We are moving from an industrial culture to a psychological and symbolic one.

I remember years ago; life carried a different weight, the ground felt firmer. A person’s routine was work, some sports on weekends, and get-togethers with friends. The center of everything — the invisible anchor — was family and raising children.

Today, little by little, we are mutating into a different society. You can feel it in the air: we are starting to value other things. One of them is experience — weathered skin. Before, a piece of paper, a degree, backed you up to do anything; today, experience also has a voice and demands its space. Most jobs are now measured by results or by lived experiences, by the mud you’ve walked through. As a reader, close your eyes and choose: what do you prefer? A recently graduated accountant, or someone who has already proven with their own flesh and blood that they can solve your problem, even without a degree?

This brings us to another reality: the new generations are ready to raise their voices, to scream what they carry inside. There is a tidal wave of published books and people on social media showcasing their way of thinking, desperately seeking to be seen. This is due, in part, to the massive access we now have to philosophy and spirituality — knowledge once believed to be reserved for only a fraction of the population, almost like a secret society. Internet generated this breakthrough: today we are allowed to self-publish our books. Although it was possible before, it was an uphill battle; you depended on the approving finger of organizations or corporations. But it is also true that, in an era where everyone is constantly watching and judging, showing your own voice is still a form of bravery.

The Weight of Feeling

In this new landscape, we have the opportunity to witness an unprecedented openness to stripping our emotions bare. Something that in past generations was punished, or frowned upon in public, and kept locked away for closed circles like friends or family. But that same open floodgate shows us the flip side: today we find people who are more emotionally lost. People living with the knot of anxiety, feeling the coldness of emptiness, a lack of purpose, or disconnected from themselves, like a ghost in their own body.

Before, people lived with more human pain, but with more intuition — with the direct heartbeat of the earth. We lived more in community; there was less room to navel-gaze. I still remember when we laughed more and overthought less.

Today, on the other hand, the noise is constant. Like never before, there are explorations of consciousness, a questioning of the mandates that burn us, and a quest for authenticity. But this can also be a cold prison. One where we live with tired eyes from wanting to understand everything, label everything, and rationalize every detail of our pain.

Sometimes the mind tries to understand life so much that it forgets to live it. And life doesn’t wait.

The Search for Balance

Most social changes are born from the scars, the pains, or the excesses of previous generations. It is a fundamental trait of human behavior: the soul will always strive for balance, even if we bleed out or lose our footing along the way. For example:

• A society that is too rigid breeds rebellion in the blood.
• A society that is too repressed triggers an emotional explosion that floods everything.
• A society that is too materialistic brings us to our knees before God.
• A society that is too collective generates a cry for individualism.
• And a society that is too individualistic makes us realize that we cannot bear everything alone.

Perhaps human history does not move in a straight line, but like a pulse — a heartbeat that comes and goes. Perhaps we are on our way to losing our balance again, only to change society once more.

Which society is better? Do you think this change is good? Is this change truly making us freer?