Apparently, life is a second womb that inaugurates a cascade of life phases which are often demarcated by crisis or grave doubt.

I think it is reasonable to suppose that perhaps the metaphors of our conception, birth and early childhood may become, to some degree, expressed as paradigms and relational idioms in our growth. But this is not necessarily because we remember birth trauma, as Groff and others somewhat insightfully suppose, as much as it is because we are struggling to be born again in circumstances that may be meaningfully compared to those involved in physical birth. Of course, we are not precisely going through another physical birth, as we progress through the phases of life — rather we undergo radical transformations psychoemotionally, cognitively, and relationally. These phases, like those in any process, demand specific circumstances… certain fuels, catalysts, and vehicles… which are neither in evidence nor forthcoming in our modern cultures because, in fact, we have no stories about these phases and thus we do not formally recognize them, or the signals of their urgency within ourselves and those we are deeply involved with.

Since none of this is being openly acknowledged, we have no idea that these processes are absolutely fundamental to our human nature and development. Thus, in a context where they are ignored, lied about, denigrated, scienced out of existence, co opted, or punished, we will often internalize the unconscious desire to fulfill these processes in ways that are largely pathological. In such cases, until these matters are made conscious and recognizable (and until they can be openly welcomed and nurtured) we will remain both ignorant and terribly vulnerable to needlessly replaying — or even magnifying — projections of loss, helplessness, terror, and isolation.

It is hard to imagine the prosperity of life and developmental opportunity we might enjoy if we together recognized and supported our actual nature, which goes through something like developmental instars or phase-steps that are relatively predictable and similar, if uniquely accomplished in each person or group. But without this knowledge, we are going to suffer greatly, for if we neither recognize nor properly support the phase-changes of human life, we are cramming them all together, and this will continue to prove as disastrous and expensive as it is crippling to those who manage to survive it.

The mantis has 7 instars. I suspect we are similar. Each comes with peculiar new abilities and challenges. Again, I think we are similar. At the gate between them, there is an encounter with ‘great stillness’ which is helplessly vulnerable. An encounter with death. Again, I think we are similar… inside.