, theois, earth as the first communion, sacramental world view, mysticism...'
Great essay that gives language to the unknown as we know it. Thank you for summarising such a complex topic and even proposing next steps.
My partner sent your article to me and has been dazed by it, still trying to figure out what kind of role to play next in this context.
My thoughts or questions are…. How quantum physics, epigenetic and neuroplasticity are part of this next phase that is unfolding?
What do we need as a society (human beings as a whole) , to evolve together to the next phase?
How can we brake the barriers of society dictated by lines on a map and become one with the same goal no matter where we live or the colour of our skin?
Do you believe we can evolve beyond the constructed (mind) walls together? I actually do believe so!
Not sure what action to take on next but thank you for inspiring me to keep on going…. 😊
Watch out for upcoming essays that will unpack these topics in more detail.
For now (and too brief to do the depth of your questions justice), my belief is that Material Consciousness has kept us blinded to what is already unfolding. (We also *had* to go through Material to get to Mycelial Consciousness - there is no bypassing.)
In other words, it's less about "What can we do to speed this process along?" and more about "How do I train myself to see the weak signals emerging all around me?" Once you know how to spot the weak signals emerging everywhere, life becomes a lot richer and more fulfilling.
I'll be writing more about this soon, thanks to your questions! 💚
Sounds like you’re suggesting people prepare for communism. Who will be at the top of the inevitable hierarchy determining conditions for this utopian society? The same people.
Oh wow, so nice to hear that my humble ramblings make a difference somewhere. We can’t change the atrocities we see, but we can change how we think about them. 💚
This is what I have been trying to explain to a friend for quite some time.
Ironically, he is the one who sent me this article.
What resonated is not the idea of collapse or drama, but the framing of this moment as an evolutionary transition rather than random chaos. That is exactly where my thinking has been landing over the past year, largely triggered by the cognitive dissonance of watching political, cultural, and psychological systems behave in ways that no longer make sense using old assumptions.
In conversations, I kept coming back to the same point. Complex systems break down before they reorganize. Fear rises because fear is fast and efficient. People narrow their thinking not because they are stupid, but because the environment is pushing them into older, more energy efficient cognitive modes. That looks like polarization, spectacle, and regression on the surface, but underneath it is a system under strain trying to find a new equilibrium.
What has been especially striking to me is how this lens suddenly makes ancient wisdom feel less mystical and more practical. The teachings of early seers, religious traditions, Stoicism, and contemplative practices were not just moral guidance. They were early maps of the human nervous system. Now neuroscience and psychology are independently confirming the benefits of meditation, reflection, emotional regulation, and restraint in exactly the kinds of high stress, high complexity environments we are entering.
That convergence is what convinced me I was not just overthinking things. When ancient practices and modern brain science start pointing in the same direction, it suggests we are rediscovering tools that help humans adapt during periods of instability, not escape from them.
This article put language to something I have been circling intuitively. Not apocalypse. Not business as usual. A transition phase where old operating systems no longer scale, and the real work is learning how to think, regulate, and relate differently before something more coherent can emerge.
Yip, through a wide enough lens and with sufficient distance from each random event, the chaos we see reported on mainstream and alternative sources is actually beautifully elegant.
I remain stunned by the sheer majesty and artistry of the progression from single-celled creatures to the complex life forms we have today. 😲
Glad it resonated, Austin. 🙏
Mmm I honestly loved reading all of this, it's beautiful to come across another threshold guide/walker and see so much of your own thoughts in someone else's words.
I have some space over the next few days to sit with these very powerful and important questions.
Thank you.
So glad it resonated, Florence. As I'm sure you know, it can be challenging putting thoughts like this out there, because one never knows how they will land. Your comment means the world. 🙏🙇♂️
I was a typical prepped a few years ago, but it felt more like hoarding. Then I watched Alone and Ray Mears wild food and realised you need knowledge and other people more than you need stuff. The saddest part is Ray talked about traditional foods like shellfish and how those habitats are now destroyed. There's no going back.
There's no going back, but there are evolutionarily coherent pathways forward, Emma.
I’m in awe. Your article feels like pure synchronicity, arriving at the exact moment I’m moving through something similar. I can’t fully believe it and I completely believe it at the same time. This paradox is where I’m living right now. What you describe resonates so strongly with the shift I’m in the movement away from the old, survival-based structures and into something more mycelial, more interconnected, more intelligent in the unseen layers.
This disruption doesn’t feel like destruction to me, it feels like consciousness unraveling just enough so that what wants to emerge can reorganize beyond the old frame. That’s exactly how my cocooning feels as an internal dissolution shaping new form.
Real preparation, for me, is attuning. Learning to move inside the web of unseen support. Treating uncertainty as invitation. Aligning with the decade that is coming.
I feel grateful for your words. They mirror something I’m already sensing and encourage me to continue this unfolding—cocooning, rooting, aligning, listening and it’s not personal event, but as participation in a collective one.
I wanted to attach my latest painting here.
It's amazing how the Evolutionary Impulse causes us to stumble over things at just the right time... when we need them the most.
Glad it was useful, Inga. Please know that it's immensely encouraging to me when I hear others are thinking along these lines too. 🙏🙇♂️
A great delve into the dark impregnable recesses of mind. What you pay attention to, becomes reality. A needed shift from the usual expectations to a higher and wider view. Seeing the whole forest instead of just an individual plot. An intertwining of roots and sustenence of the whole organism, not just a limited view. Thank you for these insights.
So grateful for your seeing beyond my fears, foibles, and failures in my faltering attempt at getting to "a higher and wider view." 🙏🙇♂️
Why are you using AI images? Why!!!!!!!!
It's an attempt to avoid being a Luddite. 💚
Thanks for taking the time to comment.
Question: Have you ever used direct dialing to call a friend rather than going through an operator?
The invention of the automatic telephone exchange obliterated an entire category of workers. The same has been repeated for numerous technologies.
Why will AI be any different?
What a great post! I love how succinct you were in covering the nature of our challenge and how to orient our attention towards a productive response.
I so appreciate your feedback, Dana, thank you! This is what feels alive to me right now - so glad it resonates. 💚
All this is absolutely what I believe to be happening, but I feel so intimidated by all of you. I used to know a lot more than I know now, I had a significant life experience from 2004 to 2013 and I seemingly lost a lot of knowledge. Now I’m trying to catch up. Plus, I’ve always been so focused on taking care of my family that I’ve never done that deep study into astrology and tarot that I wanted to do. The other thing is that I am almost completely dissociated from my body. Part of that is due to sexual abuse issues for years, but most of that is due to the level of chronic pain that I live with every day, so I’ve pretty much destroyed the connection between mind and body in my mind. And I don’t know how to get it back, and so much of what I need for what is coming, requires that connection between your mind and your body, that ability to feel things in your body. And I would really love any suggestions anyone has as to how to fix that without making my pain more of a problem than it already is. You guys are all amazing and I hope that someday I can be as erudite and educated as you all seem to be
Dear, dear Laurie,
I feel your pain, I really do. 😢🤗
The wayfinders this world needs aren't those who have read all the books and can recite them in detail.
They're the ones who've walked through fire and came out still willing to love.
You've been caring for your family through chronic pain and trauma recovery. Do you know how much adaptive capacity that requires? Do you understand what a teacher of resilience you already are?
I hope the questions in this protocol didn't make you feel inadequate. They're meant to help you see what's already true beneath the conditioning.
If they feel too insensitive, try these instead:
- What small thing brings you relief? (Not healing, just relief—even for a moment)
- Who in your life needs you exactly as you are right now? (Not who you should become—who needs THIS you)
- What would you tell someone you love who felt as intimidated as you do? (Then say it to yourself)
- What's one thing you know from lived experience that no book could ever teach?
- If your body could speak without judgment, what would it say it needs? (Not "to be fixed"—just... needs)
Bless you.
Thank you 🙏❤️
Thank you for this. I moved through the process, but left the evening prompts for the next morning so that I could integrate while I slept. This worked well for me.
Michael, I am hoping you can clarify what a mycelial integration practice might look like.
Prior to encountering your post, I had begun to reach out to people for conversations simply for connection. This is not something that I would have done in the past. I have been shocked at how open and willing people are to engage with a stranger about their lived experience, and how “fed” the conversations make me feel. Would we call this mycelial integration? Perhaps you can help me expand on it.
What a delightful question: "What might a mycelial integration practice look like?"
I can feel the stirrings of a full-length essay to unpack this further, but for now a few quick thoughts:
By reaching out the way you describe, you're weaving a living network.
As I'm sure you know, mycelium doesn't plan its connections. It extends tendrils toward nourishment and discovers what's there. You've begun doing exactly this: reaching out without any agenda but with a genuine openness to connection. The "shock" you describe at people's willingness to engage is the discovery that the network was always there, waiting — we simply forget to extend ourselves into it.
A short video that captures this process well is here: https://youtu.be/lls27hu03yw
Some of your engagements won't be as rich as others, but what you're doing is building 'an external memory' (refer to the video at about 0:45), which reminds you that certain corridors are dead ends, so that you can grow along the shortest path towards mycelial wisdom.
My response has been a little metaphysical, but if you watch the 2min video and apply it to what you're doing, I think you'll get it immediately. 💚
Imagine my surprise and delight when I opened the video to discover I was about to learn about slime molds! Thank you for this thoughtful response and for brightening my day with some (very applicable) mycelial trivia :)
🍄🟫 so glad the video resonates!
I'm just going to plant a few more 'spores' - there's a whole field unfolding which I'm going to call Mycelial Science. This is a body of work that directly challenges Conventional Science. It's a predictable outcome when the existing paradigm fails to adequately address anomalies or challenges that arise during the practice of Conventional Science (Thomas Kuhn in 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.')
It includes topics like:
- Expanded Consciousness (Out of Body) Experiences
- Near Death Experiences
- Reincarnation (especially with kids under the age of 7)
- Terminal Lucidity (surprising clarity about a day before a person passes)
What this science is pointing towards is a whole field of consciousness that can be accessed as part of a mycelial practice (your original question). This is what I'll be unpacking in an upcoming essay.
Added Kuhn to my reading list. I am here for this and will be following your posts. This work is timely as the conversation is becoming more mainstream and, while I enjoyed the telepathy tapes as much as the next podcast listener, I'm ready to go deeper. My sense is much of the work of Mycelial Science, as you call it, is more internal, intuitive, and spiritual than Conventional Science would ever allow.
To save you the time of reading Kuhn's book, 'The Structure of Scientific Revolutions' (although I recommend it if you can), here's a quick summary. Bear in mind that it was written in 1962, sixty years ago! Essentially, Conventional Science doesn't (yet) embrace emergent ideas, but the field is growing rapidly...
Kuhn made a distinction between Normal Science and Revolutionary Science (which I'm now calling Mycelial Science just to follow the alliteration of Mimetic, Magical, Mythical, Material). By his definition, Revolutionary Science refers to the phase of scientific development that occurs when the existing paradigm fails to adequately address anomalies or problems that arise during the practice of Normal Science. This phase is characterized by several key features:
- Crisis and Anomalies: Revolutionary science begins when persistent anomalies accumulate, leading to a crisis in the existing paradigm. These anomalies are observations or experimental results that cannot be explained or addressed by the current scientific framework. (This is one of the reasons for the Metacrisis - we are reaching the limits of Material Science)
- Paradigm Shift: In response to the crisis, a new paradigm emerges that offers a different perspective, fundamentally altering the scientific community's approach to understanding and investigating phenomena. This shift is often marked by a reorganization of concepts and methods. The current equivalent is the Regenerate Life Paradigm, which I'm tracking in my research database here: https://bit.ly/RegenLife
- Radical Change: Unlike Normal Science, which focuses on puzzle-solving within the accepted framework, Revolutionary Science involves a radical rethinking of theories and assumptions. This can lead to the rejection of old theories and the adoption of new ones that better account for the observed anomalies.
- Social Dynamics: Revolutionary science is not just a cognitive process but also involves social dynamics within the scientific community. The acceptance of a new paradigm often requires a shift in the consensus among scientists, which can be contentious and involve significant debate. Expect to see suppression and censorship of new ideas by those invested in the status quo.
- Incommensurability: Kuhn posited that competing paradigms are often incommensurable, meaning they cannot be directly compared or evaluated using the same criteria. This reflects the profound changes in perspective that accompany a scientific revolution.
I’m busy reading Big Mind by Larry Dossey at the moment. 😊
Do you mean One Mind? Highly recommended! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EA8UEWC
He's an example of a medical doctor who has pretty much been shunned by the scientific community.
Thank you Michael for this pretty complete and concisely written analysis and way forward. As Austin mentioned already, now I am finally able to explain my guesswork! 🙏🏼
So pleased to hear it was helpful, Martin, AND I can't tell you how gratifying it is to know there are others feeling the same way about this stuff. 🙇♂️
There are others too. About a month ago Richard Rudd was interviewed by Amrit Sandhu on YouTube and described why 2026–2027 marks the end of an era for humanity (Rare prophecy happening now).
I believe this is the interview you're referring to: https://youtu.be/BSlhHsCA2Tk
While I'm a big fan of The Gene Keys, I really don't enjoy woo-woo discussions like this one. It's just a personal preference, and I know that many place their trust in astrology and astronomy. I just seldom see sufficient science to back up the claims made.
That said, I found the mentions of 2026/7 interesting. 🙏
Yes that‘s the interview. I am totally with you concerning the “woo woo”, it was more concerning Richard Rudd’s take on 2026/27.
Ah, gotcha, agreed 💯
I resonate very much with this… it’s helped me to feel less like an outsider as I believe we have the world we have the consciousness for, and a new one is indeed being born.
AND... there's no guarantee that the birth will be painless, or even that it will happen. But my spidey-sense tells me that there are enough who are ready for the transformation. 🐛⇢🦋
This essay resonates strongly with the trajectory of my own research and creative practice. Your framing of threshold guides aligns with my work in phenomenology and imagination as modes of lived and practiced inquiry rather than abstract theory.
I’m particularly interested in how - as you describe - mimetic, magical, mythic, material, and emerging mycelial forms of collective consciousness coexist and are mobilised contextually. Much of my work sits at these thresholds, translating between systems and stories, building and being, without collapsing them into a single explanatory register.
The reframing of disruption as an evolutionary crossing, rather than collapse, offers a grounded and necessary sense of hope, one that preserves attention, relationality, and presence as meaningful forms of agency.
Thank you.
Great to meet you, Malcolm, and thanks for your email which gives further context to your wonderfully rich question.
Briefly, and I'll unpack this further in an upcoming essay, each of the forms of consciousness transcend and include the former. For example,
1. Mimetic consciousness is still very much alive in the form of mime artists;
2. Magical includes superstitions - lucky charms, not stepping on cracks, athletes' pre-game rituals;
3. Mythic includes national origin stories like the American Dream, Australian "mateship," founding myths;
4. Material is pretty much everything we see around us, starting with the idea of property ownership - land commodification, housing as investment rather than shelter, etc.
5. Mycelial includes things like biomimicry in design - learning from fungal networks, regenerative agriculture.
I could unpack 100 more examples for each, but the point is that none are right or wrong - they all exist simultaneously. Mycelial is the one we are still learning to work with. The skill is being able to identify which form exists at each activity and being able to question what consciousness is best suited to a particular desired outcome.
I hope I understood your question correctly and that this gives enough of a taste to explore further.
Thanks Michael,
That’s a very helpful clarification, especially the idea of transcend and include, rather than replace.
Where my own work tends to sit is more in the doing: trying to facilitate ways of living and dwelling that allow different modes of consciousness to coexist, without one dominating the others.
pavilionHOUSE, for example, is my attempt to manifest a degree of worldview coherence physically and intersubjectively, housing conceived less as commodity and more as shared shelter and regenerative relationships between people and place. This ethos, for me, naturally embraces mime, magic, myth, (definitely the) material, and the mycelial; I’ve just never had these words to articulate that evolution so clearly.
I’ve been writing about this on Substack alongside broader reflections on imagination, presence, and dwelling. Your framing helps articulate the larger field within which that work sits. Much appreciated.
Glad you've found it useful, Malcolm, and I look forward to exploring pavilionHOUSE.
A book that greatly influenced my thinking (after reading hundreds of books on consciousness) was 'Emerging World: The Evolution of Consciousness and the Future of Humanity' by Roger Briggs (2021). You can find a PDF version (with the author's permission) in my research portal: https://bit.ly/Em-World.
It was this book that helped me get to the Mime, Magic, Myth, Material, Mycelial alliteration. (Roger uses the word 'Planetary' instead of 'Mycelial' which felt like a missed opportunity, so I jumped on it 😁. He and I have since become good friends and sparring partners.)
(Just be patient with the link - can take up to 20 seconds to load).
I have to say...as someone who fully defends organized religion...I was taught nothing less than what you said by any Saint, Church father, or writer. Thanks for coming home...
Oooh, as someone who walked away from organized religion in my early twenties, I can point to *many* teachings and writings that entirely undermine the Evolutionary Impulse, which I describe as the innate drive or active organizing principle within all living systems to adapt and evolve into higher expressions of itself.
Just one example is The Doctrine of Discovery invoked by Pope Alexander VI in 1452 & 1493, which established a spiritual, political, and legal justification for colonization and seizure of land not inhabited by Christians: https://bit.ly/DocDisc
Another is the Code of Canon Law, the Vatican's view of the world (that most Catholics are completely unaware of) that makes my blood boil every time I read it: https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/cic_index_en.html
That said, I do believe there are eternal truths recorded in religious texts like the Bible. They just need to be read outside of the perversions of state-sanctioned religion.
Those aren't "teachings" though. Those are largely administrative rules in a time when the Church was the only organization left standing.
My kids follow hundreds of rules. Bush your teeth. No jumping on beds. Turn off lights. It would seem silly if, after having written all these, someone was against "organized families" or said that my family had no love or dynamic spirit because "look at all the rules." Participation theology, theois, earth as the first communion, sacramental world view, mysticism, that's what my "organized religion" has brought me. I am a priestly Adam, who's forgotten his home, slowly remembering. A human organization that has a list to "take my shoes off" is just governance.
In that case, I made a dangerous (and erroneous) assumption when you used the words 'defends organized religion.'
My understanding (and experience) of 'organized religion' does not include 'Participation theology, theois, earth as the first communion, sacramental world view, mysticism...'
I think we're on the same page. 👍
Great essay that gives language to the unknown as we know it. Thank you for summarising such a complex topic and even proposing next steps.
My partner sent your article to me and has been dazed by it, still trying to figure out what kind of role to play next in this context.
My thoughts or questions are…. How quantum physics, epigenetic and neuroplasticity are part of this next phase that is unfolding?
What do we need as a society (human beings as a whole) , to evolve together to the next phase?
How can we brake the barriers of society dictated by lines on a map and become one with the same goal no matter where we live or the colour of our skin?
Do you believe we can evolve beyond the constructed (mind) walls together? I actually do believe so!
Not sure what action to take on next but thank you for inspiring me to keep on going…. 😊
Such rich questions, thank you Cyn!
Watch out for upcoming essays that will unpack these topics in more detail.
For now (and too brief to do the depth of your questions justice), my belief is that Material Consciousness has kept us blinded to what is already unfolding. (We also *had* to go through Material to get to Mycelial Consciousness - there is no bypassing.)
In other words, it's less about "What can we do to speed this process along?" and more about "How do I train myself to see the weak signals emerging all around me?" Once you know how to spot the weak signals emerging everywhere, life becomes a lot richer and more fulfilling.
I'll be writing more about this soon, thanks to your questions! 💚
Thank you for your thoughtful reply 😊 Looking forward to your next essay 🤗
Sounds like you’re suggesting people prepare for communism. Who will be at the top of the inevitable hierarchy determining conditions for this utopian society? The same people.
There is a massive difference between communism and communalism. Please inform yourself. https://hcommons.org/app/uploads/sites/1002325/2023/07/Amargi-communalism-pamphlet.pdf
I went to bed last night in despair after learning of the young woman’s murder by ICE in Minneapolis.
I awoke this morning and found your Substack and it felt like a gift from the Universe. Thank you.
Oh wow, so nice to hear that my humble ramblings make a difference somewhere. We can’t change the atrocities we see, but we can change how we think about them. 💚