Uploaded January 2023 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago
Leila Kincaid
California Institute for Integral Studies
The Bully Archetype: A Phenomenology of Malformed Consciousness and Methods for Transformation in the Face of Death
Abstract: Planetary destruction of ecosystems, environmental collapse, war, famine, racial and sexual inequality, racial and sexual violence, the maldistribution of resources, lack of access to subsistence needs, and all manifestations of oppression stem from a malformed state of human consciousness that I call the Bully Archetype. This state of consciousness, faced with radical thanatophobia, emerged and evolved as a survival capacity in human evolution. It expresses itself through acts of control and dominance in order to gain power and experience a sense of conquering death. Unaware of its self-destructive processes, the Bully Archetype will destroy us all if we do not take steps to face it, satisfy its need (through confronting death), and transform its power into life-affirming expressions of human being.
To the extent that we are living on Earth in a way that is destroying the planet and all living systems on it, we must ask, “how did we get here and what are we going to do about it?” What has created this dystopian reality? The Bully Archetype is an investigation into the origins and nature of this manifestation of a malformed consciousness with a lens focused on methods of healing and transformation. Looking at theories of the evolution of and types of consciousness from Tibetan Buddhism, Carl Jung, James Hillman, Jean Gebser, Hannah Arendt, Allan Leslie Combs, Iain McGilchrist and others, I map patterns and expressions of the Bully Archetype through human history in cultural, socio-economic, religious, and political movements and organizations, and seek for key wisdom points toward processes of transformation.
Bio: Leila Kincaid is an MA student and consciousness researcher at the California Institute of Integral Studies and a voting member of Film Independent. She leads creative writing workshops, called Writing Elixir, based on the steps of the heroic journey, and is developing a documentary film about rape.
From the 2022 Annual Society for Consciousness Studies conference. SCS conferences reflects the values and goals of The Society for Consciousness Studies, a professional scholarly organization that honors work of quality from all authentic scholarly traditions, including philosophical, psychological, sociological, and other scientific understandings of consciousness. Within this broad framework the society explores potential advances beyond the classical and postmodern knowledge paradigms that have dominated science and scholarship during the past century. You can learn more at: https://consc.org.
Leila Kincaid
California Institute for Integral Studies
The Bully Archetype: A Phenomenology of Malformed Consciousness and Methods for Transformation in the Face of Death
Abstract: Planetary destruction of ecosystems, environmental collapse, war, famine, racial and sexual inequality, racial and sexual violence, the maldistribution of resources, lack of access to subsistence needs, and all manifestations of oppression stem from a malformed state of human consciousness that I call the Bully Archetype. This state of consciousness, faced with radical thanatophobia, emerged and evolved as a survival capacity in human evolution. It expresses itself through acts of control and dominance in order to gain power and experience a sense of conquering death. Unaware of its self-destructive processes, the Bully Archetype will destroy us all if we do not take steps to face it, satisfy its need (through confronting death), and transform its power into life-affirming expressions of human being.
To the extent that we are living on Earth in a way that is destroying the planet and all living systems on it, we must ask, “how did we get here and what are we going to do about it?” What has created this dystopian reality? The Bully Archetype is an investigation into the origins and nature of this manifestation of a malformed consciousness with a lens focused on methods of healing and transformation. Looking at theories of the evolution of and types of consciousness from Tibetan Buddhism, Carl Jung, James Hillman, Jean Gebser, Hannah Arendt, Allan Leslie Combs, Iain McGilchrist and others, I map patterns and expressions of the Bully Archetype through human history in cultural, socio-economic, religious, and political movements and organizations, and seek for key wisdom points toward processes of transformation.
Bio: Leila Kincaid is an MA student and consciousness researcher at the California Institute of Integral Studies and a voting member of Film Independent. She leads creative writing workshops, called Writing Elixir, based on the steps of the heroic journey, and is developing a documentary film about rape.
From the 2022 Annual Society for Consciousness Studies conference. SCS conferences reflects the values and goals of The Society for Consciousness Studies, a professional scholarly organization that honors work of quality from all authentic scholarly traditions, including philosophical, psychological, sociological, and other scientific understandings of consciousness. Within this broad framework the society explores potential advances beyond the classical and postmodern knowledge paradigms that have dominated science and scholarship during the past century. You can learn more at: https://consc.org.
