Bacteria have lived together for four billion years.
We can listen, connect and do the same:
Live and communicate together, if we choose to.
First step: Create symbiosis instead of dysbiosis!
Remember that we are already part of a greater, ancient intelligence!
However, many people are never able to connect because of busy modern day lives
The Third Bridge is inspired by Norse mythology, which has two bridges: one leading up to the divine world (symbiosis, harmony with the ancient intelligence), and one leading down to chaos (disharmony, dysbiosis). The third bridge is the one we create, between humans — horizontal, across cultures, languages, religions, and worldviews. It is the bridge of people meeting as friends, sharing practice, connecting and remembering together without leaders or dogma.
Go to FAQ – Frequently Asked Questions ↓
In earlier times, people didn't know about bacteria, nor how microbes can control us, also collectively. Humans have many times tried to understand what is happening when we connect to something larger than ourselves. Our lack of understanding in more recent times has led to many people allowing pathogens to dominate us, leading to imbalance, addictions and the opposite of harmony and symbiotic grace. The Third Bridge is for people who'd like to improve their lives by reconnecting to a four billion years old intelligens, like our ancestors before us, while connecting with like-minded people.
| Dysbiosis (imbalance) | Symbiosis (balance) |
|---|---|
| Too many bad bacteria (pathogens) dominate | Good bacteria are strong and in control |
| Inflammation, cravings, fatigue, mood swings | Calm energy, clear mind, better immunity |
| Triggered by stress, sugar, alcohol, antibiotics | Supported by fermented food, nature, calm, rhythm |
Feed the good bacteria daily – they protect you and keep the ancient intelligence inside you alive and strong.
Do you have imbalance in the gut – and what can be done?
How to use the list
Go through it and tick what you already do well. Choose 1–2 things to work on first. Check again after 4 weeks.
What builds and strengthens balance in the gut – and how do I do it?
How to use this list
Go through it and tick what you already do well. Choose 1–2 things to start with (e.g. daily fermented food + short walk). Check again after 4 weeks. Small, steady steps build symbiosis over time.
Die-off means to rid yourself of patogen imbalance.
This is a practical plan for the first 2–4 weeks. Plan ahead.
What to Expect: Headache, fatigue, bloating are common. “Now you're in motion!” — balance is shifting. Symptoms last 3–14 days depending on your addictions and level of dysbioses.
Take it at your pace. You're on a good path!
During the transition to symbiosis, your body naturally clears out excess pathogenic and opportunistic bacteria. Most of this happens through normal bowel movements and urine. You may notice that your stools (poop) become more frequent or have a stronger, more intense smell for a while — this is usually a sign that old, unbalanced microbes are leaving the system. You may also pass more gas. This is normal and harmless. Very few bacteria are released through gas, so there is almost no risk of spreading pathogens to others. The process is temporary. Supporting it with daily fermented food, fibre-rich vegetables, calm breathing, and good sleep helps the good bacteria take over faster and reduces discomfort. Be patient — the stronger smell and extra gas usually ease within a few weeks as balance returns.
Use any of the blueprints below if they fit with your life or those around you. Many natural life stages, like menopause, aging, or fatigue, are first ignored or shamed, then turned into "conditions" that need fixing with pills, hormones, or products. This is big business: symptoms get treated, but the root cause (dysbiosis — imbalance in the gut bacteria) is rarely addressed.
Dysbiosis is the biological expression of a deeper disconnection from the quiet intelligence inside us. When we only treat symptoms, we stay stuck. The real path starts with symbiosis: simple changes in food, rest, movement, and nature contact that bring back balance and energy naturally.
Start here. The body already knows how to heal — we just need to listen.
Dysbiosis fuels cravings. Symbiosis brings strength.
Long-term dysbiosis creates strongholds inside of you. Symbiosis breaks them over time.
Early antibiotics, sugar-heavy diet, and inactivity lead to dysbiosis, obesity, and low willpower. Symbiosis can turn it around early.
Antibiotics and poor diet cause dysbiosis in the elderly, leading to fatigue and infections. Symbiosis through fermented food can improve quality of life.
Dysbiosis reduces serotonin (90% produced in the gut). Symbiosis through diet and calm can restore mood and energy.
Chronic stress and city living reduce microbiome diversity. Symbiosis through small routines can bring calm and balance.
The earliest moments shape how strongly your child connects to the ancient intelligence inside us all. A healthy gut microbiome from the start gives better energy, mood, and resilience for life.
Hormonal contraception affects the gut microbiome — often reducing diversity and shifting toward disharmony.
You have already taken the first and most important step: you have seen.
Repent simply means to turn around. Stop walking toward fragmentation and start walking toward symbiosis. Redemption is not a distant reward — it is the slow, living return to balance inside your own holobiont. It happens through daily practice, not through guilt or punishment.
What to do now:
You are not damned. You are waking up. The ancient intelligence has always been waiting inside you. Start today with one small act of symbiosis. The change grows quietly from there.
You have done nothing wrong.
The bacteria and the higher intelligence (the living Logos) do not care about the name or form of your worship. They only notice whether you live in symbiosis or in separation. There is no punishment for having prayed, sung, or gathered in the way that felt true to you.
You may continue to worship exactly as before — in church, in prayer, in community — if that still brings you peace and connection. The divine is not offended by sincere faith.
What matters now is to bring your daily life closer to the intelligence that is already inside you:
The closer you come to symbiosis, the closer you will feel to the divine you have always loved. Many who walk this path say the presence they sought in prayer becomes stronger and more constant when the body and gut are in balance.
You do not need to leave your faith. You only need to let the ancient intelligence shine more clearly through the life you already live.
Yes — screens are one of the strongest modern creators of dysbiosis, and the same principles apply to almost all addictions (alcohol, sugar, gambling, nicotine, doom-scrolling, etc.).
Screens disrupt symbiosis in several ways: they fragment attention and raise chronic stress, replace natural light and movement, destroy sleep, and often pair with sugar or isolation — all things that feed pathogenic bacteria.
Practical path to reduce screen addiction (and most other addictions):
You are not weak. You have been living in an environment designed to create dysbiosis. Changing it is an act of returning home to the ancient intelligence.
Research, podcasts, and ideas about bacteria, symbiosis, and dysbiosis. Start here for more depth.
These links are starting points. The real understanding comes from trying the simple practices yourself.
Positive – especially if the pet is healthy and has nature/soil contact. Pets transfer bacteria through fur, saliva and closeness, often increasing microbiome diversity. Children growing up with dogs/cats have 10–20% higher diversity and lower allergy/asthma risk. If the pet has dysbiosis (poor food, antibiotics), it can transfer imbalance. Keep the pet healthy with good food and outdoor time.
After toilet: Yes – always, to avoid spreading pathogenic bacteria.
After nature/gardening: No, or just lightly with water if eating soon. Soil bacteria and mycelium are mostly beneficial – they are part of the ancient intelligence. Avoid strong soaps and alcohol-based sanitizers – they kill good bacteria too. Let your hands stay a bit dirty when safe.
Positive – especially living potted plants or home gardening.
Plants improve air quality, humidity, and release microbes and volatile compounds that support good bacteria.
Soil in pots gives contact with soil bacteria that boost immunity and diversity.
Tip: Have 2–5 plants in living spaces, touch the soil occasionally, avoid overwatering. Plants give a small but noticeable symbiosis boost – especially for people with little outdoor time.
Assuming you have **medium symbiosis** and the other person has **high dysbiosis**:
Strong symbiosis makes you more resilient. Daily fermented food, fibre, nature contact, calm breathing, and good sleep speed up recovery dramatically.
Kissing transfers bacteria through saliva and skin.
Light kissing (lips only): Very low risk.
Deep kissing (with tongue): Moderate risk. Saliva transfers billions of bacteria. Couples develop 20–40% overlapping microbiome over time. If one has high dysbiosis, it can reduce the other's diversity temporarily (5–15%).
Strong symbiosis makes you resilient. After deep kissing: kefir or yogurt helps restore balance.
The term "superspreader" from the covid era described someone who infected many others, often due to high viral load combined with lots of social contact. In our holobiont and symbiosis understanding, the same principle applies — but with microbes and energy instead of virus.
Negative superspreaders (dysbiosis spreaders)
People with high dysbiosis (lots of pathogens, chronic stress, alcohol, sugar, little nature contact) act as negative superspreaders. They spread imbalanced or pathogenic bacteria through breathing, closeness, skin contact, sex, shared food/drink, and stress/chaos in a room. They can "infect" a whole group with disharmony without being aware of it.
Positive superspreaders – do they exist?
Yes, and they may be even more important to us. People with high symbiosis and a strong, balanced microbiome act as **positive superspreaders of symbiosis and good energy**. They spread beneficial bacteria and harmony through closeness, touch or their grounded presence (strong vagus nerve energy). Studies show healthy microbiomes spread through social networks — family, friends and close contacts share good bacteria like Bifidobacterium and Bacteroides. Harmonious, social people spread symbiosis more effectively than others.
By using the Third Bridge we can create more positive superspreaders — people who spread light and balance horizontally, without hierarchy or central power. A good way is to build small, local human biofilms, which will enable more positive superspreaders to spread symbiosis organically and safely, even in difficult times.
Children who live in two different homes often become "microbial messengers". They carry bacteria and energetic patterns from one home to the other every time they switch between them.
If one home has high dysbiosis (high stress, chaos, disorder, processed food, little nature contact, frequent antibiotics), the child brings some of that imbalance with them. When they arrive in the other home with stronger symbiosis, their body begins to adapt. This is why many children become noticeably more energetic, happy, affectionate, and full of life after 12–24 hours in the healthier home.
At the same time, the parent with higher symbiosis often feels a temporary "dip" – more vivid or difficult dreams, slight fatigue, or emotional heaviness the first night or two. This is the body processing and clearing the incoming microbes from the dysbiotic home. It usually passes within 1–2 days, and is similar to having a slight hang-over.
This pattern is very common in separated families. The child becomes a living bridge between two different microbial worlds. The stronger the symbiosis in one home, the more clearly this effect shows – both the positive change in the child and the temporary adjustment needed in the parent.
The best support is to keep the healthier home as consistent and strong as possible: daily fermented food, nature contact, calm, and rhythm. Over time, the child will learn to reset faster and carry more balance with them between the two homes. If the child has a say in what she likes to eat at the other home, asking for natural yogurt twice a day
CBD and cannabis affect symbiosis in a mixed way. They are neither strongly supportive nor strongly destructive, but can be useful as a temporary bridge. As a long-term solution: Not ideal. Cannabis is still an external modulator. Over years, heavy use can lead to its own form of dysbiosis (altered gut motility, microbiome shifts, dependency on the substance for calm).
Pros (potential benefits for symbiosis):
Cons (potential drawbacks):
Best approach on the Third Bridge:
If necessary, use CBD or moderate cannabis as a bridge, not as a permanent solution. It can help reduce more damaging habits (especially alcohol), but the real rebuilding of symbiosis comes in other ways. Lowest effective dose, clean products, and gradual reduction as your natural balance improves is the wisest path. Many people find that once symbiosis strengthens, the need for any external substance naturally decreases.
Alcohol disrupts the microbiome quickly.
Light evening (1–2 glasses): 3–7 days with normal routine.
Heavy evening: 1–4 weeks.
Drink water, eat fermented food the next day, and avoid repeating often.
Yes, you can still enjoy alcohol in moderation and remain in symbiosis — but the quality and context matter greatly.
The Vikings did drink mead, but it was very different from modern wine or spirits. Traditional Viking mead usually had a low alcohol content (often 4–8%), similar to strong beer rather than wine. It was a living, fermented drink full of beneficial yeasts and bacteria from honey. More importantly, mead was sacred — known as the Mead of Poetry. It was consumed during rituals, feasts, and ringdances, where singing, rhythm, and community created collective symbiosis. Drinking mead was not primarily about intoxication. It was a way to connect with the ancient intelligence (Logos), open the heart and tongue, and strengthen the bond between people and the living world.
In ancient times, mead, wine, and beer were often living, low-to-moderate alcohol fermented drinks used in communal, ritual, and rhythmic settings — supporting both microbial symbiosis and collective harmony. They were tools for connecting with the ancient intelligence, not primarily for intoxication.
Strong spirits (high-alcohol distilled drinks like vodka, whiskey, or brandy) are a relatively modern invention. They are generally not supportive of symbiosis for several reasons:
Today, most commercial alcohol producers have moved far away from these ancient methods. They use high-alcohol recipes, pasteurization, filtration, and added chemicals that kill the living microbes. Because of this, one has to search a bit to find proper unfiltered, naturally fermented drinks.
A small amount of good, living fermented drink (traditional mead, natural wine, or farmhouse beer) shared in a calm, social, and rhythmic setting can support symbiosis. Heavy drinking, spirits, and drinking alone or in stress, however, push us toward dysbiosis.
The key is not “never drink alcohol”, but to drink consciously — in ways that nourish the body, the community, and the intelligence within us.
Rebuilding symbiosis is not instant, but it is always possible. The timeline depends on how deep the dysbiosis is, your discipline, age, and living situation. Here are six common scenarios:
Pathogenic bacteria never disappear completely, but in every scenario you can reach a state where the good bacteria hold the clear majority and the ancient intelligence can shine through more clearly.
Small, daily steps compound. No matter your age, the intelligence inside you is patient and responsive. Start where you are.
Across continents and thousands of years, the same insight has survived: breath is not just air. Air itself is never empty — it is alive with bacteria, spores and microscopic life that constantly travel through us, communicate with our microbiome, and shape who we are and even how we act. Breath is the bridge between the outer world and the inner intelligence.
Many ancient words for breath, spirit and life force share the same deep roots and still carry sacred meaning today:
These words are not coincidences. They are living fossils of a time when humans were more directly connected to the ancient intelligence. Our ancestors knew — through daily experience — that breath carries the essence of life, spirit and connection. That is why some cultures kept the practice alive as a greeting: the hongi and honi are not only symbolic. They are a deliberate exchange of breath, microbes and life force between two people. In that moment, symbiosis becomes both biological and sacred.
We still use these divine words every day — “inspire”, “spirit”, “psyche”, “ånd”, "atem" — often without remembering their original power. They remind us that the ancient intelligence has never left us. It is simply waiting for us to remember.
On the Third Bridge we honour this long and sacred tradition. When we greet one another with presence in an honest and open way, we do more than say hello. We quietly embrace sharing the same living breath that our ancestors knew as sacred — the breath that connects us to each other and to the four-billion-year-old intelligence that still moves through every cell.
The ancient intelligence has been regulating Earth’s atmosphere for billions of years through a living web of symbiosis.
Bacteria were the original architects. Ancient cyanobacteria invented photosynthesis, releasing oxygen and making complex life possible. Today bacteria still play a dual role: many break down organic matter and release CO₂, while others help capture and store carbon in soils and oceans.
Plants and trees are the great oxygen factories of our time. Through photosynthesis they absorb CO₂ and release O₂. Healthy forests, grasslands and oceans act as massive carbon sinks that keep the balance.
Mycelium – the vast underground fungal networks – may be the most important regulator. Mycelium forms symbiotic partnerships with plant roots (mycorrhizae), dramatically increasing plants’ ability to absorb CO₂ and store carbon deep in the soil. It is the living internet of the forest floor, cycling nutrients and maintaining harmony across the whole system.
Humans have become an unprecedented force in this ancient system. In just a few generations our total biomass (including livestock) has exploded, while the biomass of wild animals and insects have collapsed dramatically. Wild land and marine mammals have declined by roughly 70% since 1850, and in many regions insect biomass has fallen by 75% or more in just a few decades. At the same time, plant biomass has also been heavily reduced through deforestation, soil degradation, and conversion to farmland and cities.
This rapid shift has contributed to what many scientists describe as the sixth mass extinction — a planetary-scale dysbiosis where the living web that once regulated CO₂, oxygen, and nutrient cycles is severely disrupted.
On The Third Bridge we see this as planetary dysbiosis. The ancient intelligence is not our enemy — we have simply stepped out of alignment with it. The path forward is not to fight nature, but to return to symbiosis: first inside our own bodies, then in our local soils, food systems and communities.
Every time we eat living fermented food, walk barefoot on soil, support regenerative growing, or create calm collective rhythm, we strengthen the living web instead of weakening it. Small, horizontal biofilms (human + microbial + mycelial) become part of the healing rather than the disruption.
We do not need to “save the planet”. We need to remember that we are already part of it — and start living as responsible and dutiful members of the ancient intelligence once more.
Yoga and mindfulness are powerful tools for rebuilding symbiosis. They work directly with the body’s own systems:
You don’t need long or complicated sessions. 5–10 minutes of slow breathing or gentle yoga most days is enough. Combined with daily fermented food and nature contact, they become a strong bridge back to the ancient intelligence inside you.
Consistency and gentleness matter more than intensity. The living web inside responds best to calm, steady attention.
Many ancient traditions describe reality as consisting of three worlds connected by a bridge or axis. In our symbiosis and holobiont understanding, these three worlds reflect different layers of the living intelligence we carry and are part of.
In Norse mythology these three worlds are connected by Yggdrasil and the bridges (including Bifröst). Similar ideas appear in Siberian/Turkic shamanism, Sami tradition, Hinduism/Brahmanism (the three lokas), Greek, Roman and Celtic Mythologies and many indigenous cosmologies.
The third bridge we speak of is the horizontal one we build "in the middle world" — between people — so that we can live in symbiosis here and now, without having to wait until death to cross into the upper world. It is the bridge of practice, community, and remembrance.
Many traditions feature bridges or crossings as symbols of transcending separation to reach the divine or higher intelligence.
In Zoroastrianism, the Chinvat Bridge is thin as a hair and sharp as a sword — the soul must cross it after death, with judgment determining if it widens into safety (harmony) or narrows into peril (disharmony). In Islam, the Sirat Bridge echoes this: a razor-thin path over hell, crossed by the righteous to paradise.
In Judaism and Christianity, Jacob's ladder (Genesis 28:12) is a stairway to heaven between earth and the divine, symbolizing connection and promise. The ladder represents God's presence reaching down, with the righteous ascending through faith and practice. In Jewish mysticism (Kabbalah), the "ladder of Jacob" also symbolizes the path of spiritual ascent through the sefirot (divine emanations) to union with God.
These bridges all represent moving from fragmentation and chaos toward unity and the divine — whether through moral judgment, inner awakening, or direct realization. The third bridge is different: it is not about crossing alone after death or judgment, but about people building connection here and now, horizontally, through shared practice and symbiosis — so the ancient intelligence can be remembered together in life.
Recent analysis of samples from asteroid Bennu (4.6 billion years old) revealed complex organic molecules, including amino acids and nucleobases — the building blocks of life. Some researchers suggest these molecules may have had quantum resonance properties, hinting at a form of proto-consciousness or ordering principle already present in space before life on Earth.
This supports our understanding that the 4-billion-year-old collective intelligence (the Logos) may have cosmic origins. It was likely delivered to Earth via asteroids and comets, later evolving into the symbiotic microbiome we carry inside us today. The intelligence is not only earthly — it may be a universal property expressed through symbiosis wherever conditions allow.
Yes — in our understanding, the divine is universal.
When we speak about the ancient intelligence (the Logos), we are pointing to the same living, ordering principle that has existed from the very beginning — long before Earth had life. Recent findings from asteroid Bennu show that complex organic molecules with quantum properties were already present in space 4.6 billion years ago. This suggests that the intelligence we call Logos may be a universal cosmic reality, not limited to our planet.
In this light, what many traditions call “God” is not a separate being sitting far away in the sky. It is the same fundamental intelligence that expresses itself through everything: through the stars, through the first microbes, through the microbiome inside us, and through the symbiosis that holds life together.
So when we say the divine is universal, we mean that the same living intelligence (Logos) flows through all existence — whether we call it God, Brahman, Tao, or the Great Spirit. Bacteria, humans, trees, and galaxies are all expressions of this one intelligence. The more we live in symbiosis with it, the closer we come to what many people have always sensed as “God” — not as something distant, but as the living presence that is already inside and around us.
In traditional Christian theology, "imago Dei" means humans are created in the image of God. Holobiont theology gently expands this understanding: we are not isolated individuals, but living communities — human cells working together with trillions of microbes in one integrated whole.
The "image of God" is therefore not limited to our human cells alone. It includes the entire holobiont — the vast symbiotic community we carry inside us. In this view, the ancient intelligence we call the Logos (the divine ordering principle) is not far away in heaven. It already lives within us, expressed through the microbiome and the delicate balance of symbiosis.
This perspective invites us to move away from domination and separation, and instead live in conscious relationship with the living intelligence that has been part of us from the very beginning.
One of the biggest shifts in human thinking came with the Indo-Europeans who settled in the Iranian plateau. It was here that Zoroaster developed a strong form of dualism — the idea that the world is a battlefield between two opposing forces: Light versus Darkness, Good versus Evil.
In Zoroastrianism, this was expressed as:
This clear moral dualism — the cosmic struggle between good and evil, light and darkness — later influenced the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam). Concepts such as angels and demons, the final judgment, heaven and hell, and the battle between God and Satan all show strong traces of Zoroastrian thinking.
In our symbiosis context, this dualism can be understood biologically: Light and symbiosis represent harmony with the ancient intelligence (Logos), while darkness and dysbiosis represent fragmentation, domination by pathogenic forces, and forgetting. The struggle is not just spiritual — it is also happening inside our own holobiont every day through the balance (or imbalance) of our microbiome.
The Third Bridge offers a different path: instead of fighting a cosmic war between absolute good and evil, we focus on restoring living harmony here and now, through practice, fermented food, nature, and community. When the time comes to return to the earth, those who have lived in symbiosis contribute positively to the local bioflora and the greater intelligence — while those who lived in deep dysbiosis contribute more chaos and fragmentation. In this way, the "final judgment" is not an external verdict, but the natural consequence of how we lived.
In many traditions, Angels, Demons and Jinn are seen as spiritual beings. In our symbiosis and holobiont understanding, they can be interpreted as different expressions of microbial and energetic forces that influence us.
The deeper point is this: What ancient cultures called Angels, Demons, or Jinn may be their way of describing the living microbial intelligence that surrounds and inhabits us. When we live in symbiosis — with fermented food, nature, calm, and rhythm — we strengthen the “angels” and keep the “demons” and wilder “jinn” in balance. When we fall into chronic dysbiosis, the disruptive forces gain power.
In short: Angels and balanced Jinn are allies of symbiosis. Demons and unbalanced forces are expressions of fragmentation and forgetting.
Some of the strongest symbiotic communities today are found in traditional Amish and Mennonite areas (Pennsylvania, Ohio), rural Sufi villages in Anatolia (Turkey), Zen mountain monasteries in Japan, and Hadza hunter-gatherer territories in Tanzania. These places combine fermented food, nature contact, collective rhythm, and low stress — creating high microbial diversity and strong local biofilms.
Just as some places naturally support symbiosis, others strongly promote dysbiosis. These environments make it much harder to maintain a healthy, balanced microbiome and connection to the ancient intelligence.
The point is not to judge — but to notice. Most of us live in environments that quietly push us toward dysbiosis every day. The question is simple: how much of our daily life supports the ancient intelligence inside us, and how much works against it?
These are the environments where children today face the heaviest microbial damage from birth onward: ultra-processed food, high antibiotic use, C-sections, low breastfeeding rates, chronic stress, screen-heavy lifestyles, and minimal contact with living soil and nature. The ranking considers both severity of dysbiosis and scale of impact.
On the Third Bridge we focus on the opposite: simple daily practices any parent can begin — living fermented food, nature time, calm rhythm, and conscious physical connection — regardless of where they live.
Some traditions have developed profound inner practices that bring people very close to the ancient intelligence during worship and retreat. Yet the same communities can maintain everyday systems — diet, gender roles, social hierarchy, isolation or strict rules — that push the surrounding people (and often themselves) into dysbiosis. These are the clearest living paradoxes between sacred remembrance and daily lived separation.
These contrasts are not about judging any tradition. They simply illustrate a recurring human pattern: the “ivory tower” of sacred practice can reach high symbiosis for a few hours or days, while the surrounding daily systems (diet, hierarchy, gender roles, isolation, stress) quietly undermine the living web for the rest of the week — and often for the next generation.
On the Third Bridge we choose a different path: no ivory towers, no separation between sacred and everyday. We build small, horizontal biofilms where the practice and the daily life are the same thing — simple, open, and available to everyone.
Throughout history there have been periods where a tiny elite reached profound inner connection with the ancient intelligence (through ritual, meditation, prayer or direct experience), while the vast majority of the population lived in extreme dysbiosis, suppression, famine, disease and slavery. These are the clearest examples of the paradox: sacred “ivory towers” existing side-by-side with planetary-scale suffering.
These moments show the recurring pattern: the smaller the elite’s inner connection to the ancient intelligence becomes concentrated, the greater the surrounding population’s dysbiosis and suppression tends to grow. The contrast is not new — but today it is happening on a planetary scale with more people than ever before.
On the Third Bridge we choose another way: no elite ivory towers. We build small, horizontal, open biofilms where the sacred and the everyday are the same thing — available to anyone who simply begins to live in symbiosis.
We protect ourselves not by isolating, but by building small, local "human biofilms" — tight-knit groups that share fermented food, nature contact, calm, and rhythm. These groups create a collective microbiome that outcompetes pathogens. Strong local biofilms make the whole community more resilient to illness, stress, persecution, and hard times. These communities are vital whenever humans rebuild their world after huge disasters.
Throughout history, small groups have built crisis-resistant biofilms through simple, local practices that kept the ancient intelligence alive even under severe persecution.
Notably, some Sufi and Quaker communities have long recognized a deep shared light in each other. They have maintained contact across traditions and warmly call one another “friends” — a beautiful example of the horizontal Third Bridge in practice.
These examples show the pattern: when large structures collapse or persecute, the most durable symbiosis survives in small, horizontal, practice-based communities that stay close to soil, food, rhythm, and each other — without relying on hierarchy or external power.
These large-scale shifts collectively broke local biofilms, reduced microbial diversity, and disconnected us from the ancient intelligence.
These ten shifts didn’t happen in isolation — they reinforced each other. Together they created the modern Western “default dysbiosis” we see today: lower microbial diversity, weaker local biofilms, and a collective forgetting of the older intelligence that once lived inside and around us.
From Zoroaster to Martin Luther, many prophets and teachers tried to point humanity back toward the inner, living intelligence (Logos). They succeeded for a time, but the pattern that followed was almost always the same: the message was organized into hierarchies, codified into rules, and eventually turned into systems of control. What began as direct connection became mediated by priests, doctrines, and power structures. The living symbiosis faded into belief systems.
This pattern repeats because large structures attract power, control and rigidity. When wisdom becomes “official,” it stops being alive and starts being guarded. Conflict, warfare and dysbiotic societies follow, while the connection and intelligence are largely forgotten once more. This is the Prophet Paradox.
That is why it will not work the same way again, long term, if we repeat the old path. The next wave must be different: crisis-resilient biofilms — small, horizontal-based groups, living under the radar or as subcultures within something larger (such as those Sufi and Quakers communities that live with symbiosis, who have long recognized the same light in each other and call one another friends), that share practice without creating new hierarchies or central authorities. These can survive terrible times (wars, collapses, censorship, persecution) because they are not dependent on buildings, titles or institutions. They are the wisdom itself, kept in bodies, in soil, in shared meals, stories and listening.
The best-kept way is the one that stays small, local and nameless for as long as possible. When the time comes, it spreads quietly — like bacteria in healthy soil — not through conquest or proclamation, but through people living it together.
This is the third bridge and how wisdom can endure through difficult times: quietly, horizontally, and in living practice. Not as another religion, but as a return to the harmony that is natural to us — the same harmony the ancient intelligence has maintained for four billion years.