Phoenix Culture: The New Generative Frequency
An evolutionary culture stewarding human sovereignty.
⛩ Rise of the Phoenix
👀 TL;DR — Today marks the rise of Phoenix Culture — an evolutionary culture stewarding human sovereignty.
Phoenix Culture is fundamentally two things:
My masterpiece, my ongoing magnum opus, my gift to the world, my dharma for personal evolution.
My attempt to holistically address and provide responses to the problems we have been exploring thus far.
Phoenix Culture is my gift to all of my Self: the individual, the collective, & the world.
This essay builds significantly on the foundations laid in the previous essays, Ritualized Rebirth & Cultural Architecture. It is strongly recommended to read these before continuing.
🌋 Civilization Collapse is the Rule.
Every civilization that has ever existed has ended.
Civilization-level collapse is the rule, not the exception. It's just hubris to imagine that we are magically exempt from this.
We live, for the first time in history, in a truly global civilization. No single culture or country has the means to produce everything they currently use within their own borders. We have no theoretical or experiential basis for what the collapse of a global culture looks like.
We have exceeded planetary resource limits, public discourse is in shambles, individual sovereignty and responsibility are eroding rapidly. The ongoing flourishing and evolution of humanity needs a large-scale reinvention:
A collective rebirth.
To burn away the systems and drivers of these developments, and birth a new, holistic culture and global civilization capable of effectively and harmoniously stewarding the oasis we have been given.
We need radical experimentation in new ways of Collective Interbeing.
Phoenix Culture is one of these experiments. Addressing the fundamental driver of the meta-crisis — Culture.
🔮 Stealing the Culture vs. Creating the Culture
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." ― Buckminster Fuller
There are many in the sense-making space, from John Vervaeke, to Jordan Hall, to the Stoa family who have cultivated a shared meme — "stealing the culture". Akira the Don has an amazing song with Johnny V about this — check it out.
It posits that if we are to collectively phase-shift into a more holistic way of being, we must steal the culture away from the current cultural elites who seem intent on stripping the world and running it into the ground. Business as usual, culture as usual, cannot continue on its current trajectory.
I love the sentiment, and my punk-rebel disposition deeply appreciates it — but this runs squarely into the problem I've come to term the 'Angry Activist Problem'.
🤬 The Angry Activist Problem
The angry activist problem is this: activists only define themselves by a negative, what they are not, or what they don't approve of.
"You're doing this wrong!" "This sucks, stop it!" "You're the problem!"
However, they rarely, if ever, offer up a compelling or feasible alternative. Greta Thunberg is an easy example of this — what alternative solutions have been offered? What vision of the future is offered up in place of the angry outbursts? It's mostly whining.
When you define yourself solely by what you're not, if you get your way, you end up in a void space, absent of any particular solution.
This is not compelling enough. It will not steward the level of transition that we need. We must have a compelling vision of the future.
It's not about stealing the culture, it's about creating the culture.
Tesla is my favourite current example of creating the culture. Instead of getting angry and complaining about the rampant use of fossil fuels for energy and transportation, instead of pointing fingers and yelling — they create products, philosophies, and cultures that are so compelling, so beautiful, so accessible, that people naturally gravitate toward them out of their own intrinsic desire.
This 'gravitational pull' is what's most important. They offer a compelling alternative to the existing way of being, and as a result, created their own pull, their own gravity, shifting the culture towards more holistic and sustainable means of energy and transportation.
Our task is to create an entirely new culture, a new collective way of being, that is so compelling, so accessible, that people of their own accord and volition willingly begin to join and contribute to this new culture.
As Bucky Fuller so eloquently said, we must create a new cultural model that simply makes the old one obsolete. We must focus on building the new way, rather than dismantling the old. All things in culture persist because we give them time, energy, and attention. If we as a collective simply oriented our time, energy, and attention elsewhere, the old culture will fade and wither, and from the ashes, a new culture, like a great Phoenix, will rise.
Phoenix Culture is one attempt to begin modelling and enacting this new Culture. An intentional, evolutionary culture pioneering and demonstrating new ways of living, loving, playing, and architecting.
📍 Architects of Culture
Throughout the previous essays, we have explored several pressing needs that must be addressed if humanity is to collectively phase-shift into its next evolution:
Create Self-Sovereign individuals ready to become Cultural Architects.
Provide aspiring architects with the tools, technologies, training, culture, contexts, and support they need to continue their evolution and growth towards becoming Architects of Culture.
Begin building culture(s), contexts, and contents that can create and steward a regenerative renaissance for all of humanity.
Use all of the tools available: religion, movements, decentralized systems, psychotechnologies, ecologies of practices, + the yet undiscovered.
It is these fundamental needs that Phoenix Culture exists to address.
👁 Identity-Level Transformation
In Ritualized Rebirth, we explored the deep necessity for sacred and ritualized Death/Rebirth experiences, of letting go of old models of Self and personality to make room for more expansive levels of Self to shine forth.
This is identity-level transformation. It is not an easy process.
It is this process of Self-Transformation that allows the individual to step into more expansive states, to become an Infinite Player, and rise to the occasion of playing the Infinite Game of Cultural Architecture.
It's important to note that this is a highly sensitive process. It requires conducive containers, contexts, and provisions to navigate it smoothly. There is nothing straightforward about digesting your shadows, dismantling your metaphysics, and rebuilding your perceptual frameworks.
Nor is this a one-time process. It is ongoing, perpetual, infinite. Continually deconstructing and reconstructing yourself, over and over again, to best allow the Fullness of Life to flow through you in service of the collective.
This is the core mythos driving Phoenix Culture. A culture committed to ongoing evolution. Of burning away the false, the stagnant, the old identities no longer in deep alignment.
We are being called to do this at global and civilizational levels.
To burn away the old, creating a fertile ground for the new. To burn away the stories of separation that keep us isolated. To burn away the disharmonious ways of Being that threaten the continued evolution of humanity, and make space for a new culture, a new collective way of Being.
While this mythology of transformation is central to our understanding of the Phoenix, it is not the only trait associated with the Phoenix.
During its lifetime, the Phoenix is also a symbol of archetypal Beauty, Grace, Power, and Presence.
This is just as important as the willingness to burn off the old— the Full Sacred Embrace of the New.
To stand firmly in the almighty power of your Being, to enact beauty and goodness in the world with your very existence.
These are the two complimentary halves of the Phoenix: a voluntary commitment to continual evolution, and a full embrace of each new evolutionary instance.
This is why Phoenix Culture takes inspiration from the Ensō, the imperfect and incomplete (and as a result perfect and complete) circle of Zen Buddhism symbolizing perfection, enlightenment, and continuing process.
The process of Individual and Collective evolution is ongoing, and it is in this continued process we find the beauty, grace, power, presence, and Perfection of All That Is.
The mythology of the Phoenix, the symbolism of the Ensō — these two epic forces combine to create the thematic drivers of Phoenix Culture.
🔊 Phoenix Culture as Generative Frequency
We've covered the idea of cymatics — the visible study of sound and frequency. Without fail, different frequencies generate different and unique physical patterns.
If we are to collectively redesign our systems and socities, we must first reinvent the generative frequency — the culture — that gives rise to them. This must be done intentionally, with full awareness, remembering our ontological design principle: the culture we create will create the world around us as well as the people in that culture.
No longer can we keep our heads in the ground, blindly building and hoping things will work out in our favour. We must be intentional with our evolution. We must design and create a Culture that best serves the good of all Individuals, Collectives, and Life itself.
Phoenix Culture is one of these generative frequencies. A new cymatic cultural frequency. The generative source of a more holistic, sacred, and united culture.
This is the Phoenix Frequency.
🌀 Manifestations of Phoenix Culture
If Phoenix Culture is the generative frequency, the cymatic patterning force of a new collective way of Being — what are the physical manifestations? What patterns emerge from this frequency?
There are several emerging and developing patterns within Phoenix Culture:
The Academy: The Phoenix Academy is a mystery school for the Architects of Culture. It provides the community, tools, training, containers, and the support for serious Self-Transformation, systematically creating new Infinite Players & Cultural Architects.
The Experience: The Phoenix Experience is a direct, embodied opportunity for participating in deeply transformational Death/Rebirth practices. A sacred container with the safety and support needed for intense Self-Deconstruction and Reconstruction to occur.
The Fellowship: The Phoenix Fellowship is a safe space to begin experimenting, playing, and practicing the art of cultural architecture. A year-long intensive to help individuals hone their skills, discover the gifts, and to help them venture out into the world and begin contributing to and building cultural movements and containers.
The Institute: The Phoenix Institute helps to create, steward, and promote the ecologies of practices, the decentralized systems, and the psychotechnologies for cultural architecture. It is also responsible for open-sourcing all aspects of Phoenix Culture, stewarding the PhoenixDHO (more on this later), and collaborating with other communities of practice.
The Center: The Phoenix Center was the original seed of Phoenix Culture, and remains its largest ambition. The Phoenix Center is a home, a dojo, and a safe container and context for the aspiring and practicing architects of culture to come and do this work, in community, in serious play.
The Emergent: Emergence and adaptability are foundational principles of Phoenix Culture, and it remains to be seen what other patterns will emerge according to the needs of the collective.
As far as I can see, these will be built out more or less in this order, but I'm willing to see how life wants these to come together. You can find more information on each specific pattern by clicking on their respective links.
🖖🏻 The Future of Phoenix Culture
If I had to give this announcement a version number, it would be v0.1.
There is still a lot of work to be done, and a lot of refinement underway. The Magnum Opus continues to go through significant additions and edits, there are emerging patterns still being discovered, and as I continue to unlock and unblock myself, bolder and bigger visions unfold as a result for this.
Though I can no longer wait for the 'perfect time' to bring this into the world. It must be created by the community and the Culture. It must be built in public.
I am not the Founder of Phoenix Culture, I am its Steward. This is something that Life has created through me, I make no claim to ownership. This is a collective effort, and all are welcome to participate.
Here is a look at the longer-term future once the initial patterns have bloomed:
PhoenixDHO: Phoenix Culture will be governed by the collective. This requires setting up a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization); though I have been deeply inspired by the work of SEEDS/Hypha with their instanciation of a DHO (Decentralized Human/Holonic Organization). This is a major ongoing focus for me.
Culture Blueprints: Starting to open-source the techniques, the financials, and the process behind everything Phoenix Culture does.
Center Blueprints: Starting to build and open-source the systems and plans for building physical spaces for regenerative communities of practice.
Summits: Bringing the family together online and in-person for multi-day experiences, communal bonding, and idea sharing.
And as always, any input or feedback from the community is welcomed, and can be voted on by the community as future or immediate steps to be taken. This is a collective effort, as nothing less will suffice.
🫂 How to Join the Phoenix Family
If you feel this in your heart — that a new culture, complete with the gravitational pull of compelling visions and massive courageous action for the future of humanity is deeply needed at this time, and you would like to get involved, there are a number of immediate ways to do so:
Share this! Spread the word that a Phoenix rises.
Give feedback/commentary on the Magnum Opus. There are significant overhauls coming to this in the following weeks, though it serves as a deeper dive for now.
Join the Discord for ongoing communication and early participation.
Join the email lists for updates: Academy, Experience, Fellowships.
Make connections: I need to speak with DAO designers, token engineers, cultural architects, experience alchemists, communities of practice, etc. Any intro's are appreciated!
💌 A Final Note
A final note on this that is small, but deeply important. Although I believe that Phoenix Culture is the exact creation the world needs most right now — an equally important driver for this initiative is that it's a vehicle for my own self-expression and evolution.
The more I open up, the deeper I surrender to life, the bigger this vision becomes. Part of taking on the task of building a culture is that I will grow into the person who can do it. It's the biggest masterpiece that I can think to create in Life.
This is something that the Academy, Experiences, and Fellowships will help imbue in all who come — how to think on a scale as big as possible, for the good of as many as possible.
Next week we will take a deeper look at how fuse the internal death/rebirth individual process with the external collective process of cultural architecture and create the DNA double helix known as the Yoga of Becoming.