Our Story
emerge bewusstseinskultur is a continuation but also a break with our previous work in EnlightenNext. Many of us were students of Andrew Cohen, founder of the spiritual community and the network EnlightenNext, or were inspired by his vision of a collective, evolutionary awakening between people. Yet, each of us came to this work through different life paths. Some were activists who tried to bring more equality and justice into the world. Others wanted to bring Spirit into the world beyond the meditation cushion, the monastery or the deep experience of a retreat. Others were compelled to find new ways of living together and working together. And still others followed a powerful inner call for freedom and deep connection with life.
The origin of what we call the “HigherWe” came from this time. We are grateful to Andrew Cohen for creating the context in which this could come to life and for all that we learned while with him. We also feel gratitude to the many people, our spiritual brothers and sisters, who gave so much of their hearts and souls to this collective field awakening. We were all deeply inspired by the realization of what is possible through cultivating a conscious “We-Space.” This opening to a collective intelligence and creativity was developed in EnlightenNext over a twenty-year period and constitutes the most significant part of our work there. In 2013, when Cohen went on a sabbatical to address issues of integrity in relation to his teaching and then the EnlightenNext network and organization collapsed, the group of his students in the German-speaking countries, led by Thomas Steininger, a senior practitioner of and trainer for this HigherWe practice, resolved to continue and further develop this work.
Our course has not been easy. Since the decision to continue with this work, some who had been involved and given much left. Their reasons varied; some simply felt the need to develop themselves in new ways, independent of any program or structure. At the same time, others came to our work. We wanted to learn from the mistakes in EnlightenNext and further develop the depth and the potential that we had experienced together in new ways, outside the guru-context in which it was originally created. Part of emerge bewusstseinskultur is also a “spirituelle Weggemeinschaft” (meaning: “spiritual path fellowship”) that some of us founded in the summer of 2015 in order that our consciousness work can become a shared life project with a deep spiritual foundation.
emerge bewusstseinskultur thrives on the aliveness of the intersubjective field that we call the HigherWe, a field that builds as we simultaneously develop both trust in one another and our trustworthiness. What continues to give us strength and inspiration is the potential of this vibrant, creative consciousness field that we can cultivate together and gives our work with emerge bewusstseinskultur a contemporary spiritual foundation.