Education in a Time Between Worlds
Zak Stein
On the nature of educational crises during civilizational transitions and what new forms of learning might emerge.
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Go Deeper
Explore the ideas, thinkers, and stories that have shaped our work and continue to orient our journey.
Reading
Cornerstone Articles
Essential readings that inform our understanding and approach to the metacrisis.
Making Sanctuary
Bayo Akomolafe
A theory of emancipation that takes bodies, flows, fields, assemblages, networks, and terrains into consideration.
The Metacrisis
Various Authors
Understanding the interconnected web of crises facing humanity and the planet.
Postactivism
Bayo Akomolafe
Moving beyond traditional activism towards new forms of response that don't reproduce the logic of the system.
Cosmo-Erotic Humanism
Marc Gafni & Zak Stein
A new story of value, meaning, and our place in the cosmos.
The Listening Society
Hanzi Freinacht
On metamodern politics and the development of listening capacities for a more beautiful society.
References
Our Inspirations
Communities and initiatives that have inspired and informed our work.
Life Itself
Second Renaissance
Pacific Integral
RegenIntel
The Systems Sanctuary
Bodhi Sangha
Culture Hack
Emergence Network
Animas Valley Institute
The Consilience Project
GTDF
Perspectiva
Language
Glossary of Key Terms
Language shapes perception. Here are some of the key terms and concepts that inform our work.
Metacrisis
The interconnected web of global crises—ecological, social, political, spiritual—that share common root causes in our worldview, values, and ways of relating to reality. Not simply a cluster of problems, but a crisis of perception and meaning at the civilizational level.
Time Between Worlds
A liminal period in history when the old cultural paradigm is dying but the new one has not yet been born. A time of disorientation but also profound creative potential, where the focus of work is on foundations: metaphysics, religion, and the deeper codes of culture.
Making Sanctuary
Bayo Akomolafe's theory of emancipation that takes bodies, flows, fields, assemblages, networks, intensities, forces, maps, apparatuses, principalities, powers, territories, and terrains into consideration. A recognition that we are not “in charge” and not ahead of the curve.
Three Wisdom Questions
The foundational inquiries that orient our work: Who are we? (the nature of the human), Where are we? (the nature of reality and our historical moment), and What is being asked of us? (our response and responsibility). Inspired by Cosmo-Erotic Humanism.
Postactivism
A concept developed by Bayo Akomolafe describing the need to move beyond traditional activism, which often reproduces the logic it seeks to transform. Postactivism invites collaborative, creative processes as translocal interventions and cultural practice.
Educational Architecture
Long-term structures for human transformation that go beyond individual programs or courses. Like monasteries, mystery schools, or quilombos, they provide depth, progression, and duration—sophisticated enough to hold a human being across the full arc of their development.
Sangha
From Buddhist tradition, a community of practitioners walking together on a shared path. We evoke this spirit: not just a group of individuals, but a “body” or “river” that flows together, sharing practices, worldviews, and vision.
Our Story
How We Got Here
Many of us sourcing this work have been walking this path without proper containers—stumbling through, finding pieces of the map in scattered places, carrying the weight of this work in relative isolation.
We built this because we needed it ourselves. Because we believe that the wisdom, power, and coordination required to respond to this moment cannot be unleashed through a single program, but only through a multi-decade commitment to individual and collective transformation.
Metta Tropical Collective emerged from the conviction that what is most urgently missing is not more information or better policy, but new structures for human development, transformation and belonging—held within a coherent and trustworthy community of people relentlessly accompanying each other across time.
If anything has stirred in you while engaging with our work, please don't hesitate to reach out. We would love to connect and sense what kinds of exchanges can be possible between us.
The Vision
Our Vision for the Future
Our vision is to ignite a wisdom-centered movement in Latin America towards the emergence of an interdependent network of communities, initiatives and individuals who are committed to individual and collective transformation, by building the foundations of a new cultural paradigm.
Grounded in sacred, ecological, intimate and coherent ontologies, practices and mobilization towards the flourishing of all life in perpetuity.
We hope to evoke the sacred duty that lives in each individual's and community's heart to serve the sacredness of all life.
Ready to Begin?
If something has stirred in you, we invite you to explore our fellowship or reach out to connect.