The Secular Triad: Thought, Response, and Meaning in Human Learning and Growth
- Greg Mullen
- Jul 15
- 9 min read
Disclaimer: What follows is not religious in any way, shape, or form. It is not to be aligned with any attempt for a universal truth, but as an invitation for reflection, not prescription. Any interpretation of this work as an attack or aggressive provocation towards others' beliefs is wholly unintended. In the spirit of mutual respect, I ask that my right to explore and express ideas, grounded in personal beliefs and individual sovereignty, be honored, just as I aim to honor the diversiy of beliefs and experiences of others.
As the modern world continues to evolve and progress technologically and socially on a global scale, many educators, leaders, and learners alike are called to reexamine what it truly means to grow deeply, authentically, and sustainably.
This secular triad can be understood not as a static truth but as a symbolic expression of meaning and purpose—a perceived product of human thought and response, born from our deep need to organize, understand, and act within an evolving world. It seeks to illuminate a common thread running through the human experience, including our efforts to make sense of the world, to act within it, and to find meaning in our becoming.
This secular triad is composed of three interdependent forces:
Thought (Cognitive) -- everything we think
Response (Behavioral) -- everything we do
Meaning (Purposeful) -- everything that drives us
Much like the famed three-body problem in physics, where three gravitational bodies constantly shift and influence one another, this triad represents a continuously unfolding interplay, too complex to be controlled, too essential to ignore, and only in artificially-created constructs can they ever be fully figured out.
At the heart of this idea is open and honest reflection so, as you read to the end of this article, reflect on the following questions:
How might this secular triad serve as a reflection point for how your own interplay of thought and response is creating or challenging the meaning or purpose of this idea?
Thought: The Cognitive Anchor
Thought is where we see the spark of intention. It encompasses the capacity for awareness, reflection, analysis, planning, imagination, and identity. It is not only what we know, but how we know. This means exploring how we organize and relate to knowledge, how we recognize patterns, and how we form beliefs about what matters.
Sit in a room and do not move or engage with the world around you; just think. Thought shapes perception. It frames our possibilities and fuels our sense of agency. Yet thought alone is inert. A thought in the mind of one who is unable to engage with their body or their environment risks becoming abstract, detached, or idealized. Thought requires friction to develop beyond one's own finite capacity for thought. It needs to be tested, engaged, and shaped by experiences. That friction arrives through the body’s response to intent, through physical communication, including language.
...thought alone is inert.
When our thoughts remain untested, they may comfort us, but they cannot refine us. It is only when they meet resistance and risk failure that they gain depth. Thus, thought is only the beginning of learning and must be metabolized through engagement, through our response to that engagement, for thought to become anything more than thought.
Response: The Embodied Catalyst
Response is our physical and emotional engagement with reality. It arises from the sensations of the nervous system, the motor patterns of the body, and the visceral neurobiological experience of feeling. Yet the shape our emotional responses take (i.e. what we fear, what excites us, what we resist or pursue) is largely molded by the sociocultural environments in which we exist. This dual influence guides how we express emotion as much as it develops our capacity for intellectual reasoning and behavioral self-regulation.
However, in the absence of thought, response becomes reaction: automatic, unchecked, and unexamined. Left unguided by thought, response can become routine, chaotic, or hollow. When we consider the interrelatedness of Response and Thought, we find the two create a space around which each can revolve. In this space, fear meets risk, excitement meets engagement, and frustration meets the threshold between persistence and surrender.
Helen Keller is a famous example of this dual influence. Though cut off from sight and sound, her capacity for Thought, fueled by curiosity, frustration, and imagination, was met with Response through the tactile guidance of Anne Sullivan. It was through this intense, embodied exchange that Meaning emerged, not only in language but in a profound sense of identity, purpose, and connection to the world.
Keller’s journey reminds us that before understanding can be formed, it is often the body that speaks first. Response often arises before our conscious minds can name the actions. In this way, the body leads the mind, even when the mind is the source of intent. For example, a sudden tightening of the chest when a familiar voice enters the room may signal unresolved tension long before we can articulate its cause. Response reveals what we value before we’ve fully understood why. It precedes explanation and resists abstraction because it's raw, embodied, and immediate, something we feel before we can reduce it into an idea like “anxiety,” “grief,” or “love.”
This is why Response is not simply about our behavior. It is behavior under pressure, made visible by urgency, uncertainty, vulnerability, desire. And it is in these moments that Response becomes the most raw form of feedback, revealing whether our thoughts are congruent with our shared reality or in need of an adjustment.
Meaning: The Emergent Consequence
We exist in a world surrounded by virtually unlimited external forces. Our perception of that world is forged through the interplay of thought and response, taking shape when cognition and our physical and emotional embodiment align (or clash) in ways that demand reflection. It is in that resulting perception we find Meaning--the perceived product of how we think and how we act.
Meaning is born when thought and response engage with one another. This means that "meaning" might arrive as understanding, identity, direction, or moral clarity. It may emerge as a deeper recognition of what matters, to ourselves, to others in our lives, and to our place and purpose in the world altogether.
Without Meaning as the third object, it might appear as though Thought and Response can sustain a kind of mutual harmony on their own. In reality, what emerges is a self-reinforcing illusion of coherence, a closed loop where Thought and Response orbit one another in familiar, reinforcing patterns. This cycle may feel stable, even purposeful, yet it lacks the transformative tension required for actual becoming. Without the friction and emergence of Meaning, the system risks mistaking repetition for growth and comfort for clarity.
Fortunately, it is by the very interplay of Thought and Response that Meaning exists. When the two interact, when we act on what we think and reflect on what we do, it creates a space where Meaning does emerge. How we understand this emergent consequence depends on the patterns we notice, the stories we tell ourselves, and the values we bring to the experience. This is fortunate in that we are not inherently at the mercy of meaninglessness, and also that meaning must not exist as an external force. This matters greatly in that, even in times of confusion or uncertainty, we automatically participate in meaning creation through thought made conscious by response, and through response made possible by thought. When the consequence of Meaning emerges and intentionally cultivated, even simple moments can become transformative.
Most importantly, this means that Meaning is not a fixed entity. It evolves. What once felt irrelevant may, later, feel revelatory. This is not weakness of mind but evidence of growth. Our internal system of thought and response is always in motion, always recalibrating, always becoming.
This Is A System, Not a Hierarchy
This secular triad of Thought, Response, and Meaning is not a linear progression. It is not a formula of one plus the other equals a third. It is a living interdependent system, its complexity derived by the very complexity of our neurobiopsychosociocultural existence. This complexity comes from the millions of individual organisms in our microbiomes interacting with the dozens of neurotransmitters, hormones, and other neurobiological chemicals releasing and recyling throughout the various parts of our brain and body, interacting with the eltrical neural pathways forming a complex codex of programmed data sets the rest of our body translates and we understand as thoughts by which our bodies respond and, as a consequence of this complexity, offer meaning and purpose for it all.
This means that, from a developmental lens, none of these three aspects came first. They are interdependent, each shaping and being shaped by the others as a single ongoing cycle of evolutionary human development.
Just as in the three-body problem in physics, these three forces are in constant motion, continuously shifting, influencing, and responding to one another. This interplay is neither fully predictable nor fully controllable.
A powerful thought may trigger an emotional response that challenges previously held beliefs.
A visceral response may surface new thoughts that had never been consciously formed.
A sudden reordering of meaning may ripple back, reshaping how we think and how we act.
The image that accompanies this framework, the triangle enclosing a Möbius-like loop, evokes balance, recursion, and the sacredness of unity, not as dogma but as dynamic coherence. It honors not belief, but becoming. What can be known about this relationship is the qualities and features of each of these three system nodes, to understand what their made of, how they interact, and not to predict outcomes but to pursue a deeper understanding of them.
Why This Matters for Educators and Learners
In education, we often overemphasize Thought by hyper-focusing on lesson plans, direct instruction, and measurable content delivery, as though learning is the inevitable result of teaching. But this assumption confuses exposure with integration. Students are not learning simply because instruction was clear or standards were covered. The presence of teaching does not prove the presence of learning; only that something was said, shown, or assigned.
True learning does not "happen to" a student. It is a relational, emergent process in which information connects to something the learner wants, feels, or needs. It is not the transmission of facts, but the internalization of meaning through the active interplay of thought, response, including emotional resonance.
In this light, learning is not compliance—it is coherence. Not completion of tasks, but engagement with a dynamic, human system of what we think, how we respond, and what meaning we make in the process.
Understanding the Secular Triad helps educators move beyond one-dimensional instruction to create learning experiences that are neurobiologically engaging, emotionally resonant, and personally meaningful.
Practical Implications for Teaching and Learning:
Design for Connection, Not Just Content
Teacher-driven instruction often treats content as self-sufficient, assuming that clear explanations or step-by-step modeling will trigger learning. But without activating the learner's internal world, for many students, content will remain inert. Instead, begin lessons with emotionally resonant provocations (e.g. questions, personal stories, or moral dilemmas) that ignite Thought and elicit a meaningful Response. This humanizes the learning process and fosters authentic entry points.
Incorporate Physical and Emotional Cues
Many traditional teaching strategies often prioritize passive listening and compliance, inadvertently disconnecting students from their own bodily awareness and emotional states. Embodied learning practices such as role-play, movement, or expressive arts invite students to feel and do, not just think. This integration of mind and body helps metabolize abstract concepts into lived experiences, making learning felt rather than simply recalled or reproduced.
Make Space for Meaning-Making
Meaning cannot be assigned by the teacher—it must emerge from the learner through the friction of Thought and Response. Curricula driven by coverage and pacing guides often leave little room for reflection, pushing students to "perform" understanding before they've constructed it. Build intentional space for learning strategies that resonate with each learner such as journaling, discussion, or other means of personal processing.
Model Metacognition
In rigid instructional models, the teacher’s authority is often linked to being the "expert," leaving little room for transparency about uncertainty or inner process. Break that mold by sharing your own thinking, emotional reactions, and personal meaning-making. When you model cognitive-emotional integration, you signal that learning is not performance—it's exploration.
Recognize Learning as a Moral Process
Unfortunately, learning has become value-neutral, ignoring the implicit moral and social messages conveyed by what is taught and how it's learned. Acknowledge that every instructional choice communicates beliefs about what matters beyond the content. Invite students to interrogate how content intersects with who they are, who they want to be, and their sense of belonging in the larger context of their world.
Assess for Growth, Not Just Mastery
Standardized assessments and performance rubrics often reduce learning to correctness, ignoring the inner shifts that make learning durable and transformative. That doesn't mean summative assessments are inherently unhelpful, but focus on formative tools to assess changes in thinking, emotional insight, engagement, and clarity of purpose, to determine whether summative assessments are necessary. When assessment includes meaning-making, learners feel seen as whole people and not just performers of academic tasks.
By applying this triadic framework, educators are better equipped to support the whole learner: cognitively, emotionally, and morally. In this way, we move from delivering information to fostering transformation.
And we ask ourselves, with humility and hope: Are we creating the conditions for students not just to think more, but to become more? And do we not believe schools can be crucial elements of that process?
Final Thought: Toward a Framework for Learning
This triad is not a creed. It is not a theory to prove or defend. It is a mirror. A tool for reflection about how learning, growth, and transformation happen. In a time marked by polarization, performance, and passive compliance, this may offer a return to the human core of development through the courage to think, the humility to feel, and the wisdom to seek meaning in our shared learning spaces we call schools.
Greg Mullen
July 15, 2025
