One of the most interesting findings from the 20th century is that we humans go through sequential and predictable stages of development.
Healthy children go through the stages below in exactly the same order at approximately the same times.
It was previously thought this pattern ends in adulthood and that we plateau...
What we now know is that adults keep growing through additional sequential paradigms.
Each paradigm is almost like living in a new reality with new:
- Sense of self
- Way of understanding reality
- Way of making meaning (values, goals, etc)
Each emergent worldview grows in a predictable way:
- Simple ➜ complex
- Static ➜ dynamic
- Self-centered ➜ society-centered ➜ world-centered ➜ universe-centered
- Transcends and includes previous paradigms
As we go through the stages, we become more...
- Independent with more degrees of freedom in our decision-making and optionality
- Tolerant of difference and ambiguity
- Self-aware
- Integrated and differentiated
- Flexible and antifragile
- Able to thrive in our increasingly complex world as a parent, life partner, knowledge worker, and leader
Harvard Researcher Robert Kegan, one of the pioneers of the field of adult development, puts it like this...
"Consciousness development occurs when one is able “to look at what before one could only look through, so that a way of knowing or making meaning becomes a kind of ‘tool’ that we have rather than something that has us.”
Or shown visually...
Every time we step out of the water, it feels like we have "discovered" a new reality. We can suddenly look back at our old reality with a new level of detachment. However, over time, we realize that we are simply in a new kind of water that supports us, but that also has its limitations...
There are now dozens of models that have been created by academic researchers to explain the stages of adult development cognitively, morally, emotionally, spiritually, and socially. These models range from Maslow's Hierarchy Of Needs to Kegan's Model Of Adult Development and many more.
Understanding these models has changed my life...
How Understanding Models Of Adult Development Can Change Your Life Forever
Growing up, it is assumed that we are going to grow. The whole education system is based on this idea. We grow with cohorts of students who are around the same stage as us and then graduate to the next level.
In adulthood, the assumption flips. We assume that we will stay the same at a fundamental level. Yes, we may refine ourselves like a homeowner remodels a house, but is assumed that our foundation will remain the same.
Research on adult development shows that this assumption of adulthood is simply wrong.
It is critical to understand this, because it changes how we plan our lives on multiple levels...
- We can intentionally create environments that facilitate our growth.
- We can devote more time to growth.
- When making decisions about our future, we can take into account how they will impact our development. Thus, we can avoid unintentionally putting ourselves in situations that slow down or freeze our growth.
- We can better diagnose our development challenges and opportunities.
- We can put development as a central value without feeling like we're swimming in an ocean without a rudder.
For me personally, learning about developmental models helped me put words to something I had been feeling for years. It also gave the language to be able to connect with a whole new world of people who studied and applied the lessons of adult development. Finally, knowing about the stages of adult development gave me the confidence to invest more time into my own growth—not just at a skill level, but at a developmental level as well. In short, knowing about development psychology has given me a whole new compass through which to orient my life.
Now that we understand the power of developmental psychology, the questions becomes, how fast can we grow?
The 5-Year Rule Of Adult Development
One of my favorite models of adult development is the ego development theory (EDT). This model was first developed by Jane Loevinger in the 1970s. More recently, Harvard-trained, independent researcher Susanne Cook-Greuter spent over 40 years empirically evolving this theory.
Cook-Greuter summarizes her findings in Nine Levels Of Increasing Embrace In Ego Development: A Full-Spectrum Theory Of Vertical Growth And Meaning Making.
There is one paragraph in this academic paper that particularly jumped out at me...
It is estimated that it takes about five years to move to a new level if circumstances are favorable and the person is open to change. It takes minimally a year of a well-designed developmental program for participants to shift to a new level.
As soon as I saw this paragraph, my mind shot to the 10,000-Hour Rule. The 10,000-Hour Rule started off as a rule of thumb by researcher Anders Ericsson in the early 1990s. Ericsson was studying world-class performers and noticed that it often took them about 10 years of deliberate practice to become world-class.
Perhaps Cook-Greuter's 5-year rule of thumb could be the 10,000-Hour Rule of adult development. Perhaps just as the acquisition of expertise can be accelerated with deliberate practice, so too can adult development be accelerated with specific strategies.
Whereas the 10,000-Hour Rule is primarily a model for achievement. The 5-Year Rule is primarily a model for living life fully.