Book excerpt: For millennia, spirituality has been a deeply personal pursuit, monks on mountaintops and yogis in caves. But the world is more social than ever, and interconnectedness is transforming everything, from our family lives to work. Today, we need a spirituality that focuses more on "we" than "me." In Evolutionary Relationships, Patricia Albere draws on four decades of experience to introduce "mutual awakening," a spiritual path that can be explored with a partner. An "Evolutionary Relationship" is one that drives us, challenges us, compels us to grow and evolve. It is a consciously created connection that is formed between two or more people who mutually commit to explore and develop higher states of awareness together. This book shows readers how to transform any relationship - whether with a spouse, lover, friend, or fellow explorer - into a dynamic engine for mutual evolution. Evolutionary Relationships contains an insightful foreword by New York Times bestselling author Katherine Woodward Thomas. It also contains current research on the psychological, cultural, scientific, and spiritual framework for mutual awakening. Albere builds on the work of esteemed developmental psychologists such as Abraham Maslow, David Hawkins, and Robert Kegan. She cites visionary futurists such as Barbara Marx Hubbard, and she identifies various levels of relating, explaining how these stages serve different human needs. This book is an experiential journey into a new way of relating and a practical workbook for deepening relationships. It includes a step-by-step guide to the author's "Eight Activating Principles" for mutual awakening and a series of proven practices and that she has developed to achieve an Evolutionary Relationship with a partner. Albere is an internationally known, contemporary spiritual teacher, working at ground zero of an evolutionary stream of spiritual awakening. She is the founder of the Evolutionary Collective and she has worked with over 200,000 people in groups during the past 40 years, innovating the new fields of post-personal development and intersubjective awakening. Albere also hosts the popular "Evolutionary Collective Conversations," a global radio show with over 500,000 listeners, in which today's evolutionary leaders join her for dynamic dialogues. www.EvolutionaryCollective.com