Reflections…

Shifting into Web 2.0 technologies is indicative of our entrance into the Age of Aquarius.  With Web 2.0 technologies

(e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Blogs), we have shifted from a simple push of information, that being a static webpage, to an interactive environment.

The major distinctions of the Age of Aquarius are these: the breakdown of structures, personal liberty in combination with respect for all mankind, the balance of the will to change and the will to preserve, the urge toward civilization and consciousness.  One of the planetary rulers of Aquarius is Uranus (the other is Saturn), and as I discussed last week, Uranus is almost always going to cause change in the sudden breakdowns of structures, much like a lightning bolt.

We are already seeing many breakdowns in societal structures with the Age of Aquarius, and social media further enables this.  Here’s one example – it used to be that the elite celebrities were not accessible to ordinary folks except through the lens of media cameras.  However, when Britney Spears revealed that she was not sending her own Tweets via Twitter, her followers voiced their disappointment.  Why?

With social media, there is an expectation for authentic, immediate connection. We’re used to technology that enables a one-to-many network where one content originator can distribute information to many receivers.  And yet, the reason Web 2.0 is changing the game, is that now technology also enables the many-to-one channel.  In other words, all readers have access to a blog writer in the form of commenting, all fans have access to Britney via Twitter (at least the one she chooses to follow).  The information flow is no longer one-way, it is two-way, and the results of which are publicly accessible.

The dynamic of this two-way information flow can be especially fearful to many of us.  For example, authors who are innately introverted will experience anxiety as they transition from a paper-bound book publishing format to an electronic and interactive publishing format.  CIOs who have Facebook accounts will have to face the possibility of frustrated employees ‘writing on their walls.’  Professors who write their own textbooks have to be vulnerable to student book reviews displayed on Amazon.  All of us are now more exposed, more vulnerable to feedback.  The traditional hierarchies of how we receive feedback are breaking down, and with the breakdown are arising many new channels for this feedback.  Sometimes feedback is helpful and welcomed, sometimes it isn’t (have you ever instigated an incident of road rage and driven away quickly hoping to never receive the other person’s ‘feedback’).

This openness and vulnerability that is increasingly becoming the world in which we live has consequences.  The consequences include an integration of sorts.  The integration of all of our groups of friends via Facebook is but one example.  Now, with those from past and present, personal and professional environments all on one webpage, one is forced into a kind-of ‘this is the real me” moment.  This dynamic demands a new level of responsibility, and therein lies the archetype of Aquarius’ other ruler, Saturn.

The responsibility invoked by this new dynamic of technology isn’t so much to guard who you are and what you say dependent on the audience for fear of being offensive; but rather to own up to what you say and who you are to the audience, knowing you may be offensive.  This subtle shift brings with it the paramount responsibility of authenticity.

And with this responsibility of authenticity the elements of increased social consciousness emerge, which usher in the Age of Aquarius.

What do you think?  How are you experiencing your changing personal paradigm, as a result of technology?

Note: I originally published this post on www.depthpsychologytoday.com on January 25, 2009.

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