Society at Its Zenith: A Mirror of Our Collective Inner Child
We say the word society as if we all agree on what it means. Let’s pause for a minute—what do you picture when you hear that word? Is it a bustling cityscape, a moral code of understanding, a memory from childhood, or something more abstract? The truth is, society—much like reality itself—is not a fixed structure, but a living projection shaped by our personal lens. Our upbringing, fears, desires, generational wounds, and cultural inheritance all shape how we see the world and what we expect from it. What if much of what we call “society’ is really just the reflection of our collective unhealed inner child—still craving safety, certainty, still seeking permission, still unsure who’s really making all the rules? “Oh, it’s a mystery to me. We have a greed, with which we have agreed.
And you think you have to want more than you need. Until you have it all, you won’t be free”
Honking horns, barking dogs, daily commutes, sit down, stand back up, more coffee, then do it all over again the next day—being fundamentally human. Simply, purely, and in every tiny morsel of the word. We do. We don’t. We want. We need. We dislike. We no longer need. We learn and then we unlearn.
We try so hard to be and to make life predictable, even when we’re all born to evolve.
There is no true law, no unspoken rule, no ancient taboo that forbids us from changing our minds, moods, jobs, interests, or identities. And yet—somewhere along the way—we started pretending there was some kind of ‘unspoken rule’. We started whispering judgments to ourselves and shouting them at others: "How dare they change??"
"Can you believe how they’re dressing now?"
"Why would anyone walk away from a job like that?"
We have a habit of clinging to this idea that the world should remain steady—and the same, even when we are in constant motion.
We want life to be both structured and spontaneous. Safe but exhilarating. Full of clarity, but bursting with meaning. We want someone—or something, anything really—to tell us what matters, how to exist, who to fear, and what to believe. We want freedom, but we also want permission. Individuality, but also approval. A package deal with all the ingredients clearly labeled, sourced —and preferably, free two-day delivery, with 100% satisfaction, money back guarantee.
This paradox isn’t a flaw. It’s a reflection. One of something tender and ancient within us.
Because what if society—this web of norms, systems, and structures we participate in every day—isn’t the result of logic or collective evolution, but something much more childlike?
What if by chance, society is nothing more than a mirror of our collective unhealed inner child—vulnerable, confused, desperate to belong, but unsure what belonging even means?
We are walking contradictions my friends, the lot of us—adults playing house with unresolved needs, putting walls up, rules, algorithms, and labels not because we’ve outgrown childhood, but because we never fully left it.
“Society exists only as a mental concept; in the real world, there are only individuals.”
The summer solstice, celebrated for thousands of years by cultures across the globe, marks the moment the sun reaches its highest point in the sky. It’s called the Zenith—a cosmic pause of peak light before the slow decent into longer nights begins. In many ancient traditions, this wasn’t just a seasonal marker—it was a spiritual checkpoint. A time to reflect on growth, honor transitions, and rekindle connection to something larger than the self.
We’ve lost much of that reverence today. The solstice often passes by unnoticed, tucked between scrolling sessions and the next obligation. For it just passed us by this past Saturday, June 21st—to be exact—it started the night of June 20th. But that doesn’t mean the symbolism is lost.
Perhaps now more than ever, we need to pay attention.
Not just to the sun—but to what it’s illuminating.
In a world filled with constant motion and mental noise, the solstice can remind us to pause and notice—where we are, what we’ve inherited, and whether it still fits.
It can also serve as a kind of metaphor for something bigger: that maybe our current societal structures have also reached a peak—a collective ‘zenith’. A moment of maximum output, maximum exposure, maximum demands. Capitalism. Careerism. Celebrity. Consumption. Productivity culture. The constant need to define and defend who we are.
“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children.”
Our modern world, with all of its systems and beliefs, may appear some what orderly—but not we are starting to see that beneath the surface lies a smudged, marked-up and crossed out pile of emotionally reactive blueprints. Think about how we’re taught to behave: stay in line, follow the rules, win approval. Most of our social values stem from outdated survival instincts and generational scripts. We learn early on how to blend in to stay safe, and how to succeed by not stepping too far outside the lines.
As children, we sought approval. We learned the rules to avoid punishment. We mimicked to belong. We internalized stories about worth, success, gender, love, race, purpose—even how much space we were allowed to take up.
What results is a society governed not by wisdom, but by the emotional residue of the past—fear, scarcity, ego, shame. Society, then, could be less a consciously designed machine and more like a messy patchwork quilt, pieced together with inherited wounds, outdated fears, and learned behaviors passed down like precious heirlooms.
So we grow up in age, not necessarily in maturity. We become adults with credit scores and trauma. We design complex political systems and digital platforms—but still struggle to regulate our emotions or hold space for nuance.
We’ve built adult-sized systems with kid-sized coping mechanisms. Scarcity mindsets. Winner-takes-all games. Popularity contests. Fear of difference. Fear of change. Fear of abandonment.
It’s no wonder we cling to “it’s just the way things are” or “the way things used to be”—not because it’s working, but because it’s familiar.
So, what if we used this time—this moment of maximum light—to gently look at what’s been hidden in the shadows?
What if we allowed ourselves, and each other, the space to evolve, to grow—not just physically, but emotionally, spiritually, mentally, structurally?
We often talk about “burning down” broken systems, yet—maybe what we need is something softer first: a return to curiosity. To community. To excitement. to asking why before reacting with what now.
A collective coming-of-age, if you will.
The solstice reminds us: light doesn’t stay high in the sky forever. And that’s not a bad thing. There is wisdom in the waning, in the letting go. In the shift.
We are allowed to shift too.
So, just remember that systems are not fixed; they are made of people. And people are made of stories. And stories can change.
