Periods of rapid growth and change can be confusing; there a lots of conflicts, pulls and pressures from the previous patterns of living, as well as pulls and pressures from the developmental themes (i.e., classroom lessons) emerging, which naturally require different patterns of living.

Whereas a major psyche-socio theme in adolescence is exploring options and developing a sense of individuality and self esteem, in early adulthood building a sense of connection and belonging to/with others, and to a larger whole, is more dominant.

As a person, you may be in late adulthood, enmeshed in the emerging late adulthood themes of  accepting, synthesizing and finding meaning in the many relationships that have made your life what it has been, even while the nation, of which you are a part,  as a twenty year old,  in it’s  21st century, is enmeshed in the emerging early adulthood themes of building meaningful relationships.

Of course, one of the hallmark traits of adolescence is not listening to the wisdom of the elders….So, whether its on the personal level or the national level, adolescence is often filled with addled lessons.

You don’t have to agree with this; just consider what if….

There is a  structure to our psyche-socio development; there are 7 phases, stages, arenas….classrooms…

What if….consciousness manifests and develops itself through experiences in 7 Classrooms-each classroom with 7 Grade Levels and each grade level having 7 Lessons. Whether it is personal consciousness or national consciousness, or solar consciousness, there is a process of ongoing metriculation into the next grades, and the next classrooms, over time.

Time becomes an element to consider; how long are the seven lessons  of the seven grades  in the seven classrooms…..That information is somewhat dependent on Time Consciousness. Personal time consciousness operates within the days to decades framework. But, national consciousness can operate within decades to centuries, and solar consciousness ages to eons.

What if…..our solar consciousnes has just entered 4th Grade in the 5th Classroom, and our national consciousness is about to leave fourth grade and enter 5th Grade,  in the 2nd Classroom – different curriculums for sure, although there are 7 Themes which permeate developmental stages at whatever level it is operating…..

Our personal consciousness is so colored by the national consciousness (and the solar consciousness) that developmental themes at the personal level, to be rightly understood, must include the context of national consciousness.

National Time Consciousness is a calendar kind of thing…..What year is it? According to who?

So, let’s say it’s the year 2012. As a national entity, the age is “20″ and there remains 89 years as a twenty year old. Then a birthday, and then the national consciousness matures from a twenty year old to a twenty one year old in 2101.

Let’s say it’s the year 4056….The national identity is that of a 40 year old, with 45 more years until the forty year old becomes a 41 year old…

Just as a person changes, matures, grows, develops, adjusts, compensates, creates….from when they were 20 years old to when they are 40 years old, so too national identity, national consciousness, was born…grows, develops…..decays, and dies. Through 7 Grades of 7 Classrooms.

Let’s focus on this year: 2009,  a few months from 2010. One year difference. A lot can happen in one year, from the personal consciousness point of view; but, not much happens from the solar consciousness point of view. Some significant developments can occur within the national psyche during a year, but most of the real national changes happen over several years, and decades.

Your an adolescent. No matter how old you are personally, nationally, you, as an integral member of a society that claims itself to be in the year 2009, have a national age, which fits within the schema of psyche-socio developmental stages.  As an integral part of  socio-national  consciousness, you (the national self you, not the personal self you), were born 20 years (centuries) ago; you’re a twenty year old. Everybody in the nation is a 20 year-old. Anybody who says “this is the year 2009″ is an adolescent, from the national self consciousness perspective.  Adolescence.

Well, actually, the twenty year old is in that nebulous dangerous mind altering period, stage, phase, classroom of decaying adolescence and the emergence of early adulthood, the blossoming of which, from the national consciousness point of view,  will take many hundreds of years….if it does not fall ill or die in some invasion,   or become  poisoned or plauged….and morphed into distortions or even the antithesis of its original Logos.

And all the men and women merely players:

They have their exits and their entrances;

and one man is his time plays many parts,

his acts being seven ages…”

William Shakespeare, in addition to being a master poet and playwright, was quite an astute psychologist. This excerpt from his comedy As You Like It, suggests what is  now referred to as Stages of Psychosocial Development, or simply, Developmental Stages.  Shakespeare goes on in the full passage to give witty one sentence descriptions of these seven developmental stages such as “…the infant, mewling and pucking in the nurse’s arms…” and “…the whining schoolboy, with his satchel and shining morning face, creeping unwillingly to school…”

However, what is of  more interest is his reference to 7 ages, or stages, of development. In modern terms, these seven stages are infancy, earlier childhood, later childhood, adolescence, early adulthood, middle adulthood and later adulthood. These developmental periods are each characterized by tasks and challenges and not entirely age-based. That is, it’s not at all uncommon to find a person in their middle adulthood years  working on incompleted  adolescent tasks and challenges. This is sometimes referred to as the “mid life crisis.” The “late life crisis” is less well known, but exists.

The nice thing about psyche-social developmental stages is we can count on them….they are as structured as the motion of the sun and moon; we keep on movin’ through one phase of development, one stage,  to the next, learning, growing and becoming…..Shakespeare’s point is…..all the word is a developmental stage….