Wrenching Change:
Opening the Door to Growth

Catastrophic events and periods of uncertainty in history are part of a repeating cycle. The outcome is almost always the same: an unexpected step forward -- in a new direction.

A friend of mine was once the victim of a violent crime. Walking down the street one evening, he was arbitrarily selected to be the target of someone's rage.

He barely survived.

Needless to say, he was severely traumatized; it took him years to deal with all of the resulting wounds and emotions. But when he talks about it now, many years later, he has a surprising perspective on the experience. Although he says he wouldn't wish such a nightmare on anyone, he feels that it was a positive turning point in his life. It forced him to rethink everything about who he was and what he'd been doing. As a result, he made dramatic changes in his life. Those changes, he says, helped him to find fulfillment he would otherwise never have found.

In the midst of trauma and tragedy, it's hard to see that something good might come as a result. But even the most awful events in life can turn out to be powerful opportunities for positive change. And this is true for societies as well as individuals. In fact, a repeating cycle of growth based upon that type of change can be found running through American history.

In brief, here's how the cycle works: One set of ideas about "how things should be" takes hold and becomes the basis for the behavior and attitudes of our culture for a period of time. However, after 50 or 60 years of relative stability, the social system based on that set of ideas begins to fall apart. This happens because of problems inherent in the underlying ideas that have gradually become too big for the culture to resolve without making major, fundamental changes.

As the existing system starts to break down, a period of uncertainty and chaos ensues. This period usually begins with one pivotal, sometimes catastrophic event that abruptly changes the public mood from frivolous to serious.

During the ensuing period of chaos and change, the old system falls apart and a new set of ideas about "how the world should be" emerges and takes hold. This new set of ideas was germinating during the previous cycle, but couldn't take hold as long as the old system was stable.

After a 10 to 20 year "chaotic" period, the new system becomes formalized and stable, and the cycle begins again. Almost always, the new system is an improvement on the old one, and it solves many of the problems that overwhelmed the old system. However, the new system has flaws of its own. After 50 or 60 years of stability, those new flaws result in problems that cause this system to break down in the same way.

A classic example of the chaotic part of the cycle is the Revolutionary War period in American history. The problems between Britain and the Colonies finally grew to the breaking point, and the colonial system collapsed. This resulted in a period of chaos that allowed a new system to emerge. (Note that the breakdown of the old system happened fairly quickly, within a few years, but the creation of the new system -- deciding on the details of an independent democracy -- took more than a decade.) Of course, even after the new system stabilized it had flaws, several of which led to the next system breakdown at the time of the Civil War.

This pattern has been identified by several observers, but one of the best descriptions of the cycle as it has occurred in America, and its ramifications, can be found in the book Generations by William Strauss and Neil Howe. (For another perspective, see the work of Ilya Prigogine, the Nobel Prize winning biochemist who has identified the same cycle in other areas.) As explained in the Generations book, the first decade of the 21st century is the right time in the cycle for the next "system changeover." It seems clear that we have now entered such a period.

In addition, as our world becomes "smaller" and events in one country have repercussions around the globe, the cycles of different countries seem to be falling into sync, in much the same way that chemical and biological cycles of individuals often begin to coincide after a period of living together. If this is true, then the entire planet may now be entering the chaotic phase of a cycle at the same time.

This is worth knowing, because of two important characteristics of these periods:

First, times can get very tough during these periods. If times should become more difficult than most of us are currently expecting, remember this: No matter how bad things get, it's not the end of the world. It's the beginning of the world.

Second, the actions of an individual usually have only a small impact when a cultural system is stable. But during these periods of change, an individual can have a huge impact. The Founding Fathers were around before the Revolutionary War, but it wasn't until the existing system destabilized that they had a chance to change the world.

Likewise, during the next several years, people of good faith and a vision of a more humane world -- people like you and me -- will be able to have a profound effect on the future that wouldn't have been possible even 10 years ago.

Let's not waste the opportunity.

-- Christopher Kent, October, 2001