Spiral Dynamics
A key framework for making sense of human perspectives, interactions, and development.
What is Spiral Dynamics?
Spiral Dynamics is a model of human development that maps the growth and evolution of individuals, groups, and humanity over time.
Whether we are looking through the lens of history, philosophy, psychology, or biology, it has been shown that evolution happens in sudden leaps.
Spiral Dynamics gives each leap a new stage name and color, clearly distinguishing it from the beliefs and way of being that preceded it. Each new stage provides a completely new perspective which naturally shifts the way humans organize themselves and interact with one another.
We have reason to believe that humanity is currently making a new leap.
The outdated ways that we are handling today’s global challenges are causing an increasing amount of pain and dysfunction. When this happens, some people double-down on the old way of being, desperately trying to stop complexity, while others make the leap into the new way of being.
Here’s an overview of the model:
The first six stages in Spiral Dynamics are collectively called “Tier 1.” The Tier 1 stages are vitally important because they comprise the essential parts of being human.
Stage Beige - Survival: Instinctive and solely focused on the survival of the individual. This is where humanity started, a couple hundred thousand years ago.
Stage Purple - Magical: Humans formed tribes and began to conceptualize of the vast interconnected nature of the world around them.
Stage Red - Power: This is the birth of independence, autonomy, and leadership. This stage also brought wars over resources and mass de-humanization in the name of power as a means to control.
Stage Blue - Order: Humans gained the ability to create organized communities that function on a large scale. Stage blue was the introduction of nations, organized religions, and agriculture.
Stage Orange - Logic: Critical thinking, rationality, and analytics enter the picture. This is the beginning of using the scientific method to come to conclusions and find truths in the world. This stage brought the Age of Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution.
Stage Green - Equality: A new level of understanding about what it means to care for others and the planet. Green is a collective sinking into the heart that brings increased awareness about the injustices and inequalities of the world.
Next comes Tier 2, also known as Integral. This is the perspective where the seeming mutual-exclusivity of the Tier 1 stages is replaced by the idea that we can “transcend and include” by integrating the health of each Tier 1 stage.
Some of the key hallmarks of Tier 2 are: systems thinking; the ability to hold paradox; and realizing our inherent oneness.
“This might sound surprising, but I think there is reason to be deeply hopeful. The pain we feel is the pain of something old that is dying…while something new is waiting to be born.” - Frederick Laloux
Learning Spiral Dynamics brings a sense of wholeness within self and a clarity to life’s complexity which leads to increased creativity, compassion, and collaboration.
Why is Spiral Dynamics useful?
Spiral Dynamics tells a high-level story of the growth and development of humanity. It names the patterns, dynamics and complexities involved in the experience of being human.
Having this type of language and insight helps us engage with some of the most pressing questions of our time leading to more grounded and sustainable creation of government, education, healthcare, business, technology, and family systems.
Here are some questions that Spiral Dynamics can help us make sense of:
Why do some people heal and grow through life’s challenges and others seem to get stuck?
Why do some people actively resist change while others welcome or even initiate it?
Why are some people craving deeper purpose and fulfillment in life and work while others are content with the status quo?
Why have many people been politically radicalized recently?
How do we open ourselves to be curious about different perspectives so we can engage in better sense-making?
Why is it relevant now?
Overall we sense that something is shifting. The old way of doing things seems increasingly outdated and problematic, yet we don’t have a foothold on the way forward.
Einstein famously said “you can’t solve a problem from the same level of consciousness that created it.” Our current paradigm is quickly being out-run by the magnitude and scale of global challenges. Each time this has transpired before, humans have made an evolutionary leap into a new level of consciousness.
We know this because these leaps are mapped and that map is called Spiral Dynamics.
However, naturally, not all humans make the leap at the same time. Thus, part of the challenge is to understand more about how we see the world so we can learn how to make better sense of what’s going on around us and be better stewards of kind, compassionate and loving communication, regardless of what levels of consciousness those around us are viewing the world through.
Discovering Spiral Dynamics has given me a framework to handle the endless number of paradoxes I encounter in life. It provides a way to make sense of things, while also lighting the path for improvement. I appreciate the way it inspires me intellectually but also provides practical application in my daily activities. After integrating the model into my life for several years now, I am able to quickly switch from judgement to compassion for myself and others as I continuously integrate Spiral Dynamics into my consciousness.” - Caroline G.
